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Education focus of Meet a Sloth event

Zoo experience makes stop at convention center

Mirror photo by Shen Wu Tan Catalina Vargas, animal care manager for Little Ray’s Nature Centres, shows off a baby sloth named Flash to event attendees Saturday at the Blair County Convention Center.

Animal lovers of all ages showed up Saturday to get a close look at a baby sloth perched on top of a blue stuffed animal Saturday at the Blair County Con­vention Center.

Flash, a 1-year-old sloth weighing about 10 pounds, was just one animal at the Meet a Sloth event hosted as part of an educational program on conservation and responsible pet ownership.

“One of our ideas with this is to bring this type of zoo experience to places that don’t necessarily have ready access to zoos or aquariums or nature centers of their own,” said Catalina Vargas, animal care manager for Little Ray’s Nature Centres. “So we kind of wanted to bring that to them and give everyone the opportunity to see some creatures they might not regularly see or have access to see.”

The 12,000-square-foot exhibition also featured tarantulas, owls, a falcon, ferrets, bunnies, tortoises, snakes and many other animals.

While some domestic animals including ferrets and bunnies were kept in an open display for attendees to pet, other animals including various snakes, tree frogs, a green iguana and a bearded dragon could be observed through glass tanks.

ZooAmerica senior educator Alicia Snyder said the Hershey-based zoo brought its birds of prey including a barred owl, Peregrine falcon and Harris’ hawk, along with a striped skunk and baby alligator because the Canada-based Little Ray’s Nature Centres does not have a lot of animals in the U.S.

“We often, as people, get things in our head that you should only care about the cute, fuzzy things,” Snyder said. “You bring out a tarantula and a snake and everyone’s all scared of them, but they really have no reason to be scared of them.”

“A lot of the education is letting them know that everything has its part. Everything is important,” she added. “Even if they don’t physically do anything to help animals, even just not squishing the spider in the corner makes a huge impact. It’s nice to let them know that everything they do does matter.”

Hundreds of attendees filled the room where the animals were and long lines of people snaked along the convention center’s entrance.

One attendee, Michelle Phillipson, drove two hours from Shippensburg to attend the event and joked about how she has an obsession with sloths.

“I cried as soon as I saw him,” Phillipson said of seeing the baby sloth, Flash. “I love him,” she said laughing.

“I was just so excited. They pulled him out, and I just lost it for a second,” she added.

Phillipson said although she mainly came for the sloth, she interacted with other animals including ferrets, bunnies and rats and commented on how the exhibition had a lot of information about different animals.

An interesting fact Phillipson said she learned at the event is that tarantulas rub hair off their abdomen to irritate predators.

“I think it’s a fantastic event, especially for the educational purposes,” Phillip­son said. “It’s different than going to a zoo where you just walk around and see things … but you get to sit down and learn about each animal individually, which I think is really great, especially for kids.”

Missy Diehl of Huntingdon and Mary Lynn Tressler of Bellefonte also attended the event as part of their girls’ day outing.

Diehl and Tressler said they gave a tarantula a “high five” and held a snake, commenting on how they learned that tarantulas are venomous but not deadly and that snakes have sensitive heads to the point where touching their heads could give them a concussion.

While Diehl described the event as awesome for little kids and for a good cause, she recommended hosting the event in a bigger space and separating the interactive presentations from the animal displays.

The exhibition made stops at Allentown and Erie before Altoona. The Meet a Sloth event cintinues from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. today at the Blair County Convention Center.

Tickets are $14 at the door and $12 with a Facebook share. Children under the age of 3 are admitted free of charge.

The Foundation for Animal Rescue and Education, Little Ray’s Nature Centres and ZooAmerica are hosting the event.

Proceeds from the event will go to FARE, the Sloth Conservation Foundation and the Wildlife Con­servation Society.

Mirror Staff Writer Shen Wu Tan is at 946-7457.

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