Saint-Félicien, March 8, 2004.   

It is with great pleasure that the Wild Zoo of St-Félicien (now renamed ‘Centre for the Conservation of Boreal Biodiversity’) announces another major success: the birth of a baby wolverine! The wolverine has been listed as an ‘endangered species’ in Eastern Canada since May 2003, and this fragile status means that every new birth is of great significance and constitutes one more step to saving the species.

The CCBB has been an active partner for at least a decade in the struggle to rehabilitate the species, and in the year 2000 it set up a program for breeding wolverines in captivity.  The program is focused more particularly on better understanding the behaviours that promote the reproduction of this little understood species, in order that the CCBB may draw up protocols that will allow other institutions to increase the numbers in captivity and thus ensure the survival of the wolverine as a species.  

The CCBB has already had significant success with its program. The same female had three cubs on February 28, 2001, two on March 3, 2002, and this latest on March 5, 2004. Another female, imported from the Minnesota Zoo, will be dropping her young in the coming days, setting a Canadian record, since it will be the first time two litters of wolverine have been born in the same institution. It makes us proud of our efforts to foster conservation.

Source:   Sylvie Bouchard, biologist
Director, Scientific Activities
Tel: (418) 679-0543
Fax: (418) 679-3647

We invite you to watch four videos of the newborn wolverine and its mother. Just click on a one of the following picture to start the video.

Wolverine 1	Wolverine 2
Wolverine 3	Wolverine 4

Videos and images taken the 03/15/2004

Even though the mother's behaviours may appear "rough" for a human observer, they on the contrary are natural and a good sign of her maternal instinct. She is the one placing the kit onto her belly to allow it to drink or to clean it. At this age, its eyes and ears are still shut and it cannot stand on its legs, depending solely on its mother which takes the job really seriously!