Baby boom and housewarming. What concerns and plans for the future does the Minsk Zoo have

The Day of Environmental Protection at the MINSK Zoo was celebrated in a special way, on a grand scale. And the reason was the most worthy - seeing off the bison cub into adulthood. The kid - a name, his parents - a new living space, guests and participants of the naming ceremony - a ton of tenderness and a flurry of positive emotions were presented by the workers of the city oasis. At such moments, you think about how close nature is to man, and man to nature, because bison, wolves, raccoons, lemurs, lions have everything like people. They meet, create families, wait for the appearance of cubs, celebrate housewarming, and if they don’t agree in character, they “file” for divorce. BelTA correspondents visited the new settlers to assess the improved living conditions of bison and take a look at their baby. About the family relations of bison Velvet and Mulatto, the lion Artur and his girlfriend Anfisa,

Zoo workers decided to mark one of the important days of the ecological calendar with several important events at once. The first one is housewarming. The married couple of bison Velvet and Mulatka improved their living conditions and moved from the old enclosure with an area of ​​about 600 square meters to a spacious Manor, the footage of which is five times the area of ​​the family's previous residence. The apartments correspond to the natural habitat of new settlers, but with comfort: here you have a pond to splash around and a winter house with insulation. Caring builders even nailed special brushes to the wall of the bison's dwelling in case Velvet or Mulatto's withers itch. According to the DIRECTOR of the Minsk Zoo Alexander Safronov, Barhat and Mulatka changed their one-room apartment to a cottage with all amenities.

Zoo workers also thought about neighbors for bison. They would not live with anyone, given the aggressive nature of animals and the lack of such experience. So far, only wild ducks live next to the new aviary of the bison family. In the future, Velvet, Mulatto and their baby may have other feathered neighbors.

"The idea to relocate the bison was born two years ago during the restoration of the near-water path. We saw a piece of land, at that time absolutely not well-maintained, overgrown with wild plants, and realized that it could be useful. We had this idea, and we started its implementation. We worked with the soil, prepared the site, landscaped it. We started directly building the enclosure and the observation deck this year, in April. It took us about a month and a half to build. The enclosure was equipped with the financial support of the city and the Minsk City Committee of Natural resources that help us a lot from year to year. The contractor was a Belarusian company, the same one that last year helped us restore the enclosure for lynxes and caracals," he dedicates to the history of the appearance of a new enclosure for bisonzoo director .

The former habitat of bison is planned to be repaired and the living conditions of the red deer to be improved. He is still alone, but as soon as a suitable wife is found for him and it will be possible to think about offspring, the newly-made family will immediately move to the renovated enclosure.

In the family life of bison, moving is not the most significant event. In December, Mulatto and Velvet became parents, and it was time for their baby to be christened. Choosing a name for a newborn is not an easy task. Here you need not to make a mistake and guess the character, take a closer look at the habits, in general, try on the name. An already difficult task is made even more difficult by a set of certain criteria. It turns out that according to the rules of keeping a stud book, bison born in Belarus must begin with the letter B. The vowel that follows it determines the order in which children appear in the family. This is the first joint child for Velvet and Mulatto, so all the names invented for the baby began with "Ba ...".

The zoo prepared for the ceremony in advance and came up with nicknames that met the criteria and suitable for the bison, and the director of the zoo only suggested that Deputy Chairman of the Minsk City Executive Committee Artem Tsuran unwind the drum and pull out the scroll with the name. So, relying on chance and luck, the baby bison got his name - Basalt. The name of the rock perfectly suits this powerful and strong male, into which today's funny and awkward cub promises to grow. The happy family was congratulated on their housewarming and christening with a large basket of bison goodies.

"Our zoo is developing systematically. On the Day of Environmental Protection, we held such an action to once again remind the residents of Minsk and all Belarusians that nature is a wealth that we must not only preserve, but also increase. The opening of a new enclosure, the ceremony - initiative of students of ecological classes. It is very pleasant that our schoolchildren participate in such projects and not occasionally, but on an ongoing basis, study our nature and animals living on the territory of the republic. An educational moment is not excluded here. We hope that our growing the generation will be brought up in the right traditions of protecting nature and the environment," Deputy Chairman of the Minsk City Executive Committee Artem Tsuran said in a conversation with journalists.

The ecological direction is progressing in many educational institutions of the capital. With the participation of Minsk schoolchildren, a map of ecological trails was compiled, of which there are 31 in the city. One of them, the "Kingdom of the Yellow-headed King", named after the smallest bird in Eurasia, is located at the very gates of secondary school No. 141 in Minsk. And it was on the basis of this educational institution that the first resource center for green classes in the Belarusian capital appeared, opened in 2021. The center has 125 children, primary school students.

