Posted at: 10/02/2012 6:44 PM
By: Gordon Severson

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Zollman Zoo Expansion Makes More Room for Wild Cats

(ABC 6 NEWS) -- Three wild cats will soon have a new home.
    
Workers are wrapping up construction on a brand new exhibit at Zollman Zoo that's been years in the making.

"This will probably be one of the largest exhibits that we've built so far here," Construction Crew Leader Pat Gerken says.

A 30,000 square foot exhibit built for a measly $100,000.

"All donations no taxpayer money here," says Gerken.

Money for materials only, everything else is free.

Manual labor coming from the parks department and designs donated by a local architect.

Even the decorations were free. The giant oak tree used in all three pens was found a few hundred yards away.

Blown over in a recent storm.

"We counted the rings. It was just over 200-years-old," Gerken explains.

The largest pen is where the cougar will be moving to in the next couple weeks.

It's about five times bigger than where she's currently living.

The other two pens are for the bobcat and the lynx.

Once they move in, all of the other spaces will be moved around as needed.

"We're going to move the porcupines into the bobcat pen and then the woodchucks that are in there now will just have a larger pen for them," Gerken says.

For the foxes cougars, and everyone else the project couldn't come sooner.

A brand new home with plenty of room to roam.

The wild cat exhibit will be open to the public in early November.
    
the cats will be moved in over the next few weeks.