The San Francisco Zoo and Gardens is a 100-acre (40 ha) zoo located on the West Side of San Francisco, in the southwestern corner of the city between Lake Merced and the Pacific Ocean along the Great Highway. The zoo's main entrance (one located on the north side across Sloat Boulevard and one block south of the Muni Metro L Taraval line) is to the west, on the ocean side. The SF Zoo is owned by the San Francisco Recreation & Parks Department, and managed by the San Francisco Zoological Society, a non-profit organisation. under a public-private partnership since 1993 CE, receives $4.2 million annually from the city.
As of 2016 CE, the zoo housed more than one thousand individual animals, representing more than 250 species. It is noted as the birthplace of Koko the gorilla, and, from 1974 CE to 2016 CE, the home of Elly, the oldest black rhinoceros in North America.