DINOSAURS AND MORE at the Calgary Zoo, Alberta, Canada

Dinosaur at the Calgary Zoo with the skyline of the city in the distance.

How many zoos have both real wild animals AND dinosaurs? Not very many. But at the Wilder Calgary Zoo and Prehistoric Park in Canada you can not only see giraffes and hippos and a host of other wild animals, but also models of life-size dinosaurs lurking among the trees and bushes, just as they might have been in real life millions of years ago.

Like the sauropods of dinosaur times, giraffes use their long necks to reach their food.

On an overcast/occasionally rainy day in May, I visited the Calgary Zoo, dodging the raindrops along with groups of school children on class visits to see the animals. The zoo straddles the Bow River, with the Canadian Wilds (closed on the day of my visit) and Dinosaur Park sections on the same side as the entrance and parking area, and, on the other side of the pedestrian bridge, Destination Africa, the Dorothy Harvie Gardens, and Exploration Asia. All exhibits have both inside and outside viewing areas, making the zoo accessible in winter and on rainy days.

A wild Canada goose takes a stroll in the rain through the Calgary Zoo.

After buying my ticket, my first stop was at the Penguin Plunge where I watched penguins cavorting in their outdoor pool, perfectly at home on the cool, wet day. I then proceeded to Destination Africa to see the giraffes, hippos, porcupines, zebras, giraffes, ostriches and other African wildlife. 

Close-up encounter with a hippo in Destination Africa.

A group of children were clustered around the viewing window of the hippo tank, delighted by a young hippo who was just inches away.

Gorilla feet--note the black toenails!

While the enclosures give the animals plenty of personal space, they also allow visitors the occasional closeup encounter (on the other side of the glass.) One of the gorillas had chosen to nap so close to the window that you could see the details of its toes and fingers.

Lily pond in the conservatory.

By the time I got to the Dorothy Harvie Gardens, the rain was pouring down, so it was the ideal time to go inside and visit the conservatory. 

Swallowtail butterfly and chrysalis.

I n the same building I then went to the butterfly enclosure, where I watched a beautiful butterfly just emerging from its chrysalis.

Cryodrakon (wingspan 33 feet)

When the rain let up, I went back outside and followed the path to the Asian animals (gibbons, tapirs, a Bactrian camel and more) and then across a suspension bridge to the Prehistoric Park, where I was greeted by a giant pterosaur, whose wingspan in real life would have been the size of a small airplane. 

This dinosaur, whose name means "royal horned face" lived in Alberta 68-67 million years ago.

Dozens of dinosaurs line the paths through this part of the zoo, all with helpful signs and painted in bright patterns and colors. 

Corythosaurus grew to be 30 feet long.

We don’t yet know what color most dinosaurs were, but it is likely that their colors varied just like they do on the skin of lizards or the feathers of birds today.

Close, but of reach!

At the end of my visit I had a sandwich and cocoa in the zoo café near the entrance. The cafe is part of an extensive gift shop.  I enjoyed seeing all the animals at the Calgary Zoo, but what is truly unique about the zoo are the dinosaurs. With a little imagination one feels transported in time to millions of years ago when dinosaurs were alive.  

Getting there:

The zoo was a short taxi ride from my downtown hotel, but I could have taken the train. (There is a stop right at the zoo entrance.) I asked for a zoo map at the ticket window but found out that the zoo no longer provides paper maps. You can download a zoo map to your phone, or, as I did, refer to the large map signs posted at strategic spots around the zoo.

African porcupines.

 

 

A TRIP THROUGH TIME: HOODOOS AND FOSSILS in the Badlands of Alberta Canada

Hoodoos, near Drumheller, Alberta, Canada

Over the eons the Red Deer River has cut a valley into the Alberta plains in Western Canada, revealing layers of rock going back to dinosaur times. Wind and rain have carved some of these rocks into giant mushroom shapes called hoodoos when the upper layer of rock erodes more slowly than the layer beneath. 

Stairways lead to viewing platforms for the hoodoos.

In early May, my husband Art and I visited Alberta, getting a close look at some of the hoodoos and taking a self-guided geology walk near the Royal Tyrell Museum in Drumheller.

Alberta wheat fields.

To get to Drumheller we drove an hour and a half from Calgary across the Alberta wheat fields—an endless vista of golden plains dotted with the occasional silo or homestead. Then suddenly, just before arriving at the town of Drumheller, the road plunged down into the Red Deer River valley, almost as if the earth had suddenly cracked open to show us the history of its insides.

Each layer of rock is a story from the past. White sandstone was once sand at the bottom of a river. Grey-brown layers were once silt and mud. Black is coal, formed by the remains of plants. Chemical reactions in the buried sediments form the dark iron-stones.

The Red Deer River Valley was formed by floodwaters from melting glaciers during the last Ice Age, 10,000 to 15,000 years ago, and it has been eroding ever since.

Signs with history of the area are posted throughout the valley.

The black layers of the rock walls are coal. The coal mines that once drew people to this valley are no longer operating. Other layers are filled with dinosaur bones and other fossils of the Dinosaur Age. The fossil discoveries in Alberta have been spectacular and many are on display at the Royal Tyrell Museum in Drumheller. (The museum will be the subject of another blogpost.) 

A map of the trail and location of interpretive signs.

But just outside the museum is the Badlands Interpretive Trail, a one-kilometer loop walk that provides a close look at the local geology and information about the area--a good introduction or follow-up to visiting the museum.

Crocuses blooming along the trail are a sign of spring.

The climate of the Red Deer River in the late Cretaceous, 72 million years ago, was warm and moist, like Florida today. Today, the valley is seasonally warm and semi-arid. On the day we visited, in late May, the weather was cool and overcast, ideal for taking a walk.

Along the trail numbered signs explained what we were seeing.

These small boulders made of igneous rock were brought from elsewhere and dropped by a melting glacier.

Hoodoos like these on the museum trail are found throughout the badlands.

This fossilized tree stump from a giant redwood was part of a forest that once grew here.

Most of Alberta’s dinosaur remains are found in the Badlands and river valleys where Cretaceous-aged sediments are exposed. Today, wind, rainfall, and snow melt continue to erode the badlands, exposing more fossils with each passing season. We did not see any fossil remains on our walk, but we could imagine what the Earth was like millions of years ago when dinosaurs made Alberta their home.

Walking the dinosaur trail.