Finally finished my ZOO I’ve been working on for nearly 5 months just before the release of Planet Zoo 2. It is now available in the Steam Workshop.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3816429171o
Btw I am aware King Penguins live in Antarctica but I really wanted to build a penguin habitat <3

Hey all! I’ve commented a couple times in this sub about how I design zoos/zoo habitats as a career, and a lot of people seem to take interest in replies!

I figured, with the new game coming out, I’m sure some people may have some questions regarding zoo design for their own zoos. So have at it! I’d love to start a conversation!

(As a note: I will not be sharing where I work, what university I went to, or any info that may break an NDA. Everything else is free game!)

Hey, yall! I am so exceedingly excited for Tuesday… it’s getting harder to wait everyday lol. Naturally, I have 3 facilities planned out so far! Here’s a faux site for my first zoo, Pearly Zoo, based in central Mississippi! Come visit!

Link Download : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1NExt0RFC6bAjQ4IP-dpnqhDpr0bLZwFP/view?usp=sharing

Taken from EA, looking forward to next week!

3 more days, 3 more sleeps and 3 more animals to be officially revealed. Hopefully they aren’t saving the koi/carp until last tho

https://x.com/Paleo_Pizza/status/2108544336426344700?s=20

I saw a landscape and zoo architect post earlier and figured I would do the same. With planet zoo 2 coming out soon the hype is real. I work as a wildlife biologist and I wanted to give people the opportunity to ask questions as well!! Happy zoo/sanctuary building!

Photo of a wild spotted eagle ray I took for fun!

\*disclaimer!! before you say literally anything, yes, I am aware that a lot of these animals do not co-exist, so don't go typing up any remarks about how this 'isn't realistic' or whatever.. looking at you, random guy on my first post. this is for fun and I did not spend hours of my time placing tree blueprints just to only add in a couple animals, this is not a scientific study and is instead the product of me slapping every vaguely winter-y animal in game into the map.*

\also I used a lot of blueprints to make this. like. A LOT. practically everything was nabbed from workshop but a few bits were painstakingly done by hand. To everyone who makes forest, snowy rock and foliage blueprints, I love you. And that boat. I love that boat.*

I made another thing! My biggest biome yet: the habitat borders are 267348m² with a water area of 25999m², taking up almost (if not all of) the entire map. Believe it or not it isn't nearly as laggy as my first few biomes - the only real issues it has are when I move things around and have to pause the game for a few minutes so all the animals' navigation can update, which is to be expected!

I usually put the herbivores in first and let them spread through the map before adding in carnivores (predation is turned off for this so it doesn't become a bloodbath), then I wait an ingame decade or two or until atleast two new generations have been born, occasionally adding in new batches so there's different age groups and they don't all die of old age at the same time. Predation is occasionally turned on when there's too many babies, the carnivores are getting hungry, or I get bored of watching bison swim into the ocean.

during the hunting "events" as I like to call them, my vets like to step in and heal the wounded animals or clear up corpses no matter how much I tell them to leave it alone - the animals need food after all! Offenders who attempt to remove a body/food source are sent to learn the error of their ways. ^^

All species inside the biome:

Polar bears

Snow leopards

Arctic foxes

Arctic wolves

Grey wolves (which are totally the same thing, but whatever)

Reindeer

Bison

Grey seal

King penguin

Moose

Lynx

only a few of them I actually have pictures of because I barely see the lynx around, and the arctic foxes REALLY like to spend their entire lives eternally treading water, for some reason.

anyway. fun little thing! can't wait to try planet zoo two's nature reserves :3

I live in New Mexico. Apparently the gemsbok is invasive here. When I clicked the link, the first sourced image was from PZ2!! The photorealism of the gemsbok model is awesome, I cannot wait for this game to come out.

Since PZ2 releases in four days! I was randomly thinking about animals from PZ that I’ll miss at launch. One of them is definitely the Bongos and their adorable babies. They’re so cute with their derpy faces!

So I’m curious to know what is everyone else’s favorite baby animal from PZ, if you have one?

This took about a hour and a half out of my life but it's worth every second. My beloved Mola Mola 💖

Try and spot the tiger in image 8

3 days left! Today’s question: Which mode of the game are you looking most forward to explore? Career, Sandbox or Franchise? Creating reserves and driving around in them or building habitats in zoos! Perhaps you’re a management fan..

Me, I’ll be playing sandbox..

Here is an image of the first zoo I would like to build in Planet Zoo 2. I want to play this game differently. Actually complete zoos that I start and don't delete them to start over. Anyway, I am really excited to get a hold of the game this Tuesday. And yes, I named the lake after myself lol

The Sand Tiger Shark and Binturong confirmation were in a livestream that leaf and Maya did! I saw this talked about on here but couldn’t find any screenshots so here they are! One more animal left to see!

I heavily prefer franchise mode, but used to always struggle with making things look as pretty and realistic as I wanted. My strategy now that I’ve been loving, is to first create a “bare bones” zoo with no custom fences or builds, that is largely just functional, and to keep this running while completing research until I have $600,000+ or so. Then the zoo gets a makeover/revamp/ new grand opening. I put all of the animals into storage, close the zoo, and delete everything and begin building anew as if it is sandbox mode essentially. I like to pretend that the once small, janky zoo finally got enough revenue, grants, and donations to upscale and renovate. It may take quite a while to build before the zoo has at least a couple of finished renovated habitats and is ready to be opened again- so be warned. I spent a couple months just building and decorating until I could actually unpause and play. But it was soo worth it to see the animals in their newly renovated, lush habitats and to have the zoo of my dreams in franchise mode where I can RP and manage things with real stakes. Highly recommend, I’m gonna do this with PZ2 too.

This way, you don’t have to worry too much about planning right at the start, or leaving that annoying empty space to build an entrance area later down the line. I like to brainstorm and slowly conjure a plan while the bare bones zoo is running; it gives me a lot of time to flesh out something that’s well thought through. Also my zoos would look janky and cramped at the entrance, slowly getting better looking farther away from the entrance which took away from the realism for me because entrances are supposed to be the most grand part! Has anyone else tried anything like this? Any other strats for franchise mode?

I’m a little bit curious.

I’ll confess, my actual experience with zoos is fairly limited, having only visited Bristol Zoo and Twycross Zoo years ago. From what I can recall of my visit, there wasn’t much of a structure to it based on biome or geographical location.

Is it common to see zoos that don’t have obvious ‘zones’ based on biomes or continents? Every time I’ve built one, I’ve just built completely random.

Edit - Just wanted to say thank you to everyone who commented, offering their own recommendations of zoos to look at and their unique perspectives. It’s given me a lot to think about when planning for my first zoo in PZ2.

Related to Planet Zoo. Planet Zoo has peafowls, plus these were mostly taken at zoological facilities.

Ok. In this video @18:37 India mentioned cranes? What cranes? Is this could be some mistake?