ByeByeBaby
Active Member
Basically this is the existing bison and Dall Sheep areas, for reference (not the bighorn sheep / mountain goat), cutting a little into both Caribou and Whooping Crane (presumably why they are also being realigned).The project at the Calgary Zoo also includes new infrastructure for the Caribou and Whooping Crane exhibits. The new Polar Bear exhibit will be located in the NE corner of the Canadian Wilds.
It's unclear to me if viewing shelter 2 on the largest body of water could be an underwater viewing site or not; it's hard to tell from the plan, but I suspect so. It's not a huge body of water, 100 sq m or so (8% of an Olympic swimming pool); not ideal for a marine species. Canadian law requires a pool of 70 sq m and 3m depth at the deep end, so I suspect that there's underwater viewing.
It's interesting; the video game Planet Zoo required 7000 sq m land area and 2250 sq m water to house a pair of polar bears appropriately; after game players complained, it was dropped to 3900 sq m of land and 1080 sq m of water. (The Canadian law is 500 and 70 as minimums.) This particular exhibit is around 8700 sq m total, with the upper pool at 100 sq m and the lower pond at 40 sq m or so.