Five meerkats mysteriously die at the Philadelphia Zoo
The sudden death of five meerkats at the Philadelphia Zoo this month has left zookeepers and officials dumbfounded, and a dye used to mark the animals may be to blame.
The meerkats, two males named Ari and Kgala and three females named Lula, Nkosi and Nya, were siblings and arrived at the zoo in 2013, said Rachel Metz, the zoo’s vice president of animal welfare.
The three female meerkats died on June 1, one of the males died on June 3, and the other male died on June 12. None of the meerkats had previously had serious health problems, a zoo spokesman said.
The deaths came as a shock to zoo officials, who said they had never had any problems with the dye in the past.
“This is a dye that we’ve been using successfully for 30 years, and something has clearly changed here,” Ms Metz said. “We are trying to figure that out. We have a pretty robust internal and external fact-finding process that we go through.”
An in-house autopsy, an animal autopsy, showed signs that the deaths could be related to an ink used to mark small animals for identification. Zoo staff sent samples from the animals to the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine for further toxicology reports to confirm the cause of death, but results could take weeks, Ms. Metz said.
Since the meerkats’ death, the zoo has stopped using the dye on small animals such as titi monkeys and lemurs, Ms Metz said. Employees have moved to using other methods to identify animals, such as tags and monitors. It also partners with the Associations of Zoos and Aquariums, a non-profit and accrediting organization, to inform other zoos of the deaths when they use the same dye.
The mysterious nature of the deaths has taken a toll on zoo staff, Ms Metz said.
“Our zookeepers often spend more time with the animals at the zoo than they do with their own families at home and their own pets,” she said. “There’s a real bond between the staff and the animals, and they’re obviously devastated about that.”
The Philadelphia Zoo houses animal health care facilities and participates in a number of conservation efforts, including one for golden lion tamarins.
Meerkats, slender-tailed creatures with pointy faces, are members of the mongoose family and are native to Botswana, Mozambique, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. They usually live in large groups called mobs that can contain dozens of individuals. They exhibit social and animated behavior, which was documented in “Meerkat Manor”, a hit Animal Planet TV show that ran from 2005 to 2008.
Meerkats are also known for their teamwork when hunting for food and looking out for predators, as well as sheltering in vast underground tunnels.
There are no longer any meerkats at the zoo, Ms Metz said, but officials plan to work with the Zoos and Aquariums Associations to eventually bring them back. There is currently no timeline for when this could happen, she said. Meerkats have recently been born in zoos in Miami, Tucson, Arizona.And Chattanooga, Tenn.