Feeding time at the zoo a delicate task

Posted: Friday, December 25, 2015 

MICHAEL MILLER, Staff Writer

 

CAPE MAY COURT HOUSE — Vince Sonetto, supervising animal keeper at the Cape May County Zoo, swings a heavy pulley to close two steel doors. He checks his handiwork because just outside the gates — and trying hard to get inside — are two lions. Hungry lions.

The Cape May County Zoo has nutritionists and Zoo Keepers who tailor meals for each animal, including Bella, the lion. Monday, December 14. (The Press of Atlantic City/ Viviana Pernot)

Feeding time is a bloody affair for Lex and Bella, the zoo’s 4-year-old African lions.

Sonetto, 53, of Middle Township, has been caring for them for the past year, and the pair — now nearly grown — are still affectionate toward him. But he does not delude himself about the dangers, especially at feeding time. “No, I can’t make a mistake because it will be the last,” Sonetto says. “It helps to be a little OCD checking the locks.”

Sonetto opens the outer gate and lets Bella into her brother’s den. She rubs up against the gate and makes low whining noises until Sonetto kneels and lavishes her with praise and affection. Up close, the lions are impossibly big. Their father was a beast at 600 pounds — huge for any lion. And these siblings still have some growing to do.

Sonetto feeds each cat 7 to 15 pounds of ground beef, a mix of cow and horse meat from frozen packages. The den has a thawing fridge and a freezer that holds more than a month’s worth of lion food.

On Fridays, the big cats fast with the occasional bone to gnaw. This simulates their diet in the wild, where they go days between kills. With the outside gates secured, Sonetto opens the interior cage door, a mix of steel bars and heavy mesh, and enters Bella’s den. This is where she spends the night and feeds out of public view and beyond the reach of her bigger brother.

 

Bella, a lion at The Cape May County Zoo, enters her cage in time to have lunch. Monday, December 14. (The Press of Atlantic City/ Viviana Pernot)

Sonetto dumps a plastic tray of meat onto the bare concrete, where blood pools like a crime scene.

“That’s how she likes it,” he says. “Messy.”

Sometimes the zoo gets donations of deer from hunters or recent roadkill. These are shared among all the zoo’s big cats — its tiger, cheetahs and snow leopards.

Sonetto closes a cage door designed to keep prying paws from reaching keepers. He padlocks the cage and gives the lock two quick tugs. When he opens a hidden gate between dens, Bella hurries to her meal, squatting over her dinner in that particularly lioness way with her heavy tail twitching left and right.

He follows the same process for Lex, who waits eagerly behind steel and fills the entire doorway, blotting out the daylight. Lex ignores Sonetto for now and settles into his dinner.

Neither lion is a member of the clean-plate club, leaving a few scraps and drabs of blood. Lex turns his attention to Sonetto and sits regally at the cage entrance, watching with intelligent, golden eyes.

“Are you finished? Are you a good boy?” Sonetto asks the lion, who replies with a whine, burying his muzzle in the chain link.

 
Lex, a male lion at The Cape May County Zoo, waits in his cage for his lunch. Monday, December 14. (The Press of Atlantic City/ Viviana Pernot)

The zoo acquired the lions from Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson Township, where they were born. They replaced another beloved lion, Brutu, who died last year at 16. But now their roars echo across Middle Township. They have been a joy to work with, Sonetto says.

“Personality-wise, they act more like a big dog than a cat,” he says. “They’re happy to see you, so they’ll run over. They’re just like kids now. Every day is an adventure.”

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