About the Space
Wildlife Workshop, our former Swap Shop space, has been reimagined into a physical space for all ages where guests can come to collaborate, learn, celebrate, and share wildlife-saving behaviors.
Visitors will learn more about what the Houston Zoo is doing locally to save wildlife and have the opportunity to join us with various projects. Our interpretive team will be joining guests during these opportunities, offering a familiar face and encouraging guest participation.
Building hours: 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Wildlife Workshop Activities
This activity promotes creativity and critical thinking while learning about the vast array of flora and fauna that live in Houston’s bayous.
This activity will have participants remove waste before populating the bayou with animals, accompanied by a food source they would need.
In this activity, learn about the food chains we have in our local bayous, as well as learn how energy flow works. By helping keep our bayous clean and healthy, it will help our animals friends living in the bayous.
Guests will discover how long plastic waste lasts in the environment after it has been thrown away. Circular coasters are laid out on a table with pictures of commonly used plastic items. On the backside coasters show the longevity of the items. Guests compare their answer with the answer on the back of the coaster, which reveals the reality of long plastic stays in the environment once it has been discarded.
This is made to be a fun and interactive game to help distinguish trash versus compostable and recyclable items! It is a great learning opportunity for participants to understand the purpose of these three means of discarding items.
Children choose from an assortment of items and place them in one of three receptacles, recycle, compost, or trash.
Guests will help create seed balls using clay mud and native seeds. These can be used to help propagate prairies around Houston or can be taken home by guests to help birds and pollinators at home.
The goal of this pledge is to highlight the importance of reusable items, and the impact grocery bags can have on all wildlife, including sea turtles.
Participants will honor the pledge that they make and continue to bring reusable bags with them to the store out of habit. Participants are given a take-home reminder as well that will aim to remind them of their pledge even when they are away from the Zoo to further the impact of their pledge.
