The first time was I just walking around, seeing as much as I could.  This time, I rented a bike, because I needed to zip back and forth across the zoo to catch the things I’d missed.

My first stop was the lions – I wanted to see them as soon as they were let out.  I passed the eland on the way, and couldn’t resist taking a photo of this one’s hairstyle:

Also, it looks like this one is using his horns to scratch his back:

 

I have to admit, that’s what I’d do if I had horns like that (and a spine with a horizontal alignment).

The cheetahs were much the same:

Though one did sit up this time:

I also passed a peacock:

His tail is looking a bit shabby – clearly it’s not breeding season.

Finally, I made it to the lions.  The older sisters had been out with the cubs yesterday, but now their father – Lazarus – was with them.  The cubs came out first:

 

One of the first things they did was try to climb a tree:

 

Not terribly successfully, as you can see.  Then Dad came out, and I got a photo of one of the cubs in mid-leap onto him:

The family:

Fun fact – lions will pretend to be hurt by the bites of their cubs to encourage them.  Bear that in mind when you see Lazarus grimacing when the cubs pile onto him.

I took these photos just for Lazarus’ ridiculous mane:

This is a video of him wandering around and sneezing:

 

Then they kind of settled down:

Or at least, Mum and Dad did – the cubs were still climbing all over them.  You get two videos of this because it was very cute:

 

Then it was on to the other exhibits.  I actually spotted a water buffalo out of the water:

Astonishing, huh?

I passed the zebras and decided to take a pic of their interesting colouration:

It’s almost double-striped, but the intermediate ones are more brown than black.  I wonder what kind of genetics are behind that.

In the elephant area, Luk Chai was back with his buddy:

I also got a good photo of Pathi Harn for the first time:

That’s Porntip’s son, who I was talking about yesterday.  You’ll notice he has tusks, while Luk Chai doesn’t.  That’s because Luk Chai had an infection in his tusks when he was young, and they had to be removed.

I also got some video of Porntip sneaking her trunk under the fence to get some grass:

 

And little Sabai kicking up dust, apparently just because it amuses him:

 

I was in the area for the savannah safari, which I’d missed yesterday.  This is the safari area:

We were going to tour all that big, open space past the ponds.  We hopped into a truck:

And were driven around the place, like an actual safari.  The enclosure itself holds several different species, and is basically the ultimate bachelor pad, holding all the males that are surplus to the breeding programs.

A giraffe, with some ostriches in the background:

The ostriches themselves:

Blackbuck – see the one with the twisted horn?

Our guide told us a funny story about the blackbucks.  You see, juvenile males don’t have the horns, and look a lot like females, so when they were first brought out here, there were a few females stowed away amongst them.  No one realised until they started giving birth, and then they were removed.

Another giraffe – and yes, he’s licking the wooden pole:

They had a problem with giraffes’ tongues – they lick a lot of things, and it can be very destructive.  They’ll strip paint, and they can ringbark trees.

Another eland with an awesome hairdo:

A Congo buffalo:

He was in a pen by himself because Congo buffalo can be very aggressive, and he doesn’t play well with others.

The safari was short, but pretty good fun.  It lasted about fifteen minutes, and then I was off again!

When I was biking past the camels, I stopped and took this video:

 

Which I recorded solely for those teeth, and that wobbly lip.  I also recorded this little bout of interspecies friendship:

 

Either that, or it’s just a really good spot.  I got a photo of this as well:

Now for Persian Onagers, that I missed yesterday.  First, the enclosure:

Onagers are one of the fastest equine species around – they can sustain a 50km/h pace, with short bursts of 70km/h.  I took a photo of one:

Look at those ears!  I also found these two buddies:

And got video of them grazing:

 

The dingo enclosure:

The dingo itself was asleep:

It looks quite comfortable in that little patch of grass.  Dingos are one of the most ancient types of dog, and are quite intelligent.  They’re also very good climbers, funnily enough.

For our native animals, they had a large enclosure that you could walk through, and maybe give a wallaby a pat:

There were several wallabies gathering around the food bins:

I took a video of one of them walking, just because they look funny:

 

And a close-up of what looks like mango skin held in its little people-hands:

An emu, lying down and looking like it’s questioning its life choices:

‘How did I come to this?’

Spot the two galahs:

One is diligently working on a tree hollow, maybe for a nest?

 

The other is not:

Maybe they take it in turns?  Or maybe the one resting is saying ‘it looks fine to me, honey, you don’t need to keep going’.

Koalas!

Well, they’re more visible in a close-up:

See?  I took some film of one of them eating some eucalyptus:

 

And a photo:

It looks quite smug in that picture.  ‘I bet you get your own food like a sucker.’

Another wallaby:

And my little friend:

Why do I call it that?  Watch:

 

They had a sign telling us not to touch the animals’ faces, but it most definitely started it.  The way it goes, you’re meant to crouch down, offer a hand, and if the wallaby doesn’t hop away you’re good to stoke its back.  But this wallaby apparently decided my hand was good, and it was going to lick it.  It was like being snuffled at by a friendly dog, though there were more soft little whisker involved.  Maybe my sweat was delicious, or it just likes the sweet, gamey tang of human flesh.

It was also quite curious about the camera:

Next up, the emu enclosure:

Another emu lying down:

I filmed an emu walking around, just because it looks funky:

 

The open mouth is probably so it can pant, but it looks dreadfully shocked about something.

And kangaroos:

They were in with the emus.

