Jan Harm Spijkervet from Oosterhout looked up on Sunday afternoon when he arrived at his daughter’s showroom. A special stork of at least one meter high was in front of the door. The animal was admired itself in the reflection of the window. After some bells it turned out that the animal, an African Nimmerzat, along with two others, was missing from Safaripark Beekse Bergen in Hilvarenbeek.
It was about twelve on Sunday when Jan Harm went to the showroom of furniture company Immaginare with his wife. “I didn’t know what I saw when I arrived,” he says enthusiastically on Sunday evening. In front of the door was an animal that looked exotic with the bright yellow beak and the red cup. “At first I thought it was a joke and that someone had put down a fake stork.”
But it wasn’t a joke. It was a lifelike animal. After some googling, Jan Harm discovered that it was an African never. “He flew away for a moment when a dog passed, but then he came back. He was looking at himself in front of the window in the reflection.”
“They missed three of those birds.”
His wife called the animal ambulance while Jan Harm was looking further on Google. There he found that Safaripark Beekse Bergen has a number of African never. Jan Harm immediately called the animal park. “They were happy to call, because they apparently missed three of those birds.”
A caretaker of the Safaripark came directly to Oosterhout. There she caught the animal with Jan Harm. “That was quite a job,” says Jan Harm. “We first had to lead him inside in the showroom. The caretaker did that with pieces of meat. We driven him in a corner and put a kind of jacket over him. That way we could safely lift him in the car.”
“They think the third is also around here.”
According to the caretaker, the three African Nimmerzatten had gotten off course earlier this week when they were free in the Safari. Due to the sturdy wind, they could no longer find their way to the Safaripark independently. Since then the animals have been missing.
Shortly after the loss, the first African never was found in the vicinity of the Beekse Bergen. The animal that Jan Harm found is the second. The third is therefore still sought. “They think that it is also around here. The birds are moving in groups and will probably have stayed close together.”
“I didn’t mind.”
And the latter might be correct, because on Sunday evening a resident of Rijen reports to Omroep Brabant that he too has seen not one, but two of those special storks this weekend in his yard in the Mosstraat. And leave Rijen exactly on the route from the Beekse Bergen to Oosterhout. “I thought they were very tame, but I didn’t take any eight,” he says.
When the man walked out with his dog, the storks were shocked and flew away. “They also hung around here on Saturday, but I didn’t see them on Sunday.” The animals probably flown towards Oosterhout afterwards, where Jan Harm found one.
Jan Harm is worried about the still missing third. “I hope that people who see the animal know from now on know that they have to call the Beekse Bergen.”
