Exotic animal sanctuary on the verge of not being able to feed rescued pets

WINNIPEG (CityNews) – An exotic animal sanctuary owner in Manitoba is doing what he can to keep his animals fed as COVID-19 restrictions have taken a toll on his businesses.

“It’s destroyed me. The last year has been a write-off honestly,” said Steve Remple, Owner of Prairie Exotics, which houses birds, fish, snakes and even alligators surrendered to him from across Canada.

“We make money to take care of these animals and without that it’s very difficult.”

Remple says in most cases, if he couldn’t take the animals in they would be put down.

The sanctuary tends to get animals after a pet owner doesn’t know how big their pet would get, or when people buy animals and don’t realize its against their province’s laws to own them, which is how two massive Burmese pythons found their way to him.

“So in this case, if these Burmese weren’t able to get out of B.C., they would have been euthanized. So, this was their last chance so we gave them an opportunity to come here, and now they get to educate people with what’s going on with them.”

Before the pandemic, Remple would tour the animals at day cares, elementary, and high schools, or do demonstrations at parks and fairs to educate the public on responsible animal ownership.

It also generated the money Remple uses to pay his, on average, $1,500 a month heating and feeding bill to keep the animals alive. The money has dried up due to COVID closures, and now Rempel is seriously concerned about keeping the animals fed.

“In the process we moved all the animals into our home. We did sell off some animals that could be sold. We adopted out, and fostered out animals that could go to the public. But, because of legalities, some of these animals can’t go anywhere so they have to be kept and fed and taken care of.”

One of those animals is an alligator named Little Foot who started to get big. The alligators owner couldn’t keep him any longer, so Remple agreed to take him. For the time being, Little Foot is being kept in the basement while Rample converts a home on the property into a 1200-square-foot animal enclosure.

Remple added with restrictions easing, he can now let up to six people from the same house entre the sanctuary. It’s a drop in the financial bucket compared with pervious years but, he says, every little bit helps.