“The purpose of opening our center was to educate both students and all Minskers about nature. We want to preserve nature in its original form . study the plants that grow there and teach their classmates to take care of it all.We also participate in writing scientific papers.Our work "The influence of wet wipes on the ecological situation in Belarus" received a diploma of the 1st degree in the republican competition of environmental projects "Green School" at city ​​stage and a second-degree diploma at the republican level. This work was written by our third-graders," said Zinaida, director of secondary school No. 141

Gordeyuk.

Green school student Anelia Kobzeva is a vivid example of a girl who is not indifferent to the fate of the world around her. The schoolgirl actively participates in competitions and projects on environmental topics and combines initiative and a desire to create for the benefit of nature. Recently, Aneliya drew a children's picture for the drawing contest "Primroses: it's better to draw, not to tear" and realized the beauty of snowdrops, as well as how important it is to preserve this fragile and delicate beauty for others.

At family holidays, it is customary to flip through photo albums and recall the events of past years. Mulatto and Basalt also have their own history. Oksana Buko, a junior researcher at the Minsk Zoo, told the story. Let's start with the fact that for the Mulatto this is the second marriage and the third child. In 2019, the bison became a mother of twins, which is a rarity in nature. The kids were named Byasha and Buyasha, and now the grown bison live in other zoos. With her first husband, the bison Baron, who was several years older than Mulatka, the bison, as Oksana Buko says, broke up.

Velvet was added to the Mulatto in 2020. Tom at that time was not even a year old, he was much shorter and visually much weaker than his future wife. “The mulatto at first pressed Velvet, one might say, squeezed his aviary. I remember such a case. That day the weather was bad. For such cases, we put houses in animal aviaries where you can hide from the cold, rain and wind. So the Mulatto drove Velvet into the street, right in bad weather. She herself looked at the window of the house, satisfied, how he lay so poor and twisted in the center of the enclosure, "Oksana Buko recalls with a smile.

Over time, Velvet, of course, matured, and now he is the undisputed leader in his bison family. You can even say that the bison changed roles. Now Velvet is terrorizing the Mulatto, but in moderation, remembering the obstinate nature of his wife. The baby gets more.

These strong men are very sociable and love guests, especially those who bring treats. Invite Velvet or Mulatto to taste a slice of cucumber or carrot, and they will lick their fingers with their blue rough tongue, and if you're lucky, they will allow you to stroke yourself and touch your nose.

The daily diet of the bison family consists of hay, grain, and vegetables. A delicacy for them, surprisingly, is the bark of young trees. In nature, bison have great respect for the bark of oak, linden, willow, and do not refuse acorns. Zookeepers caring for Velvet and Mulatto try to pamper their pets from time to time. “It is very interesting to watch how the bison tries to tear off the bark from the branch with his lips and tongue. And the bark from young branches is the most delicious for them, but it’s also not easy to tear it off. Once I watched this process. all the same, he couldn’t tear off the most delicious piece. Then he began to butt this branch. He butted it, decided that the branch had subsided, and again began to try to bite off. We even posted this video on our Instagram, "

Life is in full swing in the aviary, not only for Velvet and Mulatto. This spring, the zoo experienced a real baby boom. The offspring were brought by red wolves and raccoons, but both mothers are still wary of showing their cubs. The she-wolf takes out eight children early in the morning, allows them to run a little, but as soon as she sees a person, she drags the cubs into the hole by the withers. As soon as she takes one away, another one runs out of the house towards her. Can a caring mother and rein in the kids. Oksana Buko noticed that the she-wolf gives the cubs some kind of signal, after which they themselves run with all their paws into the mink and do not show their nose out of it until the evening. This pair of wolves brings offspring for the second year in a row. True, last year there were six wolf cubs: three boys and three girls. The sex of the cubs from this brood is still unknown, since the she-wolf did not allow to examine the children.

The number of raccoons in the Minsk Zoo in April increased by five souls. It is impossible to even look at newborns with one eye. The raccoon does not even think about letting the tiny raccoons down. The cubs always sleep next to their mother and feed on her MILK. Acquaintance with a person is postponed until they get stronger.

Every spring, goats, llamas, lambs, mouflons also bring new offspring. This year was no exception.

Oksana Buko leads excursions around the zoo and notes that not a single boy or girl has yet refused a photo with a lemur. Such funny lemur cubs with huge eyes and a nimble long tail are a permanent photo hit. Several groups of lemurs live in the zoo. Martha and Junior, a married couple who recently became parents for the second time, wanted to meet us. The gender of the baby is not yet known, so it remains nameless. Unlike the one-year-old sister Augustine, who received the name from the month of her birth. This family has another member - Augustine's brother August, who has a freedom-loving and independent character and decided to live separately from his parents.

But the lioness Anfisa came to the lion Arthur only to be friends, the couple does not plan to have offspring.

Well, how can one disagree with the fact that animals have everything like people!

Vera VASILEVSKY,

photo by Ramil NASIBULINA,

BELTA.