Walking on the wild side

By Matt Echelberry

Inquirer Reporter

Wildlife Haven held “Walk on the Wild Side,” its annual fundraiser, on Feb. 16 at St. Joseph’s Activ­ity Cen­ter. A din­ner and silent auc­tion were part of the event. Items up for bid included hand-crafted bird­houses, paint­ings and ceramic pieces.

Founded in 1990, Wildlife Haven focuses on the care of injured, orphaned or dis­placed wildlife. It also pro­vides edu­ca­tional pro­grams for schools and the com­mu­nity. It is the only state and fed­er­ally per­mit­ted facil­ity of its kind in north cen­tral Ohio.

Matt Echel­berry — Staff

Dur­ing the fundraiser, two mem­bers of the Colum­bus Zoo stopped by with a few of their friends. The audi­ence got up close and per­sonal with an African Black­footed Pen­guin, an endan­gered species found on the South African coast.

The ani­mal han­dlers also brought in a Banded Palm Civet, one of two Palm Civets in cap­tiv­ity in the United States, and a Slip Fox, the fastest Fox in the world (clock­ing in at 35 miles per hour). Round­ing out the list was a Leop­ard Tor­toise, a Brazil­ian Armadillo and a Short-Nosed Echidna (a mem­ber of the monotreme fam­ily along with its cousin, the platypus).

[Matt Echel­berry] A slip fox.

[Matt Echel­berry] A Brazil­ian armadillo (folded into a ball as a defense mechanism).

Wildlife Haven is located at 3659 State Route 598, Crest­line. For more details or to make a tax-duductible dona­tion, call 419–683-3228 or visit www.wildlifehaven.org.

Posted by Matt Echelberry on Feb 19 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.