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I love zoos, you love zoos, we all love zoos. Why? I look at it like this. When we go to zoos, it's not really to just view the animals, to see their tiny nuances and their gazing eyes up close and personal. That's all well and good, but there's a bigger driving force that motivates us to shell out a few bucks and tread through unbearable assorted stenches for a couple of hours. We go there subconsciously praying that one of the animals will go insane. When you look at a tank full of mandrills, you spend twenty seconds making jokes about their puffy asses and the next five minutes hoping they revert to type and start acting all warlike, the males pounding each of the other's skulls in a display of group dominance. We want the ponies used for kiddie rides to learn a few good kicks from the mules and perform a revolt. We wish for venomous gila monsters to escape and attack unsuspecting old ladies. I know some of you think I'm just talking out of my ass here, but you know you've done it too. Tell me you've never gone to the zoo and checked around for security leaks that would allow for surprise tiger attacks. Of course, things like this never take place, (at least when we're watching) so instead we revel for a little while in a makeshift mixing of the animal kingdom where we can watch animals, or better yet, buy French fries shaped like animals.
Now, I don't doubt that of all of us participating here, (me the writer, you the readers, Sam the Otter) I'm one of the few lame enough to skill go to zoos on a regular basis. Unless you're a younger reader, or one with kids, chances are good that you haven't been to a zoo for a long, long time. Along the same lines, there's probably many of you out there who don't have a zoo anywhere remotely local, and making the trek out of city or state to go do something that seemed fun when you were eleven doesn't really wet your candy whistle. So, my goal with this article, a trip to the zoo, is to give you a chance to spark those mammalian memories and see if this vicarious trip to Animal Prison is enough to get you back to your own zoos. You see, I work on commission with the Great Society of Many Zoos and gain thirty cents for every one of you I can get there. And with that, if this article gets ten of you to a zoo, I can almost afford a six-pack of Dr. Pepper.
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Course, my zoo is generally such a decrepit piece of shit that you'll probably never go to another again after seeing it. Actually, it's not so bad - it's gotten tons better in the past few months. The Staten Island Zoo hasn't been exactly top-of-the-line for many years, but after the terrorist attack in September, local funding was devoted to more worthy and pertinent causes, leaving the zoo in a state of chaos where the three harper monkeys outnumbered the paid staff by 300%. There were serious talks of shutting the place down, which from my point of view might've been a good idea - there's a much bigger and accommodating zoo in the Bronx, and I'm sure they could've played host to most of these animals, which at present time are kept in cages much, much too small and without the proper staff to insure their good care.
But they're still around right now, and I guess they found some cash since there were signs everywhere for upcoming new exhibits. It's really a shame too, because I was really looking forward to the blowout going-out-of-business sale. I figure I could've landed myself a monitor croc for less than twenty bucks. Then I could've eaten it and told everyone I met, with confidence, that the strangest thing I ever ate was many times stranger than the strangest thing they ever ate. Unless they were cannibals, in which case I'd bow and accept defeat graciously.
By the way, since I've temporarily canned our Animalia section, (at least for the duration of summer) don't think I won't seize this opportunity to bore you to tears with ten trillion useless animal factoids along the way. For those of you who haven't made donations to the site or sent me clean socks, this is how you pay me back: paying attention to what you find totally uninteresting. Thanks guys!!! :D :D :D
 
What the zoo lacked in overall star power, (no lions, tigers, or bears) they made up for in animal oddities. Can you tell the difference between the two pictures above? Of course you can: one's blurry and one's not-so-blurry. Actually, the picture on the right features several 'stick insects', bugs who are camouflaged to look like their woodsy surrounding to avoid being eaten. Virtually indistinguishable from real sticks even upon close inspection, these things also have the ability to remain perfectly still for hours on end - they can even drop themselves off of trees completely stone still, appearing like a fallen twig should a predator approach.
It really goes a long way in proving the evolutionary process as a truly amazing thing - if you believe in those theories like I do, imagine the millennia it'd take for nature to craft a creature so perfectly disguised to match an inanimate and very much dead part of a tree. They don't just happen to look like sticks...they're meant to look like sticks, and it boggles the mind to think of how something like this could ever come to be. Did God create really weird bugs on the 9th day, or is this guy just the Super Skrull? Whatever the case, sometimes I wish I could perfectly resemble foliage. Not to avoid anyone or anything like that - I just wish my face looked more like a marigold.
 
