WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) \u2014 A zoo in Florida has two reasons to celebrate \u2014 the first birth of a koala and a newly renovated habitat for the cuddly creatures is opening to the public on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the zoo and for us here, it\u2019s the very big deal,\u201d said Amarylis Celestina, who oversees carnivores and koalas at the Palm Beach Zoo & Conservation Society in West Palm Beach, Florida. “We are trying the best that we can to help with a lot of the genetic diversity within the population that we have here in the United States. So that\u2019s why it\u2019s important that we do have a joey and that we were successful this year.\u201d<\/p>\n
The joey, born to Ellin and Sydney last fall, remains in its mother’s pouch and has just recently started to become visible to zoo officials.<\/p>\n
They continue to monitor Ellin’s weight, and are providing extra food as she cares for the baby.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the koala population is enjoying a renovated habitat, which include more greenery, new perching for exercising, and solar tubes to bring in more natural light. The changes bring a bit of the Australian outback to the zoo for koalas, which are an endangered species. They are able to move between their climate-controlled indoor exhibit and the expanded outdoor area.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis new habitat is a milestone for our koalas,\u201d Margo McKnight, the zoo’s CEO and president said in a news release. \u201cThe deliberate design supports the voluntary, cooperative care our zoologists and koalas have developed together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Koalas in the U.S. are on loan from the Australian federal government to help with conservation practices.<\/p>\n
Koalas are generally peaceful, have a calm nature and enjoy a \u201cslow\u201d lifestyle. They like to climb and hop between the trees in the habitat. The renovations are designed to help koalas express their natural behaviors, zoo officials said.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
Frisaro reported from Fort Lauderdale, Florida.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) \u2014 A zoo in Florida has two reasons to celebrate \u2014 the first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":244836,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[107827,107830,1618,28,30,29,107829,107828,4556,27086],"class_list":{"0":"post-244835","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-amarylis-celestina","9":"tag-cuddly-creatures","10":"tag-fla","11":"tag-florida","12":"tag-florida-headlines","13":"tag-florida-news","14":"tag-genetic-diversity","15":"tag-koala","16":"tag-west-palm-beach","17":"tag-zoo-officials"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244835","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244835"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244835\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244836"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244835"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244835"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244835"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}