Summer Fun at Lincoln Park Zoo

Season of
During the breeding season, the Blyth’s hornbill male within the
McCormick Bird House will present grapes—a prized fruit—to
the female in an attempt to woo her. Nearby at the Kovler
Penguin/Seabird House, male rockhopper penguins will present
the best stones to females, a romantic gesture that helps them build
their nests. And within Regenstein Center for African Apes, female
gorillas will lock eyes with their silverback, a sign that they’re interested
in more than grooming.
While these varied forms of animal courtship are taking place
within the exhibits at Lincoln Park Zoo, guests strolling the
grounds are courting one another as well, from teenagers on first
dates to married couples celebrating anniversaries.
Visitors shared their romantic tales, proving that the lovebirds
within Regenstein African Journey aren’t alone.
sNewly transplanted to Chicago in 1994, Ivy Herman was introduced
to Chad Gaizutis, who promptly ignored her. But the next
morning, while Herman was touring Lincoln Park with her parents
and her beloved dog, Riley, Gaizutis appeared with his own dog.
Since they couldn’t enter the zoo with their four-legged companions,
they stood at the Conservatory Gate and admired the elephants.
“Something instantly sparked,” she says. They dated three
Love
years before Gaizutis proposed at that same gate. “To this day it’s
my favorite spot in the city,” she admits. The pair now resides in
Ohio, sans dogs but with three boys. When they visit Chicago, their
first stop is Lincoln Park Zoo.
s“I really did fall in love with my soul mate at Lincoln Park Zoo,”
says Monica Colon, who joined her fiancé for an afternoon outing
to the zoo in 2003. Both were students at Chicago’s Gage Park High
School. Colon was surprised that Cristo Mireles—he of the tough
exterior—wanted to visit the animals. But it was a pleasant surprise.
“As we strolled the zoo, I grew a love for him that I thought
I would never have for any guy. I could see the excitement in his
eyes, and I just knew we would be together forever.” The two are
getting married this July.
sTracy Guth met Todd Spangler while both were students at
Northwestern University. For their first date they went to the spot
her parents took their first date—Lincoln Park Zoo. On this day in
1992, Guth remembers, there were a lot of new arrivals, newborns
and hatchlings enlivening the exhibits. Foreshadowing? Perhaps. The
pair married at Café Brauer in 2000 and has two kids of their own.
SUMMER 2009 5