Disaster animal rescueOh my, the trouble with evacuating lions, tigers, and bears
Rescuing and housing the many exotic animals at Minot, North Dakota’s Roosevelt Park Zoo from record floods presented zoo workers with a unique challenge; it was no small feat finding vehicles large enough for giraffes or getting dangerous animals like bears and wolves to cooperate; currently more than 100 animals are housed in an old furniture warehouse; makeshift pens hold deer, emu, warthogs, bobcats, monkeys and chickens, while workers struggle to keep the animals comfortable
This North Dakota zoo wolf was lucky to be evacuated // Source: livejournal.com
With advance warning, residents of a city can evacuate with relative ease, but what about lions, alligators, and wolves?
Rescuing and housing the many exotic animals at Minot, North Dakota’s Roosevelt Park Zoo from record floods presented zoo workers with a unique challenge. It was no small feat finding vehicles large enough for giraffes or getting dangerous animals like bears and wolves to cooperate.
Workers scrambled to find a trailer large enough to fit a giraffe and even longer to convince the giraffe to step inside. Meanwhile workers struggled to corral a herd of bison and police officers were on guard as three bears were anesthetized for transportation.
“If you’re picking up furniture and throwing it up on a truck — anybody can do that,” said Terry Lincoln, the director of the Dakota Zoo in nearby Bismarck, which also had to be partially evacuated. “In a zoo setting you can’t take someone off the street and, say, ‘Go get the 500-pound lion.’ It just doesn’t work that way.”
The swollen Souris River in North Dakota has topped its levees and inundated more than a quarter ofMinot in water. The town is seeing its worst flooding in nearly forty years and officials say that the river could reach a record 1,563 feet.
Heavy rain and record snow packs have gorged the river with runoff and residents have been forced to flee twice in recent weeks as the river reached 1,554 feet earlier this month.
As waters rose, the Roosevelt Park Zoo, which straddles the Souris River, was forced to transport all of its animals to safety.
Currently more than 100 animals are housed in an old furniture warehouse. Makeshift pens hold deer, emu, warthogs, bobcats, monkeys and chickens, while workers struggle to keep the animals comfortable.
So far employees have had to deal with roguish camels who have tried to escape several times and keep turning the lights on and off using their tongues to operate the switches. In addition, the zoo’s gray wolves have been relocated to another zoo, but the wolves’ howls at night can be plainly heard scaring both the zookeepers and the animals.
“All of it is very strange,” said Haley McClure, a seasonal zoo employee.
The zoos animals have been split up with its smaller reptiles housed in a locker room at the hockey rink and local farmers housing some of the zoo’s llamas, alpacas, bison, and elk. More dangerous animals like the zoo’s bears, jaguars and lions have been sent to nearby zoos unaffected by the floods.
Officials say the flood waters may not recede until late July, which means the animals could remain in their temporary shelters for even longer as crews must repair the zoo and ready it once more for the animals.
