Zoo Set to Open Yucky Exhibit

Communications Director

Kristin Farley
[email protected]
(865) 215-2589

400 Main St., Room 691
Knoxville, TN 37902

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Zoo Set to Open Yucky Exhibit

Posted: 05/24/2005
Yuck, ick, gross and a host of other words will be heard often throughout Knoxville Zoo this summer.

The zoo is opening Animal Grossology on Saturday, May 28. It's the zoo's most disgusting special exhibit ever, and visitors are sure to love it. Knoxville Zoo is the first zoo in the country to host this popular exhibit. The exhibit provides visitors with a larger-than-life look at nature's blood sucking, vomit munching, slime making and dookie loving creatures. It will be in the zoo's Pilot Traveling Exhibit Center through Sept. 5. Grossology admission is $2 for ages 3 and up with paid zoo admission. Admission is free for Knoxville Zoo members.

Animal Grossology is an icky concoction of informative, fascinating and down right EEEWY fun. The special exhibit brings to life all the gritty and gross facts on some of nature's most disgusting critters. It features five thematic areas: Dookie Lovers, Blood Slurpers, Slime Makers, Vomit Munchers and other gross stuff. The exhibit contains solid science and introduces it in a way that makes kids giggle. It's science disguised in interactive entertainment, and kids are more apt to learn when they're having fun doing it. Most people may think leeches are pretty gross, but they are used after some surgeries to assist in the healing process.

Learn why the dung beetle is nature's living pooper scooper, and why scientists are studying slug and snail slime production for clues in treating cystic fibrosis. The special exhibit is based on the book Animal Grossology, part of the best-selling Grossology series by Sylvia Branzei. Originally published in 1996, Animal Grossology was reprinted in 2004. The stunning success of the first book, Grossology, led to three more books in the series. Grossology has become a well-established phenomenon. The exhibit, Animal Grossology, features imaginative animated characters from the book and hands-on interactive challenges. It was created and produced by Advanced Exhibits, a division of Advanced Animations LLC, in collaboration with the book's author.This exhibit is a guaranteed squishy, scratchy, spiny, scaly, stinky, and slimy good time. Animal Grossology is in Knoxville for a limited time only.

Knoxville Zoo is located off exit 392 from Interstate 40 and is open every day except Christmas Day. The zoo is nationally accredited by the American Zoo and Aquarium Association and is committed to the highest standards in animal care and well-being, ethics, conservation, and education. Beginning May 28, the zoo is open every day from 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Admission and ticket sales stop one hour before the zoo closes. For more information, please call 865-637-5331 ext. 300.

Animal Grossology features:
See larger-than-life bloodsuckers and learn why they need blood and where they store it in their bodies.
Learn why a cat's anatomy is the reason they spit up hairballs.
Become a scarab beetle in a retro "Atari-type" world by competing against each other in a challenging dung ball roll race.
Discover the mystery of the incredible tapeworm.
Observe an owl pellet and learn what an owl eats.
Play Transfusion Confusion to discover which animals have what color blood.