Top 10 Iconic Zoo Animals

The Top Ten
1 Goat The goat or domestic goat (Capra hircus) is a domesticated species of goat-antelope typically kept as livestock. It was domesticated from the wild goat (C. aegagrus) of Southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the animal family Bovidae and the tribe Caprini, meaning it is closely related to the sheep. There are over 300 distinct breeds of goat. It is one of the oldest domesticated species of animal, according to archaeological evidence that its earliest domestication occurred in Iran at 10,000 calibrated calendar years ago.

Goat-herding is an ancient tradition that is still important in places such as Egypt. ...read more.

No visit to the zoo is complete without petting a fuzzy goat.

2 Lion The lion (Panthera leo) is a large cat of the genus Panthera native to Africa and India. It has a muscular, broad-chested body, short, rounded head, round ears, and a hairy tuft at the end of its tail. It is sexually dimorphic; adult male lions are larger than females and have a prominent mane. It is ...read more.

I like lions. They're cute, playful, feisty, strong, brave and wise. Even though they could be dangerous.

King of the savannah

King of the jungle

3 Elephant Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae and the order Proboscidea, extinct relatives include mammoths and mastodons. Distinctive features of elephants include a long proboscis called a trunk, tusks, large ear flaps, pillar-like legs, and tough but sensitive skin. The trunk is used for breathing, bringing food and water to the mouth, and grasping objects. Tusks, which are derived from the incisor teeth, serve both as weapons and as tools for moving objects and digging. The large ear flaps assist in ...read more.

Elephants are obviously the most iconic. When people think about zoo animals they think elephants before lions and way before penguins and zebras!

Queen of the savannah

4 Giraffe The giraffe is a tall African hoofed mammal belonging to the genus Giraffa. It is the tallest living terrestrial animal and the largest ruminant- hoofed herbivorous- on Earth. Traditionally, giraffes were thought to be one species, Giraffa camelopardalis, with nine subspecies. Most recently, researchers ...read more.
5 Zebra Zebras (subgenus Hippotigris) are African equines with distinctive black-and-white striped coats. There are three living species: the Grévy's zebra (Equus grevyi), plains zebra (E. quagga), and the mountain zebra (E. zebra). Zebras share the genus Equus with horses and asses, the three groups being ...read more.
6 Penguin Penguins (order Sphenisciforme, family Spheniscid) are a group of aquatic flightless birds. They live almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere: only one species, the Galápagos penguin, is found north of the Equator. Highly adapted for life in the water, penguins have countershaded dark and white ...read more.
7 Monkey Monkeys are haplorhine primates, a paraphyletic group generally possessing tails and consisting of approximately 260 known living species.
8 Tiger The tiger (Panthera tigris) is the largest living cat species and a member of the genus Panthera. It is most recognisable for its dark vertical stripes on orange fur with a white underside. An apex predator, it primarily preys on ungulates such as deer and wild boar. It is territorial and generally a solitary but social predator, requiring large contiguous areas of habitat, which support its requirements for prey and rearing of its offspring. Tiger cubs stay with their mother for about two years, then become independent and leave their mother's home range to establish their own. ...read more.

Tigers are the best animals.

Tiger should be first

King of the jungle

9 Mountain Goat
10 Gorilla Gorillas are herbivorous, predominantly ground-dwelling great apes that inhabit the tropical forests of equatorial Africa. The genus Gorilla is divided into two species: the eastern gorilla and the western gorilla, and either four or five subspecies. The DNA of gorillas is highly similar to that of ...read more.
The Contenders
11 Dolphin A dolphin is an aquatic mammal within the infraorder Cetacea. Dolphin species belong to the families Delphinidae (the oceanic dolphins), Platanistidae (the Indian river dolphins), Iniidae (the New World river dolphins), Pontoporiidae (the brackish dolphins), and the extinct Lipotidae (baiji or Chinese river dolphin). There are 40 extant species named as dolphins. ...read more.

Especially when they do all the tricks and stuff.

Dolphins are cute

12 Polar Bear The polar bear is a carnivorous bear whose native range lies largely within the Arctic Circle, encompassing the Arctic Ocean, its surrounding seas and surrounding land masses.

King of the arctic

13 Chimpanzee Chimpanzees are primates of the genus Pan which consists of the common chimpanzee and the bonobo. They are a part of the tribe Hominini, which also includes humans, and the family Hominidae where all great apes are included. Like their closest living relatives the modern humans, chimpanzees are social ...read more.
14 Panda The giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca), also known as the panda bear (or simply the panda), is a bear species endemic to China. ...read more.
15 Hippopotamus The common hippopotamus, or hippo, is a large, mostly herbivorous mammal in sub-Saharan Africa, and one of only two extant species in the family Hippopotamidae, the other being the pygmy hippopotamus.
16 Lemur Lemurs are a clade of strepsirrhine primates endemic to the island of Madagascar. The word "lemur" derives from the word lemures (ghosts or spirits) from Roman mythology and was first used to describe a slender loris due to its nocturnal habits and slow pace, but was later applied to the primates on ...read more.
17 Crocodile Crocodiles (family Crocodylidae) or true crocodiles are large semiaquatic reptiles that live throughout the tropics in Africa, Asia, the Americas and Australia. The term crocodile is sometimes used even more loosely to include all extant members of the order Crocodilia, which includes the alligators ...read more.

King of the wetlands

18 Alligator An alligator is a crocodilian in the genus Alligator of the family Alligatoridae. The two living species are the American alligator and the Chinese alligator. Additionally, several extinct species of alligator are known from fossil remains. Alligators have long existed since the Oligocene epoch 37 million ...read more.
19 Orangutan Orangutans are great apes native to the rainforests of Indonesia and Malaysia. They are now found only in parts of Borneo and Sumatra, but during the Pleistocene they ranged throughout Southeast Asia and South China. Classified in the genus Pongo, orangutans were originally considered to be one species. ...read more.
20 Kangaroo The kangaroo is a marsupial from the family Macropodidae. In common use the term is used to describe the largest species from this family, especially those of the genus Macropus: the red kangaroo, antilopine kangaroo, eastern grey kangaroo, and western grey kangaroo.
21 Bear Bears are carnivoran mammals of the family Ursidae. They are classified as caniforms, or doglike carnivorans. Although only eight species of bears are extant, they are widespread, appearing in a wide variety of habitats throughout the Northern Hemisphere and partially in the Southern Hemisphere. Bears ...read more.
22 Red Panda The red panda (Ailurus fulgens), or also known as the red bear-cat or the red cat-bear, is a mammal native to the Eastern Himalayas and Southwestern China. It's the only animal that belongs to the Aliuridae family. Despite having the word "panda" in its name, it's not a panda. It's closely related to raccoons, weasels, and skunks as they all belong to the musteloidea superfamily.
23 Wolf The wolf (Canis lupus), also known as the gray or grey wolf, is a large canine native to Eurasia and North America. Over thirty subspecies of Canis lupus have been recognized, with gray wolves comprising the wild subspecies. As the largest extant member of the Canidae family, the wolf is distinguished... read more
24 Snake Snakes are elongated, limbless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes. Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more joints than their lizard ancestors, enabling them to swallow prey ...read more.
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