Chehaw Park is a park and zoo located in

Albany, Georgia Albany ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Georgia. Located on the Flint River, it is the seat of Dougherty County, and is the sole incorporated city in that county. Located in southwest Georgia, it is the principal city of the Albany, Georgia ...

. The park was originally opened as Chehaw State Park in 1937, and currently covers . The Wild Animal Park was designed by naturalist

Jim Fowler James Mark Fowler (April 9, 1930 – May 8, 2019) was an American professional zoologist and host of the acclaimed wildlife documentary television show Mutual of Omaha's ''Wild Kingdom''. Early years Born in Albany, Georgia, Fowler spent h ...

of television's ''

Wild Kingdom ''Wild Kingdom'', also known as ''Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom'', is an American documentary television program that features wildlife and nature. It was originally produced from 1963 until 1988, and it was revived in 2002. The show's second ...

''. Fowler is originally from Albany, Georgia. It was opened in 1997, and features boardwalks in the cypress swamps that take visitors through natural habitat exhibits. Chehaw was an accredited member of the

Association of Zoos and Aquariums The Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA), originally the American Association of Zoological Parks and Aquariums, is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in 1924 and dedicated to the advancement of zoos and public aquariums in ...

(AZA) from 1997 to 2018. It was previously one of only two accredited zoos in the state of Georgia.

History

Originally developed as Chehaw State Park in 1937, the property consisted of donated to the state of Georgia by private landowners in

. It is enclosed on two sides by a large, clear water

bayou In usage in the Southern United States, a bayou () is a body of water typically found in a flat, low-lying area. It may refer to an extremely slow-moving stream, river (often with a poorly defined shoreline), marshy lake, wetland, or creek. They ...

formed where the

Kinchafoonee Creek Kinchafoonee Creek ( ) is a creek in southwest Georgia. It originates near Buena Vista and flows southeasterly for to the Flint River near Albany, Georgia. Its name comes from the Creek word for "mortar nutshells", which refers to a type of nutc ...

and

Muckalee Creek Muckalee Creek (pronounced MUHK-uh-lee) is a creek in southwest Georgia (U.S. state). It originates southeast of Buena Vista and flows south-southeast for U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe Nation ...

s meet. The property has expanded to nearly and consists of moss-covered subtropical cypress swamps, climax hardwood forests, and burn-controlled

pine A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus ''Pinus'' () of the family Pinaceae. ''Pinus'' is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. The World Flora Online created by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Missouri Botanical Garden accep ...

wiregrass Wiregrass is a common name for several plants Wiregrass may refer to: * Poaceae grasses ** ''Aristida'' (three-awns), especially ''Aristida stricta'' (Pineland Three-awn), '' Aristida junciformis'' and ''Aristida purpurea'' (Purple Three-awn), of ...

habitat. The park is named for the Chiha, or Chehaw, a tribe of

Creek A creek in North America and elsewhere, such as Australia, is a stream that is usually smaller than a river. In the British Isles it is a small tidal inlet. Creek may also refer to: People * Creek people, also known as Muscogee, Native Americans ...

Native Americans who inhabited around the property and befriended Caucasian settlers. Artifacts such as arrowheads, spearheads, tomahawks, hoes, drill, scrapers, clay pipes and stone celts were commonly found during original park development. Variations in artifact design show land use by distinctly different tribes over several hundreds of years. In 1974, the city of Albany leased of unused land in Chehaw Park from the state of Georgia to develop a wild animal park where exotic and indigenous animals would be displayed in their natural habitats. With the inception of the wild animal habitat, the State donated the entire Chehaw Park acreage to the city to further develop. Albany and the Chehaw Wildlife Society commissioned

to design and supervise the construction of the wildlife area. The original animals were moved from the Tift Park Zoo in Albany to their new home at Chehaw between 1975 and 1977, and the Chehaw Wild Animal Park was officially dedicated and opened to the public in October 1977. In 1979, the state of Georgia created the Chehaw Park Authority, an agent charged with the governing, preserving and developing the property as a natural and public resource for southwest Georgia. Park officials brought back the park's original designer, Jim Fowler, in 2004 to begin lending his expertise the development of the Wild Animal Park. At the same time, new exhibits were created for African black rhinoceros (opened in April 2005) and African lesser flamingos (opened in 2006). The park also retained the services of Atlanta design firm

MACTEC MACTEC was among the largest engineering design companies in the United States. The company provided engineering, environmental, and construction services to private- and public-sector clients. MACTEC was based in Denver, Colorado until 2002, wh ...

Engineering to develop the first site management plan for the entire park.http://production.albany.ga.us/engineering/documents/SPLOST%20V%20Comprehensive%20Report%20June%202009.pdf Between 1997 and 2002, Chehaw began to examine other park venues including the construction of the two-million dollar Creekside Education Center, the Children's Play Park and a nationally sanctioned BMX bike track. Additional infrastructure construction included: animal quarantine, veterinary hospital, Savannah Café, bathrooms, reptile house and ticket booth.

