Adelaide Zoo
As a conservation charity, every visit, adoption, donation and ticket helps save species from extinction

Meet the newest member of the zoo family, Cecil the Emu!

Adelaide Zoo has welcomed a new arrival into the zoo family this week, Cecil the Emu!

Our new feathered friend has had a bit of a rough journey to get here.

Found by the side of the road as a chick after the rest of his family (dad and all of his siblings) were killed by a car, Cecil was rescued by one of our dedicated native keepers, Di.

Di has hand-raised Cecil at home for the past year, giving him lots of love and care to prepare him for his big move to Adelaide Zoo.

He’s not quite 12 months old, so he still has very light juvenile plumage.

Cecil is our only Emu at Adelaide Zoo after the passing of zoo favourite Boots late last year.

The Emu is Australia’s largest bird and the second largest in the world after the Ostrich, growing up to 190cm in height. Emus are found across mainland Australia and remain very common.

The Emu is a flightless bird but is capable of covering great distances on foot at speeds of up to 50km/h. They are foragers most active during the day and eat a variety of plants and insects such as crickets, beetles millipedes and moth larvae. Females can lay several clutches of eggs each breeding season. The fathers incubate and rear the young.

It’s all very new here for Cecil, and he’s still a little nervous, but make sure you come visit our new feathered friend and make him feel welcome.