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Fossas like all animals in captivity need stimulation which we can provide in the form of environmental enrichment.
Environmental Enrichment when used responsibly can stimulate natural behaviours, both negative and positive.
Such as: Foraging, scent marking, and vocalising.
Enrichment can be provided in a variety of different ways, hee are a few examples:
Food presentation: By using feeding devices and dispensers, or hiding food, this can increase time spent looking for food and feeding.
Social enrichment; By keeping animals in groups if they are a naturally social species.
Auditory enrichnment: By providing sounds of same species or other animals .
Olfactory enrichment: By providing new and interesting smells.
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I have tried lots of enrichment methods with the Fossas, some being more successful than others.
Our male Fossa will remain stimulated for up to thre hours when given an old chlorine barrel.
Sometimes it is given full of water, holding twenty five litres, he will lift it in his jaws and wedge it somewhere where he can then pull on it with full force, often wrapping his body around the thinnest of branches.
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