#dallas zoo clouded leopard

[saritawolff]

As reports of other incidents are beginning to come in, I thought I’d make a thread on all the crazy break-ins going on in the zoo world since the beginning of 2023.

On January 13th, Dallas Zoo closed due to a loose clouded leopard. Within hours she was discovered close to her home and safely returned to her enclosure with her sister, who had not left. Her wire mesh fence was discovered to have been intentionally cut open.

The next day, January 14th, it was announced that another cut had been discovered in the Dallas Zoo’s spectacled langur exhibit. However, the monkeys did not leave their enclosure and all were reportedly accounted for and uninjured.

On January 22nd, a highly endangered lappet-faced vulture at the Dallas Zoo was found dead in his enclosure with a “suspicious wound.” The wound appeared to be unnatural and is suspected of being a stab wound.

On January 29th keepers at Zoosiana discovered that 12 of their squirrel monkeys were stolen in the night. The remaining monkeys were uninjured but stressed.

On January 30th, attention was back on the Dallas Zoo as it reported that two of its emperor tamarins were missing after their enclosure had been cut into. As Dallas was in the middle of a freeze, it was doubtful the monkeys would have left their heated enclosure willingly. They were believed to have been taken.

On January 31st, Dallas police released photos and a video of a person of interest who may be connected to the theft of the tamarins.

Later that day, the tamarins were found in an abandoned home following a tip from the owners of the neighboring church. The monkeys were in a closet filled with bird feces and moldy clothes. Police also found cats, cat feces, pigeons, and a water jug containing dead fish in the home.

The tamarins were reportedly very happy to return to their warm home, but had lost weight. The zoo currently has them in quarantine to get their weight back up and monitor them for any illnesses they could have caught from the other animals in the abandoned house.

On February 2nd, 24-year-old Davion Dwight Irvin was arrested after an employee of the Dallas World Aquarium recognized him from the “person of interest” photos. He was reportedly scoping out mesh enclosures at the aquarium and approached the employee to ask questions about the animals’ care.

Apparently there had been unreported thefts in early January of feeder fish and fish supplies as well as training supplies taken from the behind the scenes otter area at the Dallas Zoo.

Meanwhile, also on February 2nd, someone cut open the stainless steel mesh of the Central Park Zoo’s Eurasian eagle owl exhibit. The owl, Flaco, has been under zoo surveillance since he was located on the 3rd and the hope is to lure him back with food once he gets hungry. As of today, February 8th, he has not eaten or drank, as he does not know how to in the wild.

Back to Texas, and despite zoos in the area doubling security, on February 6th keepers found a 4-inch cut in the Houston Zoo’s brown pelican enclosure. The birds are reportedly all accounted for and unharmed.

On February 7th, it was reported that Davion had not only confessed to stealing the Dallas Zoo’s monkeys, but also stated that, if released, he would go right back to stealing animals.

Davion confessed that he had attempted to take Nova, the clouded leopard, but he was only able to pet her before she climbed out of reach. He was also linked to cutting the langurs’ enclosure, but not charged since the langurs did not escape.

It was also revealed that Davion had been a person of interest after staff recognized the zoo regular as someone who often asked a lot of abnormal questions (such as how to shift the tamarins in and out of their various spaces) and had been previously been caught sneaking into staff only areas.

So far the vulture, Pin’s, death is still under investigation. Pin’s enclosure was on the other side of the zoo from the area Davion had been targeting.

As for Zoosiana’s squirrel monkeys, an arrest has been made in connection to the theft. 61-year-old Joseph Randell has been taken in for questioning. The 12 monkeys remain missing.

As it stands, we still have one dead vulture who’s killer may still be at large, 12 missing squirrel monkeys, and an owl in danger of starvation or injury in New York City.

I will reblog with updates to ongoing cases as they become available, or if more zoo sabotage happens (God forbid). Please feel free to correct me if I’ve gotten any dates or information wrong and I will edit or update this post.

(Also, I am on mobile and won’t be able to add a readmore until I can access a computer, sorry) Update: I was finally able to add a readmore and also turned all news links into hyperlinks.

[misqnon]

i feel really bad for the dallas zoo rn because everyone's clowning on them for having "misplaced their leopard" when in reality her enclosure was intentionally cut, and so was a nearby monkey enclosure, and days later a vulture was found dead with "suspicious wounds" . like in actuality im pretty sure the zoo is currently under attack by somebody no fault of their own 😭

[skimblyshanks]

Alright folks, important update re. Dallas Zoo.

The Emperor Tamarins are home, and are reacclimating well!

But with this also came confirmation that the Tamarins that were stolen were the Tamarins from the Lacerte Family Children's Zoo, not the Tamarin Treetops as i previously thought.

So that means enclosures in 3/5 of the park have been compromised.

Zoo North, which houses the Clouded Leopards and Langurs.

