Two weeks ago this story began in the World of Aquatic Birds at the Bronx Zoo. It was sort of a progress in architecture meets nature story, the state of the art of buildings for plants and animals in 1964. It was also a story of public environmental education. In many ways those and these views from the two newer buildings are about sociology, how public understanding of nature was evolving at the times when these buildings were built. Once again I must point out that while the natural dioramas of the Aquatic Bird House seemed like a dramatic departure from the bird cages of the old Astor Court birdhouse, it wasn't that much different. The New York Zoological Society was originally founded as a means of saving the American bison from extinction and has been on the forefront of environmental protection and public education since the nineteenth century. The shiny new environments for birds in the Aquatic Bird House represented the evolution of a mission statement. Back when that building opened to the public, it was a time when science received a great deal of public funding and deserved much respect in the public eye. Perhaps a reflection of an era when just across the bridge public funds were building a World's Fair and downtown from the zoo, Lincoln Center for the Preforming Arts was becoming a reality. This is the story of the two newer indoor environment for birds. The World of Birds upgraded birds from specimens to residents in 1974 and JungleWorld marked the climax of indoor zoo environments on June 21, 1986. From the 1964 template improvements were obvious. Both new buildings seemed much closer to botanical garden conservatories than dioramas at natural history museums. Birds were no longer displayed but given a choice to be seen or remain hidden in their natural surroundings. The World of Birds offered a little more space and light and in JungleWorld, those birds probably lose touch with the fact that they are living in captivity. Perhaps those newer buildings are vastly improved echos of the "Great Society" era Aquatic Bird House. Perhaps they can still tell us much about where we are today.
Since 1974 high on a hill, standing above the Bronx River and overlooking the Bison prairie, when the leaves are off the trees the World of Birds seems a bit like Brutalist tree stumps in the winter forest. You can almost see the wings of a bird in the ramps from first to second floor.
In the summertime the World of Birds is hidden on that hilltop in the forest, actually with hawks nesting overhead and songbirds in the trees, it seems like the centerpiece of a local bird sanctuary. Once you go inside, you are a guest in a World of Birds.
These are not simulated treetops. This pair of Scarlet Ibis are a good twenty-five feet above their pond.
One of the best things about the World of Birds is the two floor layout where you can view a Nicobar Pigeon picking out nest building materiel on the forest floor from below.
Then go up to the second floor to see another keeping the nest warm.
And another great thing about the world of Birds is how a Blue Billed Curassow can get as far away...
Or as close to prying eyes as he wants.
There's his wife now. Good thing she is laying an egg. "The blue-billed curassow is the most threatened cracid species in the world and amongst the most endangered of all birds."
But the tour begins on the first floor and the first bird you will meet is the White-throated Bee-eater.
These very social birds (except for when I'm trying to get a photo) are extreme acrobats. The way they fly reminds me of local Barn Swallows. Zoo keepers put on daily feeding demonstrations but crickets because you know how bees get when people start throwing them into the air as bird food. The white-throated bee-eater breeds only in a narrow swath of arid, open country just below the Sahara Desert then flies thousands of miles south to spend the rest of the year in clearings and along forest borders in the tropics.
Right next door to the White-throated Bee-eaters are some of the most amazing birds I've ever seen. There is only two places it the world where they live, the island of Sulawesi and the Bronx. The way they lay eggs is much closer to dinosaur than bird, you might even say that they are "born of fire." Want to see an amazing video? A Bird Like No Other: Bringing Up Maleos explains why Maleos live in the Bronx and offers an abbreviated view of their amazing personalities. Unfortunately there are only 142 known nesting grounds left on Sulawesi but more than a few mature Maleos on that island were raised in the Bronx. “So you take a chicken with a fantail and a pink belly and then you put a football helmet on the back of it head” and you've got yourself a Maleo.
Why are Maleos so amazing? Well first of all they don't brood. Unlike most birds who sit on eggs to keep them warm, Maleos let volcanic heat do the work for them. Unlike most birds that nurture chicks, once a Maleo lays an egg that is the last she sees of them. They dig a hole about three feet down over volcanic rock, testing for the right temperature with their beaks, then lay an egg that is five times the size of a chicken egg and cover the hole back up. Then, much like a turtle, they are all done being parents. It takes the chick about two days from hatching to digging itself out of the hole but once they do the little birds are flying and fending for themselves. Here's a liberated and arid bird that is always interested in human passers by. Once a Crested Tinamou lays one of her emerald green eggs the male sits on the egg while she goes off to copulate with others.
