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Hi, everyone! Welcome back to 
Animal Wonders. I’m Jessi,  

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and this Kizmit the African crested porcupine.
Kizmit has had quite an interesting week,  

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and so have many animals and 
zookeepers across the United States. 

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We had an extreme cold front come through that 
put the lives of some of our animals at risk. 

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So what happens when the weather gets so cold it’s 
life threatening? How do we keep the animals safe?  

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Let me show you what we did.

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[CHEERY INTRO MUSIC] 

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For many of the states, like Texas 
and Oklahoma, who rarely have to  

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deal with freezing temperatures, the unusual 
extreme cold, major storms, and power outages  

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has been a very serious undertaking.
The zookeepers were faced with major  

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challenges trying to keep their animals warm.
They got creative and saved the lives of  

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thousands of animals.
So well done to all  

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the hard working animal keepers who are so 
dedicated to the wellbeing of their charges! 

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Unfortunately, extreme weather can be a really 
challenging issue, and not all of the animals  

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survived, which is why we take it so seriously.
Now, in Montana, unpredictable and extreme  

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weather happens quite frequently.
Sub zero temperatures, blizzards,  

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and power outages are so common that it’s 
one of the biggest challenges to having  

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an exotic animal rescue in Montana.
Especially when providing care for species  

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that come from desert or tropical habitats.
Which is why we have seasonal changes to  

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our daily animal tasks and cold weather 
protocols ready to implement as needed. 

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We’ve actually been having a really mild winter 
so far, with temperatures staying between 15  

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and 40 degrees F and just a small scattering 
of snow covering the ground in many places. 

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This isn’t normal for a Montana winter, but it 
has been nice since we have a few new enclosures  

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and new animals who are sensitive to extreme cold.
Because of this mild winter weather, we’ve been  

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able to test out how the heating systems are 
working and where we need to make improvements. 

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So, when we saw the alerts about a winter 
storm warning, we knew it was time to put  

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our cold weather protocols into action!
First, we needed to move all the animals  

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that were most vulnerable into areas 
where our tried and true heating  

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systems keep everyone safe and comfortable.
This includes animals like Kizmit the porcupine. 

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Kizi is currently living in one of our new 
buildings, and it’s been great because she  

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has plenty of space and it’s generally been 
staying warm enough for her over this winter. 

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But when the temperature fell under -10 degrees F, 
this space dropped under 60 degrees F,  

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and with even colder temperatures predicted,  
we didn’t feel comfortable leaving her in this room. 

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So Kizmit was loaded into her crate and moved 
into the main building for temporary housing  

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so we could safely ride out the storm.
Now, Kizi is a giant rodent with giant  

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rodent teeth, and she can easily and 
quickly chew right through a wall. 

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Housing her in a temperature 
controlled indoor space is challenging! 

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So she went into the only 
room in the main building  

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that has walls that she can’t chew through.
But that happens to be currently housing  

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our trio of rabbits, which means 
the rabbits needed to move out. 

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So they moved into Sydney the bettong’s 
habitat during the day while Sydney,  

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who is nocturnal, slept in her cozy sleeping 
pouch inside her familiar travel crate. 

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Then at night, we switched the rabbits into 
their travel crates to sleep overnight,  

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and Sydney got the space for her nighttime activities.
It might sound complicated, but it works great  

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as a temporary solution for a few days.
So with Kizmit safely secured in a warm space,  

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we moved on to her winter roommate, 
Sprite the guinea turaco. 

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Sprite is fairly cold tolerant and is comfortable 
in temperatures down to about 40 degrees F.  

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So, she just needed to be moved into 
a crate for the two nights that it  

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was predicted to get below -20 degrees F.
She doesn’t enjoy being in small spaces,  

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so as soon as it was safe in the morning,  
she was let out of the crate back into the room  

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to run and hop around on her branches.
Our next challenge was keeping Hara our  

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Harris’s hawk from getting too cold, which 
could lead to frostbite on her feet or wings. 

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Harris’s hawks are desert birds and don’t 
have adaptations to help them survive in  

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freezing temperatures like many of our 
native hawk species we have in Montana. 

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But Hara has been living at Animal Wonders 
since 2012, and with a few precautions,  

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she’s now a pro at tolerating whatever 
weather comes at us. But that doesn’t  

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mean we can completely leave her to it.
Hara has two heated perches that she can  

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choose to sit on whenever she wants. 
One is in the main space of her mews,  

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and the other is inside a wooden den box 
with a ceramic heat emitter over top. 

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She can sit under the heater whenever she wants, 
but that doesn’t mean that she’s completely safe. 

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See, hawks don’t have good night vision, 
so once they’ve perched for the night,  

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they won’t move from that spot for fear of crashing 
into branches that they can’t see in the dark. 

