Turtle Back Zoo, New Jersey, United States

5KosherAndGlutenFree 5:00 PM May 15, 2022

Great zoo
The best part of this zoo is that most of the animals are very active, not just sleeping all day. We saw giraffes walking around, monkeys swinging, a cougar jumped down from a high rock then let out a roar. The black bear walked back and forth right in front of the glass. The penguins walked and swam. We also got to pet stingrays. We spent about 3 hours and covered pretty much the whole zoo. There is food available for purchase and plenty of picnic tables if you bring your own. Bathrooms were clean. There is also a train ride that runs parallel to the reservoir next door. It takes about 10 minutes and it’s free (we went on twice). Parking is free.

4Justin W 5:00 PM Feb 1, 2022

Came for the Groundhog's Day festival
This was the first time I had been to the Turtle Back Zoo in almost five years, and I never came in the wintertime. I had read that they had a Groundhog's Day festival at the zoo, and it was much closer to home than going to the Staten Island Zoo. Their festivities amounted to a ten-minute ceremony with "Edwina from Essex", their new groundhog. The poor groundhog looked like it was trying to find a way to escape the way it moved around. They read a poem and then made the prediction of an early spring and that was it. No music, no kids' choirs and no school involvement. I would have thought they would have created a different program than this. It could be so much more. All who were there was staff, docents and politicians. There must have been about five patrons. I spent about an hour walking around the zoo, enjoying the exhibits that were open, but the poor animals looked so cold that many of them walked inside their burros. The Flamingo Pool was nice, and the birds talked amongst themselves. The Penguins looked so happy to see someone and totally interacted with me. They were a lot of fun. Going to the zoo is quiet in the winter months. The carousel and the restaurant are both closed, most of the animals are inside as the winter weather is too much for them but there is still enough to see and do here. Even though the ceremony was disappointing, the zoo is still nice to visit and fun to walk around. I want to come back in the Spring when it is nicer. It did bring back a lot of childhood memories when I came here in elementary school and with my parents.