calgary zoo- african rainforest

wrapping up the calgary zoo's african complex, we hit the transalta rain forest centre.

right away in the front entrance they have some cool reptile displays.

such as this rather fancy chameleon. i'd look as smug as him if my skin could change colour like his!

there was one case though, i couldn't spot anything at all in... oh well.

i favourite of the reptile greeters (who admittedly were further into the building) were my distant ancestors the crocodiles. these were west african dwarf crocodiles to be precise.

still kind of neat to think my kind came from something similar to one of those guys millions of year ago!

here's a better picture of them here.

moving right along was a very pretty tank of african river fish. this being a zoo's aquarium, had me totally onboard with this section of the zoo! if there is nothing i like more than an aquarium, i haven't found it yet!!!

next you enter an indoor aviary. sadly as it is indoors, it doesn't quite live up to melbourne zoo's or even the one in invercargill's botanic garden's aviary. though many of the birds here were cool...

i especially liked the african spoonbill. i have a weakness of spoonbills, which may not be my favourite type of cousin, they are still high on the list. i have to say this african genus looks a lot more dignified then their australasian cousins the royal spoonbill!

this building of the zoo also housed the gorillas... oh how i hate gorillas! (if you're wondering why just watch any [good] version of king kong, and you should be able to figure it out ;P)

even the cute little baby gorilla wasn't enough for me to pass this spot by quick...

the last thing i'm covering on the blog (as you really should just visit the zoo if you can) is the wild african hunting dogs. these guys are super cool, one of the only wild forms of dog in the world, and i've never seen them at a zoo before (mind you i haven't been to as many zoos as i'd have liked).