APE, also known as the Animal Project Editor or Animal Property Editor was a program developed by Blue Fang Games to aid in the creation of new animals for Zoo Tycoon, and allows editing many properties as well as plaques, icons, and animations. It was released to the public soon after and was for many years used by designers to create new animals for the game, though it has fallen out of usage due to the errors it can create, especially with expansions. The fanm-developed APExp program seeks to expand and create a bug-free version of the editor compatible with expansions.
No such official program exists for Zoo Tycoon 2, though HENDRIX created a user-made program entitled ZOOZANNE and Sideshow Bob at one point created a tutorial entitled APE2 that failed to live up to expectations.