User Reviews

I watched this one day because there wasn't anything else on and I was bored. I couldn't get over how bonded one of the flamingoes was to one of the female staff. I always thought flamingoes were boring and didn't have much for personalities until then. My experience with them in person (on the rare occasion that I've been in a warm place that had them on display) was that they just mostly stand around on one leg shaking their feathers every once in a while. But this one on the program had imprinted on and went nuts over this woman and it was pretty funny to watch.

This program shows a lot of detail about how the handlers in the zoo and conservation park deal with the animals, the objectives of the animals being there, why they do things the way they do, etc. It's very informative and the people are fairly likeable. I hope there will be more episodes in the future.

This show is so good and the kids learn about animals and the people behind the zoo.

You really get a new appreciation for what goes on at a zoo from watching this show. I almost feel like I'm right the with the animals.

We LOVE this show .wish it had a longer season !! With so much going on it could be on all year !! Love the critters ,the staff ,the zoo !!!

I loved how dedicated the staff was to the care of these animals. Very educational on how they perform procedures and exams. Looking forward to more.

Love this show so much- recommend it to everyone! It's fun and informative. Very cool to see the BTS of what happens at the zoo.

I have been to the Columbus Zoo many times in the 33 years of my life. I would have never imagined what really goes on behind what we as zoo visitors see. The dedication and care the entire staff gives to each and every animal is astounding. To see them get so emotional, really tells you the type of people we have caring for these animals.

The Wilds, about an hour and a half away from the zoo, is another amazing place. What they are doing there is incredible and the hard work and dedication of every staff member shines through. I have been lucky enough to experience The Wilds and I could go back over and over again.

This is such an incredible series and you will immediately get hooked!!!

Scrolling through some TV shows on my TV and saw an elephant in labor then giving birth. That was it...I was totally hooked! While the animals are awesome, the other part that keeps me watching are the staff at the zoo. Their dedication. love and knowledge of all the animals is beyond imagination. Keep this show on the air for years to come so that everyone can love it and learn from it like I do!

My wife started watching this show while I was in the same room reading my book, and while I usually have no problems tuning her shows out, this one dragged me in over and over, until I finally just closed my book and fully invested.

Great people taking care of challenging and unique animals. The level of care that is given to each animal is wonderful to see, and a nice balm for the bad taste left in all our mouths the other recent "zoo" show left us.

This is animal care done right and done with love for the creatures we share it with.

This really is a good show. The staff is delightful and knowledgeable and care about the animals in their care.

My one and only complaint is that this show is 75% about the zoo vets and about all of the health issues and artificial insemination of these animals, with the occasional pregnancy & an animal ambassador thrown in for good measure. While extremely important & interesting, there is so much more going on behind the scenes than just the vet and knocking up animals.

There is very little to nothing on the everyday routines, nutrition, habitat upkeep, enrichment activities, the crazy inner workings of the jobs of the curators, etc. Etc. They could stand to branch out a little.

Watch The Secret Life of the Zoo on the Chester Zoo in the U. K. or The Zoo that shows the Bronx or San Diego. They have broader scopes that might interest viewers who love this show but want more.

Secrets of the Zoo series are all good, but in my opinion the Columbus / Wilds series is so much more personable, likeable, educational, etc. Love the others too, but I really felt like this series also exhibited the professionals in THEIR natural habitats. Each and every one of em doing what they were clearly born to do, and they seem to have quite a bit of freedom to enjoy and excel at it.

I just wanted to learn about the animals, not see surgeries. I'd rather watch the other zoo shows. There is more diversity in the episodes.

Overall, it's not bad, but it could have been much better. I think they need to rename it.

Very informative and interesting if you can get past the annoying women who seem to enjoy hearing themselves talk. Incredibly irritating. Like nails of a chalk board. Aside from that, I do enjoy learning about taking care of these creatures and learning about the vetrinary practices. It looks to be a beautiful place and if I mute it half the time it's good. I'm glad there will be a new season and I'm looking forward to watching more of it. Love animals and love learning about them. It's just hard getting past the silly yammering that goes on incessantly. I've seen other zoo shows that don't seem to have this problem.

Fun, interesting, heart-filled behind the scenes at the zoo.

We enjoyed this so much I have given many similar shows a try since watching this. I find them all fascinating, but this one was also compelling. By that I mean I'd love to visit the Columbus Zoo and the Wilds after watching this show... meet the professionals etc. They make it impossible not to empathize with their animals, plights and travails. For example, we watched the episode with the beautiful white fox over a year ago and will never forget the emotional response we had. Had I watched "The Zoo" first, perhaps I'd be writing different reviews. But after watching a few others we haven't found ourselves hoping to visit the Bronx or Australia or San Diego any more or less, and of all places to feel compelled to visit, I would never have guessed Ohio would be included.

This show is so full of emotions. Tons of information about the many breeds they care for. It can be happy sad or down right heartbreaking. But all in all it's SO important for people to watch this show and praise these people!

I just discovered this and other Zoo programs a few months ago. I love to learn about life behind the scenes and to enjoy the wonderful relationships staff in all kinds of positions have with the animals in their care. The one suggestion I have is that in future episodes (hopefully there will be more) the producers will add the species names and name of animal in print on the screen. I want to learn the names of the species and how they are spelled. It isn't always clear from the speech what they are saying. It is great to list the names and positions of the keepers, but we want to learn more about the animals, including the names and species of the animals.

