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8 endangered black-footed ferrets born at National Zoo’s Virginia campus

By Jessica Kronzer

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Eight slender, endangered ferret babies were born last week at the National Zoo’s Virginia campus, covered in white fur and weighing about as much as a AAA battery.

A black-footed ferret named Aristides gave birth to eight kits on May 28 at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute in Front Royal, Virginia, according to a news release from the zoo.

Gender reveal

The zoo has set up a temporary live camera feed on its website to spotlight the kits as they grow up and help staff monitor their progress. But don’t expect much action until the kits get a bit older; in about 50 days, they will start to explore the enclosure’s tunnel system, according to the zoo.

Also, keep in mind the creatures are nocturnal.

When they were born, the kits were blind and weighed less than 10 grams. The darker markings on their face and feet will come through in a couple of weeks.

They’ll nurse for about a month before trying out meat.

It isn’t known yet whether the kits are boys or girls; zoo staff will perform a neonatal exam on the babies when they’re 10 days old to figure out their sexes.

Counting last week, zoo staff said Aristides has given birth to three litters. In May 2024, she gave birth to six kits.

Aristides was born at the Louisville Zoo. This is the first surviving litter for 2-year-old male ColeS, who came to the zoo from a conservation center in Colorado.

Where will the kits go?

The black-footed ferrets are the only species of ferrets native to North America, according to the National Zoo. At one point, they were thought to be extinct, but a group of ferrets were found in Wyoming in 1981.

That discovery kicked off a breeding program to help repair the population of black-footed ferrets. At the National Zoo’s institute, 1,252 kits have been born and 750 of the ferrets were released into the wild.

About three months from now, the kits will be separated from Aristides.

The SAFE Black-Footed Ferret program will carry out an assessment of the population overall that will decide whether the recently-born kits should stay at the institute, be transferred to another facility or be prepared to be released into the wild.

Cypriot fishermen battle invasive lionfish and turn them into a tavern delicacy

By The Associated Press
LARNACA, Cyprus (AP) — Photis Gaitanos’ rough fingers adroitly untangle the venomous spikes of a lionfish from a net, throwing the exotic-looking creature into an ice-filled rubber bin along with other fish from the day’s catch. Unlike a few years ago when he would have mostly caught local staples as sea bream, red mullet or bass, the veteran fisherman now hunts for the invasive species that made its way from the Red Sea to the warming waters of the Mediterranean, Lionfish, with their red and orange-hued stripes and antennae-like barbs that menacingly ward off enemies, threaten to decimate indigenous fish stocks, wreaking havoc on the livelihoods of the roughly 150 professional fishermen in Cyprus. The prickly fish has even made its way as far north as the Ionian Sea, where Italian authorities have asked the public to photograph and report sightings.
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