Zookeeper Appreciation Week: Cute as a Coati

Thursday's zookeeper of the week is Melanie Czajkowski who is about to celebrate her first year as a zookeeper at Wildwood Wildlife Park. To commemorate National Zookeeper Week, Melanie has selected as her favorite park resident the coatimundi.

The coatimundi or coati is a medium-sized mammal found only in North and South America and are members of the raccoon family.  Coatis have a slender head and as you can see, a slightly turned-up nose. This feature is part of the reason why it is given the nickname 'the hog-nose raccoon.' Additionally they have a very long tail and often hold the tail erect; using it as a way of keeping troops of coatis together while walking or foraging in tall vegetation. The tip of the coatis tail can be moved slightly, just like a cat.

Coatis are active day and night and feeds on lizards, fruits, nuts and seeds, insects, birds eggs, rodents and small reptiles. A forest dweller and an agile tree climber when the coatis is on the ground, its short forelegs give it a bearlike gait.

Females and their young travel in bands but males are solitary. Males join the band only during the mating season, typically at the start of the rainy season, when there is an abundance of food. When the female is ready to give birth she will leave the band of coatis to build a nest in the trees or on a rocky ledge, where she will give birth to 2-7 kits. The female and her young will rejoin the band when they are about 6 weeks old. 

Coatis communication using chirping, snorting, or grunting sounds. The also use postures to convey simple messages. In her photo Melanie has chosen a favorite posture of our one-year old coatis: the adorably cute tactic of begging the zookeepers for their favorite food of grapes and mealworms.

Thank you Melanie for sharing your love of animals and for highlighting the coatimundi.

Bat Appreciation Days

Bats - one of the center stage players during Halloween - is a much maligned creature of the night. 

Did you know that bats don't attack people - nor do they do not get tangled in people's hair and even true vampire bats are not true vampires.

Bats live on all continents except Antarctica, are essential members of many types of ecosystems - from rain forests to deserts. Bats pollinate and disperse the seeds of hundred of species of plants and are the major pollinators of many types of cacti that open their flowers only at night - when bats are active. They also eat copious quantities of insects and other arthropods. On a typical night, a bat consumes the equivalent of its own body weight.

Bats are very nimble flyers because of the dexterity of their wings, which, unlike insect and bird wings, are structured to fold during flight, very similar to the way we fold our hands. Bat wings are draped with skin that stretches and are powered by special muscles.

The importance of bats as part of our world compounds the tragic dimensions of an almost always fatal epidemic in bats: White-nose Syndrome.

Named for a cold-loving white fungus that is typically found on the faces and wings of infected bats, White-nose Syndrome causes bats to awaken more often during hibernation and use up the stored fat reserves that they need to get them through the winter. Infected bats often emerge too soon from hibernation and can be seen flying around in midwinter. These bats usually freeze or starve to death and is almost always fatal.

White-nose Syndrome has killed more than 5.7 million bats since it was discovered in a single New York cave in February 2006. Seven bat species in 23 United States and 5 Canadian provinces have now been documented with White-nose Syndrome.

Close to home, White-nose syndrome has been detected in two Minnesota state parks.

The disease is transmitted primarily from bat to bat, inadvertently fungal spores are carried into caves by humans on clothing and caving gear. The syndrome is not known to be a threat to humans, pets, livestock or other wildlife.

While only a few of the bats in the Minnesota state parks have tested positive for the fungus, if Minnesota follows the trends of other states, the disease is likely to be present in Minnesota bats within two to three years.

Mortality rates approaching 100% are reported at some sites. White-nose Syndrome threatens some of the largest hibernation caves of the endangered Indiana myotis, gray myotis, and Virginia big-eared bats. Ultimately, all bats across North America are at imminent risk.

What is being done?

In 2009 and 2010, a team of federal and state agencies prepared a White-nose Syndrome management plan to address the threat to hibernating bats. In Tennessee, a state of 10,000 caves and 16 species of bats including the winter home to 270,000 gray bats, a very special project is underway.

Wildwood Wildlife Park Welcomes Porcupette Spike

Did you know that a baby porcupine is known as a porcupette? They are! Our zoo is happy to introduce Spike, a three-day old porcupette. I'm sure you will agree that he is adorable!


Our zoo has three different species of porcupine: North American, South American and African. Spike is a North American Porcupine.


There are two main groups of porcupine: Old World Porcupines which are mainly ground-dwelling animals while the other species, New World Porcupines, are animals that can climb trees. Can you guess which group Spike and his parents are?


Like all porcupettes, Spike was born with soft quills that become hard within hours following birth. Did you know that quills are hairs with barbed tips on the end? Quills are solid at the tip and base but most of the quill shaft is hollow. Porcupines are good swimmers, its hollow quills help keep it afloat. A single porcupine can have as many as 30,000 needle-like quills. The quills are found on all parts of the body, except for a porcupine's stomach; the longest quills are on its rump and the shortest quills are on its cheek. 


Porcupines have hairless soles on their strong feet; their curved claws and flat paws are known as master-climbers.

Porcupines are herbivores; they like to eat leaves, twigs and green plants. They do not hibernate and in the winter they will climb trees to find food, most bark and tender twigs.


The porcupine is a solitary animal but it is very vocal and has a wide variety of calls including grunts, coughs and tooth clicking!


Baby porcupines begin foraging for food after only a couple of days; babies stay with their mother for about six months. We hope you'll visit the zoo and welcome Spike as one of our newest residents.