Plants

Besides the wonderful animals, the San Francisco Zoo has an amazing plant collection. With our year round mild climate we can grow a wide variety of plants from all over the world, in addition to our beautiful native plants.

 

 

Amazing Gardens

 

 

The San Francisco Zoo's stunning plant collection is divided into five, often overlapping categories:

  • Public "park-like" landscapes
  • Animal exhibits
  • Browse plants for animal diets
  • Windbreak forest
  • Native plant gardens, restoration and conservation areas

For example, the Zoo's Leanne B. Roberts African Savanna exhibit integrates public pathways landscaped with a variety of attractive South African plant species, naturalistic savanna-like pastures for the hoofed animals, pre-existing Monterey pine and cypress trees serving as a windbreak, and an area of the original native coastal dune habitat on which the Zoo was built. Elsewhere in the Zoo, trees and shrubs that define and enhance the ornamental landscape of public areas also serve as browse for Zoo animals to eat!