‘I want to see a snake’: Wildlife Festival returns to Saskatoon

Saskatoon’s Prairieland Park welcomed a number of furry, scaly and prickly visitors over the weekend.

The Wildlife Festival was created by Cobb’s Exotic Animal Rescue, based in Calgary. A wide variety of animals are brought to a number of cities to allow animal lovers the opportunity to visit their favourite creatures and educate the public.

Wrangler Elisa is one of the animal edu-trainers with the festival. She has the job of both showcasing the wildlife and making sure that folks leave knowing a little bit more about the responsibilities that come along with being kind to wildlife.

“One of the things that I always tell kids is [animals] are so exciting to see, but sometimes not every animal that we want as a pet makes the greatest pets,” wrangler Elisa said.

While visitors of all ages come to the show, there is an emphasis on the younger guests, many of whom are seeing these animals for the first time.

“Teaching kids right from a young age to help their animal friends, whether it be to make a bee bath, feed the birds, pick up litter if you see some litter on the ground, or don’t drop your candy wrappers on the ground as well. It doesn’t take one person to change the world. It takes all of us working together as a big team to help our world stay strong and help,” wrangler Elisa said.

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The animals on display are separated by the locations where they might be found in the wild. Visitors could see sloths, kangaroos, lizards, and many other creatures. But wrangler Elisa shared that two particular animals often catch the attention of the younger guests.

“The snakes, most definitely. Every kid comes and they say, ‘I want to see a snake’. Porcupines are absolutely amazing. The porcupines that you see here, we have actually three different species. So we have our prehensile-tailed porcupine and then a black-tailed hairy dwarf porcupine. And she’s the only one in Canada that we know of. So it’s an incredible experience to come and see some of the amazing animals that we have here to offer,” wrangler Elisa said.

The event saw hundreds of people throughout the weekend, and wrangler Elisa shared hope that everyone who came through the doors learned something new about wildlife, and how to treat wildlife with respect.

“That’s something that a lot of people come away from our shows learning is, what might work for my family versus I want a kangaroo. I’m going to get a kangaroo. So it’s super exciting to see them and be able to appreciate them, but also learn about them and maybe why some pets might work for a family, and maybe other pets might not,” wrangler Elisa said.