EL PASO, Texas ( KTSM ) – The El Paso Zoo is launching its own animal encounter program in February, allowing families an up-close experience with pronghorns, penguins, the Galapagos tortoise and Taj the rhinoceros.
“It’s going to be a beautiful experience,” said James Martinez, marketing specialist for the El Paso Zoo. “The zookeepers, they’re incredibly educated about (the animals), what they do. People can ask a lot of questions, and you leave the zoo knowing so much more about that animal, knowing that you have to try to make a difference to help the program so that they don’t become extinct.”
Martinez said this program will help them not only catch up to other zoos across the country who already have similar encounter programs, but also to build community collaboration to advance their conservation efforts.
“Conservation is the cornerstone of every single zoo. So the main goal of every single zoo is to actually have enough patronage for people to come in to support the programs within the zoo. So you want to make sure that every single species that is in the zoo is able to go ahead and propagate,” Martinez said.