Reptiland, at 58 years, a staple of Greater Susquehanna Valley – Sunbury Daily Item

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Updated: August 14, 2022 @ 2:40 pm
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland zookeeper Michael Somervail holds onto Kaa for visitors to pet after one of the Lizards & Snakes Alive program.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland guest Rebecca Warfel pets one of the Aldabra tortoises during a special meet and greet with two of Reptiland’s giants.
Reptiland zookeeper Rachel Yoder, left, holds up a small alligator for a youth group to pet after the Ancient Adaptations program at Reptiland.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Porter Bordner, 9, Rhode Island, feeds one of the parakeets at Reptiland during a recent visit.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland Zookeepers Kathryn Allen, left, and Michael Somervail, steer Thurber, one of two Komodo dragons at Reptiland, into his enclosure for the day.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item Reptiland Zookeeper Kathryn Allen, holds up a rattlesnake during the Venom program at Reptiland.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland zookeeper Ben Dodge pulls out boa constrictor Kaa as he gets animals ready for their different educational shows.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland zookeepers Brandi Eberlin, left, and Ben Dodge, bribe tortoises with watermelon to get them into their enclosures for the night.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland zookeepers Kathryn Allen, left, Rachel Yoder, Ben Dodge, and Rebecca Harner talk about their schedules for the day before heading out to take care of their responsibilities.
Reptiland zookeeper Brandi Eberlin talks about the alligators at Reptiland.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland zookeeper Rachel Yoder shows off some poison dart frogs to guests during an animal encounter at the zoo.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
An albino alligator sits in its pen at Reptiland.

Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland zookeeper Michael Somervail holds onto Kaa for visitors to pet after one of the Lizards & Snakes Alive program.
ALLENWOOD — Clyde Peeling’s Reptiland, located along Route 15 outside Allenwood, has been a staple of the Greater Susquehanna Valley for 58 years. Specializing in reptiles and amphibians, Reptiland has more than 50 species of animals on seven acres of land.
Reptiland opened on July 11, 1964, at 18628 Route 15, Allenwood. The idea formed when Peeling worked at a smaller Winfield attraction of the same name operated by a man from Texas. After leaving the military in 1964, Peeling asked that man if he could use the name and Peeling worked to make his dream a reality. The zoo became accredited by the Association of Zoos & Aquariums (AZA) in 1986.
The Daily Item recently spent a day at Reptiland following the zookeepers around and seeing what they do for a day.
Among the park’s animals are turtles, giant tortoises, lizards, snakes, frogs, crocodilians, Komodo dragons, parakeets, emus, and more, as well as a Dinosaurs Come to Life exhibit with 12 animatronic extinct species.
Founder Clyde Peeling said the zoo is visited by about 60,000 guests a year. 
“When I began almost six decades ago, people were attracted to it because there’s an inner fear, but their curiosity overshadowed that inner fear,” said Peeling. “I don’t think that is true anymore. Because of Animal Planet and PBS, people understand that reptiles are not diabolical creatures they should avoid. They have a genuine interest in animals and want to learn about them.”
The zoo is open year-round. An average visit is said to take between 1.5 to 2.5 hours. The Daily Item spent a day on July 28 at Reptiland to give readers a sneak peek behind the scenes to see what it takes to accommodate guests and manage the animals.
Elliot Peeling, Clyde Peeling’s son, is usually the first to arrive in the morning. He spends the first 45 minutes unlocking exhibits and letting animals out of their huts.
Zoological Manager Kathryn Allen, who has worked at Reptiland for seven years, said a propane cannon is used in the morning to scare away starlings roosting in the trees. The starlings, an invasive species, can make a mess that’s not a pretty sight for guests.
“The propane cannon makes a really loud bang, but the animals (in the zoo) are used to it,” said Allen.
The rest of the zookeepers and gift shop employees arrive just before 8:45 a.m. to prepare for opening at 9 a.m. It takes up to six zookeepers and three gift shop employees to run the zoo each day. The chain across the parking lot is moved and the doors are unlocked.