Close by is another Bee-eater that I find to be beautiful. Apparently Carmine is also a color because the Carmine Bee-eater below is not the least bit Italian and if you are ever near this African aerial acrobat, it would really suck if you were a grasshopper, bee or cricket.
The hundred-eyed giant is a resident at the World of Birds.
Check out that tail on the big male Great Argus above. The scientific name of the Great Argus was given by Carl Linnaeus in reference to the many eyes-like pattern on its wings. Argus is a hundred-eyed giant in Greek mythology.
And I always thought the Peacock was the big bird with a hundred eyes in his feathers.
Here's another interesting character in the World of Birds. Looks like a monk and sings like a chainsaw, the Capuchinbird.
Here's a Raggiana bird of paradise.
He has something he wants you to see. First the dip...
And then wiggle, wiggle, wiggle for the display.
Apparently 1974 was an in your face era in zoo design. There is a memorial hall of extinct birds with a timeline explaining who we killed and how. In a section where some living birds don't seem all that exotic because of the pet trade any child will walk out of there believing the exotic bird trade is pure evil.
The Bronx Zoo is active in restoring at least one of the species decimated by the bird trade. In 1990, the wild population of Bali Mynas was estimated at just 15 birds.
The Bali Myna can be seen in both the World of Birds and JungleWorld. Several of them are Bali bound but they are still being poached and still on brink of existence.
And what must be the most endangered species of bird, the Guam Kingfisher is barely hanging on in the World of Birds.
Not all of the residents of the World of Birds are endangered. This South American punk rocker called the Guira Cuckoo is well adapted to open habitats. Human encroachment isn’t such a threat to these birds.
And the gregarious Taveta Weaver are on display for both their architectural skills and some seriously cute energy.
Same pool, different day, the lovely and talented Racket-tailed Roller.
The photos above do not cover all of the birds who live on the first floor of the World of Birds. I also didn't get around to mentioning most of the education to be found winding through the first floor dioramas. One area is about the horrors of clear-cutting. Another details the pet industry devastation by demonstrating the cruelty of bird smuggling. We leave the first floor with one last section that has gone exotic over the years but I remember back in 1974 it was all about local birds and keeping your house cat indoors.
In that large area the flicker is still there but hard to find. In the three photos below are the beautiful Smew, followed by a big male Western Capercaillie keeping his eyes on things and a female Western Capercaillie.
Meanwhile up on the second floor, in the treetops a Black-faced Ibis strikes a pose.
The Toco Toucan is ready for his close up.
And the Great Blue Turaco is also quite the poser.
That White Crested Hornbill who proved popular in the first part of this story, not a vegetarian.
I've never heard a peep out of the Bali Myna downstairs but there is a Yellow-faced Myna on the second floor that talks to cameras. You click, he clicks, you click, he clicks. I have far too many photos of this bird to not show at least one.
Since I can no longer find a Palm Cockatoo there I'll end this tour of the World of Birds with an old photo and a romantic story.
Once there was a Palm Cockatoo who lived on the second floor. His name was O.T. and he like to shout it out occasionally so the Great Hornbills and a Toco Toucans across the way would know who he was. O.T. got his name because he was hatched at the zoo and sickly at birth. Apparently well trained humans make better parents than Palm Cockatoos and the young hatchling was hand reared on a twenty-four hour watch. The ornithologists made a whole lot of overtime pay watching out for for that little Palm Cockatoo and that was how O.T. got his name. And now for my favorite favorite indoor winter hangout. Flash forward from 1974 to 1986. It was a golden age in the history of the Bronx Zoo. The Wild Asia section of the Park was opening, the Bengali Express Monorail bean taking people across the Bronx River into wide opened habitats where the people seemed caged. In the center of it all a breathtaking indoor jungle made its debut in the Bronx. The first thing anyone should know about JungleWorld is that if you ever have a chance to go there be sure to arrive the moment it opens so you can witness the amazing songs of the White Cheeked Gibbons. The wildest thing I've ever heard. JungleWorld is of course not just about birds but there are eighty birds living there right now and while the building seems segmented off to mammals the building has one enormous glass roof and treetop dwellers can go just about anywhere they please. The birds in JungleWorld often fly for long distances and often do flybys on the humans. Think of Tom Cruise buzzing the tower in "Top Gun."
In the three photos above, first a Masked Lapwing is hardly suffering from that caged in feeling. Then a Painted Stork has flown down from the colony of enormous nest to find a few goodies. In the third photo Java Whistling Ducks get their feet wet by the waterfall. With all of that freedom, taking photos of the birds is challenging but sometimes they come close. An Azure-winged Magpie foraging the forest floor below the Banyan trees.
I should mention that birds and not the only creatures hanging out with wings in JungleWorld, the India Fruit Bats are just overhead.
