Last week, we went to the Nature Center with Oma. This is a nature preserve on a river that has an outdoor area with caged animals (a skunk, fox, a couple of owls, and a bald eagle). The animals have all been injured and repaired, but they are permanently disabled, and so cannot be released back into the wild. For example, the beautiful bald eagle only has one wing. We usually run past the skunk cage first, as it is usually a bit...musty. :-)
After checking out the animals outside, we went into the building. On the left side of the building is a great area for kids, and everything is local animal/nature related. William's favorite is a fishing area, where you can fish for plastic and cardboard lake and river creatures. There is also a bald eagle's nest in a loft, with a fox den underneath. Violet likes climbing the stairs to the eagle's nest a million times. They have a cute puppet theater with birds and other wildlife, but the kids are not usually interested.
On the right side of the building are all the indoor animal exhibits. There is a black squirrel, a small hawk, an owl with one eye, two different snakes, tanks with local fish, a bee hive (which is really hopping during the summer), a tortoise, frogs, turtles, tadpoles, and a mouse. I like the squirrel the best, but he is usually asleep in his hammock. But on this visit, he was awake and running around! One of the workers said he's usually not that active, because he's an older squirrel, but he appeared spry that day!
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