The animals await no picture-taking freak

I won't be posting until the end of next week, as tomorrow morning, bright and early (or as the case may be, not-so-bright because it'll be just *that* early), we're going out to the Midwest to visit Book's family. But never fear, I should be returning with loads of (read: several hundred) pictures like these to share with you all:

Well, hopefully some of the ones I bring back this time will be a tad more interesting. These are the new exhibits at the local zoo, and the animals I'm really hoping to get a good look at:

Keep your fingers crossed for me!

In general I'm quite conflicted about zoos. They can be truly depressing places to visit, and it's hard for me to imagine that it's better for an animal to be in a zoo than in the wild. It's hard for me to imagine because it really isn't better. But since we as a species are doing an awful job protecting the habitats of other species, I think zoos are the lesser of two evils as long as:

1. The animals are given plenty of space
2. Their space is a good representation of their natural habitat
3. The animals are kept as wild as possible (to enable #5)
   
4. The zoo does what it can to propagate endangered species
5. Once the animal's natural habitat has been protected and restored, the zoo actively participates in releases to the wild (see #3)
6. The zoo focuses on educating the next generation of policy makers so that they will enable #5

I'll see you all next week.