GREAT ESCAPES FAR FROM THE MADDENING CROWD : ORANGE : County’s Other Zoo Bears Visit

Although the Santa Ana Zoo is well-known, many people are unaware of the Orange County Zoo, which has been operating at Irvine Regional Park since 1920.

The zoo, at 21401 Chapman Ave., features a wide assortment of animals on a little more than an acre. Except for Jojo and Suki, a pair of stump-tailed macaque monkeys, the animals are native to the Southwestern United States.

With just five full-time workers, the zoo has a family atmosphere. The keepers design and maintain the exhibits, care for the animals and the grounds. They get to know the animals well and give names to most of them.

“It’s hard work, but it beats being stuck in an office all day,” said Carolyn Rausch, a keeper who has worked at the zoo for five years.

One of the more popular attractions is the children’s zoo, which features Betty and Pebbles, two 600-pound Hampshire pigs, two ferrets, a young mule deer, sheep, chickens and a cow. Children can buy food for the animals for 10 cents.

“The kids love the petting zoo,” said Julie Wade of Orange, who brings her son Kyle, 2, to the zoo frequently.

“You can come here during the week and it’s so quiet and empty,” said Marion Norred, who often accompanies Wade with her two children, Hunter, 3, and Alexandra, 18 months.

In the main zoo, wide paths wind through the tree-shaded exhibits. Birds chirp overhead and hummingbirds draw nectar from the yellow flowers of bladder pod bushes.

The exhibits are designed to reflect the animals’ natural habitats. Visitors can see prong-horned antelope, a gray fox, two red foxes, an egret, several barn owls, two gray wolves--Charlie and Little Girl, crows, ravens, a seagull, a roadrunner, American kestrels, mountain quail, acorn woodpeckers, burros, bobcats, raccoons and collared peccaries. Mallard and pintail ducks swim in a pond.

All of the animals in the zoo were either abandoned, injured or donated by another zoo, Filbert said.

The zoo got its start in 1920 when a Tustin rancher donated a pair of pet deer to the park. Soon after that an alligator was added to the collection.

In 1935, an aviary was built and in the early 1940s, the former owners of the Modjeska estate donated a bear and ostrich.

The collection, which was known as the Irvine Park Zoo, grew gradually. Then in 1972, the county took in many animals to hold for the Cypress Zoo, which was undergoing construction. The Cypress Zoo never opened so the animals remained in Orange.

For many years, animals were housed in old Army barracks surrounded by a chain-link fence. Goats, deer, sheep, ducks and geese roamed among the barracks. Raccoons lay in wait for passing chickens.

In 1983, the barracks were bulldozed and the new zoo was built. The zoo was renamed in 1988 to give it a stronger identity and eliminate confusion about the zoo’s location.

The zoo, which costs about $300,000 a year to operate, is under the jurisdiction of the county’s Harbors, Beaches and Parks Department. It is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is free, although visitors must pay $2 to enter the park, which includes facilities for horseback riding, hiking, picnicking, softball, tennis and volleyball.