The Indian River Reptile Zoo saved over 150 alligators, crocodiles, and caimans from a Toronto-area home.
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“I couldn’t believe what I was seeing”, Loyst said Thursday on CBC Radio’s Metro Morning show. These were not baby little crocodiles. “They were adults”.
A spokeswoman for the city said Toronto Animal Services received no complaints about the reptiles so no investigation will be launched.
He told the Toronto Star that it was a couple keeping the animals, but has not identified them. “It is possible, I suppose, but they’re just not something that should be kept as pets”, Loyst said.
A Toronto couple gave up their personal zoo of almost 150 crocodiles and alligators last week after realizing they grew too big and could no longer care for them, reported the Toronto Star. The tiny hatchlings are less than a foot long now, but could reach up to 10-and-a-half feet in length as adults.
Luckily, the zoo recently added a new $1 million crocodile rescue building, which has over 100,000 gallons of water held in multiple pools, Loyst added, saying that numerous rescued animals would be housed there. The zoo is home to more than 400 snakes, turtles and lizards. The animals will be given a new life, and Loyst said they will be fed the right food will be able to swim and bask in the sun, which numerous animals have never seen. “Kudos to them. A lot of people don’t do the right thing with exotic pets, and they actually did”.
The facility is looking for donations to help buy equipment for the reptiles’ new enclosure that will help keep them comfortable over the winter.
He said he’s unsure how the couple obtained the reptiles, where they came from or how they took care of them.
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He rented four, 26-foot long trucks and bought dozens of Sonotubes (the large cardboard tubes used as concrete forms in building construction).