Gift shop employees Ashley Kernan, Madison Moody and Alyssa Hoffman said they must make sure the register is counted, the snacks are out and everything is clean and tidy for guests’ arrival.
The busiest days are weekends when guests often are waiting at the door to come in, but weekdays can offer a younger crowd from schools, day cares or summer camps. On July 28, the employees said they are expecting a group of children from a day care called Kinder Care. They prepare the group’s schedule and special bags to hand out when they arrive.
“Little kids are either so excited or so scared,” said Moody, a staff member since February. “It’s either one or the other.”
“Sometimes little kids come out crying from the dinosaurs,” said Kernan, an employee since October. “It can be intense.”
When the doors open at 9 a.m., the gift shop employees are in charge of admission and setting up guests with any additional experiences, such as souvenir photographs or a Meet and Feed with the giant tortoises. The price of admission is $20 for ages 12 and up, $16 for ages 3 through 11 and free for anyone under the age of 2.
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Reptiland zookeepers Kathryn Allen, left, Rachel Yoder, Ben Dodge, and Rebecca Harner talk about their schedules for the day before heading out to take care of their responsibilities.
The zookeepers converge in what they call “The Island” — the space behind the 6,500-square-foot indoor exhibit gallery house — to discuss schedules and who will be overseeing animal encounters and shows. Each day there are five 30-minute full shows in the program center, two 10-minute animal encounters in the Komodo Plaza and two 20-minute Croc Talk shows in the Alligator Building.
A lot happens in the hour between 9 and 10 a.m. Allen calls it “organized chaos.” Animals are unpredictable and displays may need to be fixed, she said.
“You never know what’s going to happen,” she said.
The schedules are written on a whiteboard with an erasable marker. There are several reminders on the board, including that ice cream and popsicles are in the freezer and Gatorade is in the fridge. There’s also a message instructing zookeepers to “Let someone know immediately if you need a break from heat.”
Zookeepers will spend the first hour of the day cleaning the exhibits, making sure each animal is accounted for, and preparing animals to take to the program center. Every exhibit is scrubbed every day and the water is changed once a week. They must check the list, pick a task and initial it twice: once to show they are doing it and once to show it’s finished.
On average, the zookeepers said they walk 8,000 to 10,000 steps a day through the zoo.
Zookeeper Michael Somervail cleans the Madagascar’s Giant Gecko enclosure. Part of that task is using a squeegee to wipe down the glass with a special solution called RO (Reverse Osmosis) water, a water treatment process that removes contaminants from water by using pressure to force water molecules through a semipermeable membrane. During this process, the contaminants are filtered out and flushed away, leaving clean drinking water.
Somervail wipes down the glass, being careful to not disturb the gecko who likes to attach itself to the sides.
“Someone does this every morning,” said Somervail. “Animals love to make a mess.”
Zookeeper Rebecca Harner cleans the Parakeet Landing exhibit by spraying down the rocks and sidewalk of the enclosure because birds are “very messy,” she said. She puts out fresh water, fresh food and may add new branches for enrichment.
Zookeepers Ben Dodge and Rachel Yoder prepare the feed list for the day for all animals, whether they are on display for the public or behind the scenes. Many of the animals behind the scenes are part of the traveling shows and exhibits or conservation breeding.
Not all animals are daily eaters, so they said it’s important to make sure to follow their eating schedules. Some of the animals eat thawed silverside fish while others eat thawed rats or mice. The green anaconda is scheduled to eat today, so they have taken a full chicken out of the freezer to thaw.
Dodge also packs the animals that will be part of the shows for the day with the exception of the Venom! show at 1:30 p.m. He is not certified to work with venomous animals. 
Among the animals for today’s shows are Kaa, a 5-foot boa constrictor, and Loki, a baby American alligator. 
Dodge taps Kaa lightly on the head, a move to indicate he is not being fed, and then uses a hook to pull him out and place him in a crate. When handling Loki, he makes sure to grab behind the back of the head so the animal cannot bite him.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland zookeeper Ben Dodge pulls out boa constrictor Kaa as he gets animals ready for their different educational shows.
