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Santa's Village halts tortoise shell decorating activity

Under fire from an Internet petition, Santa's Village AZoosment Park in East Dundee will stop the practice of using paint to decorate tortoise shells.

A petition on change.org called “Stop allowing children to paint turtle shells!” garnered more than 10,000 signatures in six days.

“Please sign my petition in hopes of getting (Santa's Village) to stop this barbaric behavior and instead teach children to respect all living creatures,” read the petition, which was started by a woman who identified herself as Jenny Abrams. Efforts to reach her Wednesday were unsuccessful.

Jason Sierpien, president of Azoosment Park, said children did paint tortoise shells — not turtle shells — on four separate occasions during the park's Junior Zoo Keeper Critter Camp, an educational program that allows kids to learn about the animals at the park.

Sierpien said the paint used was nontoxic, water-soluble finger paint that children typically use during arts and crafts projects.

He said it caused no long-term or short-term harm to the tortoises.

“We knew it was safe for the animals, which is our foremost concern here,” he said.

Upon realizing that the public had an issue with it several weeks ago, however, the park halted the activity, he said, noting that this occurred before the petition began.

“If they're not happy, they're not going to come in here and get educated,” Sierpien said. “We've stopped doing it. It won't happen again.”

On the petition, Abrams posted concerns regarding the painting of turtle shells. The fumes, for example, could cause respiratory issues, she said, and chemicals from the paint can be absorbed into the bloodstream and can taint the water the animal swims in.

The park posted a statement on its website disputing this information, saying children only used paint to decorate some tortoise shells, but turtles were not involved.

Sierpien also said the tortoises were kept in an outdoor environment and do not enter the water. Therefore, the animal would not be ingesting the paint, he said.

Sierpien said he consulted with Dr. Sean Costello, a veterinarian at the Harvard Veterinary Clinic who also serves as one of the park's on-call veterinarians.

“I don't see that there's going to be a toxicology issue at all,” Costello said.

Though he noted that he is not a reptile specialist, Costello said he doesn't believe the practices at the park are “detrimental to the animal's physical well-being.”

The unpopular activity will not be considered again in the future, Sierpien said, but “we will not change doing hands-on educational programs.”

“This whole thing has been blown out of proportion,” he said. “We're here to educate. Safety and care is always a primary concern.”

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