Until he crunched the numbers, Superintendent of the Miller Park Zoo Jay Tetzloff had a hunch they were having a good start to their fiscal year, but the ten-year leader of the Bloomington entity had no idea how good.

Turns out, the first six months of the fiscal year for the zoo in Bloomington was a record-setter. The Miller Park Zoo continues to break records the last several years and Tetzloff indicates this was one that he somewhat saw coming.

Improvements in the exhibits and watching the progress move forward could be one of the factors of the attendance continue to bring people out. This summer and fall, the zoo improved its parking lot and added a concession stand. Tetzloff says "excuse our progress".

According to Tetzloff, they have a few smaller projects coming up but after that, they have a $6-million tiger project they will be fundraising for. He hopes the momentum they are gaining with attendance and completed projects will carry into the fundraising phase of that project.

Will the next six months allow the zoo to top the record for attendance? Tetzloff says if they get some good weather for February when they offer free Friday admissions, that could go a long way to breaking the record, if not finishing the year with a top-five attendance figure.