“The animals are taken to the program center,” said Dodge. “They are padlocked to keep guests out.”
The animals are rotated each day, he said.
Paid zookeepers are the only employees who can work with certain animals like the saltwater crocodile and large crocodilians, large constrictors and Komodo dragons. Only certified zookeepers who have worked with senior keepers for at least 15 hours and have passed an on-site written test and a practical test can work with venomous animals.
The Giant Tortoises — Al and Henry — are outside today while the Komodo dragons — Thurber and Saphira — are inside. The Komodo Plaza is never set at a temperature less than 80 degrees. Both species like it warm and today it is 93 degrees inside their building. When the Giant Tortoises are outside, the female Komodo dragon gets the larger exhibit all to herself and the male Komodo dragon is placed in the Giant Tortoise indoor exhibit.
Thurber, the 14-year-old male Komodo dragon, is nearly 90 pounds and just over 7-1/2 feet long. He hatched at the Sedgwick County Zoo in Kansas on Jan. 31, 2007, but it wasn’t until 2016 that he came to Reptiland as part of the Komodo Dragon Species Survival Plan (SSP).
Saphira, the 8-year-old female dragon, is nearly 50 pounds and just under 5 feet long. She hatched in the United Kingdom at the Colchester Zoo on Nov. 24, 2013, and came to America to live at the Memphis Zoo in 2017. She was last at the Bronx Zoo until she came to Reptiland in October as part of the SSP program. 
The Komodo dragon, the largest of all lizards, is an endangered species native to five of the Lessor Sunda Islands of Indonesia. These predators are renowned for bold hunting techniques and are capable of killing pigs, deer, and even water buffalo.
It’s a short walk between Thurber’s off-exhibit holding and the indoor habitat but both Allen and Somervail wear bite-proof kevlar shin guards. They encourage him to walk to the exhibit with the gentle prodding of the komodo sticks and he finally enters the door.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Reptiland Zookeepers Kathryn Allen, left, and Michael Somervail, steer Thurber, one of two Komodo dragons at Reptiland, into his enclosure for the day.
Once a month, the Komodo dragons are fed a deer carcass, which will happen in two days. The zookeepers are thawing the deer in preparation for the feeding in the backstage area. The dragons are fed rats, chicks, and hard-boiled eggs during the week as rewards.
Reptiland works with the Pennsylvania Game Commission to pick up roadkill that hasn’t been too badly mangled as food for some of the larger animals.
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Porter Bordner, 9, Rhode Island, feeds one of the parakeets at Reptiland during a recent visit.
The Parakeet Landing exhibit opens at 10 a.m. Since it is an open exhibit where guests can interact with the animals, it is staffed by a zookeeper every moment of the day in one-hour shifts.
Tori Libby, of Mifflinburg, walked into the exhibit shortly after it opened with her 2-month-old son Jamison Libby, 2-year-old daughter Ella Libby, 9-year-old cousin Porter Bordner and her grandmother Irine Heimbach. Flying around them and perched on branches are 185 colorful parakeets and seven cockatiels.
“We love this exhibit,” said Tori Libby. “They also really love the snakes. It’s our second time this year.”
Heimbach said she has lived in the Mifflinburg area for more than 70 years and she had never visited Reptiland before.
“I love it so far. I don’t love the snakes, but I love birds,” she said, with two parakeets on her shoes.
Most of the birds in this exhibit do not have names, but the zookeepers have come to know two of them personally. There’s Vulture, a cockatiel who came to the zoo with damaged feathers on her head.
“She looks goofy, but we love her,” said Allen. “She was someone’s pet before coming to us. Once her feathers are damaged, they can’t grow back. She’ll be bald for the rest of her life.”
Another well-known cockatiel is Red, named as such because he mimics the song of cardinals. 
“He’s very loud,” said Allen. “He picked it up from the native birds.”
The birds in this exhibit are known by many different species names including parakeet, budgerigar, budgie, grass parakeet, and shell parakeet, to name a few. Wild budgies are originally from Australia. While it’s not known exactly where the name budgerigar comes from, it is thought to originate from an Aboriginal word or phrase.
