scorn. If the humans heard the roar, it was doubtful that they would have guessed what animal was making it, or why. The deep bass note repeated over and over, punctuating the morning. It didn’t sound like tigers in the movies. More like a bellow than a roar, it declared the presence of something vaguely big and clearly ferocious and maybe hungry. Perfect. Much more enticing than the jungle drums, still pounding from the loudspeakers.
As visitors paid their money and pushed through the turnstiles, the predictable soundtrack reassured them that what awaited inside was not true wildness but a carefully staged illusion of wildness. At an almost subliminal level, the true message of the drums was that the zoo’s staff would control the experience ahead and that all the leopards and bears and panthers—not to mention any tigers—were safely behind lock and key and would not be allowed, no matter how peckish they might feel, to snack on any children.
Lowry Park prided itself as an institution custom-made for families with young kids. Even though the zoo was growing, it remained compact enough that it was possible to take in the highlights in a couple of hours or less. This was no accident; the new zoo had been designed not to overwhelm. The size of the place was ideal for a four-year-old’s attention span. Moving at a reasonable clip and fortified with enough liquids to stave off heat stroke, parents could whisk their brood from one end to the other and be gunning for the exit just as the little one crashed into a blissful stupor. From start to finish, the experience was tailored for the delight of impressionable children. The front courtyard was graced with a fountain where manatee statues swam in the air and toddlers squealed with joy as they jumped through jets of burbling water. Wallaroo Station, featuring species from Australia, offered a rock-climbing wall for older kids. At Stingray Bay, over in the Aquatic Center, children reached inside a shallow tank and ran their fingers along the sleek backs of Southern stingrays whose tail barbs had been removed. Every day, families crowded into an outdoor theater for Spirits of the Sky , a birds-of-prey show where the handlers invited the guests to admire Smedley the vulture and cued Ivan the Eurasian eagle owl to fly directly over the audience, his massive wings flapping so close that the churning air ruffled their hair. Inside the Discovery Center, kids studied toxic toads up close and were allowed to fondle a replica of a raccoon dropping. For their birthdays, children were encouraged to celebrate at the zoo with their friends, pet a skink or snake, and play Pin the Tentacle on the Octopus. On special evenings, the zoo sponsored slumber parties where third-graders climbed into sleeping bags next to the underwater viewing windows, drifting off to the sight of the manatees swimming. At Halloween, preschoolers were invited to a camp with bats and tarantulas. At Christmas, they met real reindeer and a not-so-real Santa.
One of the most popular attractions, all year round, was the petting zoo, a dusty corral where children waded happily among bleating sheep and fed them grain pellets and ignored the teeth and gums pulling at their clothes. Unbeknownst to parents, the herd included a billy goat named Cody who had somehow mastered the art of contorting himself so he could urinate on his own head. To impress the nanny goats, of course.
“We call him Pee Goat,” a keeper said under her breath one day, maintaining a safe distance. “He’s disgusting.”
Many of the kids, no doubt, would have been ecstatic to learn of Cody’s special talent. They howled at the raccoon poop. Why not a malodorous goat? From a child’s perspective, nothing could have been more enchanting.
Perched on a branch, two golden lion tamarins peered out with their tiny old-men faces, chirping as though they were birds, not tiny monkeys.
With silky, reddish gold manes that swept backward toward their
As visitors paid their money and pushed through the turnstiles, the predictable soundtrack reassured them that what awaited inside was not true wildness but a carefully staged illusion of wildness. At an almost subliminal level, the true message of the drums was that the zoo’s staff would control the experience ahead and that all the leopards and bears and panthers—not to mention any tigers—were safely behind lock and key and would not be allowed, no matter how peckish they might feel, to snack on any children.
Lowry Park prided itself as an institution custom-made for families with young kids. Even though the zoo was growing, it remained compact enough that it was possible to take in the highlights in a couple of hours or less. This was no accident; the new zoo had been designed not to overwhelm. The size of the place was ideal for a four-year-old’s attention span. Moving at a reasonable clip and fortified with enough liquids to stave off heat stroke, parents could whisk their brood from one end to the other and be gunning for the exit just as the little one crashed into a blissful stupor. From start to finish, the experience was tailored for the delight of impressionable children. The front courtyard was graced with a fountain where manatee statues swam in the air and toddlers squealed with joy as they jumped through jets of burbling water. Wallaroo Station, featuring species from Australia, offered a rock-climbing wall for older kids. At Stingray Bay, over in the Aquatic Center, children reached inside a shallow tank and ran their fingers along the sleek backs of Southern stingrays whose tail barbs had been removed. Every day, families crowded into an outdoor theater for Spirits of the Sky , a birds-of-prey show where the handlers invited the guests to admire Smedley the vulture and cued Ivan the Eurasian eagle owl to fly directly over the audience, his massive wings flapping so close that the churning air ruffled their hair. Inside the Discovery Center, kids studied toxic toads up close and were allowed to fondle a replica of a raccoon dropping. For their birthdays, children were encouraged to celebrate at the zoo with their friends, pet a skink or snake, and play Pin the Tentacle on the Octopus. On special evenings, the zoo sponsored slumber parties where third-graders climbed into sleeping bags next to the underwater viewing windows, drifting off to the sight of the manatees swimming. At Halloween, preschoolers were invited to a camp with bats and tarantulas. At Christmas, they met real reindeer and a not-so-real Santa.
One of the most popular attractions, all year round, was the petting zoo, a dusty corral where children waded happily among bleating sheep and fed them grain pellets and ignored the teeth and gums pulling at their clothes. Unbeknownst to parents, the herd included a billy goat named Cody who had somehow mastered the art of contorting himself so he could urinate on his own head. To impress the nanny goats, of course.
“We call him Pee Goat,” a keeper said under her breath one day, maintaining a safe distance. “He’s disgusting.”
Many of the kids, no doubt, would have been ecstatic to learn of Cody’s special talent. They howled at the raccoon poop. Why not a malodorous goat? From a child’s perspective, nothing could have been more enchanting.
Perched on a branch, two golden lion tamarins peered out with their tiny old-men faces, chirping as though they were birds, not tiny monkeys.
With silky, reddish gold manes that swept backward toward their
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