Granby Zoo has been around forever. My first visit was when I was in Grade 2, 8 years old and thats 20 years ago (almost). It was open before that. Over the 20 years, I went a few years back as well with my boyfriend and till now, there have been a lot of changes. They’ve been getting a lot of new animals and setting up nice events. Last summer’s highlights was their acquisition of red pandas. Now, if you’ve been following me since 2012, you might have read about my Hong Kong trip and my love for pandas, giant and red ones. They both are mega adorable!
Granby Zoo entrance
Back in February, Tuango had this deal on Granby Zoo and my boyfriend and I bought it. This winter’s theme was Baby Invasions. During certain times in the afternoons, the visitors would get to watch the feeding of these babies and learn a little bit. There were obviously 3 very cute red panda babies, baby yaks, baby Amur Tigers and baby snow leopards.
Before we get to that, there were lots of animals to see. First up was the elephant and giraffe pens.
Elephant pen
And then as we walked around, we saw the Snowy Owl perched on the arm of one of the animators.
Snowy Owl
And we had Africa which was pretty much indoors and heated viewing huts.
Baboons
Python
Hippo
This hippo was really hard to capture due my height so I had to stand on the kiddie steps and had my boyfriend keep me from falling. I’m pretty happy to get a decent shot of it 🙂
Back outside, we saw little llamas walking around.
Black and White Llamas
This is only a fraction of what I saw. Some of those huts had pretty bad reflection and the pictures weren’t too good. Moving along to our highlight: Asia. Why? Because thats where all the baby invasion animals were. Honestly, I only managed to catch the red pands really well. The others were all enjoying their naps.
Baby Snow Leopards sleeping in their hut
Adult Snow Leopard getting taunted by a visitor
Baby Amur Tigers and parent napping
As for the yaks, I didn’t get a good shot as they were behind high fences. But, I do have a whole lot of red pandas to offer 🙂
And then during feeding time, we realized that there was supposed to be four but mom was not there. Dad was though and he ate with the kids.
Dad Coco and his kids eating
Can you tell which is dad, called Coco?
Yup! He’s the one with the nice fur. Coco is 10 years old, which is actually approaching the last few years of a normal red panda’s life cycle which is usually 14 years in habitats, but he is in great health. Plus, you also have to be very proud of him because apparently female red pandas are fertile one day in a year and he caught that day and had these little three panda cubs 😉
I took a million pictures of them. Its a different feeling to be watching them in an actual outdoors habitat unlike in Hong Kong where its set indoors. I never knew they loved snow so much. The cubs especially were running around in the snow and everything. It was SO CUTE!!!
That was the only feeding we managed to catch because it was really cold and with my constant pulling my hands out to take pictures, it got even more chilly. I am quite happy that I managed to end the day with some awesome maple taffy.
Maple Taffy
I’m guessing its a pretty Canadian thing so I don’t know how many people actually have tried it. I totally love it! I usually try to have it once every year. This time was slightly messy, which was actually a somewhat funny story but things worked out and I did manage to eat it without getting frostbite on my hands 😉
That was my day! We couldn’t get to all the feedings sadly because we had to take care of a few things in the afternoon before the stores closed but it was really fun!
Do you like zoos? Which zoos are near where you live?
Tranquil Dreams 