Paris Zoo nursery will be quieter in spring 2020

In spring each year, there is usually a baby boom at the Jardin des Plantes Zoo—the Paris Zoo in the 5th arrondissement. But this year, the nursery will not be as full as usual.

However, zoo staff will still be busy. They primarily look after baby birds in the nursery. The eggs in incubation at the baby animal nursery still have to weighed, frequently turned and rotated, and when hatched, there will be chicks to raise.

There are currently two clutches of birds’ eggs in the care of their parents. In normal times, the staff sleep at the zoo nursery at night to keep an eye on the eggs and chicks. This year, with Paris in lockdown during the Coronavirus pandemic, nursery staff have not been able to stay at the zoo overnight. ‘We’ll just have a little less births, that’s all,’ said chief caretaker Christelle Hano.

The zoo staff will still have a lot of other zoo residents to look after. ‘The orangutans are particularly in need of visits,’ she said. ‘They miss the company of zoo visitors watching them everyday. It’s a habit, and they love company.’

MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of: The Paris Residences of James Joyce (2020), Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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