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Which means if there’s a major temperature drop 
at night and she hasn’t chosen to perch in the  

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heated area, she’s at risk of getting too cold.
So our protocol for her is when the temperature  

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is predicted to get below -10 degrees F, 
we’ll go in and make sure she’s safe. 

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If she isn’t already in her box, we move her 
onto the heated perch and close the doors of  

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her heated box to wait out the cold.
The only downside to this is that she  

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ends up pooping all over the box, and since 
everything is frozen, cleanup sometimes has  

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to wait until things thaw out enough to scrub.
Thankfully, the really dangerous part of the  

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cold snap was short, and Hara only needed to 
be moved into her heated box for two nights. 

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And since she’s proven to be quite smart about 
keeping warm during the day, we opened up the door  

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and she had access to her full space each morning.
And our last major challenge was for a new animal  

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that recently came to live at Animal Wonders: 
Gwendolyn the turkey vulture. 

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This is Gwen’s first winter in Montana, so she’s 
not as savvy as Hara about keeping herself warm. 

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So even though she has heated areas in her 
home, we didn’t feel completely comfortable  

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leaving her to her own devices.
And since we don’t have a fully built  

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indoor area for her, we moved her into the main 
building in the only available space large enough  

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to keep her happy: right in the hallway.
Which was a really interesting experience  

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for both us and her.
It was really fun watching  

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all of her unique behaviors, and  
we’re really getting to know her better. 

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So that meant all of the cold 
sensitive animals were accounted for,  

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but that still left a lot to do.
We turned up the heaters in all the main indoor rooms  

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and turned down the ventilation systems.
Then we turned up the air purifiers to keep the  

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animals’ natural dust and dander under control.
Next we gave all the native species living in  

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outdoor spaces extra bedding, double checked their 
dens to make sure they were secure and the animals  

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could make them cozy, and ensured their heated 
water bowls were properly secured and functioning. 

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Lollipop the skunk is getting older, so she’s 
now getting a heat pad under part of her den box,  

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so we made sure it was working 
and she was warm and happy. 

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Ringo the racoon got fresh blankets to pile 
into his house since he had recently pulled  

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all of them into his water for who knows 
what reason! Raccoons are trouble makers. 

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Also, Ringo’s daily dumping of his water dish has 
created a big berm of solid ice around his bowl  

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that’s threatening to block the door.
So we’ll need to figure out how to prevent  

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that from happening in the future.
Then we installed a heat bulb  

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over one of the ravens’ perches to give them 
the option to sit under it if they wanted to. 

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And that left us with Huckleberry the beaver.
Now, with Huckleberry comes even more challenges. 

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His need for a large pool of fresh 
water every day combined with freezing  

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temperatures creates a unique situation.
And we’ve thought about this a lot, especially  

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while we were planning the construction 
of his building and we put the pool in. 

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So his home has an outdoor yard, but his 
pool is completely indoors, so we can keep  

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it and the filter pipes from freezing 
solid by using just a small wall heater. 

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Now most of the time, we can keep the 
indoor space just above freezing with the  

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windows open to allow for nice air flow.
So during the cold snap, Huckleberry was  

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completely unphased by the cold and 
carried on doing his beaver business. 

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And since we weren’t worried about him 
tolerating the cold, we made one little  

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mistake. We didn’t close the windows, and 
the water ended up freezing in his pipes. 

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Luckily, the pipes didn’t break, but it did make 
it very hard to clean out his pool for a few days. 

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Of course, we’d do anything for Huckleberry, 
but I’ve got to give a huge shout out to Taylor  

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and Augusto for taking on cleaning beaver poop 
water in sub zero weather! It’s no easy task. 

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When extreme weather comes unexpectedly, 
it can be devastating. I want to send  

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out my deepest condolences to all of the 
animal caretakers who are grieving a loss  

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due to the cold or the power outages.
I’m incredibly thankful to have a great  

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animal keeper team and solid plans in place, 
even if everything isn’t completely perfect. 

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Overall this cold blast was challenging, 
but it wasn’t more than we could handle. 

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It came with some known tasks 
and it presented some new hurdles,  

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but we’ve made it through and we’ve come out 
with good ideas for what needs to be worked on! 

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We’re going to figure out how to 
keep Kizmit the porcupine’s room  

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warmer even in extreme cold temperatures.
We’re going to build Gwendolyn the vulture an  

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indoor space that she can go into when she’s cold.
We’re going to figure out how to keep Ringo  

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the raccoon from creating ice 
sculptures in the front of his door. 

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And we’re going to not forget to close Huckleberry 
the beaver’s windows when it gets 20°F below. 

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We won’t be able to make any real progress on 
some of these things until spring comes, but I’m  

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looking forward to tackling those improvements 
so we’re even more prepared for next winter. 

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Thanks for going on this journey with us! 
Every day is an adventure at Animal Wonders.  

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And if you’d like to continue going on adventures, 
please be sure to subscribe and I’ll see you soon! Bye! 

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[BOLD OUTRO MUSIC]