 Tropical Aviary and Nocturnal House
At the entrance, you'll see orchids, those denizens of shady places--lady's slipper, small-blossomed twayblade, rattlesnake plantain, vanilla.
As you enter, the effect is that of climbing along a shaded mountain stream in a tropical rain forest. The roof is thirty feet overhead, obscured by greenery, and birds flutter freely from brance to branch, past your nose and over your head--hummingbirds and bee-eaters and sunbirds and jewel thrushes and brightly-colored swift-moving birds of all kinds.
And then--a cave. You enter and discover the cave walls are windows into the sea where aquatic life of the Santa Barbara coast can be seen.
Go deeper into the cave and you find a dim and dark area where creatures of the night scurry in their dens. Nocturnal animals sleep during the day and emerge at night to feed and play. We've reversed the lighting in the Nocturnal House so that you can view their activity. At night we turn on the lights, and the night monkeys and bushbabies and rat kangaroos yawn and climb into their nests. In the morning before visitors arrive we turn the lights off, and the animals awaken and begin to prowl the five separate environments: brush-tailed phalangers from the open woodlands of Australia, ground pangolins from the forest of East Africa, agouti from the Amazon basin, striped skunk and pine marten from the North American coniferous forest, Pallas cats from the Himalayas...
The foundations, the walls, the floors of this complex are finished and awaiting a roof and the interior construction. Delicate species from tropical and subtropical climates require heated quarters during winter and demand intensive care. Completion of this exhibit is high on our priority list when funding becomes available.
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