The first case of a preterm large anteater baby artificially bred in Shanghai Wild Animal Park officially met with tourists today. This is the first case of successful breeding of premature large anteaters in China.
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Autumn high and cool days, nursery fathers always love to take the little guy to the outdoor lawn sports to play, fortunate to meet its tourists are always a surprise, because the big anteater not only looks special, "spoiled and sell cute" kung fu is more first-class, this is not, and began to chase the grandfather to hug (back), and its 30 cm long tongue from time to time to stick out, to a "tongue to sell cute", this posture is estimated that the grandfather is almost overwhelmed.
The due date for the baby anteater is the end of June, but early in the morning of June 3, the big anteaters found that the baby anteater had been born, and the mother ignored it.
Generally speaking, after the cub is born, the mother of the large anteater will lick the anus and tire coat for the cub, and the cub will also crawl along the tail of the "mother" to its back out of instinctive reaction. And this little guy was born prematurely, the system was particularly weak, and the back hair was even less pitiful, and he had no ability to climb onto the mother's back, and the mother beast discarded the cub aside. In desperation, the nurseryman decided to take the cub out and send it to the small animal paradise nursery for the animal father to rescue and take care of.
"The young animal weighed less than 1,000 g when it was sent, was male, had a low body temperature and had entered a semi-comatose state." The nursery staff raced against the clock to rescue it, soaked it in warm water to warm it up, dried and dried it, the veterinarian conducted a comprehensive examination, timely handled the sterilization of iodine wine in the umbilical cord, infusion, injection treatment, and put it into the baby incubator...
A set of "rescue" process down, looking at the weak ups and downs of the baby of the big anteater baby in the nursery box, the nursery staff began to worry again, "Although the parenting experience is rich, but never artificially bred a large anteater, let alone a premature baby." "24-hour rotation of care is a must, there is no experience in the country to find foreign information in time, combined with their own experience in childcare, so that the nursery began to artificially raise premature large anteaters baby process."
How do I get it to milk smoothly? Finding a "special pacifier" is the key, because the mouth shape of the large anteater is more peculiar, the nursery staff first uses different pacifiers to try, after the improvement of the pacifier and then after repeated training, it took more than a day, after more than a dozen times of training the young beast to master the sucking skills and successfully sucked the milk, completed the necessary skills to survive - "will eat".
From a few drops to a few milliliters at a time, you can slowly eat 10ml of artificial milk in one meal, and the nursery staff feeds it 6 times a day. When the little one can drink 60ml of artificial milk at the age of 1 month, the nursery staff is happy to celebrate the midday meal.
Nowadays, the baby anteater is more than three months old, and has begun to feed the "sauce" broken by ants, cat food, eggs, beef, spinach and other feeds, and the little guy adapts well to the "sauce", and currently weighs 10kg. Next, the childcare worker's baby anteaters will live in the small animal park for a while.
"In the subsequent stage of the baby's growth, we will gradually reduce the number of artificial milk and gradually wean, and then we will simulate some toys similar to the shape of the wild ant nest, which will place its favorite food and carry out rewilding training."
Shen Yajun, the nurse's grandfather, said: "The big anteater likes to use its front paws to cut the ground, so it will prepare some wood or build sand and mud, so that it can learn to use the front paws flexibly, increase its natural habits of its usual life, and when it can fully adapt to the life of the adult big anteater, it will be integrated into our big anteater family." ”
Native to South America, the Great Anteaters are also known as "South American monsters" and are mainly distributed in central Guatemala and northern Argentina. Of the few living dentates, the Great Anteaters are probably the most eccentric.
The big anteater has "four monsters": one monster: the long-looking monster, small eyes, small ears, the head is like a slender round tube connected to the neck, and the small hole in the front of the round tube is its mouth; the second monster: the long tongue, the large anteater has no teeth, but has a long tongue that is flexible and free; the third monster: the claw is sharp, its long claws are bent like a sickle, which can not only be used as a digging tool, but also the best defense weapon; the fourth monster: the long tail is useful. A fluffy and hairy tail of sixty or seventy centimeters long, which can be used as an umbrella on rainy and hot days, and spread on the ground at night to become a fluffy blanket.
In 2009, Shanghai Wild Animal Park introduced a large anteater, which is a second-generation large anteater bred in Shanghai Wildlife Park. Large anteaters are relatively special mammals, because of the pointed mouth, sharp front paws and other reasons, it is not easy to feed, and because the overall number of large anteaters in China is small, there is not much experience to learn, especially artificial child rearing work is more difficult.
In the process of raising large anteaters, Shanghai Wildlife Park mainly refers to relevant literature and foreign child-rearing experience, as well as continuous exploration and accumulation of its own breeding experience. Through the in-depth understanding of the wild living environment of the large anteaters, as well as closely observing and recording the food, defecation, hair changes, weight gain and other conditions of the large anteaters, the wild environment of the large anteaters is simulated, and the breeding management is continuously optimized and adjusted.
With the big anteater baby and the majority of tourists to meet, Shanghai Wildlife Park's "Giant Beast Festival" activities have also begun, the National Day holiday is a good time for the family to travel, in addition to seeing the "little monsters" in the park, this time in the "Giant Beast Festival" for the first time also appeared in the "big moon" of the little white tiger, small Northeast tiger, small lion, small black palm spider monkey, white-faced monk monkey, Arabian baboon and many other animal babies.
In addition, the largest "giant beast" large population in East China, African elephant herd, Asian elephant herd, rhinoceros family, hippo family, giraffe large population and other large animals became the protagonists of this event. The seemingly bulky bodies of these behemoths have great wisdom.
The intelligence of the elephant is obvious to all, following the nurseryman's password to show their skills, and sometimes fanning up the big ears, stuffing the elephant trunk into their mouths, like a cute posture, such a contrast is irresistible to tourists; rhinos are best at playing with mud to disguise themselves, smearing their whole body motionless hidden in the exhibition area like a "mud pier"; the elegant momentum of the giraffe can always arouse the desire of everyone to take pictures with them in the same frame...
Author: Yao Yifan, Ni Li