Taronga Zoo

Taronga Zoo is the city zoo of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia and is located on the shores of Sydney Harbour in the suburb of Mosman. It was officially opened on 7 October 1916. Taronga Zoo is managed by the Zoological Parks Board of New South Wales, under the trading name Taronga Conservation Society, along with its sister zoo, the Taronga Western Plains Zoo in Dubbo.

Divided into eight zoogeographic regions, the 21-hectare (52-acre) Taronga Zoo is home to over 4,000 animals of 340 species. It has a zoo shop, a cafe, and information centre.The Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales opened the first public zoo in New South Wales in 1884 at Billy Goat Swamp in Moore Park, on a site now occupied by Sydney Boys High School and Sydney Girls High School. Inspired by a 1908 visit to the Hamburg Zoo, the secretary of the zoo, Albert Sherbourne Le Souef, envisioned a new zoo based on the bar-less concept.^[3] After realising that the Moore Park site was too small, the NSW Government granted 43 acres (17 ha) of land north of Sydney Harbour. A further 9 acres (3.6 ha) were later granted in 1916.

Taronga is an Aboriginal word meaning beautiful view.The first public zoo in New South Wales (NSW) officially opened in Sydney in 1884 on a site known as Billy Goat Swamp in Moore Park, operated by the Zoological Society of NSW which was founded in March 1879. After a visit to Germany in 1908 the elected Secretary of the zoo, Albert Sherbourne Le Souef, returned with a vision for a new Sydney zoo, based on the bar-less exhibits of Hamburg Zoo. The site at Moore Park had become too small and was not suited to the vision. A new site for the zoo was sought.