SANFORD, Fla. \u2014 After reporting numerous deaths among 13 ailing sloths brought from Sloth World on April 24, the Central Florida Zoo & Botanical Gardens was able to announce some good news this weekend.<\/p>\n
According to a post on the zoo’s Facebook page, two sloths \u2014 Dolce and Chewie \u2014 have recovered enough that veterinarians\u00a0were able to release them from intensive care. Currently in quarantine, the post said the pair of sloths’ condition was encouraging.<\/p>\n
“While their situation can still change at any moment, they are doing better and continuing to fight every day,” the post said.<\/p>\n
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The news, which was announced on May 16, closely\u00a0followed an announcement from the Central Florida Zoo that the smallest and youngest of the sloths had died.<\/p>\n
Mr. Ginger, one of 13 sloths brought from Sloth World, had been in critical condition and intensive care by zoo veterinarians and animal care staff since his arrival.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Over the past few days, his condition worsened,” the zoo said in a statement. “When it became clear he was not improving, we made the decision to humanely euthanize him.”<\/p>\n
Zoo staff hand-fed Mr. Ginger every few hours, and he spent most of his time in an incubator to help regulate his body temperature, zoo officials said. They estimated that Mr. Ginger was 4 to 6 months old.<\/p>\n
His death followed those of three others \u2014 Bandit, Habanero and Dumpling \u2014 since the sloths arrived at the zoo.<\/p>\n
\ufeff\u201cWe are heartbroken by the loss of Mr. Ginger,\u201d Central Florida Zoo Chief Executive Officer Richard Glover said. \u201cFrom the moment Mr. Ginger arrived, our animal care and veterinary teams dedicated countless hours to providing intensive and specialized care. Mr. Ginger\u2019s condition was extremely fragile, but our staff remained committed to giving Mr. Ginger every opportunity possible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Officials say 55 sloths imported to Florida to be showcased at a planned Sloth World attraction on International Drive in Orlando died before the zoo took in the remaining 13.<\/p>\n
Sloth World, which had touted itself as the world\u2019s only “Slotharium,” has announced that it will not open.<\/p>\n
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is working to finalize an executive order to temporarily prohibit the importation of sloths into the state of Florida for 60 days while it works with wildlife experts and other stakeholders to examine the rules and regulations regarding the possession, sale and exhibition of a broad category of animals that are not domestic, it announced Wednesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SANFORD, Fla. \u2014 After reporting numerous deaths among 13 ailing sloths brought from Sloth World on April 24,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":275511,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[1684,767,274,770,28,115,139,141,140,1014,275,135,278],"class_list":["post-276628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-animals","tag-app-community","tag-app-top-stories","tag-community-news","tag-florida","tag-news","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-seminole-county","tag-spectrum-news-staff","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276628","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=276628"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276628\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/275511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}