ZOO BEGINNINGS

The Barranquilla Zoo had a discrete beginning on the 1930's, when Mr. Tomás Suri Salcedo gave away to the "Barranquilla Society of Public Improvements", (BSPI) a plot of land on the neighborhood of "El Prado", across from the Municipal Soccer Stadium. In that land, the BSPI developed a small park-nursery which started its animal collection with some doves which Mr. Roberto Puyana, president of the BSPI at the time, brought from its own home.
On August 1952, this park-nursery was relocated as a result of the city's urban development.

The new park, located at the corner of 77th Street and 58th Avenue (today 68th Av.) on the neighborhood of "La Concepción", had some hectares of flat, undeveloped land, and it was named after Mr. Roberto Puyana, its enthusiastic founder, who dreamed of making Barranquilla, his adoptive home city, the "city of parks".

The park-nursery "Roberto Puyana" was officially inaugurated on February 1953. Its founder had in mind the development of either a Botanical Garden, a Zoological Park or a recreational park, all for the enjoyment of families, and to encourage admiration for the wonderful creations of nature.

In February of 1956, the Zoo was a reality. Plants from all over the world could be found on this park, planted to provide all city parks and boulevards with trees and bushes, and to give away to families who wished to decorate their house's facades.

It also had a wide variety of animals such as deers, rabbits, collared peccary, central american agouti, porcupines, foxes, fish, turtles, birds, parrots, macaws, parakeets, and many other species, 62 in total, mostly donated by the families, who had them as pets at their homes.

The Barranquilla BSPI named Mr. Ricardo Tinoco as the Zoo manager, who continued improving the Zoo facilities, giving such impulse and vitality to his work, which made him deserve the title of founder of the Barranquilla Zoo.

During his administration, Mr. Tinoco opened the Natural History Museum on the Zoo grounds, and named it "Armando Dugand Gneco Museum" in honor of this well known botanist from Barranquilla.

Between 1968 and 1975, the Barranquilla Zoo had the largest number of exotic animals, exchanged for native species of Colombia with the Zoos of Zurich, Lisbon, Barcelona and Miami, among others.

Throughout the 80's, managed by the "Empresas Públicas Municipales" (then Barranquilla's Utility Company) the Zoo falls into a deep crisis due to administrative and financial hardship. It was then when the National Institute of Natural Resources (INDERENA) examined the Zoo as the national environmental authority and determined that it had to be closed, since its condition would not allow for its adequate operation.