Lion Country Safari

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Lion Country Safari
Date opened 1967
Location Loxahatchee, Florida, USA
Accreditations/
Memberships		 AZA
Website

Lion Country Safari is a drive-through safari park located in Loxahatchee (near Wellington), in Palm Beach County, Florida. Founded in 1967, it claims to be the first 'cageless zoo' in the United States.

Contents

[edit] Background

Lion Country Safari was founded in 1967 by a group of South African and British entrepreneurs who wished to provide a safari experience for families who would not normally be able to experience it. The park originally exhibited only lions.

The first park, in South Florida, is the only Lion Country Safari still in operation. At one time there were parks in Irvine, California (1970-1984); Grand Prairie, Texas (1971-1992); Stockbridge, Georgia, and Ohio.

[edit] Exhibits

The original park in Florida consists of over 1,000 animals, kept in large fenced areas with approximately 5 miles of paved roadway running throughout.

Visitors who purchase a ticket enter the park in their own vehicle, driving slowly at their own pace, and view the animals while listening to a recorded narration on audiotape or CD. Some animals, such as giraffe, rhinoceros, and zebra are allowed to roam freely, even crossing the road in front of vehicles. Others, such as lions or chimpanzees, are segregated behind fences or water barriers.

Visitors are warned to drive slowly and carefully, to avoid stopping too close to animals, and not to open their car doors or windows. The lions, whose ability to roam freely with cars was one of the parks original attractions, were separated from visitors by a fence around the road in 2005, due to visitors ignoring warnings and opening their car doors.

A unique aspect of Lion Country Safari is the chimpanzee exhibit. The chimps live on an island system where they move to a different island every day, replicating their natural nomadic lifestyle. The chimps live in complex social groups, as they would in the wild. Because of this, Lion Country Safari has been useful to those interested in behavioral studies of chimps. As of 2006, chimpanzees living at Lion Country Safari include "Little Mama", one of the oldest chimpanzees in captivity, born in 1938. Lion Country Safari also serves as a retirement facility for chimpanzees who were once used in research laboratories and entertainment.

After visitors have driven through the park, they can visit Safari World, a theme park with some zoo exhibits, and amusement park fare such as a ferris wheel, a petting zoo, and a small water park. There is also a giraffe-feeding exhibit.

A partial list of animals exhibited at Lion Country Safari in 2006 include:

[edit] Cultural references

  • Lion Country Safari plays a major role in Frederick Buechner's novel Lion Country.
  • The park was referenced in a Simpsons episode when the family takes a trip to Discount Lion Safari.

[edit] Other parks bearing the Lion Country Safari name

[edit] Irvine, California

Another drive-through zoo known as Lion Country Safari existed in Irvine, California until 1984. Lion Country was founded and headed up by South African CEO Harry Shuster of United Leisure in 1968 and the first park opened in Florida in 1969. The second park in California opened in June 1970. In 1982, two years prior to closing the park, United Leisure opened a summer day camp, Camp Frasier to hopefully help offset the effects of low attendance. Meanwhile there was still no budget for maintaining the park and its deteriorating attractions meant the park's future was doomed. In 1984 with dwindled attendance and decrepit conditions the park closed. In 1982, During the final years of the park, a long bitter battle began between Shuster and the Irvine Company where the Irvine Company decided to renegotiate the 28 year lease on the land (which began in 1968) and try to take back control as nearby property values increased and the park was proving to be a financial liability. Harry Shuster then became involved in a bitter and excruciating legal battle until 1997 when they finally reached a settlement. During the ongoing legal battle Shuster threatened to 'tear it all down' -- including Irvine Meadows (built on a sublease agreement with U.L., now Verizon Wireless Amphitheater), Wild Rivers, and the day camp. His reasoning was, "I built all this on a firm 28 year lease agreement, why should the Irvine Company be allowed to take it from me just because they want it back?". A portion of the park's entertainment area was converted into the current water park Wild Rivers in 1986-87. The remaining portion of the park was left as Camp Frasier which continued until the early 90's when it became Camp James. During the Years of Camp Frasier the drive through reserve was used for horseback riding, archery, ATC, ATV riding and hiking. Lion Country was originally in the city limits of Laguna Hills.

An amazing event occurred at Lion Country Safari, when an aging circus lion from Mexico, who was ill, was given to the Irvine facility, where one day, he had sired a litter of lion cubs, being the result of having several lionesses, who had hunted for the lazy lion. His name was "Frazier the Sensuous Lion" who became the rage, drawing huge visitors to the site.[1] In 1973 Lion Country tried to capatilaize on their new star and a movie was made called "Frasier the Sensuous Lion". T-shirts, watches, and other souvenirs were sold featuring Frazier all over, until 1974, when he died and was buried on the grounds of the Safari. Attendance went down, and negative incidents occurred at the Safari Park. An escaped elephant killed a motorist on the 405 freeway and had to be euthanized. When a hippo named Bubbles was loose for 19 days, the hippo was shot with a tranquilizer, rolled into the water of a resevoir behind the park's rolling hills and drowned. A necropsy revealed Bubbles was pregnant. Also, several lions had killed the hoofed animals and had to be quarantined from the rest of the animals in a fenced section of the park. Monkeys reportedly ripped the rubber bumper striping off car doors and jumped on hoods. Insurance claims sky-rocketed. As of May 2008, the Irvine Company still hasn't done anything with the land except re-grade what was once the Drive-Through Preserve and designate portions for nurseries to store plants and large specimen trees (presumably for use in the great park to be built on the site of the old El Toro Marine Base). Harry Shuster also founded the 'Loves' restaurant chain.

[edit] Richmond, Virginia

Kings Dominion, located in the town of Doswell, Virginia (just north of Richmond), operated a similar attraction called Lion Country Safari from the park's opening in 1975 through the fall of 1993.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ "5: Best Thing Not There Anymore", Orange County Weekly, October 19, 2000. Retrieved on 2008-05-05. 

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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Zoos of Florida
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Zoos, aquaria and aviaries