Their Temple of Swine had the pinkest pigs I've ever seen - usually, zoo pigs are whitish or grayish brown - these were classic pink superstar pigs. They seemed pretty content with their surroundings, probably because they were of a very select few farm animals at the zoo that weren't being pelted in the head with food pellets by overzealous kids. The 'petting zoo' portion of this place had baby goats being passed around like moon rocks at an astronaut convention. I'm not sure what the point of petting zoos are -- the little kids generally become so afraid of the giant bull mouths and sheep tongues that they develop a severe phobia for the rest of their lives, while the rest of us who can handle touching dirty animals without fright usually don't because we realize how filthy and diseased they sometimes are. The real victims are the animals themselves, all showing off big ellipse-shaped bald spots as a result of ten years of people scratching their heads for five hours a day, every day.
In the Animal Kingdom, the pigs might've drawn one of the shorter sticks - but at least they don't have to deal with 10,000 five-year-old hands a week, or jump through rings of fire. Being cooked and eaten isn't the worst way to go. In a way, they live on forever, since bacon just sticks to our insides and makes us fat. Just don't think of it as 'fat' - think of it as gaining the power of the pig. Same with the chickens and cows. Pretty soon you'll be a modern day Marshall Bravestarr, calling upon the powers of all the poor animals you've eaten so you can stop crime. The bonus is that you won't have to answer to any Indian chiefs who continually tell you not to use your powers for cool things like flying or winning church raffles.
Anyway, here's a picture of a pig's ass, for all those curious. I've included a haiku about the ass, also for all those curious:
Pigs have coiled tails
Their assholes look like chestnuts
I eat pigs for lunch
 
The otter exhibit has been a crowd pleaser ever since I was a kid. It's one of the first things you see when you get into the zoo, aside from children being screamed at and assorted trash in the general vicinity of the trash cans. The otters live in a very well-made habitat consisting of several tunnels, a bridged pool, even a waterslide. Over the years, they've had many different types of otters, large and small, but this time we had just two little guys roughly the size of cats. The current poor shape of the zoo really shined through here - the water slide has been reduced to a trickle, the walls looked totally dilapidated, and the otters themselves got some posterboard, markers, and even went as far as learning how to write so they could offer us signs pleading for aid in their escape.
Actually, it wasn't so bad, just a tad depressing because, in yesteryear, this place just blossomed with budgeting and had everything from a lion to a land turtle that was roughly 40" long. Now they've been reduced to sticking the janitors in cages and calling them giant hairless skunk apes. I long for the days where the snow tigers came cheap and the zoos were a Babylon of mega-funded madcap. And while we're on the issue, I also long for the days where I didn't wake up every morning with a sinus headache so terrible that I'm sure someday soon one of those worms from Star Trek are gonna come crawling out my ear.
 
The zoo boasts an aquarium, but it's really more of a token gesture than anything else - a medium-sized room full of fish tanks that don't always look big enough to play host to the fish inside them. I remember many years back when this exhibit first opened, we went there on a school trip and I was real excited to see all the new fishies. When I walked into the room and noticed that the only thing of any real note was a three-foot nurse shark that even some pet stores around here outdo, I was miffed and probably uttered the phrase 'this sucks!' for the first time in my then-short life. Fortunately, either they've added more interesting things to the small feature since then, or I'm more appreciative of sea life that isn't necessarily larger-than-life nowadays. Either way, the end results aren't too impressive and only justify around thirty-five cents of the three dollar admission price.
I only found three of the aquarium exhibits truly worth noting, which isn't a bad score for them because there were only around six exhibits total. World's Largest Aquarium. The other tanks had stuff you could buy at Petland or the local grocery store, only these fish were mostly alive and not incredibly ill. The most interesting? A tank with three positively massive moral eels - larger than any I've seen anywhere, including documentaries. They were easily almost a foot THICK, and lengthwise, obviously several feet. The two giants were a beautiful jade green, with the smaller third displaying a gray hue. He's the dull one of the group whom nobody loves. I'd assume he does eccentric things to keep the attention on him - maybe he wears comically oversized novelty glasses on the weekends. These eels, by the way, are very much monsters. If their looks won't kill you, the fact that they can pretty much eat your hand if they tried hard enough should keep you at bay.
 
