Dublin Zoo bosses have announced half price on thousands of online tickets to celebrate a bumper year of visitors.
As many as 3,500 tickets are on sale to be snapped up half price between December 27 until January 1 as the zoo celebrates a record year of visitors coming through their turnstiles.
This year, Dublin Zoo welcomed its 60,000,000th visitor, as well as new animals, including an okapi calf and two male red howler monkeys.
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Speaking about their successful year, Dr Christoph Schwitzer, Director of Dublin Zoo, said: “We’ve been extremely fortunate to be able to share some major milestones with our visitors in 2022.
“Having An Tánaiste Leo Varadkar launch our highly anticipated Himalayan Hills habitats was a highlight, as was welcoming our okapi calf in August.
“We were delighted to be able to acknowledge the generosity of the Irish public with the unveiling of the red panda sculpture by Stephanie Hess in September.
“We’re excited about the potential of our recently launched Conservation Master Plan, which supplements our ‘Dublin Zoo 200’ vision and shows our commitment to becoming a globally significant zoo-based conservation organisation.”
On April 1, Leo Varadkar opened the spectacular new Himalayan Hills habitats for snow leopards and red pandas.
In September, in honour of International Red Panda Day and to mark the "incredible generosity of the Irish public during the ‘Save Dublin Zoo’ campaign of 2020", the Zoo unveiled a red panda sculpture created by award-winning sculptor Stephanie Hess. The sculpture can be enjoyed by visitors to the Himalayan Hills habitats.
In early December, Dublin Zoo launched its Conservation Master Plan, which sits under the overall ‘Dublin Zoo 200: Vision 2021-2031’, and identifies 42 actions across seven strategic areas necessary to achieve the Zoo’s ambition of becoming a zoo-based conservation organisation of national and global significance over the next decade.
These areas include conservation breeding and reintroduction, protecting Ireland’s wildlife, conserving genetic diversity and creating conservation scientists.
Following its return in 2021 after a Covid-enforced absence, Wild Lights has been popular with visitors again, with the theme “The Magic of Life".
Taking into account the energy crisis, Dublin Zoo has made a significant investment to ensure the 2022 Wild Lights event can run without impacting the national energy grid this winter. To ensure Wild Lights has no impact on energy supply, it was taken off the grid and is powered by hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) derived from 100% renewable raw materials.
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