Cherry Brook Zoo's reptile house created after $1.5M rhino horn reclaimed

The loss of a major display, in a bizarre turn of events with Environment and Climate Change Canada, has led to a new reptile exhibit at the Cherry Brook Zoo in Saint John.

The zoo's new reptile house is opening on Monday and is located in the building that used to be the zoo's Awareness and Discovery Centre that showed the dark side of the animal trade.

Len Collrin, the zoo's chief administrative officer, said federal government officials came to the zoo last spring and were particularly interested in the horn on the skull of a rhinoceros.

It turned out the cash-strapped zoo possessed an ivory rhino horn worth $1.5 million.

"There was a SWAT team basically came down and came in and took the rhino's head away that day," said Collrin.

"Then they came in the next day and took everything else away, like all the ivory and everything else."

The rhino skull and other items belonged to Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) and had been on loan to the zoo for years. But as the value of ivory increased, ECCC took possession of the items again to protect them against theft, said zoo officials.

The action left the zoo with an empty building.

Donations have helped the zoo turn the building into a reptile house, which is now home to a variety of snakes, lizards and spiders.

Martha Frank, a zookeeper, said students from the Tir Na Nog forest school, which uses the zoo's grounds, already had a sneak peek of the exhibit.

She said the students are "just crazy for" the new display.

"They're, you know, fascinated," she said.

"Their faces are pressed up against the enclosures just to see what's inside. So I think I'm really, really excited about it."