The majestic Lionfish, winner of most undersea beauty pageants, uses it's looks to fool us into thinking it can't kill us. In fact, it could. It's spines are equipped with a venom so poisonous, it could prove fatal even to those of us with the advantage of Tylenol on our side. Incidentally, you could find these guys right alongside the moray eels in reefs. Because of their killer defense system, they're virtually without enemies - very few fish have developed an immunity to their poison. On top of everything else, lionfish are fierce little hunters, and far less delicate than they look on the surface. A favorite amongst those with large home aquarium tanks, it's never a good idea to throw these guys in with most other types of fish, especially smaller ones, unless your intention is giving the fishy a little variety in his diet.
The place still had a few sharks - mainly nurses, one of the most common found in aquariums at least around here partly because of their high numbers but mostly because they're some of the easiest sharks to take care of - they're pretty docile, and they don't require huge meals. Consider yourself lucky if you find a man-eater in the aquariums near you, because those types of exhibits are becoming rarer and rarer. If you ever find yourself in Sea World, do yourself a favor and go through the 'shark tunnel' - scarier than most roller coasters and a whole lot cooler, you slowly glide through a long cylinder just absolutely surrounded by sharks. A few years back I had this obsession with buying a real, life, 'big' shark - until I found out the cost of the tank necessary to keep 'em, which is several thousand dollars. Nurse sharks are the most popular choice because of their general gentility, but really, who wants a shark that wouldn't eat a baby 10 times out of 10? I'd say 50% of the fun in owning a shark is always having the option of feeding it human babies. So screw you, nurse sharks. Stop eating dead squid and do something interesting.
 
Some pretty pedestrian animals found themselves locked in the zoo for reasons unknown to us. What's the point in going to the pet store, buying rabbits, and throwing 'em into a display? I thought zoos were all about conservation and giving the general public a chance to see animals they couldn't see elsewhere - and above all else, in a modified version of their natural habitat. Anyone could just go buy a rabbit, and besides, nobody involved in brimming with delight watching it sit around in a cage a canary would feel crammed in. By the way, no, it's not some rare arctic snow hare or anything like that - it's just a damn rabbit. A pretty solemn one, too.
Same with the ducks - around here, they're by no means a rare animal - virtually every park in this city plays home to hundreds of them. What does this zoo do, go around stealing housepets and local animals to make up for the lack of real exhibits? I'm not saying ducks don't deserve to be in zoos, I'm just saying I don't understand why seventeen of the zoo habitat chambers need to be filled with ducks. It's like the Pope always says - ducks are a lot like Murphy Brown reruns. They can be interesting, but only in moderation.
 
On to the petting zoo portion of the place, where you're allowed to feed various animals (or just goats) special rye crisp crackers, which you can buy for a buck. I've always thought these things tasted pretty darn good, all things considered. Who knew goats, which are such indiscriminate eaters, could have such great taste? Oftentimes I find myself arriving at zoos with a little canister of jam in my pocket, eager to sample the rye wares. I'm not sure if it's legal though - the person who sells them to you makes sure to tell you that you can only feed the crisps to the animals labeled as 'crisp worthy.' They might've got me on a technicality, because I have no such labels. Then again, it can be a jailable offense, and if worse came to worse I could always scribble a little note on my arm saying that I'm crisp-worthy. The point is, it's much cheaper eating these things than finding lunch from the zoo's concession stand, and the crisps taste a whole lot better than their hot dogs.
 
As much as I like rye crisps, though - I've got nothing on the goats. These things are like their heroin. They want it, they need it, they crave it, they'll kill for it. No goat will deny a rye crisp, not now, not ever. The best part of feeding them is when they accidentally drop the cracker from their mouths to the floor outside their pen. They give you this 'AWWW SHIT!' look and, in a goat-like way, seem to beg you to pick it up and give it back to them. If you do it, they calm down and become more friendly. If you don't, they stand on their hind legs and choke you to death with their front ones. It's a dangerous forage here in the petting zoo, but it's a lot more enthralling than the cage full of bored rabbits.
 
The makeshift concession stand / souvenir shop was a complete joke - zoos are supposed to double as great toy stores, this one has worse merchandise than the football erasers you get for fifteen points at video arcades. On the plus side, the crap was so, well, crappy, they had to sell it dirt cheap. My goal was to see what could be purchased for a single dollar. So, sitting beside me now, some of the zoo's best souvenirs: two 5" yellowish plastic snakes with no features whatsoever - the look like rubber strings of hair. Three colorful plastic animal rings that would barely fit around a pencil: a spider, a scorpion, and a lizard with only three arms. Finally, a box of four shitty crayons that seem to be a kind of funny gag item since they break if you try to use them. I should've just bought another package of rye crisp crackers, but this stuff did give me the opportunity to take a picture I otherwise wouldn't have...
 
We were pretending to take pictures of the bag of stupid toys I bought, but the reality was that I needed to inconspicuously take some shots of one of the staffers. It's Andy Dick! He works at my zoo!
Here's a few more of the exhibits - some of my favorite ones. First up are entries from their reptiles and amphibians section, which might be the most impressive thing they've got going for 'em. Hundreds of rare and huge reptilian beasts who could easily maim or kill you all kept together in one big Hall of Scales for our convenience. Take a look at some gators. Everyone loves gators.
 
