Detroit Zoo Offers To Take 61 Animals From Shuttered Bat Zone

The Detroit Zoo offered a new home to 61 animals displaced by the recent shuttering of the Bat Zone, an animal sanctuary in Pontiac. The zoo will house fifty-four bats, five southern flying squirrels, a Linne’s two-toed sloth and a Cranwell’s horned frog. There are three species of bat represented, zoo officials say: straw-colored fruit bats, short-tailed fruit bats and Jamaican fruit bats.

“This is an unfortunate situation and we are doing everything we can to assist them in placing animals with facilities capable of ensuring their lifetime care, including taking in more than 60 of the animals at the Detroit Zoo,” said Dr. Randi Meyerson, deputy chief life sciences officer for the Detroit Zoological Society in a statement Wednesday.

The Detroit Zoo began working with a network of accredited institutions nationwide to help the Organization for Bat Conservation (operators of the Bat Zone) to find safe new homes for over 200 displaced animals. The Detroit Zoo is currently readying habitats for its newest residents, and the animals face a monthlong quarantine before they can move to “behind-the-scenes” areas of the zoo where they might be with existing Detroit Zoo animals, zoo officials said.

In addition to taking 61 animals, the Detroit Zoo is working with Association of Zoos & Aquariums accredited zoos and Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries accredited sanctuaries to place the remaining 140+ creatures left homeless by Bat Zone’s sudden closure last week.

The Detroit Zoo has made a habit of taking in animals from circuses and exhibitors, and zoo officials say one past rescue included 1,000 exotic animals authorities confiscated from a Texas animal wholesaler. They’ve also offered a new home to a polar bear from a tropical circus, lions found abandoned in city homes and lions who were used as security for a Kansas junkyard.

The Detroit Zoological Society Kalter/Lezotte Fund for Wildlife Rescue will pay for the rehoming. The fund exists specifically to help the zoo offer a sanctuary to exotic animals in need.

Photo by Ian Waldie/Getty Images.