Photo: Facebook "Kazkova Dibrova"
In the private zoo "Kazkova Dibrova" ("Fabulous Oakwood"), almost all the animals drowned. The Insider learned about this from volunteers who helped monitor the animals. The zoo is located in a lowland near the Dnieper. According to The Insider's interlocutors, it was flooded almost instantly after the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric dam broke. Volunteers dived and tried to open the enclosures, but they failed. On the day of the flood on June 6, a video was circulating on social media of a crying woman filming water escaping from the zoo gates. It was Kazkova Dibrova that was filmed in the video.
According to volunteers, the owner of the zoo left some time ago, local residents and volunteers looked after the animals, bought food and looked after the entire zoo, he continued to work. The animals survived the cold and shelling, but could not survive the flood. Volunteers emphasize that the Russian media report false information about the rescued pets, because they talk about the Kherson zoo, but do not mention the private menagerie in Nova Kakhovka. The owner of the Crimean zoo "Taigan" Oleg Zubkov took the animals from the station of young naturalists, volunteers explain, no one took the pets from the "Kazkova Dibrovi".
“It was not a zoo, but a private menagerie,” a source told The Insider. – There were raccoons, and ostriches, and monkeys. They say that there was nothing there, but there was! There were two monkeys, green monkeys, both drowned. There were six raccoons, porcupines, ostriches, peacocks. There were many. They survived everything in a year and a half – arrivals, flights, they all survived, and then they drowned. At two o'clock in the morning there was a sharp flood, and no one had time to open the enclosures. Volunteers came, tried to dive, but there was a strong pressure of water. They wanted to at least save the monkeys, but they couldn't. Their aviary is the very first from the gate, but they still couldn’t.”
Some animals ended up in the zoo by accident. Right before the flood, the Charlick monkey was brought there – he is brought every summer to another monkey, Anfisa.
“Charlik is a monkey, a green monkey, and Anfisa is his girlfriend. They died. Charlick was brought in every summer to frolic and be together. The whole zoo stayed for the winter, because it was heated, there were winter enclosures, but the monkeys were small and therefore they were taken home,” says the volunteer.
According to The Insider's interlocutors, the Malysh pony, Wasp mule, raccoons, bear, Jaco parrot, Viennese parrot, Roma crow, marmot, Cameroon goats, sheep, parrots, guinea pigs, ferrets and many other pets died. Saved a couple of swans and ducks. A little swan died, born 5 days before the flood. Those animals that were taken by volunteers for the period of cold weather also remained alive: parrot Venya, flying squirrels, ferrets (a type of ferrets), chinchillas and guinea pigs. Volunteers also hope that a dog and one cat survived – they were not locked up and could have escaped to the city further from the coast.