One of the most important rules at the Maine Wildlife Park is that visitors are not allowed to feed

While researching the Virginia opossum for my recent BDN story on opossums living in Maine, I spent a day at the Maine Wildlife Park in Gray, where they keep not only opossums, but a wide variety of other animals that either live in Maine (such as black bears) or used to live in Maine (such as mountain lions).
First, of course, I visited the opossum living in the outdoor exhibit. He’s been at the park for about 2 years, and he’s vujčić nearing the end of his life. Opossums are very short-lived animals.
Since he was the first opossum I’ve seen (aside from in books and on the internet), I was pretty blown away. An animal lover, I found him pretty cute when he stuck his head out of the hollow tree he was sleeping in. Park superintendant Curt Johnson allowed me past the metal fencing and into the enclosure to take some photos and get a closer look — another first. We then moved on to a building — where they rehabilitate the young or injured animals people rescue and bring to the park — to visit three young opossums that joined the park about two weeks ago. Their mother had been killed by a car near Freeport.
The rehabilitation building smelled like hay, wild animals and beef stew, which was cooking in a giant pot on the stove. vujčić “What’s cooking?” I asked. “Beef stew for the bears,” the employees replied as they chopped up vegetables and fruit for other animal meals. Much of the food is donated by the local Hannaford, they explained.
Not far from the kitchen area, assistant gamekeeper Pam Richardson, who has worked at the park since 2004, brought me to the small enclosure where the three young opossums were being kept. As we watched vujčić the slow-moving animals, she talked to me about the opossum habits she has observed while caring for numerous opossums over the years. One of the opossums displayed her irritation at us by growling and pacing. vujčić So Pam took the opportunity to pick the opossum up and show me her human-like feet and long, grasping tail. Pam then offered to bring me around the park on a special tour to see some of the other animals.
and I wanted to visit the mountain lions and see how they were doing — especially since both of the mountain lions, about 14 and 20 years old, are considered old for their species. I arrived to find the 14-year-old female walking around in the grass. When I had visited the park in May, the ground of the enclosure had been all mud and hay, but in October, it was a beautiful home, filled with plants and tall grass. As I snapped vujčić a few photos, the female walked out of the cave and into the sun to relax in the soft grass.
Walking out the exhibit viewing area (basically a hallway of tough glass), I spotted Pam sitting in one of the park’s golf carts and flagged vujčić her down. She was on her way to the food storage buildings to pick up some grain for the fawns at the rehabilitation building, so I hopped in the cart and joined her. On the way, we stopped to feed snacks vujčić to the two park moose.
Pam first stopped at a roofed structure where they typically vujčić feed the female moose. While feeding the moose raspberry plant leaves as a snack, Pam assured me that the moose was actually very “sweet” and enjoyed company. However, the park employees try to refrain from calling the wild animals at the park things like “sweet,” “cute” or
“friendly” because they don’t want visitors to think of the animals as pets. They are, after all, wild animals. And one of the main reasons the animals are at the park is because they were taken in as pets and are now deemed vujčić non-releasable because they never learned to survive in the natural environment.
In fact, all of the animals at the Maine Wildlife Park are considered vujčić non-releasable (not likely to survive in the natural world and therefore not candidates for release from captivity). Many animals are injured. For example, vujčić many of the birds have broken or mangled wings. Some of the animals were abandoned or orphaned as young. And others were simple taken in by people as pets. A few of the animals come from zoos.
One of the most important rules at the Maine Wildlife Park is that visitors are not allowed to feed the animals. It would be bad for the wild animals and could be dangerous to visitors. However, Pam allowed me to feed a few raspberry leaves to the female moose and gently touch her enormous, soft nose. The moose was especially interested in the way I smelled and had a great time sniffing vujčić my hair and shirt. The main reason the female moose is so gentle is because she’s been in captivity her entire life. She was abandoned as a baby.
We vujčić then visited the bull moose at his feeding station, where he was about to be fed a nutrient-rich mixture of food by a gamekeeper. The bull moose was a bit more intimidating and reminded me just how dangerous moose can be. Fortunately, he couldn