As part of the experience, guests can buy seed sticks for $3 to feed the birds and have them land nearby or on their hands.
At 10:30 a.m., the first show of the day is Ancient Adaptations at the program center led by Yoder. She discussed how the shell of tortoises and turtles became bony after millions of years, as well as the ancient adaptations of dinosaurs.
Theropod dinosaurs, such as Tyrannosaur rex or velociraptor, have adaptations that are still around today. There are more than 100 skeletal similarities between birds and a T-rex, said Yoder.
The biggest similarities are three toes, hollow bones, fused clavicles (wishbones) and feathers, she said.
Rebecca Warfel moved from the Philadelphia suburbs of Delaware County to Milton in September to be around more nature. An owner of two tortoises, Warfel said she wanted to visit Reptiland when she first heard about it. Today, she visited with her nephew Lucas Bryant, 11, an incoming sixth-grade student in Delaware County, and paid extra to Meet and Feed the Gentle Giants.
“I wore all my reptile jewelry today,” said Warfel with a snake ring and earrings. “I have been into reptiles for a while. It was amazing. I have been wanting to do something similar to this for a while. I watch a lot of nature documentaries related to them (tortoises). It was really cool.”
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Reptiland guest Rebecca Warfel pets one of the Aldabra tortoises during a special meet and greet with two of Reptiland’s giants.
Warfel has owned her own tortoises that are about the size of a dinner plate. Al and Henry, the giant Aldabra tortoises at Reptiland, are much bigger: Al weighs 300 pounds and is 39 inches in length; Henry is 350 pounds and 41 inches in length.
Al, at age 1, and Henry, believed to have been age 7, have been with the zoo since 1967. The broken spot on Al’s shell is from a burn or infection during the first few years of his life. A section of dead bone was ejected from the shell and new bone is slowly filling the void.
Henry’s age is not truly known. He was imported by another zoo in 1959, but records of his age at the time of purchase are sketchy. His smooth shell appears to be weather worn, so he may have already been an adult when purchased.
Aldabra tortoises live for about 150 years in captivity, according to zoo officials.
As part of the Meet and Feed, Warfel and Lucas are given large leaves of lettuce and carrots with oversized clothespins. The vegetables go in the clothespins to keep human fingers away from tortoise mouths. They were allowed to feed Al and Henry, pet them and take some pictures with them.
Aldabra tortoises are native to a group of islands southeast of the continent of Africa in the Indian Ocean. They usually eat grass, leaves and other vegetation, but Al and Henry enjoy lettuce, carrots and cantaloupe. Their “absolute favorite” is watermelon, said Yoder.
“And they love being outside,” she said, which can pose a problem when they try to round them up to go back inside at the end of the day.
Lucas said his favorite animals at the zoo are snakes.
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Reptiland zookeeper Rachel Yoder shows off some poison dart frogs to guests during an animal encounter at the zoo.
Yoder also leads the first animal encounter of the day at 11:30 a.m. outside at the Komodo Plaza. She shows off the poison dart frogs, which are native to tropical Central and South America, for a group of people.
Poison dart frogs get their poison from the items they eat in the wild. Since they only eat fruit flies at Reptiland, these particular poison dart frogs are not poisonous, said Yoder.
The bright colors of the species usually mean “don’t eat me.” An animal is poisonous if you bite it and you get sick. An animal is venomous if you are bitten by it and you get sick, she said.
Yoder also has a six-foot blow gun to show the crowds. Tribes of indigenous people in the Amazon harvest the poison of the frogs to use for hunting, she said.
Allen, at a later show called Venom! at the program center, would tell guests that poison dart frogs are the most poisonous animal ounce for ounce. In the wild, they can kill 10 adult humans, she said.
Somervail leads the next show at the program center called Lizards & Snakes Alive. He talks about how no snake species have ears and instead are able to sense vibrations around them.
This is where Kaa, a boa constrictor from South America, gets to shine. Somervail, acting as a tree, explains that Kaa would usually live in treetops. He has heat-sensing pits that would show everyone in the room to be in shades of orange, reds and yellows.