The Aussie animals didn’t have as much security around them as the other places, which I guess makes sense.  After all, what happens if they escape?  They won’t exactly destroy the local ecosystem.

Some more addax, because I like their horns (which can be up to 85cm long):

One of them was grazing:

 

My next stop was a feeding I’d missed the other day – the spider monkeys and ring-tailed lemurs.  The timing was too close to the lion talk for me to see both, and you guys know which one I chose yesterday.  So, I made my way to the lake, and settled down to eat my lunch and watch some other primates eat theirs.

I spotted a black swan on the lake:

And a turtle:

I took a video of the turtle swimming – they can really motor:

 

The island of the black-handed spider monkeys:

The monkeys:

Check out those long fingers:

They came in really variable colours, too.  They had a few golden ones:

Look at them climb:

 

Check out the crazy tail:

It’s longer than their body!

I took a video of them being fed (and one getting rather frustrated):

 

Another video of some of them eating:

 

After the food, a lot of them went to drink from the lake:

Next up were the ring-tailed lemurs:

I also took some video:

 

I had some time to kill before the Asian forest feed, so I wandered over the zoo.  I re-visited the black rhino and baby from yesterday:

You can really see how big he is, next to her.

I also dropped in on the meerkats, and took a photo of one of them stretched out and relaxing:

The little, upturned black pads on its feet are strangely adorable.  You can also hear them in this video, that sound like a small dog whining:

 

This is the sound of a siamang hooting:

 

For reference, it’s several enclosures over at this point.  They can get really loud.

The white rhinos were out of their pen!  Hooray!  I think I mentioned yesterday that they live in herds, unlike the black rhino, and this is the Dubbo herd:

As you can see, they do have a very wide mouth:

I took a video of one of them grazing.  I honestly have no idea why its horn is notched like that:

 

The bongo was more active today, too:

It’s not crouched down – the bend in its spine just makes it look like it’s permanently hunched.  This photo is closer to head-on, and you can see the spine rising over its head:

Check out the stripy legs!  They also appear in this video:

 

This is a photo of a photo – the air sac the siamang use to create such loud noises:

Their calls can carry up to 5 kilometres.  They must have been fed recently, because one of them was eating some kind of fruit:

 

Like the elephants, these guys also get puzzles to keep them stimulated.

Then it was time for the otters!  There are four in the enclosure, and today I learned they’re a mated pair and their two daughters – they had sons as well, but they got old enough that the Dad didn’t want them around anymore.

They look they’re hugging in this photo:

Lining up at the fence:

‘What are you talking of?  We must have our part in the conversation!’

Actually, they’re doing this because another two daughters/sisters are inside a building behind the fence, being readied for transport up north.  They’re very social animals, so the zoo won’t send one by itself.

I took a whole bunch of videos, because they were so active it was rare to catch them still enough for a photo, though I did get this pic of one imitating a meerkat:

Now the videos!  This is the otters swimming:

 

Look at their little legs go!  I have one of them playing on land:

 

Playing in the water:

 

And swimming again:

 

Otters have no blubber like most marine mammals – their coat is what keeps them warm.  Humans have about 200 hair follicles per square centimetre on our heads, but otters have much more, with sea otters holding the record at about 200,000 per square centimetre.  That’s the most of any mammal, which is why they and several other otter species have been endangered by the fur trade.

They also have a really fast metabolism, so they have short bursts of hyperactivity, followed by periods of rest.  This means they get lots of little meals instead of one big meal – the keepers feed them seven times a day.

This species has short claws and little webbing on their front paws, because they use those paws to grope about in muddy water and find food.  The food is usually shellfish, frogs, crabs and the like, but otters will eat anything they can fit in their mouth.  At this feeding, they were being given fish:

 

When the keeper came out to talk to us, they were splashing around close to the glass, probably hoping to get more food from him:

 

It wasn’t just otters that were being fed.  The keeper then strolled over to the one-horned rhino enclosure and introduced us to Dora:

In spite of the name, Dora is male – he has a much longer name that means ‘dragon’ in Japanese.  Because that’s where he’s from; Japan.  Zoos don’t buy and sell animals, as they don’t want to put a price on them for the black market, so instead zoos around the world will trade animals.  Now, greater one-horned rhinos are rare and endangered, and the Dubbo officials were bewildered when the Japanese zoo kept turning down their offers of equally rare and exotic animals, only to demand two koalas.  Yes, Dubbo zoo got a rare male rhino for the price of two koalas.

Anyway, they got Dora for their breeding program, which has already been successful.  In another enclosure, currently out of the public eye, is Dora’s girlfriend Amayla and their baby, Kamari.

As you can see from the picture, this species is a very good swimmer.  They also have a good sense of smell and sharp hearing, but their eyesight is pretty poor, and they won’t see a stationary animal a few metres away.

When I was looking in on him before the feed, he was scraping his horn against the gate:

You can see the marks where he’s scraped his horn there before.  You see that big pile of dung?  That’s not the keepers’ doing – this species of rhino will choose one spot to make their toilet, called a ‘midden’.

The ‘feed’ was the keeper throwing apples into the water, and Dora went for an apple-bob.

Walking towards the water:

He had a bit of a think before he actually got in, though:

Once he was in, he seemed to be having fun:

I filmed this after he’d grabbed up one of the apples and was eating it:

 

Then it was time to go back to Turtle Shell.  The bicycle was a pretty good way of getting around the zoo – there were some hills that kind of killed me, but the way to the exit was downhill for a very long stretch, so that was nice way to end it.