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Event at Akron Zoo honors special species
By Bill Lilley
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Wednesday, Aug 22, 2007
Akron Zoo Marketing Director and confirmed animal lover Dave Barnhardt took animal rights to what could be considered a new level Tuesday morning.
The four Humboldt penguin chicks selected their own names in a special event orchestrated by Barnhardt and his staff.
''They are special, part of an endangered species, so we thought we'd do something special with them,'' Barnhardt said. ''This was the first time the animals at the zoo selected their own names.''
Now, Barnhardt knows the four chicks on a first-name basis even though the chicks themselves do not.
After all, they are only 4 months old.
And while they are always well-dressed in their formal attire, they are penguins.
''We'd like to think that after they select their name, they will respond to it,'' wild animal specialist Vicky Croisant said. ''But they don't.
''If you would say their name and they did respond, it's simply by chance.''
Croisant, who is in her fourth year at the zoo, used a bit of trickery to get the penguin chicks to pick their names.
How hard is it to deceive a penguin, you ask?
Croisant, a Michigan native, took a big bucket of the Humboldt penguins' favorite delicacy small fish called capelin into the climate-control water of the zoo's penguin exhibit, which is modeled after a shipwreck in the Humboldt penguins' native habitat of Chile and Peru.
Croisant created a feeding frenzy among the 19 penguins by doling out several capelin and then sticking a batch of four paper fish under the beak of a unsuspecting chick. Each of the four paper fish had one of the 646 names submitted by the worldwide public an entry came from England written on it. Whichever paper fish the chick bit at, the name on it became the chick's name.
''If you hold a fish in front of a penguin, they'll answer to anything,'' Barnhardt said.
Croisant repeated the act of deception three times.
And now the four each have a name.
Meet Poquita, Aletta, Fausto and Guapo.
''We were really pleased with the interest the contest generated and the number of entries we received,'' said Barnhardt, who is in his 14th year at the zoo.
''Most of the entries were from Northeast Ohio, but there were some from other states and there was one from a person in the U.K. who visited the zoo while in Akron last year and kept up with what we're doing on our Web site.
''With all the recent movies out on penguins, they are very, very popular . . . In fact, our penguin exhibit is one of the most popular exhibits at the zoo right now. Kids really go crazy over the penguins.''
Barnhardt said that with the closing of Sea World and Six Flags, the zoo is the only place in Northeast Ohio to see penguins.
There are less than 20 zoos in the country that feature the Humboldt penguin, which is on the endangered species list, because there are less than 10,000 Humboldt penguins in the world. noweb
Bill Lilley can be reached at 330-996-3811 or blilley@thebeaconjournal.com.
Akron Zoo Marketing Director and confirmed animal lover Dave Barnhardt took animal rights to what could be considered a new level Tuesday morning.
Get the full article here.
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