Visitors to an off-the-wall Melbourne zoo can hand-feed the giraffes at eye level from a boardwalk. Or they can rent a kayak and paddle around an island of free-roaming rhinos and five types of antelope.
"One of our board members said we had too many boardwalks and should try something different," said Margo McKnight, director of the tiny Brevard Zoo. "He facetiously mentioned kayaks. I took him seriously."
The zoo's 10-acre Expedition Africa opens July 4 with more than 60 animals roaming a landscaped 10-acre island. McKnight sunk a rhino-barrier in the moat so kayakers have an unobstructed view.
"It's impossible to kayak over the barrier," she said. "But the state required we have one steel cable at the water line just to be sure."
Such creativity is common at this little zoo that refuses to act small.
Built on donated land, the zoo has been constructed mostly with donated materials and labor. With only 475 animals, it's the only "community-built" zoo accredited by the American Zoo and Aquarium Association. Yet it acts big enough to contribute staff and money to animal research and conservation programs in the Congo.
Eight staff members are Busch Gardens alumni recruited by McKnight, an 18-year veteran of the Tampa park. She also enlisted Tampa artist Lynn Ash and some crafts people who worked on Disney's Animal Kingdom.
The new habitat is the 72-acre zoo's largest. The Brevard County Commission provided $2.5-million in hotel tax money. Local business and volunteers contributed $2.5-million in materials and labor. About 250 volunteers waded into chest-deep water to lay 10,000 feet of steel cable and set 200 poles for the rhino barrier. Another 200 sawed and hammered to erect the animal barn.
"Without volunteers and sponsors we would not have a zoo," said McKnight, 34, taking a break from scrubbing decorative stain into a sidewalk.
