Ankole-Watsui & Turs & Meerkats, Oh My

One of the reasons for living in the Chicago area is because Wisconsin is so close. Last Friday -- a day called "Nonattendance Day" on the school calendar, a thin secular mask for getting Good Friday off -- we drove to Racine, Wisconsin, one of the small cities on Lake Michigan between Chicago and Milwaukee. The last time we were there, Lilly was small and Ann wasn't born yet, so it's been a while.

Our first destination was the Racine Zoo. Last time the zoo charged no admission. At some point in the last eight years, it started to charge admission, which made me grumble for a while, but in the end we got our money's worth. With 76 species on 32 acres, it isn't a huge zoo, but size isn't the thing. Novelty is, and at Racine I saw some animals I don't see often, or ever, such as Ankole-Watsui Cattle, with their enormous horns.

Ankole-Watsui is an ancient African breed, with ancestors among the Hamitic longhorns bred by ancient Egyptians. Lately North Americans have taken to breeding them.

Also living at the Racine Zoo are coati -- South American raccoons, essentially -- ever-active meerkats, West Caucasian turs, Andean bears ("last of the short-faced bears"), Amur tigers and African penguins. It was news to me that any kind of penguin lives on the southwest coast of Africa. Off the west coast of South America, there in the Humboldt Current, certainly, but Africa? About a half-dozen African penguins stood in the shade, reminding me of my ignorance about most things penguin. They are short, stubby penguins, not the kind that are lauded in noble penguin movies.