The indoor African Pavilion exhibit at the North Carolina Zoo near Asheboro will reopen Friday after having been closed since January for improvements to several exhibits inside the building.

With the reopening, visitors will see a new animal species exhibited, the tiny dik dik antelope. Included in the pavilion improvements is an outdoor exhibit adjacent to the pavilion building that will house a pair of Bateleur eagles. That exhibit is scheduled to open in about a month.

The large colobus monkey habitat will have a new series of artificial vines, and the present section of welded wire and Plexiglas at the habitat will be replaced by Lexan to provide visitors with a better, unobstructed view of the monkeys.

As with last year’s improvements, most of the work was done by the zoo’s staff, with little done by outside contractors.

The 40,000-square-foot pavilion, the zoo’s largest indoor exhibit, is devoted to African animals and plants. Renovated in 2002, the redesigned exhibit dramatically links people and their natural resources, especially forests and fresh water, to the biological future of the African continent.