Wilds of Africa, which is across the grounds from Zoo North and houses the Lappet-Faced Vultures

Lacerte Family Children's Zoo, which houses this pair of tamarins.

The Children's Zoo is linked to Zoo North through a walkway, similar to the way Giants of The Savanna connects to Wilds of Africa.

While there is still a geographic proximity for 3/4 of these incidents, it's less clear cut than initially thought

Dallas Zoo's Update on the Tamarins

[kyleighgrace28]

no because seriously what is going on at the dallas zoo??!! the monkeys have been found but ?!who steals monkeys?!!

[newl0ndonfire]

while it’s great that being at my mom’s means I don’t have to deal with my dad’s blatant bigotry, it also means that I have to listen to her prattle on about things that are incredibly irrelevant (and I don’t care about in the slightest) in addition to being around her messes with my already fucked eating habits while she says shit that fucks with my eating more. she’s also bigoted but not intentionally like my dad and doesn’t bring it up nearly as often

[ihatepissvortex]

i’m going to refrain from comment until investigators have some answers to this (if they do) but if it turns out that an animal rights group has been cutting animals free and killing them at the Dallas zoo i’m going full protracted guerilla warfare against PETA. i will be on my maoist shit because of these people

[is-the-primate-vid-cute]

Arrest made after Dallas Zoo events, including the theft of two tamarin monkeys:

Davion Irvin said he loves animals and that if he’s released from jail, he would steal more, the documents said.

Irvin, who remained jailed Tuesday on $25,000 bond, was arrested last week after asking questions at a downtown Dallas aquarium about animals there. He is charged with six counts of animal cruelty and two counts of burglary.

Zoo staff say the monkeys have lost weight but are unharmed.

Irvin told police that on the night of Jan. 29, he waited until dark, jumped a fence to get onto zoo grounds, cut the metal mesh of an enclosure and took the two emperor tamarin monkeys, according to arrest warrant affidavits . He then got on the city’s light rail before walking to the vacant home where he said he kept his animals.

Irvin has been charged in two of the odd events over a span of several weeks at the zoo and is linked to another, police said. In the taking of the monkeys, Irvin faces one count of burglary and six counts of animal cruelty — three for each monkey. He also faces a burglary charge in relation to the escape of a clouded leopard named Nova, who was discovered missing Jan. 13. A cut was found in her enclosure, and the zoo closed as a search was launched. She was found later that day near her habitat.

Irvin told investigators that he’d wanted to take Nova but that he was only able to pet her before she got on top of her enclosure, an affidavit said.

Police said have said they are still investigating, but Irvin has not been linked to the suspicious death of an endangered vulture at the zoo in January.

Meanwhile police in Louisiana announced the arrest Tuesday of a 61-year-old man in the case of 12 squirrel monkeys that were discovered missing Jan. 29 from their enclosure at Zoosiana in Broussard, about 60 miles (96 kilometers) west of Baton Rouge.

Police said the missing monkeys haven’t yet been found.

Source

[why-animals-do-the-thing]

Wait, don't clouded leopards have the proportionally largest canines of any wild cat? How can that be considered non-dangerous? (Also seems to me like some more states should enact similar laws, because wow.)

Yeah, clouded leopards have the largest canines proportionally to their body size of any extant (non-extinct) feline species. I was honestly pretty surprised to see Dallas say Nova wasn't dangerous. It's definitely not the same level of risk as an escaped tiger or lion, but that's... still a cat capable of doing a pretty serious amount of damage if you fuck with it. It may be that the comment was based on the fact she'd be more likely to hide and avoid people, whereas bigger cats might stalk or attack people? It does sound like they thought they could recapture her without danger to staff - I saw one article saying the SWAT team that responded was sent home. I'll be interested in finding out more for sure.

State laws regarding how zoos and sanctuaries operate are just weird as hell. One of the big projects I'm working on right now (with a lawyer colleague coauthoring) is combing through every state law and piece of regulation that mentions zoos and sanctuaries to see what we find. It's really all over the place. California is the only place that explicitly prohibits trespassing into exhibits; Rhode Island the only place that explicitly prohibits setting captive animals free; Louisiana has a law explicitly prohibiting hunting any current or previous zoo or circus animal (but AFAIK there's no hunt ranches in the state?). All of the specific things you'd expect to exist generally don't, unless there's been a significant incident that led for relevant stakeholders to pester the legislation to write it down. So Dallas will still be able to prosecute whomever cut those cages (if they want) but it'll be under laws that aren't specific to zoos.

[liontalon1]

Welcome to the first IUCN Wednesday! Today we’re going to be talking about one of my favorite cats the clouded leopard

(Image description: a clouded leopard sitting on a branch looking in the direction of the camera)

They are a small cat only weighing up to 51 lbs, they are mainly arboreal (the best climbers among cats) and hunt macaque, hog deer, slow loris, and other small vertebrates.

