The Toronto Zoo opened in August 1974 and we have been frequent visitors through the years. The zoo is divided into geographic regions and each area contains birds, animals, fish, bugs and plants from that region.
This makes you feel like you are traveling the world during a visit. In fact, Toronto Zoo is one of the biggest zoos in the world.
The main areas of the zoo are Africa, Canada, Indomalaya, Americas, Australasia and Eurasia. Some of the areas have indoor pavilions with huge glass roofs such as the African Pavilion below.
For those who don't wish to walk the zoo, there is a zoomobile that will take you to each of the different areas.
We have written blogs about the zoo many times. We could go on and on about how much we love the zoo, but we feel that pictures say it best.
This Easter weekend we thought it would be a good time to take a look at our top 10 bunny encounters. Here they are in no particular order.
1 )Lop-Eared Rabbit
A friend of ours used to care for a very cute lop-eared bunny. A lop-eared bunny is a bunny whose long ears hang (we guess you could say lop) down. You will notice all of the other bunnies in this blog post have ears that stand straight up or sit back on top of their heads.
2) Bugs Bunny
One of the all-time favourite bunnies is Bugs Bunny from the Looney Tunes cartoons. He is among a short list of animated characters to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. The outline drawing of Bugs Bunny (above) was in the Warner Brothers Studio's Museum.
3) Flemish Giant Rabbit
From Bugs Bunny we go to Big Bunny. A Flemish giant rabbit can weigh up to 10 kg and grow to about 30 inches long. It is one of the largest domesticated rabbits. The bunny above was at the Toronto Zoo for a short time and shared an enclosure with the wombats and wallabies. Perhaps it had outgrown its previous living space.
4) Arctic Hare
While we were in Churchill, Manitoba we spotted this hare just across the road from our lodge. While it may not be the smartest thing to do in polar bear territory at night, we headed outside to try and get a closer look. Luckily, he stood still long enough for us to get the picture above. It took us some time to determine if this was an arctic hare or a snowshoe hare as both inhabit Churchill. We read about one having bigger feet or ears than the other. Some reports said that one has bigger eyes or fluffier fur. We made our determination by the black on the ears. As far as we can tell arctic hares (like this one) have black just on the top tip of their ears while snowshoe hares have a black edge that may cover the tip, but runs further along the ear as well.
5) Lionhead Rabbit
A lionhead rabbit is bred to have a mane around its face like a lion. They end up looking like little balls of fur with ears. We wondered how they can even see where they are hopping. When taking pictures, the bunny below did flash us a look from beneath all that fur just to let us know he was in there. The lionhead above is from Prickly Ball Farm and the lionhead below is from Far Enough Farm.
6) Rabbit Balloon
Artist Jeff Koons had a piece of his art appear in Toronto's Nuit Blanche 2009. It was simply named Rabbit Balloon. It featured a giant shiny silver bunny that was floating inside the Eaton Centre. This bunny also once floated in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 2007.
7) Tortoise & Hare
In Boston's Copley Square is a sculpture of a tortoise and a hare. It was installed as a tribute to runner's of the famous Boston Marathon. It is based on the popular fable of The Tortoise & the Hare. The fable tells the story of a rabbit who was so confident in his ability to outrun the tortoise that during a race he ran ahead and took a nap. While he napped the tortoise passed by heading for the finish line. The hare finally awoke and tried to catch up, but it was too late.
8) Cute Bunnies
We think that all rabbits are cute. There is something special about a tiny bunny that you can pick up and hold in your hands while it sits quietly twitching its little nose. These cuties are from the Toronto Zoo kid's section and from Jungle Cat World.
9) Chocolate Bunnies
Chocolate shaped like eggs is good. Chocolate shaped like bunnies is good. This bunny above is a box from Teuscher Chocolates and hides a chocolate truffle in its belly. We like chocolate.
10) Eastern Cottontail
The one rabbit that we have encountered the most is the eastern cottontail. Actually we have eaten more chocolate bunnies and watched more Bugs Bunny cartoons than we have had encounters with eastern cottontails. Let's try that again. The eastern cottontail is the wild rabbit that we have encountered the most. Sometimes when you least expect it you look out into the yard and there is one munching away on something. Here comes Peter Cottontail hopping down the bunny trail!
