The Lake Superior Zoo is going batty next week, with a little monkey business mixed in.
A week devoted to all things bats will begin Monday as Bat
Conservation International kicks off its International Year of the Bat campaign at the zoo in West Duluth.
Lake Superior Zoo is the first location in the Western Hemisphere chosen to host a Year of the Bat event. Festivities later in the year will take place at the Houston Arboretum and Nature Center, the Audubon Society of Portland and Zoo Atlanta.
James Eggers, director of education for Bat Conservation International, said the conservation group was attracted to the Lake Superior Zoo because of the "Buy a Pumpkin, Save a Bat" fundraiser the zoo's chapter of the American Association of Zoo Keepers staged during Boo at the Zoo last year.
ADVERTISEMENT
Events during the week will include bat breakfasts, kids' activities, a bat house workshop, brown bag lectures with bat experts and nocturnal tours, culminating in an all-day bat party on Saturday,
Aug. 20. Eggers also will speak at the Uncorked for Conservation beer and wine tasting event on Thursday.
Also starting Monday at the zoo, a pair of Allen's swamp monkeys, on loan from the San Diego Zoo, will go on exhibit.
After spending 60 days in quarantine, Noki, an 8-year-old male, and Karen, a 12-year-old female, will be placed in their new home in the Primate Center.
The pair eventually will be introduced to the zoo's trio of
Angolan colobus. In the wild, swamp monkeys and colobus, native to the Central Congo River basin of Africa, share habitat.
More information and a schedule of events are available at the zoo's website: www.lszoo.org .