A fun fact about these guys are that they are often referred to as “modern-day sabertooth cats” and you can see why

(Image description: clouded leopard yawning, showing off their teeth)

Their canine teeth unusually long for their body size (the upper canines being about 3x longer than the basal width of its socket).

Unfortunately life hasn’t been kind to these guys, most of their subspecies are classified as vulnerable, with the Sumatran and Bornean classified as endangered. The Formosan subspecies has actually been classified as extinct since 2012 though in 20-8 there were two alleged sightings but these can’t be confirmed.

(Image description 1: a map of the current and past geographical range of the clouded leopard. Image description 2: a key to the previous map listing extant, possibly extant, possibly extinct, extinct)

(All subspecies are being included here)

This is the IUCNs most recent geographical range based off of the last species assessment from November 2020. The estimated number of mature individuals ranges from 3700-5580 and the population is decreasing.

Their biggest threats are of course people from human development to agriculture to transportation (roads and railways) to how we modify the environment (dams). That doesn’t even include the international pet trade or being killed for their pelts or body parts for medicine. Or because they’re seen as a threat (just look at how people over reacted when Nova was let out at the Dallas zoo).

These guys are really amazing (more so than i can say in a single post) so i encourage you to do your own research and hopefully fall in love with them like i have.

[orcinus-veterinarius]

did you hear about what’s going on at the dallas zoo? one of the clouded leopards is missing, and they’re saying it’s possible she was stolen. i hope she wasn’t, and that she’s found soon, but it’s a scary thought that people are breaking into zoos and taking rare animals. i feel so bad for her keepers :(

I did… the good news is Nova was found safe earlier today and is currently in the care of the zoo’s veterinary staff!

Thank goodness she’s okay and wasn’t stolen, but yeah, police suspect foul play. The wire mesh used in cat habitats isn’t something that just randomly gets a hole in it. Hopefully they catch whoever put this beautiful animal in danger.

[is-the-owl-video-cute]

funnily enough, when the dallas zoo announced a clouded leopard had escaped, i was at the houston zoo looking at her parents

Did you tell them Nova was causing a scene

[demon-dragon-leopard]

It was you! You were the clouded leopard that escaped the Dallas zoo!

They will never catch me! 🐾

[kyleighgrace28]

okay so i saw this post and it reminded me of the fact that someone tried to “free” a clouded leopard from the dallas zoo like LAST WEEK and then literally this weekend they found one of there ENDANGERED african vultures dead, due to unnatural causes… WHO IS ATTACKING THE DALLAS ZOO ????

[schmergo]

There's some real Scooby-Doo stuff going on at the Dallas Zoo. The fourth suspicious incident in January just happened. Someone apparently compromised a clouded leopard enclosure and let it escape (it was safely returned) and slashed a languar enclosure (they fortunately did not escape). Then a vulture was found dead in its enclosure in a 'suspicious' manner that was thought to be foul play. NOW two tiny monkeys have disappeared and the zoo staff thinks they were stolen.

Okay, who's your bet for the culprit? A disgruntled member of zoo staff, an anti-zoo crusader, someone with a personal grudge against a member of zoo staff (head vet's ex-spouse?),  a person who's been living inside the zoo property and thinks they're a werewolf, a group of evil monkeys running an organized crime ring, or something else?

[littlesolo]

Kacy Drabble - Back in Texas: Dallas Zoo

Kate and Lucy are in Texas.

A friend of Lucy's died and Kate had been very concerned until Lucy told her they first met the guy when she was eighteen and he was already in his seventies.

They go to the funeral, but don't stay.

"This isn't how he'd want me to spend today. He believed in living life to the fullest. Let's go do that."

So, now they're at the Dallas zoo. It's been a while since Kate's been to the zoo, Dallas or otherwise. The biggest problem are all the vendors. She's spent fifty bucks already and the gift shop is located near the exit. She has no regrets though. Not about the cap she bought because the sun is something else, not the stuffed tiger or dinosaur she bought because they were adorable. Kate see a coffee cup probably being her last purchase, but that's necessary. Lucy laughs and smiles the entire time and that makes it worth it too.

They're wander towards the reptile house when an alert is broadcast across the zoo.

The zoo has to be evacuate.

It isn't until they're outside with everyone else that it's disclosed that an animal got loose. Staff members are going around and handing out certificates for a free visit to compensate all the guests. Lucy takes theirs and tucks it into her pocket.

"Should we offer to help?" Kate raises an eyebrow. "We're federal agents!"

"Not animal control! We are not assisting."

"Look, the guy said it's a non dangerous animal out of it's habitat."

"We're going to leave it to the handlers that it's know all it's life."

"Field experience, Kate."

"I do not ever plan on being up against a clouded leopard in the field."

"No one does until it happens! It's the plot to Jurassic World!"

"If dinosaurs are loose, I don't care what kind, we are not staying." Lucy just smiles wider.

"You had fun today though, right?" Kate smiles.

"I always do when I'm with you."