Nashville Zoo’s ongoing dedication to animal conservation is on full show because it welcomes the arrival of a clouded leopard cub and one banded palm civet package. Each newborns may be seen on the Zoo’s HCA Healthcare Veterinary Heart and on-line with their nursery digicam.
The male clouded leopard cub was born on July 18 on the Oklahoma Metropolis Zoo and delivered to Nashville for hand rearing and eventual introduction to a mate. As a nationwide chief in clouded leopard breeding and care, Nashville Zoo was chosen by the Affiliation of Zoos and Aquariums’ (AZA) Clouded Leopard Species Survival Plan (SSP®) to supervise the cub’s upbringing and eventual pairing. The Clouded Leopard SSP® helps to make sure genetically numerous populations of this species in human care.
“We’ve been breeding and elevating these cats since 1991 and have discovered loads about this course of,” mentioned Dr. Heather Schwartz, the Zoo’s Director of Veterinary Providers. “We hand rear our cubs as a result of it permits this usually nervous species to turn out to be acclimated to the sights and sounds of human interplay, typical in an exhibit surroundings.” The cub will keep within the Zoo’s Veterinary Heart nursery till he’s sufficiently old to be moved to a beer habitat on the Zoo’s property the place he’ll finally be launched to an acceptable mate.
“Clouded leopard males may be very aggressive when they’re launched to females,” says Nashville Zoo President and CEO Rick Schwartz. “This may trigger severe, even deadly harm to the females. Hand rearing this species lowers aggression and will increase the possibility of profitable mating.” Because of Nashville Zoo’s data on clouded leopards, the AZA’s SSP now recommends hand rearing for all cubs of this species.
Clouded leopards (Neofelis nebulosa) are native to the tropical lowlands of Southeast Asia in nations resembling Nepal and Bangladesh. They’re thought of weak to extinction in response to the Worldwide Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) on account of deforestation, poaching and pet commerce. Exact knowledge on clouded leopard inhabitants numbers will not be recognized, however researchers estimate there are round 10,000 clouded leopards within the wild. Particular populations may be troublesome to trace, because the clouded leopard is among the many rarest of the world’s cat species and one of the vital elusive. The diminished variety of pelts encountered at unlawful markets and diminished sightings of clouded leopards by folks inside its vary counsel the species is in decline.
The Veterinary Heart nursery additionally lately welcomed a child (package) banded palm civet born on August 12 at Nashville Zoo. The male package was eliminated to be hand-raised on account of insufficient milk manufacturing by the mom. The new child might be raised within the nursery and finally skilled to be an envoy animal, educating the general public about his species and native surroundings.
Banded palm civets (Hemigalus derbyanus) are small nocturnal mammals native to the rainforests and jungles of Southeast Asia and are categorized as close to threatened by the IUCN on account of habitat loss, on account of deforestation, agriculture, and plantations in addition to water damming, looking and logging. Roughly the dimensions of a home cat, banded palm civets are intently associated to weasels and mongooses. Nashville Zoo has been efficiently breeding this species since 2015.
Autor Andrew Bleiman
