In the Danish Munkholm Zoo, in the east of Jutland, there was not enough fruit for the 400 animals on Saturday morning. Normally, the zoo buys cheap leftover fruit, but the hoarding population has been buying the shelves empty for the past few days.
One of the zoo's regular visitors, Stefan Bak, created a Facebook account to help the zoo. Through it he asked for vegetables, fruits and nuts for the zoo animals, which had almost run out of food. The first messages of help came shortly after the group was created, and within a few hours the fruit supply was restored, according to Benny Sejer Johansen, owner of the Munkholm Zoo. "Everything is going very fast, thanks to social networks. We have received between 15 and 20 boxes of fruit from individuals who have also been requesting it from other neighbors, for example. We are really happy with that help.”
Johansen usually collects leftover fruit from the distribution center in Grenå and from smaller shops nearby. But in recent days, there have been hardly any excess products from hoarding because of the coronavirus. Johansen expects that the donations will no longer be necessary when everything has stabilised again.
There was never any question that the animals would have too little to eat, but the question was more about what diet they could get, Johansen emphasizes: "They would never starve, in case of shortages we would have transferred them to dry food." There are a total of 90 animal species in Munkholm Zoo, which eat between 90 and 100 tons of fruit and vegetables per year.
Munkholm Zoo will reopens on 2nd of April for visitors, although that date could of course change. The zoo has already taken action against the virus by canceling animal shows, which bring together large numbers of people.
Source: jyllands-posten.dk