More Zoo

Late breaking  Zoo news!

Emi Lane, the pregnant giraffe has given birth.

 

A heartfelt THANK YOU! to dedicated and expert Birdacologist  ERIN for identifying most of the exotic avian species  found in yesterday’s post. Although Erin has left very little for JUDY to do,  there is one mystery bird remaining.

This sweet and quite stunning  pigeoney creature remains elusive. With “her” pale, creamy white feathers,  matching pale blue feet and beak, and her tres chic navy tail feathers… she needs only a navy leather Chanel bag, a sting of pearls and a Galoise Bleu dangling from her bill.  Coco would approve.

 

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Where else but Texas would you give a guy a hippo for Christmas?  I wonder how they gift-wrapped the poor beast.

From Wiki:

“In 1965, Lufkin Industries President, Walter Trout, received a 500-pound (230 kg) Hippopotamus as a Christmas present. The hippo was boarded at the Monroe, LA zoo until a hippo pen was completed 18 months later. The present zoo was built around the hippo pen, and was opened in 1967. Since 1989, the Lufkin Kiwanis Club has helped with projects at the zoo. To date, thirteen projects have been completed, totaling over 3200 person hours of donated time and $35,000 of donated materials. In 1999, the Maasai Giraffe and White Rhinoceros exhibits opened. These were followed by a Nile hippopotamus exhibit in 2002 where visitors can view the animals both above and below the waterline.^”

  Yep, that’s a hippo alright. And yes, that water was chilly.

The lighting at the Flamingo enclosure was very interesting, dark, mottled and moody.

 

They are almost, but not quite, as gorgeous as our Texas resident Spoonbills.

  

 

 

There were a bunch of other animals that were not birds. Whatever…

 

This porcupine stunk to high heaven. With that aroma, one has no idea why he needs quills.

 

The Zoo has a pair of Galapagos Tortoises and one skinny Rhino.

 

I have omitted the reptilians to avoid creeping out the squeamish.

There were Komodo dragons, but they remained huddled around their heater, still too cold to come outside.

 

A couple more Peacock shots, just because they are so darned gorgeous.

 

Lastly, a compilation for our recovering Bird Lady of Blogland .

The end, the end, the end.  (of pain!)

Ellen Trout Zoo

Our trip to Big Bend delayed, we took advantage of a rare good weather day with a trip to our local ZOO.

For a small town zoo it does a decent job of giving you a pleasant half day’s worth of entertainment.

The stars of the show, hands down, were the Peafowl. The place was infested with the creatures.

The Peacocks were displaying and calling all over the place. It was very amusing.

They strolled down the paths, totally oblivious to us humans.

 

They filled the trees with raucous conversation.

And there was no limit to the number of “The End” shots available. Talk about shake your bootie…

This Zoo has very few signs. Perhaps they were being refurbished or replaced, but aside form the obvious eagle, flamingo, hornbill… I have no idea what these birds might be.

Judy, since you’re temporarily grounded maybe you could help identify the exotics?

   

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Eagle, Flamingo and the Victoria Crowned Pigeon we recognized.

This post is awfully heavy on pictures, so more flamingos and the other animals, (yes there were other animals beside birds, but I hardly noticed them) next post, hopefully tomorrow.

If the weather continues to improve we are out of here (finally!) on Thursday.