It could appear that there is only bad news to report during this period of self-isolation and quarantine brought on by the new coronavirus. And while that may be the case for some people, nature and animals—especially those who are often kept in their zoo enclosures—are probably not grumbling about a little bit of extra freedom.

The penguins at Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium recently went on a cute field trip where they got to interact with the other animals. There was also news about orangutans in Belgium’s Pairi Daiza Zoo making friends with an otter family. And even while that seems like an extremely strange friendship, you should read about the dolphins who went completely crazy when they saw a sloth!

Dolphins and a sloth would undoubtedly win a competition to be named the unlikeliest friendship on Earth.

Zoo animals are probably not moaning, even though quarantine isn’t the best thing that happened to us this year (yeah, introverts would disagree). Little, endearing excursions around the zoo that would otherwise probably never be possible, as well as a little respite from seeing people every day, all check boxes.

But when the dolphins at the Texas Aquarium saw a sloth, they went absolutely crazy.

 

And while dolphins are undoubtedly the most gregarious creatures on the planet, sloths might not be. Perhaps for that reason Texas State Aquarium thought it was a fantastic idea to let these two meet. Of course, during his tour of the Gulf of Mexico exhibit, 3-year-old local celebrity Chico the sloth didn’t only meet dolphins—that encounter was undoubtedly the high point of the entire experience.

Even though the Aquarium is closed to visitors, it appears like more doors are being opened than usual to the animals.

Before meeting the seahorses, Chico the sloth had a chance to say hello to a few ducks during his tour of the Aquarium. After that, he was transported along his preferred branch where he encountered a shark and some other amiable vibrant fish. Though Chico appeared to be highly interested in jellyfish, nothing could top the previous encounter he had with the dolphins who were waiting for him.

 

It turns out that these kinds of “play dates” are a regular occurrence for the Aquarium workers. In order to enrich the animals and keep them mentally and physically active, we regularly allow them to “meet” one another. It seemed sense that our dolphins and sloths, who are among our most well-known creatures, should have an opportunity to interact while we were momentarily closed. On that particular day, Xena, another of our sloths, would have preferred to sleep than see the dolphins.

Last week, the Texas State Aquarium made the decision to put two dolphins and a sloth to the test.

Over the years, our dolphins have had the chance to interact with a variety of other creatures, such as young gators, an African serval, red-tailed boas, and others. As the Aquarium staff pointed out, “They’re almost always very curious about the other Aquarium residents.” Shadow, Kai, Liko, and Schooner, their four male bottlenose dolphins, were the fortunate ones that had the opportunity to meet Chico last week.

Additionally, the outcomes exceeded their expectations.