Sunday, June 24, 2012

Lions and Tigers and Bears Oh My!

Well, we didn't see any tigers yesterday but we did see mountain lions and bears. Close enough.

After last weekend's high of 108 on Sunday, we were promised a much cooler weekend, with highs in the mid 80's. Yes! Sounds like a perfect time to get out of the house and go do something. The air quality was actually going to be good, too, so let's go!

Last holiday season when we went to the Holiday Light's at Calm thing, where the California Living Museum outside of town was all lit up with lights and displays we were given a flyer with two free tickets to come back to the museum, and misplaced them. I finally found them in a pocket of the purse I was carrying that night, and they expire next weekend, so let's go to the zoo for free.

So, we did. It was warmer there than at our house, we have a really nice breeze here that was keeping our yards and house nice and cool, but it wasn't too bad. The museum is small, with only California animals and birds on exhibit, animals and birds that are either disabled or have some other problem where they can't be left out in the wild. The zoo is also home to lots of local plant species which isn't quite so interesting, but they are pretty much left to grow wild, so you sort of feel like you could be wandering in the mountains nearby. Sort of. But the bears won't get you because they are in an enclosure.

I mostly wanted to go visit the mountain lion and bobcat exhibit since last time it was so exciting with the mountain lion coming right up to the window. This time he and his mate were up on the rocks laying around like cats do.


But one of the bobcats was quite active. We think he (or she as the case may be) was newly introduced to the enclosure as a big cat carrier was by the zookeeper's door. He was pacing the area, coming down to the little waterfall and dipping his paws into the water, then around the enclosure again, then over to the window where he wanted to play (or maybe eat) a little girl on the other side of the glass. He kept pawing at the ground by the glass and batting against the glass where her hands were.




The bobcats are about the size of a medium sized dog and so beautiful. We watched for a long time, it was really amazing to be able to see this bobcat in action.

Keith was taunting this woodpecker by rapping on the wood fence and the woodpecker kept looking around wondering what other woodpecker was in his territory.



I can't remember which type of fox this one was, there were three fox enclosures with different foxes in them but this was the only one that was out and active.



And here are the bears. Oh My! This was the only time we've seen one of these bears sitting up at this zoo, usually they are laying around like the one in the bottom of the photo.


So, it was a nice outing and FREE! We only spent the gas to get there and a couple of dollars on some cold drinks from the vending machine.

No comments: