The Franklin Park Zoo’s New Zebra Is Named ‘Jakobi’
IMAGE CREDIT: ZOO NEW ENGLAND/SARAH WOODRUFF
As we informed you earlier this week, The Franklin Park Zoo allowed fans to vote on a name for its new Grevy zebra foal, choosing between options that included ‘Papi’ and ‘Koji.’ But despite Boston’s current swell of affection for both Big Papi and Koji Uehara, the zebra will be named ‘Jakobi,’ the zoo announced today.
The foal was born October 16, to resident Franklin Park Zoo zebras Evita and Menelik. Jakobi is especially welcome to the world because his fellow Grevy zebras are endangered in their native land of Kenya and Ethiopia thanks to poaching and habitat loss.
Sure, he’s still got a note of Red Sox pride there, as he now has a name with undertones of Ellsbury, but the zoo says Jakobi is actually a West African word for “Star.” Six-hundred seventy votes were cast, and Jakobi received 38 percent of them. To celebrate his christening-by-Facebook, he’ll make his public debut this morning. What a super-jakobi.