February 25th 2017 was International Polar Bear Day. We attended the Toronto Zoo that day. Specifically we attended a talk by the Torono Zoo's polar bear keepers and Dr. Martyn Obbard, a polar bear researcher. Dr. Martyn Obbard talked about how the increasingly shorter season of sea ice is making life harder for the bears. The bears rely on the sea ice to go out and hunt for seals. Without the sea ice, the bears do not get enough to eat. Dr. Obbard worked for the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and his research has helped us understand what we can do to help the bears. Conservation of polar bears requires not only several Canadian provincial and territorial governments working together, but several countries as well. Polar Bears can be found in Canada, Greenland, Norway, USA and Russia.
The zoo keepers also talked about their experience working with the polar bears. The three most recent polar bear babies were all offspring of Inukshuk and Aurora. Hudson and Humphrey just recently returned to the Toronto Zoo and Juno was leaving the week after International Polar Bear Day. The keepers talked about enrichment and training of the bears. One lucky person at the talk would win a chance to see a polar bear training session. Guess who won?
We attended the training session a few weeks later. The training sessions make it easier for the keepers to administer medication, to give the bears a checkup and to move the bears around the exhibit. Our training session was with Nikita. The keeper used different hand signals and a whistle to ask the bear to perform a task. Each success was rewarded with either a handful of meat or fish. When the keeper made an open hand motion Nikita opened her mouth. When the keeper tapped a wooden stick against the fence, Nikita would touch it with her closest hand. When the keeper pointed to a target, Nikita would go over and touch her nose to the target. The children that attended the training with us were very impressed with how well Nikita performed. Finally, one big fish and the training was completed for the day. Good work Nikita and good work to all of the people helping polar bears in the wild.
The four white lions born at the Toronto Zoo in 2015 were part of a baby boom. They were all males and have the colour mutation, like their parents, that makes them rare. The Toronto Zoo is one of only a few zoos in North America where you can see white lions on display.
The Toronto Zoo has seven white lions, but very soon the four brothers will be leaving. We visited one last time to say goodbye to Hank, Harrison, Oliver and Gus. The whole family was outside huddled together for a family portrait. Only their mother couldn't sit still to pose for a good photo.
Aside from their colour, white lions are just the same as regular African lions. This means they like to sleep in the sun on a hot summer's day and are no more susceptible to sunburn than other lions. The Toronto Zoo has both white and regular lions that take turns sharing the display so this means that you will see different lions on different days. White lions also tend to be more of a beige colour so it can sometimes be difficult to tell which lions you are seeing.
Above is a picture of a regular African lion male for comparison.
Below is a male white lion.
We enjoyed our last visit with the white lion cubs and it was great to see all of the brothers together one last time. Soon they will be off to start prides of their very own.
A Canada lynx is a medium sized cat which closely resembles a bobcat. The easiest way to tell a lynx and a bobcat apart is that lynx have longer legs and their back legs are actually longer than their front ones. They appear to be on a bit of a slant when running or walking. Like most large cats they are beautiful to look at, but scary to come across in the wild.
We have only ever encountered lynx at the zoo as it is very rare to see one in the wild. The Canada lynx above was at the Toronto Zoo and may be one of the parents of the two babies that were born in 2016.
Canada lynx can be found throughout Canada as well as in the northern United States. The lynx above was from the Assiniboine Zoo in Winnipeg and was already wearing his winter coat which made him look twice as large.
In 2016, the Toronto Zoo was lucky enough to have two lynx kittens born at the zoo. The Canada Lynx can be found in the zoo's Canadian Domain on a very steep hill that goes down into the valley. The lynx are one of the first animals on the way down the hill for those that fear they may never make it back up if they venture down to the bottom.
When we visited, the babies were already about 3 months old. They were still as cute as ever. A Canada Lynx's favourite meal is snowshoe hare. As you can see from the picture above, this baby lynx has already developed a taste.
The video above shows the babies walking around and giving wide eyed looks.
We visited again when the lynx kittens were about 7 months old. The two kittens loved to play fight and chase each other around the enclosure.
The Canada Lynx usually prefers a quiet, solitary life and likes to stay hidden. While these two juveniles are in the exhibit it is a great time to see these animals in action.
Toronto Zoo
