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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

February 21, 2005

CONTACTS:
Elaine Kirchner, Zoologist 260-427-6807	Cheryl Piropato,  Communications Specialist 260-427-6803

Rare Striped Possum Born at Zoo

A striped possum, thought to be one of only six known born in captivity, is making its debut at the Fort Wayne Children’s Zoo this week.

The tiny female baby recently emerged from her mother’s pouch in the zoo’s Australia After Dark exhibit. Zoo keepers estimate that she was born sometime in the fall of 2004. Because marsupial babies are so tiny at birth, they may not be detected until they are several months old.

“Very little is known about striped possums,” says Australian Adventure Zoologist Elaine Kirchner. “By observing this female and her young, we’re able to make significant contributions to the body of knowledge that exists about this animal.” Only about 30 of these rare animals live in zoos around the world; the Fort Wayne Children’s Zoo houses five of them.

Zoo keepers first discovered the baby in early December 2004 during a routine physical on Alkira, the female striped possum. Alkira and her mate, Bardin, were reintroduced to each other in June of 2004 after a long separation and were living in the Australia After Dark exhibit. The light cycles in the exhibit are reversed, so that zoo visitors can view nocturnal animals like the possum during the day. “We’ve been adjusting the light cycles in the building,” explains Kirchner. “We may have stumbled on the right combination of daylight and darkness to stimulate breeding activity.”

Once the baby was discovered in December, keepers returned Alkira to the exhibit to avoid any further disturbance. They started researching the striped possum, only to discover that there was precious little information published about these elusive animals. “Virtually nothing exists on their development, so we’ve been collecting as much data as we can,” says Kirchner. She learned that only five other striped possum births have occurred around the world, including at the London Zoo, the Memphis (Tennessee) Zoo, and recently, the Philadelphia Zoo. Kirchner hopes to publish her data so it can be made available to other zoos.

Striped possums are native to northeastern Australia and New Guinea, where they dwell in the treetops. They are related to sugar gliders, which are familiar to many Americans who keep them as pets. Striped possums use their sharp canine teeth to strip away tree bark, exposing the insect larvae on which they feed. As their name implies, these 7-inch-long mammals have bold black and white stripes running the length of their bodies. Adults weigh about 12 to 16 ounces. Like all marsupials, striped possum young are born in a highly underdeveloped state. The baby crawls into the mother’s pouch where it drinks milk and grows for several months.

Zoo visitors should be able to see Alkira and her baby later this spring when the zoo opens for the season on April 30.

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