12:00: TBD
1:00: River otters in Rochester: A conservation success story
Then in our second hour, otters! The Seneca Park Zoo recently welcomed the first-ever North American river otters to be born at its facility. Leaders say it's a conservation success story that has been decades in the making. It comes at a time when a shift in federal priorities has affected environmental and wildlife protections: funding cuts to USAID and a funding freeze for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have halted projects centered on animals facing various threats, including extinction. Can the local project serve as a model for continued conservation work, despite changes at the federal level? Our guests discuss it. In studio:
- David Hamilton, general curator at the Seneca Park Zoo
- Larry Buckley, Ph.D., senior associate dean of the College of Science at RIT
- Laura Gaenzler, community science coordinator for the Seneca Park Zoo Society
- Tom Snyder, director of programming and conservation action for the Seneca Park Zoo Society
*Note: "Connections" is livestreamed each day on the WXXI News YouTube channel. Watch here.
