Royal Oak — The search continues for a baby wallaby that disappeared over the weekend from a Detroit Zoo exhibit, but the likelihood it will be returned to its mother lessens the longer it’s missing, officials said Monday.
“We don’t know what to think at this point,” said Scott Carter, the zoo’s Chief Life Sciences Officer. “We’ve never had an animal disappear like this.”
Officials are leaning toward the 5-month-old wallaby – about the size of a small rabbit – being taken by a predator from outside the park.
“There are native predators that live here, like owls and hawks,” he said. “And we can’t overlook the possibility that an owl or a hawk took the joey. It may be that is the case and we’ll never find the joey.”
Andrew McFerrin, a zookeeper who works with the park’s giraffes and marsupials, said he and the staff are heartbroken by the joey’s disappearance.
“We love to see new animals at the zoo, especially babies,” he said. “Because we don’t know what happened to this joey and because it was so sudden, it’s just very shocking for all of us. We’re definitely very sad about it.”
He also said the staff is holding out hope the joey will be found, but they also know because it’s so young that it can’t survive very long away from its mother.
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Source: ‘It’s just very shocking for all of us’: 5-month-old wallaby still missing at Detroit Zoo