“That’s really helpful in the rainforest,” said Somervail.
Gavin Willcock, 10, of Mechanicsburg, said the show was “very cool.”
“And kind of scary at the same time,” he said.
His grandmother, Vicki Kohls, of Mechanicsburg, said it was Gavin’s first time. She said she hasn’t been to the zoo in years.
“A lot has changed,” she said. “It’s a lot more interactive and way better.”
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An albino alligator sits in its pen at Reptiland.
The first Croc Talk of the day starts at 1 p.m. at the alligator building, one of the most popular exhibits. Here, zookeeper Brandi Eberlin stands in the pit while guests gather around the railings to listen to her talk about the zoo’s three American alligators.
There’s Sirphis, a 14-year-old albino American alligator who is 125 pounds and 7.5 feet in length. Sirphis is visually impaired, said Eberlin.
Rocky is a 34-year-old male American Alligator, coming in at 11.5 feet in length and 600 pounds. Adrienne is a 39-year-old female, coming in at 8.5 feet in length and 250 pounds, said Eberlin.
“They’re actually pretty trainable, like an average dog,” she said. “However, I can’t ask them to roll over and play dead. They do know their names. They do if there are two keepers down here in blue, they’re getting fed. They only get fed on the weekends. Since they’re at healthy body weights, they only need one percent of their body weight (in food).”
Reptiland zookeeper Brandi Eberlin talks about the alligators at Reptiland.
The alligators can open their mouths so zookeepers can “Skee-ball” the food into their mouths. Feedings only happen during the week, she said.
“We never feed them on land. If we start feeding them on land, I’ll have a 600-pound gator at the door, which I don’t want,” said Eberlin. “If we ask them to go to the water, that’s one of the first things we ask them to do or sometimes they do it on their own, (they know) they only get fed in the water. We can come in and clean up after them if we need to.”
Eberlin said each of the alligators has its own personality. Sirphis is “pretty much a teenager,” Rocky is a “lazy lump” and Adrienne is the “queen of sass.”
“She is very intelligent,” said Eberlin. “She knows who the new keepers are. She knows us by our voices. Whenever we have a new keeper, she tries to push the boundaries to see what she gets away with.”
Each zookeeper uses a large metal stick to keep something between them and the animal.
“If I need to get them into the water, I can just poke them because they’ll move toward whatever is poking them,” said Eberlin.
Allen said in 2016 that Adrienne built a fake nest with unfertilized eggs. Adrienne was a “super mom” and wouldn’t let any zookeeper into the habitat. 
Adrienne ended up eating some of the eggs. One zookeeper kept her attention while Allen and other keepers snatched away the remainder of the eggs.
“As soon as the eggs were gone, she went back to normal,” said Allen. “She never laid eggs again.”
Allen leads the next show of the day — Venom! — 1:30 p.m. at the program center. Venomous animals are packed just before they are taken to the program center for the show: each tank is marked red for venomous and white for non-venomous.
Robert Inglis/The Daily Item Reptiland Zookeeper Kathryn Allen, holds up a rattlesnake during the Venom program at Reptiland.
At the show, she shows a Gila monster, a copperhead, a western diamondback rattlesnake and a cobra. If bitten by a rattlesnake, Allen said the most important thing is to call 911 and get to a hospital.
“Time is tissue,” she said, noting the effects of venom on skin and tissue.
The last animal in the show is a harmless Pueblan milk snake, which has a similar color scheme that mimics the venomous coral snake. When the show was over, Allen allows the guests to pet the milk snake.
“It’s a good experience,” said Khalif Ryan, of Williamsport. “The kids like it.”
“I like snakes,” said his oldest son Daveon Ryan, 11. “I’m not afraid to pet them.”
After the Venom! show, Allen said the venomous animals are always immediately packed up and taken backstage to their pens. There’s a “huge amount of training” working with venomous animals, she said.
“I fully respect that these animals are deadly and have the potential to harm us, but I don’t ever walk in being afraid of them,” said Allen. “That’s when you make a mistake. If you have fear you’re going to panic.”
