By: Staff Writer
August 3, 2021
The Belize Zoo and Tropical Education Centre had been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 but this year they are rebounding and seeing a “steady increase in visitors” to the Zoo according to its director.
Celso Poot, told Caribbean Magazine Plus that despite the Zoo being closed for several months in 2020, it is now having a “steady in increase in visitors” during the summer months, all thanks for summer tourists from the US along with a surprising increase in Belizeans supporting the Zoo’s efforts.
Mr Poot also said: “It’s mostly Belizeans still, because one of the things is that Belizeans pay a reduced rate for Zoo entrance while the non-resident or tourists they sort of subsidize the Belizean rate, so foreign tourists means more income for the Zoo.”
The Zoo traditionally depend on gifts in kind and grants from the Belizean government to sustain operations as they depend on feed and livestock to feed the animals from Belizean farmers and other private donors to supplement the subvention they receive from the Belizean government. Of which, Mr Poot is thrilled for the increase in foreign visitors because it allows the Zoo to do more for the animals in terms of veterinary care and various enrichment exercises.
Mr Poot also said: “We’re getting enough to feed the animals, so yes the animals are doing well. We’ve actually had some veterinary check-ups, because one of the things that the Belizean public health system comes through big for us is donating in kind and donating food and donating meat.
“We’ve had people donating whole cattle we’ve had people donating goats, sheep ducks and eggs, and so while we were not getting monetary donation we are getting in-kind donation from all across the country. We get to the point where people just pull up to the zoo and drop off their donation.”
He added: “Also there’s a group of tour guides who actually post things on their social media posts and said in their heydays they’ve benefited from the zoo significantly by bringing guests to the zoo; and so they have also embarked on a donation drive for the zoo.”
The donations are well received and appreciated as there are a lot of animals that are in need of rescue as Belize and its Central American neighbours continue to develop and the urban sprawl continues to encroach on the rural, jungle areas where the animals native to the area have been forced into encounters with humans and domesticated livestock. Something Mr Poot is concerned about, however he claims that the Zoo is a sanctuary first and not designed to house healthy wild animals.
Mr Poot said: “We don’t remove all animals from the wild for the zoo. The animals that are in the Belize Zoo are here because this is is more like a wildlife sanctuary. So all of the animals in the Belize Zoo have unique stories of how they arrived at the Zoo, so they are basically educational ambassadors.
“Some animals are injured and people find them on the roof and they bring them to the zoo. We give them care, we provide health care for them and if they can be released back into the wild, we release them but if not then we keep them.”
He gave an example of a Jabiru Stork that is at the Zoo with a broken wing where it is receiving veterinary care with the hopes of it being released back into the wild, but if not it will remain at the Zoo as an “educational ambassador.”
The Jabiru Stork is said to be the largest bird in the Americas with a height of five feet and wingspan that can reach up to eight ft Mr Poot said.
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While some animals do come in injured, he also said that some animals come in as pets that were confiscated by Belizean authorities. “With some animals, some people have them as pets and from time to time the government will do a sweep and confiscate these animals.
“Some of these animals can be rehabilitated and then released but some of them have become habituated and are imprinted on humans, so they cannot be released into the wild. Those animals stay at the zoo as educational ambassador,” he added.
While the Zoo is having a good run in these past few months in 2021, Mr Poot expects a tourism slow-down in August in line with the typical Belizean tourism period. He said: “Traditionally, tourism will slow down and Belize around August to mid-August and coincidentally that also peaks with the hurricane season also. Peak hurricane season for this region is September October and so normally this would be the slow season for us. If it will stay the same then I think that September and October will be very challenging for the Belize Zoo and tropical education centre.”
When crunch time hits this October, Mr Poot, who was also the immediate past finance director at the Zoo prior to taking over as its overall director, said that they may have to go back to their COVID-19 pandemic strategy where they would have to decrease work hours, work on a shift system and send a fee people home. “Prior to the pandemic, we had 58 staff and during the pandemic we operated with 30 staff, we are back to 42 staff members now along with some who work part time. Unfortunately, some of them we had to terminate because it had been too long before we were able to re-engage them,” he said.
(In loving memory of Sharon Matolla, former director and founder of the Belize Zoo and Tropical Education Centre who passed away in March this year. She will be sorely missed.)
