Birmingham Zoo

Can you believe I have lived in Birmingham for over 4 years, and I haven't been to the zoo yet?? It is about 3 miles up the road from my house. A couple of weekends ago, it was $5 day, so I took full advantage. 

This nut came along with me!

We went to the petting zoo first. There were some lovely smelling goats.

a butterfly house.

and this chicken wing clucking around. Aren't his feathers lovely??

One of my favorites was the mini horse (maybe I watched too much Rob and Big, but I love a mini horse). He was on the outside of his stall (of course) so the pics are through the door. He laid down on his back and rolled around like a dog. Hilarious!

Then he gave me a glamour shot. 

And another horsing around pose. 

UHHH, Cotton and Diesel, is that you?!?!? 

Here are my pups, Cotton and Diesel, for you to see how goat-like they are. Gah, especially you, D-man. 

Turk turks and their babies. 

Next up, we went to Africa!

A giant tortoise. 

And my favorite..

the tiger! 

RAWR!!!

I was clearly super excited. 

So pretty. 

Next up was the lions.

Simba gave us his best side. 

This painted dog was awesome looking. 

And I am super jealous of this hog's ear hair. I couldn't stop singing Lion King songs in my head at this point..

"When I was a young wart hog! (bum bum) When he was a yooooung waaaaart hoooooooog!"

One of the only fur patterns cooler than tiger stripes is giraffe spots. 

The Bham Zoo has a big monkey/ape section. I loved this little guy's hairdo. 

Murray's favorite was the gorilla. 

When we got to the viewing area, he wasn't in there, but after a few minutes he was released (I think they were cleaning his cage). 

Donkey Kong with his barrel. 

HAHA! Murray is very sweet to appease my pose requests! 

me-- "OMG, PUH-LEASEEE GO POSE BY THAT ORANGUTAN!"

In this area, there is a mama and baby orangutan. 

How cute! 

"OMG, YOU'VE GOT TO STAND WITH THE DUNG BEETLE!!!"

Am I annoying or what?!

The rhinos were eating by the time we made it back to their area. 

"RHINO POSE!" 

After not showing her (his?) face all day, the elephant finally came out to say hello.

After the Africa part, we went over to the birds and reptiles. 

There was a part with sea lions, but they weren't doing any tricks when we were there. 

Toucan!

CAAHHH! 

That's a hawk call for those who don't know. 

The very dormant, yet HUGE alligator

More birds. 

There were a couple of reptile rooms with big lizards

and snakes. EEK! 

I named this the capri pants bird. The picture isn't that great, but you can see the tops of its legs are black with feathers and the bottom are yellow-ish. These nugs ran around and all I could think was: soccer mom! or skinny girls that run around my neighborhood! haha 

More flamingos! 

And another lizard.

We walked around the birds for a while trying to find an eagle, but we found out that it was in a different section of the zoo. BOO! The zoo was closing shortly after we finished the bird and reptile section. All in all, I liked it! I would definitely go back! 

So I brought this up as we were walking around..

If the animals that coordinated with their respective SEC teams foreshadowed the football season to come, here is what we have to expect: 

UF gator just laid there.

Arkansas hogs stunk up the joint. 

UA elephant didn't show up until the end.

The tiger was the most active/awesome of the whole group. 

The trouble with decoding this is that there are three tiger teams now. I'm gonna say he represents Auburn. Wishful thinking?!?