Reptiland has numerous safety protocols and runs safety drills, she said.
If an animal is acting strange, she said you close the door and try to figure out what’s different. It can be as simple as a heat lamp being too warm, she said.
“When you hesitate, when you start and stop, that’s when something generally goes wrong,” said Somervail. 
When working with venomous creatures, Allen said overconfidence often leads to risks.
“Always have it in the back of your mind, this is a king cobra with a lot of venom, this is a rattlesnake,” said Allen.
Peeling said it has been at least 25 years since Reptiland had a venomous snakebite.
“We have had a few injuries since then,” said Peeling. “About 2013 a male Komodo dragon bit one of our staff. Komodos do have trace amounts of venom in their saliva but there was no envenomation (injection of venom) from the bite. We have pretty rigid safety protocols and try very hard not to incur injuries.”
Allen said she witnessed one of the smaller saltwater crocodiles jump and bite a keeper’s finger. She took that keeper to the emergency room to be stitched up.
Reptiland zookeeper Rachel Yoder, left, holds up a small alligator for a youth group to pet after the Ancient Adaptations program at Reptiland.
The zookeepers start feeding the animals on exhibit and backstage at 2 p.m.
Somervail goes through each tank of the animals with meals of fish or mice. Since it’s Thursday, the two adult female African dwarf crocodiles in a larger room enclosure are fed mice. Somervail keeps a stick between him and the crocodile for added protection.
“It’s a precaution we take with all our gators when they’re large enough to be fed in the water,” he said.
Somervail and Allen take a thawed dead chicken — feathers, beaks, talons and all — to Big Mama, the green anaconda. She usually eats once every three weeks.
“We always do this with two people,” said Somervail. “They are big enough to overpower a single person.”
Big Mama is about 15 feet long. Females in the wild grow between 12 and 18 feet while males grow 8 to 10 feet.
Ranging from South America, green anacondas can swallow big prey. They eat wading birds, pigs, deer, capybaras and even river turtles. After a huge meal, an adult anaconda may go many months without food. One large female refused to eat for 26 months at Repitland before resuming her normal diet.
Somervail and Allen open the door to the anaconda’s enclosure and push the food into the exhibit, inch by inch. As the meal nears the water, the massive snake suddenly snaps its head forward, its jaws on the chicken, and starts constricting around it.
“She may not eat it right away,” said Allen.
Sure enough, hours later, Big Mama is still wrapped around her meal as if she’s cuddling with the deceased bird, waiting to eat her supper at an undetermined perfect moment. Allen said later the chicken was gone by the morning.
At the outdoor Dinosaurs Come to Life exhibit, guests find 12 different species of dinosaurs, including Ankylosaurus, Brachiosaurus, Coelophysis, Dilophosaurus, Oviraptor, Pachycephalosaurus, Parasaurolophus, Stegosaurus, Triceratops, Tyrannosaurus rex and Velociraptor. The life-size animatronic animals roar, bellow, hiss and even spit. It also features static dinosaurs, a climbable model for picture-taking, a recreated paleontologist dig site, and a fossil dig.
Patty Marshall, of Watsontown, and Ben Heyler, of Westfield, brought their children to the dinosaur exhibit. The kids especially love the dig pit, but they also love interacting with the animals in the other parts of the zoo.
“We (the Marshals) have a membership,” said Marshall. “We live very close and every time we come we find something new to do. It’s different throughout the year, so it’s not always the same.”
The zoo is “very educational,” added Marshall. “It’s a fun place to go where they can learn new and different things every time they come, and meet new people.”
Heyler agreed with Marshall about the educational value of the zoo.
“It’s science-based,” said Heyler. “They (his children) get to ask questions about the different animals, they ask their names, where they’re from, how big they get, things like that.”
Heyler said his young children don’t remember everything, so coming back can be a new experience every time.
“Every year is a little bit different,” said Heyler.
Also in this area are three emus. This is where Andy and Fiona Martinek, of New York City, their 18-month-old son Silas, and their cousin Matt Rader, of Muncy, are feeding the large birds.
