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 Thursday morning was week five of the six week summer
reading program “Reading by Design” entertainment at the library.
Amazon John from Silly Safaris brought an assortment of animals not
only to show the unusual nature of animals from around the world,
but to teach the young readers how an animal’s shape and coloring
help them survive in nature. With the help of his Boston Terrier,
Wofford, John had the kids charged up from the start.
His first animal was a red footed tortoise that not only had a hard
shell to protect it from predators, but also huge feet for digging
holes that offered it protection from the sun. Amazon John pointed
out that a tortoise lives on land unlike a turtle whose habitat is
water. Oh, and John was not above a little humor in his act. The
tortoise was named Shelly. Get it?
It was love at first sight when Amazon John brought out an adorable
white bunny. Its adaptation was also the ability to find shelter in
a hole during times of heat and danger, where it lives in a small
colony.
A yellow billed kite, a type of hawk from Egypt, has the ability to
match the opposing wind speed while it is flying so that it can
hover in one spot and check out the landscape below for prey. It
then drops out of the sky to try to snag a mouse. Think of it, if
the wind is blowing at ten miles per hour, the kite can fly into it
at ten miles per hour and not move an inch over the ground. It is
sort of like a helicopter that is hovering and from this aerial
perch, the kite can survey the ground for prey. Because this kite is
from Egypt, its name is Cleopatra. Amazon John had an amazing way of
throwing out zingers that had the full house of kids and parents in
stitches.
Can you feel the
excitement in the air as Amazon John is about to bring out the next
animal?
The
ugliest specimen in the Silly Safaris bag of animals was a huge
bullfrog from Africa named Bubba. Amazon John had two volunteers
come up to join him on stage. Each got to hold the giant frog that
hides in a pond and waits for prey to come to it. Neither volunteer
wanted to kiss the frog to see if it would turn into a prince.
An enormous African
bullfrog.
Zane and Ava get
ready to hold the bullfrog.
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Ava cracks up
when John places Bubba the Bullfrog in her hands.
Zane gets his chance
to hold Bubba.
These kids are having
a blast with Bubba.
Oh no! Ava does not
want to kiss the frog to see if Bubba turns into a prince.
When Amazon John pulled a large cloth bag out of his trunk of
animals, the kids knew just what was in the mystery bag and shouted
out their guess. And you know what? They were spot on. Amazon John
had brought a long snake to show them that slowly slithered out of
the bag.
Amazon John concluded by displaying an animal that we see scurry
around town at night all the time. A possum may seem like an
ordinary animal, a pest even, that has adapted to human neighbors,
but they do a lot of good. Amazon John described the possum as a
superhero because it eats thousands of ticks during its nocturnal
roaming looking for food. The possum helps rid our neighborhoods of
ticks that may cause all sorts of ailments in humans if bitten.
After concluding his show, Silly Safaris guide Amazon John stayed
around for another half hour after his presentation to let all of
the young readers in the audience touch each animal. Kids, parents,
and a few librarians formed a line that stretched around the entire
library waiting for a chance to touch the unusual animals in the
Silly Safaris Zoo. And then Amazon John was off to turn his next
destination into a zoo.
[Curtis Fox]
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