Our bears are some of the most entertaining animals to watch here at the museum. Gus is our only male bear, and he has some funny antics that make the keepers laugh on a regular basis. Even though he is the youngest bear, at only 3 years old, he is already the dominant bear in the enclosure! Since black bears are naturally solitary animals, they have to form a heirarchy in order for them to co-exist with one another. ItRead more
Posts tagged: #CreatureFeature
Creature Feature: Banded Water Snake
This snake came to us in September of 2008, but its estimated birth date was in August of 2007. The previous owners had it for 6 months and then gave it to a pet store, which then donated the snake to us. We are not sure if the snake is male or female, and I am hesitant to speculate due to the most recent mix up with our black rat snake! However, what I am sure about is that thisRead more
Creature feature: Lightning the Sicilian donkey
Lightning is one of the most well known and popular animals we have amongst our visitors. I have had people tell me they have been coming to the museum for years and that Lightning is their favorite animal! And there is good reason for Lightning to have made such a good impression, because he interacts with the visitors in many different ways. Lightning seems to thrive off of human interaction, whether it be spending time with the visitors or givingRead more
Creature Feature: Yellow-eyed eastern screech owl
We are not really sure if this owl is a male or female, but we think it’s a female because of her size. She was known as “yellow-eyed screech” for several years because the other screech owl she lives with has gray eyes. However, we now call her “one-eyed screech” because she had one of her eyes removed last year. In 2005, she started showing signs of glaucoma in both of her eyes. Over time, the pressure in her rightRead more
Creature Feature: Wilco the Florida Gulf Coast Sheep
Wilco is one of five sheep living in our farmyard. She is the easiest sheep to identify because she is the smallest and has a black spot on her nose. Of our five sheep, there are two mothers, two daughters (one to each mother) and a male (whom is not related to, nor the father of, the other sheep). Wilco is one of our mothers. Surprisingly enough, both of the mother sheep are significantly smaller than their daughters! Wilco wasRead more
Creature Feature: Donald the eastern box turtle
Donald is another of our education animals that lives behind the scenes. He came to us in March of 2004, and was brought in by one of the animal keepers. The animal keeper had acquired him from one of our volunteers at the time, who had found him injured in the road after being grazed by a car. When first found, one of Donald’s legs was injured and his shell was damaged, and the volunteer thought he was dead. However,Read more