“My mom did the graphic design for Clyde years and years and years ago,” said Andy Martinek. “He’s kind of a family friend. We had to come to check it out. It’s pretty cool that this exists out there.”
Silas is “quite fascinated” by the dinosaurs, said Andy Martinek. Rader said he enjoys the albino alligators.
“Alligators and dinosaurs are always what I remember,” said Rader.
In a few minutes when the zookeepers start closing up for the night, Harner will be at the emu pen to remove their feeder, fill up their water bucket and make sure no one threw anything in throughout the day that could harm them.
“I’m giving them a tuck in for the night,” Harner said.
The last hour that the zoo is open is reserved for moving the animals back to their huts and rooms where they will spend the night.
Allen and Harner attempt to return Thurber, the male Komodo dragon back to his nighttime enclosure. He was lazily relaxing by the pool all day, but at the first sight of a mice snack, he bolts out the door to follow. One would never imagine looking at his swiftness that day that he is showing signs of arthritis.
Al and Henry are next. Enticed with their favorite food of watermelon, Al immediately goes through the door and back to his exhibit, but Henry is being stubborn. Henry stops at the door but refuses to go in and attempts to turn around several times.
“Sometimes we have to get a cart,” said Allen. “He seems to like that because he gets to go fast.”
“He’s 350 pounds, so it can be a workout,” said Harner.
Eventually, with a little bit of maneuvering, heavy lifting and plenty of watermelon pieces, the zookeepers entice Henry back inside.
Allen takes a few rats over to the Great Horned Owl exhibit for a meal before the zoo closes. Darwin, the female, cannot fly, and Wallace, the smaller male, has trouble taking flight.
“Darwin tolerates my existence,” said Allen. “She was a full-grown adult bird when she flew into a car and broke her wings.”
Both Darwin and Wallace cannot return to the wild, so it was either live in a facility like Reptiland or be euthanized, said Allen.
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Reptiland zookeepers Brandi Eberlin, left, and Ben Dodge, bribe tortoises with watermelon to get them into their enclosures for the night.
Using watermelon, Eberlin and Dodge are working on enticing the smaller Aldabra tortoises back into their hutch for the night. Two of them are already inside, but get curious when the zookeepers come around and try to wander outside again.
“Sometimes they put themselves back in the hutch,” said Eberlin. “It’s a miracle if all four are there at the end of the day.”
Even though the Aldabra tortoises are smaller than Al and Henry, it’s still difficult to lift them. The nearby forest tortoises are easier to wrangle. The zookeepers find them and just pick them up where they want to take them.
After the last show of the day, the zookeepers take the animals back and place them in their backstage holding areas. They sweep the upstairs, wipe off counters, check to make sure the venomous animals are secured, and then lock all the doors.
Zookeepers do a final walkthrough to make sure everyone is out of the zoo. They also turn off the pond in the turtle enclosure and the animatronic dinosaurs, and they lock all the doors.
Before guests leave, many of them stop at the Natural Selections Gift Shop where they can pick up a variety of souvenirs and merchandise, including educational toys, plus, themed apparel, African masks, pottery and handmade jewelry.
“We always sell t-shirts,” said Kernan. “And a lot of stuffed animals.”
The zoo closes at 5 p.m. Before the gift shop employees leave, they stock up, clean, put away snacks, count down the drawer and make sure the lights and music are turned off.
Kernan said the day had a good amount of people.
“It was a little lighter today,” she said, “but it was pretty steady.”
Once the zoo is closed and keepers go home, Peeling said there are monitoring and camera systems to keep an eye on the grounds and the animals. If temperatures fluctuate wildly or another anomaly occurs with the animal exhibits, Peeling said they are alerted and will go in to address the issue.
Otherwise, he said, “Not much happens after the doors are locked.”
Name: Kathryn Allen, zoological manager
The Daily Item recently spent a day at Reptiland following the zookeepers around and seeing what their day was like.  
Northumberland County Reporter
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First Amendment: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

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