I really love visiting the zoo because I rarely see any animals in my normal daily life, except for the squirrel that likes to bounce around outside of office window. This past weekend, Boston experienced some incredible weather and I had to shoot something! Please I bought a new camera and lens over the weekend that I was dying to try out! We ended up going to the Stone Zoo in Stoneham. Boston is interesting in that it has two zoos, and the animals are different at each zoo. So essentially you have to pay twice the admission to see all the animals. Sneaky!

The Stone Zoo made headlines a few months back when Massachusetts had some budget issues, and the PR team at the zoo thought it would be a good idea to shock taxpayers by releasing a statement that they would be forced to euthanize some of the animals if they didn’t receive enough funding from the state. They later apologized for the stunt, and thank goodness no animals were harmed during their prank. That peaked my curiosity, so I decided we should make a trip to the zoo and see what all the fuss is about.

The zoos that I’ve been to have all been pretty nice: San Francisco Zoo, San Diego Zoo, and the National Zoo in DC. The Stone zoo is a bit run down and much smaller in comparison. Also, the weather is a lot colder, so many of the tropical animals are living in cramped indoor conditions with spartan decor. There are a lot of North American and Himalayan animals which are used to cold weather, and their outdoor space was a lot larger. Some animals get all the luck!

Here’s Rudolph the regular-nose Reindeer

I love the color of flamingos.

It is sad sometimes to read about a certain species, like monkeys, who like to socialize in large groups, but when you go to the zoo, there’s always a lone monkey. It’s almost like putting them in solitary confinement, which is cruel to an animal that socializes a lot. I think zoos should adopt a policy to have at least two of every animal if they are social creatures.

This jaguar walked right up to me! Thank goodness there is a thick piece of plexiglass between me and him. Then this cute little kid asked his mom if the glass could break, and she said it shouldn’t. Then she turned to me and asked me if I remember the San Francisco Zoo incident where the tiger attacked and killed someone. Ha, at this point I’m questioning whether that plexiglass does hold or not. I slowly move to the next animal…

I’m not sure why this exhibit is so dark. Wouldn’t they want lots of sun because they are tropical animals? The only thing they had was this skylight, and you can tell they really want to be in the sun.

Speaking of animals basting in the sun, the black bears were loving it! I know there’s so much glare and reflection in this photo from other people’s clothing, but it was one of the most popular animals at the zoo. They were sitting right next to the glass and enjoying all the attention.

Ooh a cougar. He doesn’t look so scary, ha. I was pretty happy that most of the animals were awake when we went. Usually when you visit the zoo on a summer afternoon, the animals are almost always napping.

Coyotes don’t look that scary either. He just looks like a really big dog.

This is who Apple named its latest operating machine after: the snow leopard.

I forgot the name of this bird, but he’s somewhere from the Himalayas. He was very curious about my camera!

This is one of my favorites of the day. They built some big rocky hills for the Himalayan mountain goats, called markhors.