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PETA Says Duluth Zoo Negligent In Deaths of 13 Animals

• by Kristina Chew
• June 23, 2012
• 4:00 am

Extreme weather events are taking their toll on animals in zoos, sometimes with tragic results. Earlier this week, after Typhoon Guchol felled a 120-year-old pine tree near the enclosure for 30 Japanese squirrels in Tokyo’s Inokashira Park Zoo, about a dozen have still remained at large. Zookeepers have been setting traps and arming themselves with nets to capture the missing squirrels and are advising people not to chase or otherwise tease the animals.

Rain led to flooding that caused the deaths of at least 13 animals in the Lake Superior Zoo on Wednesday. Three birds (a turkey vulture, a raven and a snowy owl) as well as six sheep, four goats and a donkey named Ashley are believed to have died after a creek overflowed; the zoo grounds also suffered extensive damage. The raven’s body has not been found and it is thought that it may have flown away, as Sam Maida, CEO of the Lake Superior Zoological Society that oversees the zoo, told the StarTribune.......