Elephant Springs Makes a Splash This Summer

There's a new way to go wild at the Fort Worth Zoo!

by

The Zoo’s long-awaited Elephant Springs habitat has officially opened. This expansion project for the Zoo’s elephants—a three-generation herd of Asian elephants—has nearly tripled their home. It features a 400,000-gallon pool where the elephants can fully submerge, bathe, swim, and play, along with a waterfall and a lot more room to grow!

There are multiple yards and watering holes within Elephant Springs that allow the elephants to mimic herd dynamics as they would in the wild. This new area will lend itself to enrichment opportunities for these bright animals, and give the Asian elephants enough space to be comfortable when more generations are born in the future. 

The Zoo’s Asian elephant program has been incredibly successful in conserving the species and making sure that our future generations can also enjoy the experience of seeing these majestic creatures in person. This new expansion is another big success, not only for elephants, but another type of animal as well.  

Upstream from the elephant herd is another species that the Fort Worth Zoo is committed to helping conserve: a greater one-horned rhino. These rhinos are facing extinction in the wild in as little as 20 to 30 years. Fortunately, the Zoo has already had one big success in their fight to save this species when a greater one-horned rhino calf, Asha, was born in 2012.

Asha’s birth was the first of its kind at the Fort Worth Zoo, and she was the first-ever greater one-horned rhino birth in the state of Texas. She now resides at another accredited institution on a breeding recommendation to contribute to a healthy and genetically diverse population of this vulnerable species. Now, with more space at Elephant Springs, there’s also more room for future generations of greater one-horned rhinos at the Zoo. 

The Zoo is committed to conserving animals that are in danger of extinction, like the two that visitors will see at Elephant Springs. Both the Asian elephant and the greater one-horned rhino are species that may not have a future if not for the Zoo’s conservation efforts and the community’s support of the Zoo. 

Not only is Elephant Springs a great addition to Fort Worth, giving locals and visitors alike the opportunity to experience incredible elephants and rhinos, but it’s also a great step towards saving these animals from extinction. 

This summer, experience the Zoo in a new way at Elephant Springs: watch elephants train with zookeepers, interact with elephants by spraying streams of water into their habitat, walk through an authentic fishing village floating on the water to arrive at the viewing deck, and see these animals closer than you’ve ever seen them before.