you helped save animals
25 cents
from every
Louisville
Zoo general
admission ticket and one
dollar from every membership
goes to special worldwide
conservation programs.
Collectively, these quarters and
dollars can make a huge impact.
A Second Chance to Prevent Extinction
By Heather Dishon, Communications Coordinator
Have you ever thought you had
lost something precious forever?
It’s a scary thought — the idea
of something being gone never to
be found again. If by some stroke
of luck, you did manage to find the
thing you lost, you likely worked very
hard to make sure you never lost
it again!
This is the story of the black-
footed ferrets. These black-masked
little members of the weasel family
were declared extinct in 1979 and
considered lost to the world forever.
Their numbers, once estimated
at 500,000, had been decimated
due to habitat destruction and the
poisoning of prairie dogs (their
primary prey).
Fortunately, in 1981, a shining
moment of fortune appeared. A
remnant population of ferrets was
discovered in Meeteetse, Wyoming.
However, this group of ferrets faced
almost insurmountable odds when
in 1985, there were outbreaks of
canine distemper virus and sylvatic
plague. With the population critically
at risk, the last 18 black-footed fer-
rets were gathered and placed in a
managed breeding program.
Now, through the intense ef-
forts of a multi-institutional recovery
program, the black-footed ferret
population continues to improve.
Your Louisville Zoo is one of the six
organizations contributing to the
revitalization of an entire species.
The Zoo’s Conservation Center has
produced over 1,000 kits since 1991
and provided over 700 ferrets for
reintroduction to over 21 reintroduc-
tion sites across the Great Plains. This
is no small feat by any standards in
the world of conservation.
To add to these efforts, In January
of 2018, the Association of Zoos and
Aquariums formally announced that
the black-footed ferret had been
added to the international Saving
Animals from Extinction ® (SAFE) ini-
tiative. SAFE combines the expertise
of Zoo and Aquarium professionals
with conservation partners in the
field to increase awareness about
species and the importance of saving
them through collective impact and
public engagement. We are honored
to be a part of such an important
project. To bring a species back from
the brink of extinction takes vigi-
lance, skill, insight, lots of luck and
an unwavering commitment by a
community of caring individuals and
supportive organizations. We are all
so proud of this project and hopeful
for the future of black-footed ferrets.
Help support conservation
in style with a BFF t-shirt. See
page 27 for details.
Top: A black-footed ferret (BFF)
in its new enclosure.
Directly above: A BFF pops
up from his hole after being
reintroduced in Wyoming.
Did you
know?
The Louisville
recently made
improvements
to our black-footed
ferret conservation center. New
enclosures and with energy ef-
ficient LED lighting were installed
by Zoo staff in December. Black-
footed ferret breeding cycles are
completely reliant on seasonal
light cycles. This upgrade to LED
lighting enhances the Zoo’s ability
to ensure this species survival into
the future.
Louisville Zoo Trunkline • Spring 2018 • 11