Woodland Park Zoo Blog

The release of 50 western pond turtles went well into a protected pond in Pierce County. Due to our headstarting program, their population has grown from a low of around 150 to more than 1,500! Here, zoo staff member Walter English paints a tracking number on one of the juvenile turtles shells. Thanks for the zoo's curator of reptiles, Dana Payne, for sending this photo.

Tomorrow, Tuesday, July 17, the zoo will be releasing endangered western pond turtles (Clemmys marmorata), some with tiny radio transmitters glued to their shells, into the wild in Pierce County. A portion of the group of 50 turtles will be released in Mason County. The 10-month-old turtles were collected from the wild as hatchlings and “head started” at Woodland Park Zoo to improve their chance of survival in the wild. Invasive bull frogs often eat the young hatchlings, so the headstarting provides a way for the young turtles to grow to a size that is too large for the frogs to consume. The turtles currently weigh about 2 ounces. Woodland Park Zoo, along with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and Oregon Zoo have collaborated for more than a decade, raising turtles and letting them loose in protected ponds in Washington. From an all-time low of only around 100 turtles left in the state, this headstarting has swelled their population to more than 1,200!

Today was the perfect day for Hadiah to make her first forays out into the outdoor tiger exhibit. She rambunctiously played, sniffed and rolled around in the bushes while visitors looked on. Only around 400 Sumatran tigers still exist in the wild; each birth is cause for celebration to help keep genetically viable populations intact. How can you help tigers? Watch what you buy (for example, plam oil, which is in thousands of products, comes primarily from Indonesia where forests are being destroyed to plant palm oil plantations, so look for foods and products that do not contain it); don't buy exotic wood products that aren't from certified sustainable forestry practices; donate to organizations helping to conserve tigers and their habitat.

Hadiah, our 7-month-old Sumatran tiger, will make her outdoor debut on Wednesday, July 11. She and her mother, Jo Jo, will romp and play (and probably do a lot of sleeping in our recent heatwave!). She will be out daily from around 11:00 a.m. to around 2:00 p.m. Come and visit them!

On July 4, the new tapir calf received her first neo-natal exam by associate veterinarian, Dr. John Ochensreiter. A quick weigh-in, a blood sample and some other tests and she's checks out well. Neo-natal exams are important in order to make sure that all the vital signs are normal and that the calf's overall health is good. Exams happen very quickly so that the calf can be returned to her mother. But mom received snacks while the baby was being looked over so she didn't even miss her!

After eagerly being anticipated for weeks, we were pleased when our female Malayan tapir, Kelang, gave birth to a healthy calf on July 3 at around 7:20 p.m. The 26-pound, female Malayan tapir calf marks the fourth birth for the 12-year-old parents. Striped and looking not unlike a four-legged watermelon, Malaysian tapirs only number somewhere between 900-3,000 in the wild. The calf will be off-view for awhile while the mother bonds with her, but a "tapir cam" is at the exhibit where zoo visitors can see them inside their indoor barn. Tapir gestation is approximately 13 months and an average birth weight is 22 pounds. A newborn tapir has a reddish-brown coat dappled with white and cream-colored spots and stripes. The unique coat pattern helps provide excellent camouflage in bamboo or reed jungles. The striped pattern begins fading after a few months and adult coloration appears by 5-8 months old. Tapirs are among the most primitive large mammals in the world, changing little

There will soon be a pair of new roars at the zoo. A new male lion, 8 years old, has arrived at the zoo and will live in the lion exhibit. The 424-pound African feline arrived in April from Knoxville Zoo. A new 8-year-old female arrived at the end of May from the Virginia Zoo. The lions belong to the South African subspecies, Panthera leo krugeri , and will be paired for breeding in the future. They will be introduced to their grassy new exhibit later this year. Photo by Ryan Hawk