The National Aviary

When you stop and think about the title alone you have to wonder. The NATIONAL Aviary? In Pittsburgh? Like, I know where the National Zoo is, and the National Mall, the National Arboretum, the National Conservatory, and the National Philharmonic, why even the Nationals baseball team. They're in Washington, D.C. So why is the National Aviary in Pittsburgh? And it's not that I'm unwilling to share, it's just an unexpected place to find it. Perhaps this nagging question colored my visit.


No matter what you make of this floor plan, it's not a large place. It's located off of a lovely park not far from the B&B I stayed in during my previous visit in a decidedly older and less gentrified part of the city known as Allegheny. When parking in the parking lot, you enter via the West Entrance that is located in the bottom center of the map. $13.00 later, I began my tour by walking up the first corridor you see on the map. To my right was a large courtyard divided into three open areas. The first one was empty.


The second contained a pair of Bald Eagles, Haliaeetus leucocephalus, and they were simply magnificent. There just isn't a more regal raptor on earth. To see them in person and up close really was worth the price of admission, even if everything at the National Aviary was not as it was advertised on their website. There is no way to over-hype a Bald Eagle.

The third portion of the courtyard was home to a really wonderfully designed penguin habitat. One that was visible from two sides if you chose to walk into the courtyard, and from one wall of glass on one side from within the aviary. It even featured a sort of children's playhouse area where younger kids could go and watch the swimming birds from a bubble-glass natatorium accessed also from inside the aviary.


The little African Penguins, Spheniscus demersus, like Sidney here, were just delightful to watch and eager to interact with their audience.

At this point, you have three other places to visit. I know that the map looks more involved than that, but that's it. There are three other habitats where birds can be observed. They are: 1) the Tropical Rainforest, with its adjacent large cage of parakeets, or Lories as stated on the map, 2) the Wetlands, and 3) the Grasslands.

The Tropical Rainforest was a very muggy large greenhouse like room with tropical vegetation and a flowing water feature. To enter it, you passed through a little foyer where you encounter a lone Laughing Kookaburra, Dacelo novaeguineae, in a large birdcage and completely separate from the Tropical Rainforest. The main walkway is elevated to allow both the flowing water and the flightless birds the ability to run around freely on the floor the space. A list of birds with their photos is posted for your convenience, and I was disappointed that a couple of the species promised didn't appear to be present.


However, there were others to enjoy, like this pair of White-crested Laughing Thrush, garrulax leucolophus.


The Wetlands was a more open re-creation along a similar vein with an elevated walkway from which to observe, and when it came to this Inca Tern, Larosterna inca, BE observed!


I also happened to arrive at the just the time when the pair of Brown Pelicans, Pelecanus occidentalis, was being fed. Greedy little buggers! You can see where the one had his lover bill snapped. His rescue was his ticket to the National Aviary and a prolonged life. The attendant explained how in the wild the injury so changed the dynamic of his beak-poach as to allow fish to escape thus sentencing him to a fate of certain starvation. Lucky little bugger, too.

This room seemed to have more specimens and more varied species of birds than the first.


Here an odd couple made up of a Roseate Spoonbill, Ajaja ajaja, and a Scarlet Ibis, Eudocimus ruber, exchange a glance after taking in my presence.

Area #3, the Grasslands was little more than a long room with some birds trapped inside. There were no windows, no skylights, not even consistent artificial lighting. Perhaps the greatest aspect of false advertising was due to this lack of light, there was no grass. In fact, there weren't any organic plants at all. There were silk plants and plastic plants, but no real plants. The space altogether was doubtfully much larger than my basement. The birds were quite beautiful, and being birds they seemed to be doing their best to manage their little world. I was fairly well whipped by the time I arrived here, and so my own subsequent outrage, was just too tired to make it fully into my conscience mind, until later in the evening.


The hands down stars of the room were the two Scarlet-headed Blackbirds, Amblyramphus holosericus. They totally upstaged the hand full of finches and warblers that were kept in the space with them.


And I was just about to leave when this little Golden Plover, Pluvialis dominica, caught my eye.

As a concept, the National Aviary is not fully realized. Some of its spaces are adequate, even nice. Had its depiction on its website been more accurate, I doubt I would have made the effort to visit. And I don't regret my visit or the price of admission, if only some portion of it could go to building a decent Grassland habitat. On the website, 139 species of birds are listed. There is no way in hell I saw that many different kinds of birds, my best guess would be 40. Again, why do places that house and display animals exaggerate? OR where do they hide away the majority of their collections, and why? This is a truth in advertising issue.