(Source)This is a picture of a platypus from the Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia taken by Tom McHugh. Unfortunately, the San Diego Zoo is not home to any platypus so I was unable to get a picture of the adorable yet strange creatures myself :( In even worse news, there actually are not any American zoos that house platypus; to see an authentic, live platypus you must travel outside the country. Even the countries that do have the platypus in their zoos, typically Australia and New Zealand, have strict limits on the number of zoos or universities that are allowed to house platypus as well as the number of platypus they are allowed to house. Apparently, having platypus in a zoo is not easy because of the difficulty of breeding the animals in captivity. In fact, only a few platypus babies have ever been born under such artificial conditions.
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I wonder why it is so hard to breed platypus in captivity when there is such success with other animals. Do we just not understand the needs of the platypus as well as other animals? They really don't seem like the type of animal that gets paid much attention. Maybe it isn't worth the investment on the zoo's part to figure out why they can't successfully breed the animals when no one seems to miss them (except those who have to blog about them)!
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