Zoo Atlanta Launches Campaign to Keep Giant Pandas in Atlanta

Zoo officials announced the launch of Give So They Stay, a major fundraising effort to keep giant pandas in Atlanta. President & CEO Dennis Kelly made the announcement this morning from inside an empty giant panda habitat in the Zoo’s Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation Giant Panda Conservation Center.

“Giant pandas have been an important part of Zoo Atlanta’s collection and a source of Atlanta pride for 10 years, and we are a national leader in the care and study of this species,” said Kelly. “Without significant support from our community, our giant panda family will have to return to China in the near future.”

Zoo Atlanta is one of only four zoos in the U.S. currently housing the critically endangered species, of which fewer than 1,600 are believed to remain in the wild. The Zoo’s adult giant pandas, Lun Lun and Yang Yang, arrived from China in November 1999 on a 10-year loan, achieving instant celebrity as two of Atlanta’s most recognized animal stars. The pair’s offspring, Mei Lan, 2, and Xi Lan, 9 months, were the only giant panda cubs born in the U.S. in 2006 and 2008.

The Give So They Stay campaign is focused on ensuring that Lun Lun, Yang Yang and Xi Lan continue to have a home in Atlanta, where they have become beloved by thousands of friends and fans around the world. Mei Lan, who turns 3 on September 6, has already been recommended to return China, where she will be a new and important contributor to the global captive population of giant pandas.

Friends of Zoo Atlanta’s giant pandas are encouraged to visit a new campaign website, www.givesotheystay.org, for program information, support vehicles and answers to frequently asked questions. The Give So They Stay effort will continue through December 31, 2009.

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Zoo Atlanta Debuts New Parakeet Adventure

The parakeets have landed, and today, Zoo Atlanta’s Boundless Budgies:
A Parakeet Adventure opened with an official ribbon-cutting.

Long renowned for showcasing wildlife in naturalistic settings, Zoo Atlanta
raises wild encounters to new heights with the debut of a 2,200 square-foot aviary,
home to more than 500 parakeets (also known as budgies). The Boundless Budgies are
free to fly, roam, and forage throughout their new habitat. Guests will have the
opportunity to hand-feed the parakeets with specially-made seed sticks, encouraging
up-close-and-personal interactions unlike any other ever offered in Zoo Atlanta’s 120-
year history.

“It’s always exciting when a new exhibit opens at Zoo Atlanta, however what makes this
experience so special is its interactive nature,” said Dennis Kelly, President and CEO.
“We are proud to bring citizens of Atlanta the largest aviary in the Southeast.”

Representing one of numerous subspecies of parakeets, budgerigars, or “budgies” as
they’re familiarly known, are often seen in flocks numbering in the thousands in their
native Australia. Gregarious and highly active during daylight hours, the birds roost in
trees but are equally comfortable on the ground. Their outgoing nature and
perpetually busy behavior also adds a visually stunning component to the aviary, which
also features lush landscape work, pools and brooks.

The product of over a year of construction and design, the aviary is
the largest of its kind in the Southeast and one of the largest in the U.S.

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Zoo Atlanta Celebrates 120 Years

It’s been 120 years since the circus came to town – and never left.

Zoo Atlanta celebrated its 120th birthday on March 28, 2009, recalling the date
when one visionary entrepreneur backed the beginnings of one of
Georgia’s most beloved attractions.

In March 1889, a traveling circus – Colonel G.W. Hall’s Railroad Show
Bingley’s Monster European Menagerie, by name – went bankrupt just
south of Atlanta. Disgruntled circus employees deserted the show, leaving
a ragtag collection of caged wildlife behind. The homeless motley crew,
which included a jaguar, a hyena, a black bear, a raccoon and several
lionesses, pumas, camels and snakes, had already drawn scores of
curious Victorian gawkers by the time it was announced that the erstwhile
circus stars would be placed at public auction.

On March 28, 1889, businessman George Valentine Gress purchased the entire
collection, donating the wildlife to the city of Atlanta. One of only 13 zoos in the
U.S. at the time, the Gress Zoological Gardens opened that April, with Grant Park
streetcars straining to accommodate an opening weekend attendance of nearly
12,000.

Now home to more than 1,300 mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians
and the locus of numerous international conservation programs, Zoo Atlanta remains
one of the top 10 oldest zoos in continuous operation in America. “Reaching this
milestone is exciting especially as we embark on an amazing 20 year master plan that will
transform and take Zoo Atlanta into the next 120 years,” said Zoo Atlanta President and
CEO Dennis Kelly.

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Making Aquariums and Museums More Accessible

Georgia Tech researchers are using music to aid the visually impaired in understanding the movements and displays featured in aquariums, zoos, museums and other dynamic facilities.

The research is using technology that tracks movements; in the case of an aquarium, it tracks the fish and interprets the movements into music and automated commentaries and narrations.

“We have three main components to this research,” said Bruce Walker, associate professor in the School of Psychology and the School of Interactive Computing at Georgia Tech. “The first is tracking the animals, the second is interpreting it into music and the third is making a seamless and interactive human experience.”

According to Walker, there are several challenges associated with these research goals.

“It is challenging to automatically track animals when they go behind rocks or venture to other parts of the environment,” said Walker. “The music and narration also pose a challenge because we need to make sure that it is pleasant and interesting, but also communicates what’s happening in the exhibit. Our final challenge comes in trying to coordinate all of this technology into a seamless, real-time experience for the aquarium visitor.”

Walker is leading an interdisciplinary team to put the pieces of this research puzzle together. Gil Weinberg, director of the Georgia Tech Center for Music Technology, is focusing on the interpretation of movements into music. Tucker Balch, in the School of Interactive Computing, is leveraging his expertise on tracking the movements of animals. Researchers Carrie Bruce and Jon Sanford of the Georgia Tech Center for Assistive Technology and Environmental Access (CATEA) are working to evaluate the effectiveness of the resulting multimodal exhibit. The Tech team is also collaborating with the Atlanta Center for the Visually Impaired (CVI), and with staff at local zoos and aquariums.

Walker says that tracking moving objects and then communicating the dynamics to someone who cannot look at, or cannot see, the actual moving items has broad application in biological research, entertainment and sports, and tactical situations.

The technology is still in the research stage, but Walker and his colleagues are excited about the potential of opening up a whole world of new experiences for aquarium and zoo visitors who have vision impairments. Walker says, “There are lots of possibilities. We chose to begin by making exhibits more accessible to people with low vision. We’ll see where this leads after that.”

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