NB Zoo Reopens

New Owners Plan To ‘Reinvent’ Park

The Natural Bridge Zoo reopened for Memorial Day weekend under new ownership.

In a press conference Friday, Gretchen Mogensen, former manager of the zoo, said that her stepmother, Debbie Mogensen, and her father, Karl Mogensen, had transferred ownership of the zoo to Gretchen and her brothers.

The zoo and Karl and Debbie Mogensen have been at the center of legal battle since December of last year, when the state Attorney General’s Office seized around 100 animals.

In January, a judge in Rockbridge General District Court ruled that ownership of 61 of the animals seized would be given to the government.

This case was appealed to Rockbridge County Circuit Court, where a jury decided in March that ownership of 71 of the seized animals would be transferred to the government.

A final post-trial hearing in that case in scheduled for June 10.

In a statement Friday, Mogensen acknowledged the impact of the ongoing court cases.

“My brothers and I have now come together to reopen the park. It will be under new management and ownership. The impact of this situation, both personally and financially, cannot be understated,” she said.

“This entire ordeal has been very hard to accept, as we as a family have always loved the animals with whom we have shared our lives,” said Mogensen.

She also spoke of her father’s health issues, and the decision to retire Asha, the zoo’s elephant.

“Since last summer, my father has been struggling with serious and debilitating health issues. His wife, my stepmother Debbie, has not hardly left his side,” Mogensen said.

“The decision to place our beloved Asha the elephant into a sanctuary was a necessity, and she left us at the end of the 2023 season,” she said. “She is starting to adjust to her new life with other elephants in a place she will come to in time accept as home.”

Visitors to the zoo will see some significant changes.

“We hope to reinvent the nature of the park with a focus on personal and educational encounter experiences. We hope that if the park is successful, we can help our parents through this devastating financial circumstance,” said Mogensen.

“We are committed to restarting our beloved park, much humbled, greatly improved, and forever hopeful. We hope people will please join us in making this new chapter a success.”

A spokeswoman for the Attorney General’s Office, when asked about the zoo’s reopening, said, “We have no comment due to ongoing litigation.”

The most recent available federal inspection of the zoo is from March 27 of this year.

In it, USDA inspectors noted two “non-critical” noncompliant items: one being that the zoo did not have a current inventory of its animals, the other that it did not have and plan for providing enrichment to birds.

Richard Bell, spokesperson for the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health and inspection Service, said he could not comment on when the next inspection of the zoo would take place. -In a visit to the Natural Bridge Zoo Sunday afternoon, The News-Gazette saw several dozen families with small children checking out the animal exhibits in the front part of the zoo. The back portion of the zoo remains closed to the public.

Near the entrance, a staff member waited with a goat for children to visit. A little while later, another staff member near the exit enticed visitors to touch a king snake. Nearby, the children got to feed other goats behind a fence.

At the top of the hill, children and adults entered a walk-thru aviary where they got to see a variety of small birds.

Most of the visitors were from out of town, many of them on their way from one tourist attraction to another on Memorial Day weekend.

Editor’s note: Darryl Woodson contributed to this story.