Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden Director Thane Maynard will transition to a new role with the zoo at the end of the year. Maynard will become executive chair of the zoo Board, effective Jan. 1, 2026.
"It's not really a retirement, but I will play a different role for the zoo," Maynard tells WVXU. The part-time position will focus on fundraising for the zoo's Impact Fund, with Maynard serving as a liaison with the zoo Board and donors.
Chief Operating Officer Dave Jenike will take over the reigns as zoo director.
"He's been our COO for those 19 years, and he'll be a perfect zoo director," Maynard says of his friend and successor. "I know at least 100 directors of American zoos, and none of them can touch him, he is great. He's a big reason that the zoo's been so successful over the last 20 years."
Jenike adds, "Thane and I have worked side by side for decades. We trust each other and are aligned on what's important — for the zoo and for the planet. With his help, I'm confident that we can meet our goal to ensure a bright future for the zoo and the impact we create."
Jenike began working at the zoo as an intern, working his way across the zoo's many departments, including serving as director of education, before becoming COO in 2007.
Maynard began his career in 1977 as the zoo's assistant curator of education. He held several positions before being named executive director in 2007. Maynard has spent nearly his entire career at the Cincinnati Zoo, leaving briefly for a stint in Seattle where he helped found an outdoor education center called IslandWood on Bainbridge Island.
Now, as the zoo is celebrating its 150th anniversary, he says it feels like the right time to transition to this new role.
"I've been at the Cincinnati Zoo since I was a kid; I came here right after grad school, and I've been here 48 years," he says. "When I think of the organization, it really does feel like the right time. We've come through a great growth spurt with the capital campaign. We built our Africa exhibit with Fiona years ago, and now we've built Elephant Trek, which is the biggest exhibit we've ever built, and we want to keep that momentum going, so this seems like the best way to do that."
The future of The 90-second Naturalist
Maynard will continue to host his popular podcast, The 90-Second Naturalist, which is produced by Cincinnati Public Radio and airs on radio stations across the country. The program began on WNKU-FM on Aug. 27, 1987. It moved to WGUC in the 1990s and continues to draw listeners.
"We're almost to 10,000 shows," he notes.
Maynard will continue in his role as an ambassador for the zoo. Doing public events, likely showing up with baby alligator "Cruncher."
Two years ago, on the 35th anniversary of The 90-Second Naturalist, Maynard did an in-depth interview with Cincinnati Edition. In it, he talked about his passion for the zoo, reflected on his career, and addressed the controversy around the public death of one of the zoo's gorillas when a child fell into the enclosure.
"It was a very hard day. It was hardest on the keepers who knew Harambe so well," he told host Lucy May. "It was a terrible loss. People would say at the time, 'Do you second guess?' and of course, you second guess everything when something bad happens, but we would do the same thing today.
"No, Harambe was not trying to hurt him. If he tried to hurt him, he would have hurt him. On the other hand, Harambe weighed 450 pounds, and that little kid was 3-and-a-half-years-old, and he was getting dragged around the exhibit by his heel and banging his head on concrete, and so we made a hard call."
It was a hard time for the zoo. Then, six months later, a tiny ball of joy arrived in the form of Fiona the premie baby hippo. Zookeepers rallied to keep her alive, and the community championed them at every turn. Now, she's a healthy nearly 9-year-old superstar.
"Her phenomenon of how people love her so much all over the world is ... unprecedented in my experience, it's really something like lightning in a bottle."
Leaving a legacy
Maynard likes to say that every town has a zoo, but not every town embraces it, like Cincinnati embraces the Cincinnati Zoo. He says he came to the zoo because of his love for animals and drive to help in conservation, but he found extra inspiration in meeting with people in the community and hearing why the zoo is important to them.
"Whether I'm at a grocery store or gas station or a Reds game, people talk to me about how important the zoo is to their family. Their kids grew up going to zoo camp and then they became biology teachers, and all the sorts of things. It's sweet because the zoo has a big impact in the community. We've grown over the years to be the number one attraction in city, in attendance, the number one attraction in the county."
While Maynard — being the front man — often gets the credit for the zoo's successes, he's quick to point to all the hard work of everyone at the zoo.
"We have a terrific team. We lead the world in sustainability. There's not a zoo that does any of the stuff we do with giant solar panels, a giant water catchment system — saving energy, saving water. There are a variety of things like that that we do that are exceptional, and they take just an absolutely crazy, great team that says, 'All right, we're just going to do this,' " he says. "We're a small park in a medium-sized, non-tourist, bad weather town, and we pretty much eat everybody else's lunch."
Editor's Note: Plus, we have Fiona.
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