Taronga Zoo has bid a sad farewell to one of its longest-standing residents today, with Cynthia the Kodiak Bear passing peacefully away at the grand old age of 31.Cynthia and her sister Bethel have awed Taronga Zoo visitors since they arrived in Sydney in 1985.

Taronga's keepers have discovered Fiordland Penguins like to walk.Zoo visitors have been enchanted to discover Mr Munro and female penguins, 'Chalky' and 'Milford' out for a stroll through the Zoo grounds as part of their exercise routine.

Australasian Zoos have joined world Zoos in Year of the Frog 2008 to help avert the dramatic increase in frog extinctions.The coordinated regional conservation strategy will be announced during the Australasian Regional Association of Zoological Parks and Aquaria Conference at Taronga Zoo this week. The program addresses the steady decline of Australasia's frog populations with 47 species out of 220 endangered by habitat loss and disease.

The first Booroolong Frogs to be bred in zoos will be released today, only a year after Taronga started a breeding program to save the tiny amphibian.The critically endangered native species has suffered unprecedented population declines recently, with fewer than 5000 individual Frogs remaining in the wild. The decline has been attributed to water pollution, loss of habitat and use of herbicides and pesticides, as well as chyrtid fungus and climate change.