Volume 1, No. 18. October 5, 2001
[Photo of Chelsea shortly after her birth.]
At least it wasn't in a
taxi
No drill had prepared the Jacksonville
Zoo staff for handling the developing situation, particularly concerning issues
of the public's need to know. “We acted on whim,” said Angie B. Lindsey,
manager of marketing and communications of the Florida institution. “We
just knew there was a need to get out there and explain what was going on to
the public.” The zoo's education director, Kelli Whitney, quickly gathered
the necessary information, imparted a quick lesson to the volunteers and sent
them out as troops into the crowd of some 150 people who had gathered around
the giraffe and zebra enclosure. There one giraffe had an extra set of hoofs
sticking out from her belly.
The births of two giraffes in one month—the first giraffe births at the Jacksonville Zoo since 1989—was news enough, but the second birth occurred on public display. “Usually they happen at night," Lindsey said. “The keepers walk in in the morning and there's a baby.” That was true of the September 7 birth of the as-yet-unnamed daughter of E.T. (Extra Tall, who herself is a 19-year-old Jacksonville Zoo native) and Sterling, a 5-year-old brought to Jacksonville in 1998. The baby was to go on public display September 28, but two days before her debut she was upstaged by the dramatic arrival of her half-sister, Chelsea.
Six-year-old Zawadi, also impregnated by Sterling, went into labor at 10:30 in the morning. After her water broke and the baby's feet appeared, keepers moved her to a private yard, though it was still in public view. “We had several school groups in the park that particular day,” Lindsey said. “The giraffes are in an enclosure ysou can see from three different locations, and at every one you couldn't get through the pack of people.” Quickly on hand were the education volunteers, explaining the feet- and head-first sequence of giraffe birthing and the infant's 6-foot plunge to the ground from the standing mother. The volunteers also fielded questions, but as always there's nothing quite so precious as parental involvement in a child's education. “This little boy saw the feet sticking out and said, ‘That looks like it hurts,’” Lindsey said. “And his mom looked down at him and said, ‘It does.’”
Chelsea was named after The Pride of Chelsea, the nickname for a New York City Fire Department Unit that lost five members during rescue operations at the World Trade Center September 11.