Riverview Park and Zoo is proud to announce a fundraising event in support of the Calgary Zoo’s 2 By 2 Rebuild the Zoo campaign. In June, Calgary Zoo suffered an estimated $50 million in damage due to a devastating flood when the Bow River overflowed its banks. The flood caused severe damage to most of the zoo and forced 34 animals out of their permanent exhibits. Within days after the flood, a call for help to CAZA (Canada’s Accredited Zoos and Aquariums) went out. Riverview Park and Zoo was selected to take Calgary’s two-toed sloths, Porsche and Ferrari.

“Sloth Mania” will be held on Saturday, October 19 from 11:00 am until 6:00 pm and will feature an afternoon schedule of special "Meet the Keeper" activities (including two sessions with the sloths), a barbeque, face painting, etc. There will also be raffles that include opportunities to win a behind-the-scenes tour of the Park and Zoo as well as an up close and personal feeding encounter with Porsche and Ferrari. Donate online at here.

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[UPDATED October 4th: The sloths have moved to their new location in the Squirrel Monkey exhibit at the Primate Building. They will be available for public viewing there starting on Saturday, October 5th, 2013 at 10:00 A.M. As the zoo says, "Please keep in mind, they really do like to sleep most of the day!"

[UPDATED September 26th: Jim Moloney, Manager and Curator for Riverview, tell us "Unfortunately we have had another situation to deal with that has put us behind schedule with the sloths. At this time I'm guessing we're going to be about a week later."

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[UPDATED: Jim Moloney, Manager and Curator for the Riverview Zoo, tells us, "If we don't run into problems we may be able to have them on exhibit for the weekend of September 28th."]

Porsche and Ferrari, the two sloths that came to the Riverview Zoo from the flood-damaged Calgary Zoo earlier this summer, are settling nicely into their new digs. The sloths arrived at the zoo August 15th and have been in quarantine ever since to adapt to their new surroundings—if all goes well (they have passed all their medical tests so far), they should be on exhibit in the next week or so. The zoo has been tweeting photos and updates in recent weeks (see below) of the sloths as they get used to their new environment. We can't wait to meet them.

"Midnight" Snack - We just managed to catch one of the sloths up and about for a snack in the middle of the day. pic.twitter.com/PC0rNWRMTJ
— Riverview Park & Zoo (@RiverviewZoo) September 18, 2013