On the left, standard alligators that have been here seemingly forever. I've been to this zoo at least 50 times over the course of my life, and I don't think I've seen these things more even once. Maybe they're toy lookalikes. The picture on the right, though, features a new exhibit - a land monitor lizard version of the gator, and a pretty cute one at that. They look sort of like baby komodo dragons, only with neater designs on their hides, and sadly no one in their family starred opposite Matthew Broderick in The Freshman. Discounting the sharks, if I could've taken one animal home from the zoo, it'd probably be this guy. Sure, he might eat my leg, but he'd look real badass while doing it.
There were also assortments of bats, in make-believe cave exhibits which were surprisingly nice, all things considered. This zoo was a mish mosh of features that were either real nice and pricey or totally disintegrating. Amazingly, the bats lucked out and got better accommodations than all of the farm animals combined. It was obviously too dark in their section to get anywhere near a decent picture, so instead, here's me under their evil red batlight:
 
I look like I should either be developing film, hearing confessions, or leading the Hydra as the Red Skull. Of the different bats available here, there were two that really stood out. The first was a vampire bat, whom we had the pleasure of watching feed - it really drinks blood, living solely off of it, and must drink many times it's own body weight per day to remain healthy and energetic. They also look pretty much exactly how you would picture a vampire - extended 'snoutish' nose, fangs, evil lemon peel eyes, pointy ears, the works. Oddly, they always appear to be smiling, but you'd smile too if you could make children cry any time you felt like doing it.
The other cool bats were a colony of 'fruit bats' - little monsters who live exclusively off fruit. Sure enough, their exhibit was packed full of grapes, berries, and melons, scattered about like a rookie party platter while the bats all hung upside-down from the top of their prison. They didn't look all that impressive, it was just interesting to picture them chowing down on cantaloupes and sucking the blood out of a jar of V8 Splash.
 
The local paper here made a big deal out of the arrival of mandrills to our zoo. I've got no idea why - sure, monkeys are cool, but what's so absolutely fantastic about a sky blue tank with three or four big-assed apes looking totally indifferent? The way they built it up, you'd think these guys were going to be playing paintball against each other when you walked up. Instead, they just sat atop fake rocks looking miserable, or playing with their private parts while looking miserable. It was like the equivalent of getting to sit down with a 'madman' like Gene Simmons or Ozzy, and all he does is talk about the dangers of draughts in the Southwest for twenty minutes. I didn't want my mandrills to be all calm and collected, I wanted them to break through the glass and kick the crap out of me. Since they didn't deliver, I'm now vowing to kill any mandrills I come across in my daily travels. Watch out, monkeys. All of you monkeys, I'm not limiting it to just the mandrills. You're all guilty. You're all mine now.
On the right, a miniature horse. For midget cowboys or little girls who lost half their legs in freak boating accidents.
 
The last exhibit I wanted to mention was the spiders - they had tons of 'em, ranging from the deadly black widow to huge bird spiders, which are eerily reminiscent of any spider you've ever seen in a horror movie. While they were in small tanks, (most less than ten gallons) they were probably my favorite part of the entire zoo. They had other weird bugs and insects too - most notably a tank full of gigantic cockroaches. Also around were water scorpions and giant icky worms. The black widow spider, by the way, doesn't look anywhere near as dangerous as it actually is. I've seen larger, more menacing spiders walking around my apartment. Looks can be deceiving. Just ask anyone who's ever heard Tara Reid give an interview.
Lastly, we have 'Zookeys', a failed attempt by the zoo to make more money while teaching the kiddies something. The deal was simple enough: when you paid your admission price, you could also rent a 'Zookey' - if you stuck in one of the slots alongside many of the exhibits, you'd hear various animal factoids and crazy church music. It wasn't too successful because most kids are more interesting in watching the animals run around, not hearing a green box (very slowly) explain how long their fur is. Now these green boxes just remain dormant, scattered around the park as a tribute to poor budget spending. The money would've been better served establishing a giant ant farm, or getting a panda. Pandas are a lot more entertaining than green android talkboxes.
And that's my zoo. Not incredibly interesting, but good enough for a three-dollar admission price. Was this enough to get you out the door back to your own local zoo? Probably not. I've failed you all. Oh well. I think I'll go play Nintendo now so I can get over the grief. But before I do, a window into why I'd be the type to go to zoos on a regular basis to begin with. I friggin' live in one:
 
Here at my apartment, we've got three cats, two rabbits, a chinchilla, a 30-gallon frog tank with four frogs, a 75-gallon fish tank including a 8" catfish shark and a 17" pleco, several howler monkeys, three clowns, a rhino, and all six Dinobots. The upkeep is tough, but it's worth it since there's a lot of living things to kick around when I'm pissy. Do yourself a favor - go to your zoo or aquarium when you have the chance. Do it for me. Do it for your country. Do it for Andy Dick.
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