Maybe it's just my own bias showing but I get the impression that the staff get too emotional about the animals in their care.

The zoo and conservatory appear to have a lot of animals and therefore a lot of work for the staff. I would expect this should make them view a lot of the problems of the animals as somewhat routine and produce a certain measure of detachment in them no matter how much they love animals in general. A bit like the detachment that is common among busy doctors who are good at their jobs.

What I see however, are too many cases of the staff emoting over the animals as if they're their personal pets. To me it comes across as something of a made for TV performance (fake).

Also there's too much focus on sick or problematic animals and not enough display of some of the behind the scenes routines of caring for animals in a zoo.

I just saw the episode with Suzi having a serval jump up in the air for a food reward on the end of a pole. Suzi, this is a zoo... not an entertainment show. You are not helping servals when you do this. You are not helping cheetahs when you walk around with them on a leash (different episode). The message you are giving the viewers is that it is okay to have a serval, or a cheetah, as a pet. It is not. This is not conservation. The show said that the serval in question may have injured its leg jumping for the food reward. Is this animal husbandry? Is this responsible or good for the animals? No, no it isn't. Just. Stop.

The ignorance of the majority of people who work this issue is unbelievable and I tune into watch the cute animals being cared for and time and again I see a bunch of people afflicted with Munchausen by proxy injuring the animals and often killing them for entertainment purposes which is disgusting in itself!

Yes the animals get a 10/10 and so do most of the female caretakers; beyond that there's a lot that is wrong with this show and it is sad that nobody is pointing this out. As we now know since 20/20, vaccines kill and injure people and animals alike; they are unneeded, they are nothing but a hoax that destroy your health and whatever to tell your benefit is a complete and utter lie and there is plenty of documentation to prove this. Beyond this, they are behind the cause of SIDS in infants, and they maim & injure animals for life, and I know this first hand from caring for wildlife, that some people capture and get vaccinated, and then their health goes downhill compared to what unwittingly becomes the control group.

Dr Priya I cannot stand it is clear that she enjoys herself giving countless unneeded procedures to the animals in fact it would appear they are constantly annoying the animals with invasive procedures and surgeries that they do not need. I mean think about it what drama would they film if it's wearing for those dramatic procedures?

I also cannot stand a certain female caretaker who keeps using a screechingly high pitch voice to a baby talk to the animals which is rude and disrespectful towards wildlife and grates on my ear so much so that I either mute or change the channel when she comes on until she is gone

Beyond her, there is a couple of immature males who are much worse than her: they aggressively manhandle and capture animals like ostriches and baby takin, it seems for their own perverted pleasure causing unneeded stress to the mother and calf, while they shoved fingers up the babies nether regions and mouths, and then tag their ear causing neededless pain; but I guess viewers here like to gloss over the insanity and the violence and pretend they're watching a show of people caring for animals that is only 50% accurate; meanwhile animals really suffer! Those two young men have no business working at a zoo I'll take the woman with the annoying screeching voice any day over them.

This show should be about things like when they reunited the baby dhole with its father although that didn't go to well and it ended up injuring his son; And things like feeding time there is not enough showing of animals being fed other than a treat here and there so they comply with positioning to get there disturbing vaccine and other tranq shots. Stop pumping animals full of synthetic chemicals! They do not need it out in the wild and is certainly do not need it in your zoo period.

At least I am glad they are not manufacturing fake romantic or rivalry drama between the caretakers for the sake of a dumb TV show so we'll give them kudos for that.

But!! I tune in to watch a wholesome show free from repulsive graphic 2020s images, yet time and again, the majority of the episode is spent cutting up the animals open and showing close up gore which is there is no need for that, otherwise call this the veterinarian surgery show and get it over with but the majority of people don't want to watch that. I invariably change the channel and then forget to turn back in oh well!

Again they need to be showing more interesting interesting things about the day-to-day life of these animals in captivity interactions between mother and child father and child animal couples and so on and so forth and again feeding time should be more interesting to anybody watching then graphic gore and gore and surgeries.

Props to go to the editor for making an interesting show out of all this and they get a 10/10 rating. Whoever it is that decided to show all these surgeries and animal abuse due to unneeded procedures and separating mother and baby, be it producer or director, gets a zero out of 10. It is very hard for me to rate this; like many I want to give it a 10/10 for animals only and for the good caretakers, but I cannot due to all the pumping animals full of synthetic chemicals that kill them, and time and again almost every episode they say: 'oh we lost her and that's too bad' like the mother of the dhole babies (for those who don't know those are wild dogs from Asia, and endangered at that) and still they are clueless that the anesthesia, the tranquilizers, the vaccines and other synthetic chemicals are building up in their system! This is a natural and end up killing them endangered species and I cannot stand for that. If you are in lunatic fan of vaccines and working a suit and vaccinate yourself up the Wahzoo but leave the animals damhned alone! Stop taking and medication for an illness that you do not have and you live longer and the Animals as well. Refer to that the hearings currently going on suing the stupid c'vid vaccine makers, manufacturers & pushers for millions of deaths, and the powers that be denying that they ever made it mandatory or that the Cvd19 jab was safe and effective; enough said word to the wise and all that.

The guy that works with the penguins, with the effeminate voice, is so annoying to have to listen to.