Jan 20 2009
Koalapalooza at San Diego Zoo
Koalapalooza Sign at Entrance
We went last Sunday at San Diego Zoo when we saw the San Diego Zoo’s Discovery Day: Koalapalooza on local TV. They had free raffles of koala stuff toys, among others every hour for free.
Stuffed Toys for Raffle Prizes (done @ every hour)
Since we have annual membership at San Diego Zoo and San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park, we decided to avail again of our free visits to the zoo to be part of the celebration of these amazing denizens down under. My hubby asked me what is the best time to visit the zoo, I told him if he plans to be part of the merry making where the Koalas are awake, the best time would be late afternoon.
A Fully Awake Koala
During the day, koalas are mostly asleep, being nocturnal animals.
Koala Feeding on Eucalyptus
Koalas feed on eucalyptus, and because there is very little nutritional value in the leaves of eucalyptus, koalas spend most of their time sleeping.
Sleeping Koala
Sleeping koala is probably the most common situation zoo guests would experience since most guests visits during mid-day. The zoo looked very festive last Sunday, there were a lot of koala keepers talking to the guests, and also the zoo’s veterinarian was around to share to everybody how they track koalas in the wild and also how they keep the health of koalas in the zoo. The San Diego zoo’s koala exhibit has 22 koalas, which started in 1970s and is the largest colony outside of Australian. They actually have 40 koalas but loaned to other zoos to give ample room also at the exhibit.
There were a lot of activities at the zoo, like scavenger hunt, but we decided instead to walk around more at the zoo as an exchange to walking in trails.
I will post a lot more about the zoo’s walk in one of my posts later.
Thanks Gem, Iwalk and Melissa.
@ Gem, I changed the description already for picture #2 so that it won’t be confused with a living koala. It is a stuffed koala toy, the 2nd one I am not sure what it is, but it should also represent Australia as it is an advance celebration of Australia day.
@Iwalk, I know, the first time I saw koalas, they were all sleeping
if they are sleeping they really look more like a stuff toy than real koalas. But later I have learned to visit the koala exhibit last, by late afternoon if I wanted some of them fully awake and playing.
@ Melissa, I love going to the zoo too, there are just so many things to learn there and it is nice to be talking with the keepers about animals also.
I LOVE koalas, they are precious and it’s so much fun seeing one that is awake
Love this post.
You were lucky to catch him awake- they actually sleep over 20 hours a day - the particular species of eucalyptus provides very little nutrition so they sleep to conserve it - I’ve always related to that! I had no idea there are so many in San Diego zoo. They seem to breed well when protected - they were introduced to Kangaroo Island in Australia and are now a problem because they have eaten all the eucalyptus and are starting to die from starvation.
Lis
http://australia.today.com
http://travelover30s.toda.com