The Zambezi River Hippo Camp will open at the Memphis Zoo this Friday after two years of construction. Workers were putting finishing touches on the exhibit Tuesday afternoon in preparation for Friday’s opening.
After two years of construction, the hippos of the Memphis Zoo have finally moved into their new home. The zoo’s Zambezi River Hippo Camp will open to the public Friday.
This is the newest exhibit to the Memphis Zoo since Teton Trek opened in the fall of 2009.
The new exhibit is near the front gate, just past animals of the night. At the exhibit, guests will feel like they are “walking along the banks of the Zambezi riverbed,†said Laura Doty, communications manager at the Memphis Zoo.
Doty said the Memphis Zoo is unique because they want their visitors to experience “cultural immersion.â€
She said visitors should not just learn about the animals but also about the animals’ native habitats and the people who live there.
She said when people leave the Zambezi river area; they should leave feeling as if they have traveled to Africa. The exhibit has been under construction since April 2014, Doty said.
The zoo opened in 1906 and had their first hippos eight years later.
The hippos got their own exhibit in 1916. They have had the same exhibit for the last 100 years. Doty described the new exhibit as beautiful and said there would be an underwater viewing panel for both the hippos and crocodiles similar to the viewing area for the polar bears and sea lions in the Northwest Passage exhibit.
“You can stand nose-to-nose with a hippo or crocodile†and “view the hippos like you never have before,†Doty said.
The hippos underwater look “graceful … almost like they’re dancing.†In addition to the two female hippos the zoo already housed, they just received a male hippo from Walt Disney World’s Animal Kingdom. Hippos live in a warm environment, so Doty said their water would be heated during the cold winter months.
“The new exhibit provides them a more naturalistic exhibit,†Doty said.
In addition to hippos and Nile crocodiles, the four-acre exhibit will have other African animals, including the flamingo flock.
New to the zoo are the opaki, animals found in the Congo forest. They are related to giraffes.
Although, they are not as tall, they do have large tongues like giraffes. The nyala, spiral-horned antelope native to southern Africa, are also new to the zoo.
The exhibit will also feature three new kinds of birds and Pata monkeys.
Doty said zookeepers would have a scheduled feeding at least once per week for the Nile crocodiles.
They will feed the crocodiles above the exhibit, but as visitors watch, they will be able to witness how these animals would catch birds as they come up from the water in the wild.
They will also talk about the care of the animals. The finishing paint touches were being put on the buildings of the exhibit Tuesday in preparation for the grand opening later this week.
