in which we go to the Zoo, again

We bought a zoo membership last May, on Mother's Day. It took us an entire year, but today, we finally succeeded in seeing the entire zoo! (Well, Connor and I did, at least. Lex made a valiant effort, but he got started a bit late.)

Our first stop of the day today was to see the "pink geese." Connor wanted to know "what are those pink geese doing today?"


Then our next stop was the carousel. Because you can't just walk past a carousel with a two year old and not get on it.


Lex got to take his first carousel ride today!


Oh, and speaking of Lex, I accidentally left his hat at home. And it was so sunny and hot and he doesn't have much hair, so I was afraid that his little head would get sun burned. So, I bought him a zoo souvenir hat. He wears it well, no?


Actually, the large size of the hat came in handy later on in the afternoon when he was sleepy. I was carrying him and as soon as I covered up his little head (and eyes) he fell fast asleep. He took a solid stroller nap in the blistering afternoon heat.

This is a pretty little pair. The one on the left is a Racquet-Tailed Roller and the one right is an Emerald Starling. The Racquet-Tailed Roller apparently eats insects, scorpions and lizards, which is totally badass compared to the Emerald Starling, which only eats seeds and fruit pulp.

This is a Jungle Nymph. I always thought a nymph would look somewhat different. More beautiful. Something romantic.

But no. Rather, what we have here is one of the heaviest insects in the world. One which people in Malaysia apparently feed guava leaves to in order to make tea from their droppings. Sounds tasty, right?


Actually, I think I'll pass on the guava-leaves-and-nymph-dropping tea.

And speaking of gorillas, I have a good gorilla story for you all.

(Oh, we weren't speaking of gorillas yet? Well, that was the best segue I could come up with. I'm suffering from gorilla induced post-traumatic stress disorder, so you'll have to excuse me.)

As we were watching a male silver back gorilla through the glass, a class of elementary age kids was there with us, taunting the gorilla. He got mad, and decided to attack. He came running at the glass full speed and jumped into the air and pounded on the glass. Connor probably jumped about 10 feet back, and I caught him and assured him that everything was alright, even though my heart was pounding, too. Then all the elementary kids started screaming and Lex started to cry. So we were done visiting the gorillas.

But after seeing that, I can totally see how that 2 month old baby girl gorilla from Kentucky could have ended up losing a leg after a fight with a male. I talked to a zoo keeper about her, and she arrived at the zoo only yesterday. She is still in the nursery, being handled by zoo keepers who are pretty much treating her like a 2 month old baby. One with an amputated leg. Apparently that baby gorilla hasn't been set down since she arrived.

Then we went to see the polar bears again. We went to the underwater viewing area, but none of the bears were in the water. So, we went back upstairs to see what they were up to. As we were watching a bear pace the shore, she decided to jump into the water right in front of us. It was the second time that an animal had launched itself right at us on the other side of the glass!


But the polar bear was much less aggressive than the gorilla. I've never seen such a large, playful animal.


Her mate, on the other hand, was having a little snooze.


Connor and I are both highly disappointed that the Columbus zoo has no zebras or giraffes. We searched for them for a year, and never found them, because they aren't there! I should have looked at the map a long time ago to determine that...but everything will be fine. We'll just have to go to a different zoo to find them.