Exhibits

Chehaw is home to many endangered or vanishing species, including the

red wolf The red wolf (''Canis rufus'') is a canine native to the southeastern United States. Its size is intermediate between the coyote (''Canis latrans'') and gray wolf (''Canis lupus''). The red wolf's taxonomic classification as being a separate s ...

black rhinoceros The black rhinoceros, black rhino or hook-lipped rhinoceros (''Diceros bicornis'') is a species of rhinoceros, native to eastern and southern Africa including Angola, Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Eswatini, Tanzania ...

cheetah The cheetah (''Acinonyx jubatus'') is a large cat native to Africa and central Iran. It is the fastest land animal, estimated to be capable of running at with the fastest reliably recorded speeds being , and as such has evolved specialized ...

black-and-white colobus Black-and-white colobuses (or colobi) are Old World monkeys of the genus ''Colobus'', native to Africa. They are closely related to the red colobus monkeys of genus '' Piliocolobus''. There are five species of this monkey, and at least eight subs ...

monkeys, four species of

lemur Lemurs ( ) (from Latin ''lemures'' – ghosts or spirits) are Strepsirrhini, wet-nosed primates of the Superfamily (biology), superfamily Lemuroidea (), divided into 8 Family (biology), families and consisting of 15 genera and around 100 exist ...

bongos Bongos ( es, bongó) are an Afro-Cuban percussion instrument consisting of a pair of small open bottomed hand drums of different sizes. They are struck with both hands, most commonly in an eight-stroke pattern called ''martillo'' (hammer). The ...

duiker A duiker is a small to medium-sized brown antelope native to sub-Saharan Africa, found in heavily wooded areas. The 22 extant species, including three sometimes considered to be subspecies of the other species, form the subfamily Cephalophina ...

Grant's zebra Grant's zebra (''Equus quagga boehmi'') is the smallest of the seven subspecies of the plains zebra. This subspecies represents the zebra form of the Serengeti- Mara ecosystem and others across central Africa. Distribution This subspecies is di ...

s, black bears, American

bison Bison are large bovines in the genus ''Bison'' (Greek: "wild ox" (bison)) within the tribe Bovini. Two extant and numerous extinct species are recognised. Of the two surviving species, the American bison, ''B. bison'', found only in North Ame ...

bobcat The bobcat (''Lynx rufus''), also known as the red lynx, is a medium-sized cat native to North America. It ranges from southern Canada through most of the contiguous United States to Oaxaca in Mexico. It is listed as Least Concern on the IUC ...

Bactrian camel The Bactrian camel (''Camelus bactrianus''), also known as the Mongolian camel or domestic Bactrian camel, is a large even-toed ungulate native to the steppes of Central Asia. It has two humps on its back, in contrast to the single-humped drom ...

, several species of antelope, and unique birds (

ibis The ibises () (collective plural ibis; classical plurals ibides and ibes) are a group of long-legged wading birds in the family Threskiornithidae, that inhabit wetlands, forests and plains. "Ibis" derives from the Latin and Ancient Greek word f ...

flamingo Flamingos or flamingoes are a type of Wader, wading bird in the Family (biology), family Phoenicopteridae, which is the only extant family in the order Phoenicopteriformes. There are four flamingo species distributed throughout the Americas ...

grey crowned crane The grey crowned crane (''Balearica regulorum''), also known as the African crowned crane, golden crested crane, golden crowned crane, East African crane, East African crowned crane, African crane, Eastern crowned crane, Kavirondo crane, South ...

ostrich Ostriches are large flightless birds of the genus ''Struthio'' in the order Struthioniformes, part of the infra-class Palaeognathae, a diverse group of flightless birds also known as ratites that includes the emus, rheas, and kiwis. There are ...

es,

bald eagle The bald eagle (''Haliaeetus leucocephalus'') is a bird of prey found in North America. A sea eagle, it has two known subspecies and forms a species pair with the white-tailed eagle (''Haliaeetus albicilla''), which occupies the same niche as ...

s, and

turaco The turacos make up the bird family Musophagidae ( "banana-eaters"), which includes plantain-eaters and go-away-birds. In southern Africa both turacos and go-away-birds are commonly known as loeries. They are semi-zygodactylous: the fourth ( ...

). These exhibits are accessed through a boardwalk in the swamp area. The zoo also provides a home to native species such as fox, squirrels, beavers, bobcats, gopher tortoises, and white-tailed deer. The park also contains the following special attractions. * Ben's Barnyard: the petting zoo includes an interactive portion where visitors can see how they would fare next to wild animals. Zoo visitors can climb into a bald eagle's "nest", take a giant leap from a standstill into a sandpit, jump as far up as they can, and measure their "wing" span. * Alligator's Outpost: a boardwalk leads visitors to a swamp where dozens of American alligators live. Unlike most zoo exhibits, this one is a natural habitat where the challenge is to see how many eyes visitors can spy emerging from the waters. Zoo visitors can also feed the alligators on the weekends. * Wiregrass Express: the zoo's train, which runs through the pine/wiregrass restoration area. Visitors can take a 20-minute ride on this train during the months of March through December. * African Veldt: runs March through November and takes guests out on safari in a covered trailer. During the ride, guests will see several different species of antelope, zebra, wildebeest, ostrich, eland, and impala. The animals roam and herd freely in this 40 acre exhibit.

Other facilities

The parks also includes nature trails, BMX trails, an 18-hole disc golf course, BMX bike racing, campgrounds, a

RV park A recreational vehicle park (RV park) or caravan park is a place where people with recreational vehicles can stay overnight, or longer, in allotted spaces known as "sites" or "campsites". They are also referred to as campgrounds, though a true ...

, and a playground.

Gallery

Chehaw Park Creekside Education Center.jpg, Creekshide Education Center Chehaw Park splash pad.jpg, Splash Pad Chehaw Park disc golf course entrance.jpg, Disc Golf Chehaw Park zoo wildlife theatre.jpg, Wildlife Theatre Chehaw Park ibis and flamingos.jpg, Ibis and Flaminos

References

External links

{{authority control Nature parks Zoos in Georgia (U.S. state) Buildings and structures in Albany, Georgia Protected areas of Dougherty County, Georgia Tourist attractions in Albany, Georgia 1937 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state)