বাংলায় পড়ুন
The enclosures are ready. All the necessary arrangements have been made. By the end of July, general people will be allowed to have a look at the four anacondas which have been kept at the quarantine area at the Alipore Zoo so far.
After they had been brought from Madras Crocodile Park, they were kept in the quarantine area as part of a standard procedure for the animals to get acclimatise to the new location before they are brought to the reptile house for visitors. Senior officials of the zoo said that they would be shifted between mid and end-July.
At the quarantine area, experts are taking care of these reptiles. They are fed one rat each, two days a week. The rats weighing between 50 and 75 gm each are first made unconscious before they are hung inside the place where the snakes are kept. The snakes are dragged towards it because of the smell and then they take away the rodents. The snakes coil around the rat till the rats are still and then they swallow those. “We feed them unconscious rats because if they were alive, they could bite the snakes before they are eaten, posing a risk of infection which we cant afford to take,” the official said.
Each of the snakes take 15 to 20 minutes to eat a rat. The snakes are also fed with small hens. About 32 hens are being fed every month to them.
Of late, authorities have brought in several animals such as white tiger and black bucks to the zoo. Wild dogs and spotbill pelican are also expected to arrive soon from Vizag’s Indira Gandhi Zoological Park, for which special houses are being built for their accommodation. As these animals are exchanged from one zoo to the other, two zebras, two water monitor lizards and a marmoset will be sent in return.
Zoo authorities said that everything will be in place before winter, which is the season when maximum people come to visit the zoo.
