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Date Published: 21/02/2024

Ostrich egg stolen from Almeria theme park

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The egg that was stolen from MiniHollywood belongs to an endangered species of ostrich

Ostrich egg stolen from Almeria theme park

A rare ostrich egg has gone missing from the Oasys MiniHollywood theme park and zoo in Almería, Andalucía.

Located in Tabernas near the Almería desert, MiniHollywood has old Wild West-style movie sets to entertain visitors, as well as animals such as flamingos, giraffes, hippos and ostriches.

This Sunday February 18, however, the first egg of a pair of mating red-necked ostriches was stolen from the park.

The red-necked ostrich (Struthio camelus camelus) is an animal that is extinct in the wild and there are very few of them left in the world – fewer than 40 males and 38 females exist in zoos worldwide. Only a few are kept in a captive-breeding conservation programmes in European zoos, which makes the theft of this egg particularly distressing.

The female ostrich, named Carlota, laid her first egg on the morning of Sunday 18. The last time that egg was at around 1.30pm and by 3pm it was confirmed that it had disappeared.

It seems that one of the approximately 1,000 visitors to the park that day decided that it would be a good idea to jump over the double fence of the enclosure to steal the precious egg.

Sources from the park claim that they have seen the footprints of some trainers near the wall that they must have jumped over to get hold of the egg, before stuffing it in a backpack and walking out the front door.

José María Rodríguez Linde, director of the Oasys MiniHollywood Park, has appealed for the thief to return the very special egg, saying, “the egg is still viable”.

“For the next 12 days it will still be viable and even if the mother does not hatch it because her oestrus has broken, we have the capacity to hatch it and options to make the attempt,” he said. “This is a European captive breeding programme for highly endangered species with the aim of reintroducing them.”

The pair of ostriches in this reserve have been in heat for a couple of weeks now, and finally just managed to fertilise an egg.

What’s more, it was an incredibly dangerous move on the part of the thief to hop into the ostrich enclosure as “these animals are between two and a half and three metres long” and “an ostrich kick can kill you”, especially during the rutting season when the birds are in heat or feel their eggs are threatened.

In the more than 25 years that the park has been open, nothing like this has ever happened, and the staff are not worried about who committed the crime, but just want the priceless egg back.

“We have no greater interest than to be able to recover it,” insisted José María Rodríguez.

Image: Archive

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