The zoo was opened in 1966 by cousins of the Chipperfield circus family. It was notably famous for a large fiberglass Zulu warrior standing at the main gates. Coventry Zoo housed two bottle nose dolphins, 'Chipper' and 'Nero' for a number of years in the early nineteen-seventies in a geodesic dome. The animals had been originally imported from Florida for a dolphinariums in Weymouth or Bournemouth in Dorest which may only existed for one summer season. The animals left the zoo and where re-homed at Tierpark Hagenbeck's dolphinarium Hamburg, Germany.