Sometimes a bird is also right overhead on the walkways, a Victoria Crowned Pigeon hanging with the people.
But usually they are way off in the distance, a Raja Shelduck taking a bath while another and two Mandarin Ducks watch.
I wonder if Mandarin Ducks are conceited.
To keep the humidity up to jungle levels misters spray regularly and if you are lucky a family of Pied Imperial Pigeon come out to enjoy the spray.
Check out the wing on these gorgeous communal fruit eating pigeons that can usually be found in mangrove swamps and coconut groves.
Then there is the Comb Duck.
The Comb Duck is the largest of all living ducks and was given its name because of the large grey knob, or comb, that grows above the male's bill. Below is a female just after enjoying a shower in the waterfall.
I've never actually heard any whistling from the Java Whistling Duck but they are cute.
And finally the Raja Shelduck sees all.
Now it is time to end this story and I'm sad to say that in bringing it up to the present day I must close it on an extremely sour note. I'm not going to make light of this story of public land theft and I really can't understand why just about every other New Yorker is not up in arms over taking Cope Lake away from the public. Perhaps they just don't know. I should tell you what Cope Lake is before explaining how we the people lost it. It is a large beautiful lake on Bronx Zoo property. For about one hundred years it was know and loved as Pelican Lake but it was a public lake even before New York deeded 365 acres over to the New York Zoological Society "for the purpose of creating a zoological park." This last photo of that lake I broke the law to take. Criminal trespassing I think would be the proper charge since I scaled a locked fence.
The Black Necked Geese in the photo are strictly for the entertainment of the elite. The way the lake was removed from public view happened after the zoo decided to obliterate the animal displays and replace a forest in that area with administrative offices. Of course, in order to properly administrate, pristine views on all four sides are a necessity. Once the windows of these administrators faced the lake, then the great unwashed masses could no longer be tolerated on that path between administrators and their view. With the value of parkland I honestly think it was wrong to replace a forest with a huge three story office building but that can be tolerated. When the public path between the building and the lake is still existing but they gated it off so they don't need to look at us, I think it safe to say that the Bronx Zoo is now being run by complete assholes. Even if the people in that building who are dressed like Wall Street brokers and Pfizer sales reps really are scientist there are not a lot of public lakes to go around in New York City and nobody should be allowed to take one back. Actually they closed off around fifty acres of zoo for that building. From the Rainy Gate parking lot which was also closed to the public to improve administrative parking all the way to Southern Boulevard in now off limits. After some public pressure to give the land back to the people, last summer they turned some of the gated off section into an ersatz Jurassic Park. Let me remind you that around one hundred and fifteen years ago the city deeded the land over "for the purpose of creating a zoological park" and closing off parkland year round to charge parents extra during summer so their kids can see rubber dinosaurs sort of makes John Hammond look good. That lake and that stolen land has been a part of my life for all of my life. Once it was a beautiful nature path, the lake filled with pelicans and indigenous birds with beautiful New York City forest to your back. I remember when the deserted island in that photo was Gibbon Island and that morning call of the white cheeked Gibbon that I'm so fond of could be heard as far away as the New York Botanical Garden and Fordham University. The gibbons on that small island were extremely popular with children of all ages. I remember witnessing a hue pelican finding out that he was no match for a little mama Mallard after swallowing just one little duckling. The Mallard got her baby back. Further down the lakeside path emus and ostriches populated the other side of the lake with much information about how the two species explained convergent evolution. Now those birds live in a Guantanamo Bay like setting that is also closed to the public. Before the Administrative Building that poses as a science campus, the once beloved path used to also lead to the Rare Animal Range, another part of the zoo that has been discontinued. Before that it was an old growth forest path filled with huge mammals that connected the Rainey Gate to the far more popular but now closed entrance on the corner of Fordham Road and Southern Boulevard. "Do Not Enter." After all my years of loving the zoo I sometimes ask myself "Is it really the zoo's fault?" I mean look at the timeline. Back when this story began the nation was fighting a war on poverty. Today there is a war on the poor. When all three of the buildings were build there was two free days underwritten by the city of New York. Now there is only one free day for the poor and an extra fee for most of the best places. For the last twelve budget wars with Michael Bloomberg he said over and over "If you just discontinue the free day you won't need city funding." The Zoo is fighting for survival and the loss of that lake might be a case of trickle down stupidity. Perhaps the loss of that beautiful lake is a sign of the times but still I want it back. It all seems so Koyaanisqatsi to me. Sorry for the unhappy ending and the state of things in the present day. Let me take you back to 1986 and the last sign you see when you leave JungleWorld.
Sign of these times?