{"id":70349,"date":"2016-06-28T05:39:15","date_gmt":"2016-06-28T09:39:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=70349"},"modified":"2016-06-27T17:12:55","modified_gmt":"2016-06-27T21:12:55","slug":"california-sea-lion-born-at-utica-zoo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=70349","title":{"rendered":"California Sea Lion Born at Utica Zoo"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"sea<\/a>Utica Zoo is pleased to announce the birth of a baby boy California Sea Lion to parents, Munchkin and Porter.\u00a0The newest addition to the zoo\u2019s sea lion family was born at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, June 22, in the sea lion\u2019s\u00a0indoor den.<\/p>\n

Munchkin is 18 years old and has resided at the zoo since 1999, when she was placed from the Marine Mammal Care\u00a0Center at Fort MacArthur in southern California. Porter is 14 years old and came to Utica Zoo in 2011 from the Audubon\u00a0Zoo in New Orleans, La.<\/p>\n

“We\u2019ve had sea lion births here before, but it never stops being exciting for any of us,\u201d said Beth Ricci, Area Lead Keeper\u00a0and Primary sea lion trainer.<\/p>\n

Porter and Munchkin were recommended to breed by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums\u2019 Species Survival Plan.\u00a0The SSP works to promote genetically diverse populations of captive sea lions. The successful breeding pair have two\u00a0offspring that now live at other zoos across the country. Utica Zoo has had a long history of working with California sea\u00a0lions, with the first arriving in Utica in 1976.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnlike seals, sea lions cannot swim when they\u2019re born \u2013 they actually are taught by their moms\u201d, said Pearl Yusuf,\u00a0Director of Animal Operations. \u201cSo we\u2019ll need to keep mom and pup out of the pool until we\u2019re sure the pup is strong. But\u00a0that should just be a matter of a few days.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMunchkin is an experienced mom so she\u2019ll tell us when she\u2019s ready to take the pup outside of the den,” Ricci said. “So far he\u2019s looking\u00a0pretty strong. I can\u2019t wait to get new flippers in the pool.”<\/p>\n

Utica Zoo will announce when the pup will be on public display.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Utica Zoo is pleased to announce the birth of a baby boy California Sea Lion to parents, Munchkin and Porter.\u00a0The newest addition to the zoo\u2019s sea lion family was born at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, June 22, in the sea lion\u2019s\u00a0indoor den. Munchkin is 18 years old and has resided at the zoo since 1999, when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[23813,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","category-top-story"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p43meu-iiF","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/sea-lion-pup-2016.jpg?fit=5248%2C2952&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=70349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/70350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=70349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=70349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=70349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}