Cold Is Blamed in 8 Animal Deaths at Zoo

Colder than usual nighttime temperatures played a part in the deaths of eight animals during the past nine days at the San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal Park, zoo officials said Wednesday.

Jeff Jouett, a zoo spokesman, said that, since Feb. 12, hypothermia has contributed to the deaths of five birds and one newborn antelope at the Wild Animal Park. Necropsies performed on two birds that died at the zoo during that time also indicate that cold was a factor, he said, adding that similar deaths are likely to follow.

“If the weather holds as cold and wet, we’ll expect more marginal animals to succumb,” Jouett said.

The number of deaths does not appear “abnormal” considering the below-average temperatures, he said. “Each one of them is a regrettable loss, but it’s something that we take precautions for, and there’s nothing we can do.”

During the past week and a half, as San Diegans have braced for cold weather and high winds by turning up their heaters, zoo staff members have given animals some extra warmth as well, Jouett said. As temperatures in San Diego and Escondido dipped into the 30s and below, heat lamps and other sources of warmth have been provided in most zoo and park enclosures, he said.

“We take extra precautions,” he said. “We put up plastic sheets where necessary to act as windbreaks, provide extra straw to floors and nest boxes, leave doors open to allow inside access if that’s an option.”

Still, Jouett said, “sometimes the weather is the last straw for some of these animals that are sick or injured.”

The recent spate of deaths is not the first related to cold this year. Since the beginning of 1990, necropsy reports list hypothermia as a factor in 28 animal deaths--18 in January and 10 so far in February, Jouett said.

Since Feb. 12, pathologists have listed the weather as a factor in the deaths of a Costa Rican banded barbed-throat hummingbird, a lesser flamingo, an African sunbird, a painted stork, an African oriole, a pygmy goose, a bird of paradise and a Malayan sambar antelope.

In most of the bird deaths, Jouett said, malnutrition or other ailments contributed. The newborn antelope died of maternal neglect complicated by the cold, he said. It was on exhibit in a field at the Wild Animal Park where there was no artificial heat source. The rest of the animals probably had access to “at least a heat lamp--and some had nesting boxes,” Jouett said.

Heat lamps, which consist of a bare bulb with a metal shade, have prompted criticism from some animal keepers at the zoo, who say animals often burn themselves as they attempt to get warm.

Carmi G. Penny, curator of mammals at the zoo, acknowledged that some animals have been burned as they huddle near the lamps.

“That has happened,” he said in a recent interview. “That’s why we prefer not to use heat lamps. I do not like heat lamps.”

Part of the problem, he said, is that some keepers have placed heat lamps too close to the cages.

“You have to know how to use them,” he said. “You can burn yourself with an electric blanket if you’re not careful.”

Still, he said, the lamps have been standard equipment at the zoo for so long that it will take time and money to replace them all.