Artis Zoo, Amsterdam

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So, some overall thought about the zoo:

I really liked Micropia (a microbe exhibit). I loved the interactive bits too and there is a lot to look at. It's a completely different concept to any exhibits I have seen or even heard of before. Do any other zoos have anything like it? I wasn't sure what to expect really before going to it but it exceeded my expectations and I was very impressed despite the fact that there were no animals apart from a small fish tank and some ants. A very cool exhibit.



In terms of the zoo overall. For the most part, what they have is done well I thought. The standard of the enclosures was good overall with notable exceptions being the lion and elephant exhibits which were awful and some rather small enclosures in the small mammal house. The other enclosure that I didn't really like was the paddock for domestic hoofstock that you see when you first enter the zoo. It looks ugly to my eyes and is too small with a lot of wasted space with the moat so I think it makes a bit of a poor first impression. Maybe for the average zoo visitor it doesn't have this effect if they are not bothered whether the animals are domestics or not.



I thought that most exhibits were to a very high standard though, with the rainforest and bird house being fantastic as was the aquarium, the pheasantry, the butterfly garden and quite a few of the other areas. I thought the size of enclosures in the reptile house was good too, compared to many places that have very small reptile enclosures.



As well as the animal exhibits there were a few non-animal things such as the planetarium which I am in two minds over. I didn't watch any of the shows in the planetarium but I thought it was an interesting idea for something to add to a zoo, however I did get the feeling that it was a waste of space that I would be all for in a zoo with loads of space but in such a small zoo as Artis... maybe space better used for animal exhibits. I had similar thoughts about Micropia too, though it's not really in the zoo (just outside the gate) so it didn't feel like such a waste of space for animal exhibits.



Of course there weren't so many rarities compared to Walsrode or Berlin that I had visited in the days previously to visiting Artis but for the very small size of the zoo, I thought the space was used very well. I wouldn't call it a world class zoo because of how the collection is limited by the small space so there isn't so much possibility for expansion or big open exhibits. But most of what they have is very well done!

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