The Akron Zoo has teamed up with FirstEnergy to provide various animals with nutritious food to keep them healthy and happy while allowing the electric company to clear vegetation along power lines to keep electricity flowing safely and reliably across northeast Ohio.
Trees are a leading cause of power outages. As part of its vegetation management program, FirstEnergy routinely trims trees to help prevent or minimize the impact of tree-related outages and enhance electric service reliability.
Each week, the Akron Zoo collects a portion of FirstEnergy’s trimmings, which are called browse, from various locations in greater Akron. The sticks, leaves and buds are high in fiber and an important part of the animals’ diet. Chewing on browse can also improve dental health.
“We are very grateful and excited for this new collaboration with FirstEnergy,” said Shane Good, senior director of animal care at Akron Zoo. “The Akron Zoo has wanted to increase the scope of our browse program for long-term growth of the zoo, and FirstEnergy has allowed us to accomplish this. This natural food source improves animal wellbeing, which is a top priority for the Akron Zoo.”
The zoo’s primate and hoofstock species, such as lemurs, tufted deer, alpaca and goats, are currently benefiting from FirstEnergy’s browse donations.
Prior to the collaboration, the Akron Zoo was able to intermittingly collect browse from zoo grounds, but this was not a long-term possibility. Now, the zoo has enough browse to provide to the current animals daily. The donations from FirstEnergy will also help sustain the zoo’s efforts to provide the animals with browse as the zoo continues to expand.
"This unique collaboration allows us to repurpose the trimmings generated by our day-to-day operations to benefit the beloved animals at the Akron Zoo,” said Tara Weckerly, FirstEnergy's Forestry Services Manager. "This initiative fills us with pride as it promises to contribute to the thriving wellbeing of zoo animals."