Penguins Die of Avian Malaria at Yagiyama Zoo

 

This is a sad story.  All four Humboldt penguins living at the Yagiyama Zoo in Sendai died last month of avian malaria, a mosquito-borne illness. The illness can progress rapidly with no symptoms to death. Iwate University was commissioned to investigate the cause of the deaths. The four died between July 9th and 19th, with no signs of illness until the day before their deaths. 

The zoo has no immediate plans to bring in new penguins. The zoo will investigate how to prevent a recurrence by redesigning the penguin enclosure to prevent the formation of puddles where mosquitos breed. 

Humboldt penguins are common in Japanese zoos because they are adapted better to warmer climates than penguins that come from Antarctica.

Fuji Safari Park

I have known people who visited this place, but it is not near public transportation, so I hadn’t gone myself before. Two friends invited me to join them. 

(If you are over 65 and/or buy your ticket online you can get a discount ticket). 

This was our view of Mt. Fuji while driving there.

The animals here are in bigger areas than a normal Japanese zoo, but they are not free in an open area. (I imagined something more like the North Carolina Zoo, and it was not that big of an area.)

Visitors can drive their own cars through the park, or pay an additional fee to ride in the park buses. We arrived when the park first opened so it was not crowded. By the time we left, it was pretty busy. We had an expert driver/friend who safely drove us through the animal areas.

There are many warnings to stay inside your car with the windows closed. Between the animal areas, there are double gates so the animals cannot escape.

There were quite a few bears.

The lions were not very energetic.

Throughout the park, there were these zebra looking vehicles patrolling.

Between the areas were guard towers, to open and close the gates, and make sure the car windows were closed, maybe.

We only saw one tiger.

The elephants looked a little lonely. Their area was covered in concrete.

This area had a mixture of different animals. I guess they could be together because they wouldn’t eat each other.

After finishing the driving course, we parked and visited the small animal and shop area.

There were several tiger cubs in a room behind glass.

One of my friends brought a Japanese lunch for us. I brought  American dessert- apple pie for us.

It was an interesting trip, but the day wasn’t over yet. I have a couple of more posts coming to tell about what else we did. Stay tuned…