Florence County Library brings in an exotic animal rescue

FLORENCE, Wisc. (WLUC) - With the warm weather heating things up outside, the Florence County Library had a nice event indoors introducing the community to an exotic animal rescue.

The library provides educational opportunities beyond the pages of its many books. The Florence County Library provides six to eight events throughout the summer.

The library has a mix of different presentations including magic, music and animal shows, and the community has responded positively.

"We average between 50 and 150 kids and adults every week," Florence County Library Director Stephanie Weber said. "We provide snacks, sometimes we do the goody bags giveaways, book giveaways, whatever we can do to get the kids welcomed into the library."

The Kingdom and Animalia Exotic Animal Rescue from Suring, Wisconsin has rescued over twelve thousand exotic animals including foxes, lizards, tortoises and parrots. The star of Tuesday's show was a parrot named Clemintine who loves to be in front of the crowd.

"She (Clemintine the Parrot) loves to be doted on," Kingdom and Animalia Exotic Animal Rescue Founder and Executive Director Jamie Kozloski said. "She comes to our program, and she teaches people how important they are in nature, being natures gardeners, repopulating rain forests where they come from with fresh plants and seeds."

The many kids on hand enjoyed the chance to see and touch a tortoise, lizard and parrot. Often when you think of animal shelters, you likely think of their physical wellbeing, but you also have to consider the exotic animal's emotions.

"Surrendering these types of animals can really be emotional on them because of how strongly they bond," Kozloski said. "Depending on the species, they can learn up to a one to five-year-old learning level, and they feel every emotion we feel, they have their own thoughts and so surrendering them does a lot of emotional damage to them. So, we do a lot of emotional work with them as well, getting them back up to speed before we do any adaptions."

The next goal for the Kingdom and Animalia Exotic Animal Rescue: build their own building that will not only house the animals but also host educational events.

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