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In 1994, Disney's animated film "The Lion King" introduced the meerkat to the world as the wise-cracking Timon, singing, "Can You Feel the Love Tonight?" with a little help from Nathan Lane.
The feisty yet adorable insectivores gained renewed fame when Animal Planet debuted "Meerkat Manor," a program the cable channel describes as a docudramedy that follows the antics of the Whiskers mob of meerkats.
If the new season of "Meerkat Manor," which debuted Aug. 10, whets your appetite for more meerkats, never fear:
Salt Lake City's Hogle Zoo has its own mob of three meerkats ready to share their daily rituals in real time.
There are some differences.
On "Meerkat Manor," the Whiskers mob of about 30 lives in South Africa's Kalahari desert and is led by the brave and brilliant Flower, easily identified by her transmitter collar. Flower has problems that would break a soap-opera heroine: "My daughters are sleeping around," "The neighbors are trying to evict us" and "I'm pregnant. Again. And again. And again."
Hogle Zoo's meerkats have different accommodations. Hank, 5, and Maggie, 6, have an elaborate termite hill replica in the small-animal building where they live. They have sand to dig, hidey holes, burrows, a tree-root ball and a good view of humans who watch from behind large glass windows.
A third meerkat, Nicki, a svelte, 20-ounce 2-year-old, has her own soap-opera problems. Tailless after a fight with Hank, she lives in the porcupine enclosure. She does sentry duty standing on her hind legs and what is left of her tail. She gives occasional barks of warning as people pass by. The porcupines ignore her. Fearless, she often grabs a quill from an unsuspecting roommate and chews it.
"Hank and Maggie do not like her. She was almost killed," zookeeper Crystal Derusha said, adding, "She is tough."
Close cousins to mongoose, meerkats are small, alert, seemingly tender and more than willing and able to fight for survival. When things get tough, they have been known to, well, eat their young.
Hey, it is a savanna out there - a hot, seasonally dry grassland with some trees, where living is good when it rains and harsh when it is dry.
Defined as an "injurious species," meerkats are in the classification of animals that "could cause harm to other people, their property or their pets." The U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife and the USDA have classified them as "detrimental species/injurious wildlife," and a double escape-proof exhibit is required. In the past, most zoo requests for meerkats have been denied. The Small Carnivore Taxon Advisory Group (TAG), a committee of the American Zoo and Aquarium Association (AZA), names meerkats as one of nine species recommended for Population Management Plans, although the listing may be lifted due to the popularity of meerkats.
"We are hoping for more meerkats and received permission to see if Maggie and Hank will have a litter," Derusha said.
Trying to spiff up their home for any new arrivals may prove challenging.
"We tried to put live plants on the side of the [termite] mound, but Maggie and Hank dug them up. They prefer to sleep in the pot holes." she said.
In "Meerkat Manor," or in any large gang retreat, there are designated rooms, one for sleeping, one for nesting and one just for hanging out, Derusha said.
"Meerkats are smart. I work with them in manipulative enrichment. I put a ball on a string and when they touch the ball, I feed them something. That way, they have learned to step up on a scale to be weighed."
While the termite mound is not part of a wild meerkat environment, Hank and Maggie seem to like the hidey holes.
"They have a tree-root ball so they can dig out the meal worms and crickets we feed them. They can close their ear canals to keep sand out of their ears when they are digging for insects, and the long tail acts like the third foot in a tripod so a meerkat can stand up and balance while on sentry duty," Derusha said.
Meerkats definitely are not pet material, nor can they return to the wild once they have been in captivity.
Pam Bennett-Wallberg, executive director of Fellow Earthlings Wildlife Center, Morongo Valley, Calif., said the center had its beginning with the rescue of a hand-raised meerkat.
"She was born in a litter at the zoo and was very fragile. She survived with human help, but she did not integrate back into the colony."
The center now has seven meerkats from similar rescue situations; they live in an outdoor habitat, well-covered and escape-proof.
Animal Planet senior executive producer Mick Kaczorowski loves meerkats and believes "Meerkat Manor" fascinates people because they "relate" to the animals in all kinds of situations. Based in Silver Springs, Md., Kaczorowski spends about two months of the eight-month filming season in South Africa's Kalahari Desert while cameras capture the daily drama of Meerkat Manor.
"Meerkats are kind of unique in the natural world. They live in family groups with a matriarchal leader who rules the roost. The stronger the leader, the stronger the mob," he says.
The Animal Planet crew goes with researchers who are studying 15 groups of meerkats as part of a project out of Cambridge University in Great Britain. Meerkats, Kaczorowski says, are among the most studied animals in the world.
"One of the most difficult parts of the show, now in its third season, is the camera work," he said.
"The meerkats are so small [10 to 14 inches] that the camera must be on the ground. We switch camera crews every four weeks during the eight-month filming period to give them a break."
And, he says, there will be a fourth season.
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* JUDY MAGID can be reached at magid@sltrib.com or 801-257-8608. Send comments to livingeditor@sltrib.com.
"Meerkat Manor" airs Fridays at 9:30 p.m. on Animal Planet.
* Meerkats are part of the mongoose family. They are not rodents.
* A mob of meerkats is more than two; as many as 35 or 40.
* Meerkats stand on hind legs and use their long tail to balance.
* While digging for food, meerkats can close their ear canals so no sand or dirt gets in them.
* Gestation for meerkats is 11 weeks; litters range from two to four pups.
* Meerkat mobs are led by an alpha female and an alpha male. They may stay with their original gang for up to three years and venture out in groups of two or three, or they may remain in the original group.
* Meerkats have special duties, such as hunter, sentry, teacher, baby-sitter.
* Meerkats sleep in burrows as deep as 10 feet.
* Their eyes are very dark, as if they have dark glasses on, to protect them from the sun.
* Litter is nursed eight to 12 weeks and sexual maturity is 1 year.
* They are diurnal, active in the daytime
* Life span in the wild is about 10 years; they live longer in captivity with good diet and protection from other animals.
* Average height is 10 inches to 14 inches with a 10-inch tail. Weight averages 2 pounds.
* In the wild, meerkats eat insects, millipedes, spiders, grubs, lizards, snails, bulbs, roots; zoos supplement feed with crickets, mealworms.
* While mongoose are very fast and able to grasp a snake, kill it and eat it, the smaller meerkats tend to eat more insects. Meerkats will mob a snake in a large group and drive it away. They have some immunity to venom, consume scorpions on a regular basis and have been known to survive a venomous snake bite, but not always.
For more information, visit:
zoo-guide.html
animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/accounts/information/
suricata suricatta.html