Highly Endangered Baby Peccaries Born At Elmwood Park Zoo

NORRISTOWN, PA — Elmwood Park Zoo is celebrating the arrival of their newest residents, a trio of highly endangered peclets, whose birth represents a major conservation victory.

The new cadre of tiny Chacoan peccaries, including two females and a male, add to a species that was once thought to be extinct.

The three new peccaries follow the trio of peclets already born at Elmwood earlier in 2024.

The rare species of peccary was thought to be extinct as recently as 1971, according to wildlife biologists. Elmwood and other zoos around the country have joined in a combined Species Survival Program, though it's believed there are only about 3,000 Chacoans extant today.

The species is found in the wild only in the Grand Chaco region of South America, a hot and dry desert-like environment covering parts of Paraguay, Bolivia, and Argentina.

The peclets are healthy and reportedly settling in to their new environs.