Baby gazelle hand-reared at ZSL Whipsnade Zoo. Hoofstock keepers at ZSL Whipsnade Zoo have helped to hand-rear a baby Thomsons gazelle. The youngster, named Larry, was born on 9th October and is one of only four Thomson’s gazelles in the UK, all of which are kept at Whipsnade. After the little gazelle was born, keepers noticed that his first-time mum was not returning to feed him, and grew concerned for his survival. Senior keepers were therefore forced to make the difficult decision to step in and hand-rear the youngster, with Team Leader Mark Holden volunteering to bottle-feed the calf with goat milk five times a day and at regular intervals during the night. Mark commented: It’s always a last resort to separate a calf from the group, but little Larry was getting very weak and needed our help. As soon as we got some milk into him he started to improve. We named him Lazarus - Larry for short - because for a moment there we really didn’t think he was going to pull through. We put a sky kennel in our lounge for him and he quickly settled into a routine. When hed had his milk and a little walk-about, he’d just take himself back off to bed. It was a little tricky having Larry in the house. We had to keep an eye on him after each feed and get ready with a towel in case he started to urinate. After two weeks Larry was healthy enough to go back to ZSL Whipsnade Zoo and be reunited with the group, although he’s still getting a lot of extra care. He’s doing really well now, growing nicely and putting on weight. He has started to eat some solids like grass and hay, and he can be properly weaned in a few months. Photo credit: ZSL Whipsnade Zoo
Posted on: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 09:00:01 +0000
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