{"id":395623,"date":"2026-09-10T07:56:34","date_gmt":"2026-09-10T07:56:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/395623\/"},"modified":"2026-09-10T07:56:34","modified_gmt":"2026-09-10T07:56:34","slug":"busch-gardens-tampa-bay-welcomes-2-elephants-as-part-of-a-conservation-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/395623\/","title":{"rendered":"Busch Gardens Tampa Bay welcomes 2 elephants as part of a conservation program"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Busch Gardens Tampa Bay welcomes Schottzie and Jati, two female Asian elephants, as part of a conservation effort by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums.<\/p>\n<p>TAMPA, Fla. \u2014 Soon, residents of the Tampa Bay area will get to meet Schottzie and Jati, two female Asian Elephants at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wtsp.com\/article\/entertainment\/busch-gardens-kumba-roller-coaster-closing-last-day-tampa\/67-4e050028-e38b-45de-b030-dbb6ca66a103\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Busch Gardens Tampa Bay<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Wednesday, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay announced that the two elephants moved into the park in Tampa as &#8220;part of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums&#8217; (AZA) Species Survival Plan (SSP).&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Schootzie is 50 years old, and Jati is 39. They were brought to Tampa from the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden in Ohio, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay said on social media.<\/p>\n<p>The Florida Highway Patrol said they assisted with escorting the animals to the zoo.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;These elephants come to us AZA&#8217;s SSP recommendation. The recommendation comes to us as part of a greater plan,&#8221; a Busch Gardens spokesperson said in the announcement video shared on social media. &#8220;So, being part of the SSP and AZA organization is you can pull animals to breed or you can be a facility that holds animals, like we are with our elephants to allow other facilities to bring in breeding groups.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Busch Gardens added that its staff is already caring for Joti and Schootzie. Guests will be able to visit them &#8220;in the coming weeks when they make their debut,&#8221; and visitors will learn more about the importance of conservation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Busch Gardens Tampa Bay welcomes Schottzie and Jati, two female Asian elephants, as part of a conservation effort&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-395623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395623","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=395623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}