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We’ll ask ourselves, “What if we breed this one and this one— BINTURONG
what would it do to the population?” Their computer program
spits out a recommendation. It might tell us the breeding would Anne Nichols, our lead animal care
increase the genetic variability of the population. Or it might specialist of large carnivores, is Brookfield
tell us it would do nothing for the population, or that it would Zoo’s institutional representative, or contact
decrease the genetic variability because you’d be trying to breed person, for snow leopards, Amur leopards,
two animals that are too closely related. and sloth bears. She is also a non-voting
member of the Bear TAG steering committee.
One of the things to keep in mind is that every institution As the studbook keeper and SSP coordinator for binturongs, Nichols
that participates in an SSP isn’t necessarily a breeder. Some documents and manages 70 binturongs living in 31 institutions.
zoos don’t want the responsibility of having to breed an animal.
They’re willing to hold those animals instead of breeding them. Brookfield Zoo is a huge player in the binturong population.
And that’s important when you have animals that might be Our staff is well-trained and has a long history of working with
valuable down the line, but aren’t right now. binturongs. We have a great exhibit and our breeding pair is very
compatible. Currently, we have six binturongs here—two males and
Someone has to raise Jamaican boas for seven years until four females.
they get big enough to reproduce. And a lot of zoos don’t want
to do that. They want something that’s going to fill an exhibit There are very few successful breeding pairs in the country and
and a little baby snake won’t. That makes it a challenge to find we have one of them—Anton and Vivvy. All of our other animals
institutions that will rear the young. are their kids. One of their cubs is at Zoo Tampa and just had her
first baby there in May.
We’re working on several SSP recommendations right
now. Just in the Herp department, we are working on a In the studbook I track all the binturongs in the country.
recommendation for a female Fiji Island iguana from Zoo Tampa I track who their parents are because I want to make sure we’re
to pair with our male. There’s also a recommendation to bring a breeding unrelated animals. Binturongs are typically more
female spider tortoise in from San Diego Zoo for our male. compatible when paired when they’re younger. There are also other
considerations—body size, subspecies, and geographical location.
I do a lot of interfacing with institutional representatives
throughout the zoos—usually a specific curator or
animal keeper. I ask if they need to place offspring
or bring in an animal to make a breeding pair.
If they have offspring, we want to make sure
those offspring survive to viability. We may
want to get an animal to another zoo so it
can continue to breed.
TAG: Small Carnivore
Wild habitat: Tropical rain
forests of Southeast Asia
Description: Long, shaggy
fur; prehensile tail; smell
like buttered popcorn
Life expectancy: 14 to 17
years in the wild, can live
to late 20s in human care
IUCN Red List Status:
Vulnerable
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