A Day at the Taronga Zoo

One of the highlights of Sydney is their Taronga Zoo. We booked passage by ferry to the zoo with our tickets including admission to the zoo. It is about a 15 minute ride over with a stop along the way at Fort Denison, a small island in the middle of the harbour with defensive battlements built in the 1850’s. The zoo itself is built upon the side of sandstone bluffs with an excellent view of Sydney proper:



At the zoo they have the usual collection of primarily African animals (lions, gorillas, etc.) with a smattering of others from around the world such as Asian elephants and a Kodiak bear. But what we wanted to see were examples of Australian wild life and there they did not disappoint! At one of the first stops along the serpentine trail down the side of the bluffs was a building with platypus. While it would have been nice to take a picture they are nocturnal creatures and as a result their enclosure is kept fairly dark and not conducive to photographs without a flash.

But right next door is an area where people can pay an extra fee to get up close and personal with several varieties of Australian animals, in particular Koala’s. That we did not do but we did get to see the Koalas, even if they were mostly snoozing! Here is the most lively of the bunch that we saw:



And of course what would an Australian zoo exhibit be without Kangaroo’s and Wallabies! We learned what the difference is between the two in that Wallabies have more pointed snouts. Here is a picture of a Wallaby:



Another native animal, or at least native to the island of Tasmania, is the Tasmanian Devil who are currently under stress in the wild due to the presence of a cancer causing virus whereby, once infected, they usually die within about 6 months. Right now the zoo, in partnership with other Australian zoos, has a breeding program ongoing with the hope of raising enough disease free Devils that they can start releasing them back in the wild. Here are a couple of pictures of a pair of juvenile Devils and a single one:



And here is a video of an emu getting a bath!:



So far the visit to Sydney has been an interesting one. The city is far more people friendly than say, Toronto.