Zoo hopes kids get in touch
The Stingray Bay exhibit, which opens this weekend, offers close look at gentle but potentially dangerous sea creature

The Stingray Bay exhibit will allow zoogoers to touch and feed rays and horseshoe crabs. DALLAS -- The Dallas Zoo's latest hands-on exhibit features animals like the one that killed the beloved Crocodile Hunter, Steve Irwin.

Indeed, the Dallas Zoo is encouraging children to rub the velvety backs of stingrays, and if they're lucky, to feel the nibbling of a stingray mouth.

It's worth noting that the 31 rays swimming around the zoo's 16,000-gallon saltwater tank are considerably smaller than the bull ray that killed Irwin in September 2006; the zoo has reduced parental anxiety by trimming their venomous barbs.

But the zoo hopes to capitalize on interest in the creatures, even though this traveling, interactive exhibit was planned well before Irwin's untimely death. They are, despite their rather menacing name, considered a gentle animal that whips its barb only when frightened.

"People are always fascinated by incidents like Irwin's," said Sean Greene, the zoo's community relations director. "Steve Irwin was watched by millions of people. But maybe people are going to get more in tune with these animals by seeing them and touching them."

Dallas Zoo

The Stingray Bay exhibit opens Saturday and runs through Labor Day.

The exhibit features cownose rays from the Atlantic, Southern rays from the Gulf of Mexico and horseshoe crabs.

Admission to Stingray Bay is $2.50, or it can be included as part of a package at the admission gate. Adult admission to the zoo is $8.75, and children's is $5.75.

The zoo is at Interstate 35E and Marsalis Avenue.