Cheyenne Mountain Zoo surpasses $4 Million Quarters for Conservation milestone
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, its guests, and members are celebrating a huge milestone, having raised $4 million for wildlife and wild places since the Zoo’s Quarters for Conservation (Q4C) program launched in 2008.
"A number of years ago, we wanted to make sure that every visit to the zoo really directly benefited wildlife," said Bob Chastain, President and CEO of Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. "So we started a program called Quarters for Conservation. Three-quarters of every admission goes directly into the field to save animals. You'd think that's not going to really produce very much, but this year we hit $638,000 through that Quarters for Conservation program, and we hit an overall milestone of $4 million.”
Every guest that comes to the zoo is given three tokens to place inside a kiosk right near the front gate. Those tokens symbolize the 75 cents out of every admission ticket donated to Quarters for Conservation.
It’s an attraction at the zoo, that’s almost as popular as the animals themselves since families can choose which 'legacy project' they'd like their money to support.
Among the several legacy projects, quarters can benefit giraffe conservation project in Uganda, on-site breeding programs at the zoo for black-footed ferrets and Wyoming toads, and even the 'Tsavo Trust' – an organization in Kenya that works to protect the last of the big tuskers, which are African elephants with tusks weighing more than 100 pounds.
Bob Chastain, the Zoo’s CEO recently returned from a trip to Africa to see how the quarters are being used at the Tsavo Trust.
"It's an organization right in the middle of Tsavo National Park," said Chastain. "When you think about Tsavo National Park, think about an area the size of Switzerland. Then think about an area where when you're sitting in your living room, which is kind of an open floor plan, so to speak, no windows at all in their living room, a leopard can literally come in, or a small gannet cat or right outside their door is elephants. So they're living in the area where they're protecting those animals and making sure that there's no illegal activities like logging or poaching going on."
Chastain says another way these quarters support the communities, is by creating jobs for people who work up close and personal with wildlife.
"They employ 49 employees, mostly from two local communities around there," said Chastain. "They're doing everything from anti-poaching patrols to taking data on these 'super tuskers' that are there. Those are elephants that have ivory going all the way to the ground."
Besides the quarters, money from immersive activities like feeding the rhinos or giraffes at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo also goes towards conservation efforts.
Chastain says he hopes Quarters for Conservation continues to grow in success so they can help larger wildlife projects around the world.
"When I took over, the zoo was about 400,000 people, and it took us about ten years to get to the first $1 million," said Chastain. "Then this year, we hit $1 million in every 18 months. So we're scaling up faster than ever before, as more people are coming to the zoo. We took it from one quarter, and now it's three quarters. Obviously, when we do that, we can do larger and larger projects in the field. And we've now become one of the top supporters for the Tsavo Trust."
If you'd like to donate directly to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo's conservation efforts, click here.
