Skånes Djurpark

In the middle of Scania outside a town called Höör is Skånes Djurpark (Scania Animal Park). It's situated about 3 km from the town's train station and only has a bus stop outside. The bus makes a stop on a quiet country road where nothing is especially noticeable in the surroundings. Once the bus leaves a large sign behind is revealed with the text "Skånes Djurpark."

The entrance to the animal park reminds of a red vacation hut. Entrance tickets can be bought either at the entrance or online. The entrance admission will differ between the seasons, and during high seasons it can cost as much as 350 SEK.

The first enclosure is marked out with a soft wooden fence and inside some goats rest in the shade. This is a petting zoo and as the morning visitors enter the enclosure the goats get up to welcome the visitors. Among the goats one walked out to a corner, stuck a tree branch onto itself and began to gnaw on the tree bark. Meanwhile the goat kids approached the enclosure's visitors to receive some scratches.

Once one exit the back of the enclosure they'll find yet another petting zoo. This part of the petting zoo contain sheep. There are also some small enclosures within and inside of those are rabbits and chickens. Here one of the black sheep approached the photographer and flickered its tongue into the air as it received some back good scratches.

Next up is a playground. However, from here the park gives a feeling that it was built for children. The next enclosure has figures from a children's TV show which move up and down as a tractor is pulled alongside a rail. Down the track a few figures of pigs with water guns squirt water onto the amusement park passengers. At least there are two storks that have built a nest on top of the ride entrance from which they watch down onto the visitors.

When you leave the playground and get back onto the main road there will be an enclosure for domestic pigs and inside a pale piglet played and ran around in the green grass. After the pig pen is a pond with seals. The surface of the pond moves in a mesmerizing fashion. Then the water surface is broken by a seal who swims around for a short while before it dives back under water.

If one crosses the pond they'll get to the badger enclosure and the wild cat enclosure. However, neither of these animals were out and visible that day. Further up the road is the red fox enclosure. The fox ran around and played, and then gnawed on a piece of meat for a short while before laying itself down in a little hut. Regular fox behavior if anything.

After that there is a dinosaur park behind the red fox enclosure. Hold on a minute... dinosaurs? Along the road are dinosaurs animatronics. Brontosaurus, pterodactyl, tyrannosaurus rex... At the exit of the road is even a dinosaur souvenir shop.

East of the red foxes and dinosaurs are wolves and wolverines. However, these animals are known to be hard to spot. The wolf enclosure has a viewing tower that one can enter, however, even from here the wolves are nowhere to be seen.

South of the wolves are skyways tied between the trees. This skywalk connects the East road with the West road, however you may only walk on it from East to West.

To the North of the wolves is a brown bear. Unlike the wolves the bear is hard to miss. Every now and then a caretaker throws in some apples and the bear munches on them as a quick snack before it lies down to relax by the pool.

Next to the bear enclosure is a restaurant. To the north of that is owl, lynx, raccoon and arctic fox enclosures, however, only the owls could be spotted for the current post. Further East are wild boar. The boars have plowed up all the ground in their enclosure to which they like to lay in the wet mud.

After that, if one follows the road North, passes yet another playground, turns on the road and then passes yet some more playful goats they'll arrive at the moose enclosure. The moose here are friendly and sometimes the children can get apples from the caretaker to feed directly to the moose. Next to the enclosure is also some European Bison. These species of bison are near-threatened which makes them a spectacle to see up front.

The next enclosure contains a golden eagle. While the eagles photos were taken some fallow deers watched the photographer from the shade of a tree. Further down are aurochs and muskox. In reality the auroch has gone extinct, however, a new species of cattle was bred to look like aurochs. This human made species is the one visible in the park today.

In the corner of the forest are reindeer. Some young reindeer paced back and forward alongside the fence. Reindeer are native to North Scandinavia and Russia, and they gather in large herds, however, these 3 reindeer are in the Southern landscape of Scania. Inside a shed there was an adult reindeer, however it was difficult to see from the outside.

The last enclosure contains red deer which graze the grass of their large field. Red deer exist in large populations in Southern Sweden and across Europe. While the male deers keeps a watch out on the herd, the fowls play around, and once they get thirsty they stroll down for some puddle water.

And so a full lap around Skånes Djurpark has been completed. In the park there are animals in full view and animals who you'd mostly never see. Probably it's better for the animals to get well rested when they take a midday nap rather than to get woken up by some noisy children who visit the park. After all, the park makes you feel like it was built for children. Not only because there are plenty of playgrounds scattered around, but also because there are things unrelated to animals like the dinosaur path and the sky walk. Even on the way out of the park children showering under a small water tower could be seen. Was the park built as a big amusement park, or is there another reason for its establishment? One may wonder.