Changes are afoot at Stringybark Zoo, largely because I've finally started using mods! I've been following the modding scene for years and always planned on waiting until PZ finished development before actually using them myself, but yesterday I finally bit the bullet and decided I might as well start now. I have pretty high standards for mods, they must integrate into the game fairly seamlessly and generally be close to Frontier quality - still no Tasmanian devil for example, which is an animal that's far too unique for mods to replicate effectively - but that still left a lot of options for species I've always wanted to have in my zoos but felt had little chance of ever being added. Such is the case for the species in the latest two habitats I've built for Stringybark Zoo.
For these showcases all modded animals have been removed for obvious reasons.
First is an extension of the previously completed Temperate Australia area, a small enclave for Australian sea lions! This is a rarely kept species even in Australian zoos, with only Taronga and Adelaide holding them at the moment (they're also at three Australian aquariums/marine parks), but given I grew up seeing them at Adelaide Zoo they've always felt like the basic zoo pinniped from my skewed perspective. This habitat houses four individuals, and has its own little distinct environment themed around the temperate coast of southern Australia.
Back over in South-east Asia, I built what is probably my favourite ungulate habitat in the zoo so far, a mixed species enclosure for the chital and banteng! I originally threw the banteng in with the water buffalo over in the Floodplains before realising they'd make a great excuse for integrating some hoofstock into the South-east Asia area. I put small fencing around the bamboo in the enclosure to protect it from browsing/trampling, which is probably something I should start doing more in the future - with this zoo I've generally decided to not pay too much attention to realism in regards to foliage and just focus on building habitats I'm happy with, but it's definitely going to be something I'm going to take into consideration with other projects going forward.
I also realise that with the Indian peafowl and chital this is starting to become more of a general tropical Asia section than a South-east Asia area lol.
As you may have noticed in the habitat images above, I've also made custom infoboards for each of the 28 species in Stringybark Zoo, something I've been meaning to do for a while. Each section of the park has its own colour template for the infoboard, although currently given South America, Temperate Australia and South-east Asia all share various shades of green its a bit hard to tell the difference. I may recolour the Temperate Australia infoboards to make them all feel more distinct.
As for what's next, it'll probably be either the sun bear habitat (followed by the Sumatran tiger) or a yellow-footed rock-wallaby x red kangaroo mixed enclosure to start off the Drylands area, depending on what I feel like.
