By Morgan Pilz, Staff Writer

(Jan. 30, 2020) With the help of four young marsupials, the Healing Arts Center in Berlin raised more than $1,700 Saturday with its “Kangaroo Yoga” to help wildlife reserves that have been burning in Australia for the last several weeks.

By Morgan Pilz
Seaira Carven, 8, left, and Elliott Murphy, 7, of Bishopville, play with 1.5-year-old Arnie during the Kangaroo Yoga session at the Eastern Shore Healing Arts Center in Berlin on Saturday, Jan. 25.

Chrissy Earhart and Berkleigh Diaz, co-owners of the center, joined members of the Barn Hill Preserve of Delaware for two yoga sessions that involved four young kangaroos, or joeys, that ranged in age from 8 months to 1-and-a-half years old.

“I saw on Facebook that [Barn Hill Preserve] was having Kangaroo Yoga at Energy Gym in Delaware for a fundraiser for Australia, and I just loved the idea so I just reached out and asked if they wanted to do a second event, and they were on board with it,” Diaz said. “All of the money is going directly over to Barn Hill Preserve of Delaware, who will give it to a local organization called Bushfire Wildlife Rescue and Support.”

“This is an awesome opportunity to give love and to work with our own energy in the sense of cultivating love and compassion from our hearts and sending some healing and love and light to beings all around the world,” Earhart said. “It’s good practice to calming yourself down and trying to be connecting with something bigger than yourself.”

The four joeys – named Arnie, Chandler, Rufus and Mac – hopped around and stretched alongside their human counterparts for two different sessions of yoga. One for families and one for adults only.

“I think the kids had a great time and the parents had just as much fun,” Diaz said. “I don’t know who could not have fun with little baby kangaroos hopping around. They’re very friendly … they came right up to so many people and they nibbled some hair and they nibbled some clothes, but they were super friendly.”

Rachel Azejzak, the mobile crew manager for the organization that provided the joeys, recognized the animal yoga trend and thought she could use it to raise awareness and funds for fire ravaged animals in Australia.

“There’s all kinds of animal yogis around. There’s goat yoga, cat yoga, puppy yoga … when we saw the fires in Australia, we knew we were going to do something to help them,” she said. “So, we thought maybe kangaroo yoga would be a good idea.”

The joeys adapted to the situation well, Azejzak said.

“It was the kangaroos’ first time interacting with people doing yoga, and I think everyone enjoyed it. The kangaroos enjoyed hopping around and exploring and sniffing everyone,” she said.

All of the money raised from the yoga sessions will be sent to Bushfire Wildlife Rescue and Support. Azejzak left for Australia on Sunday, Jan. 19, and will help deliver supplies to organizations that need it for the next two weeks.

“Australia is such a unique place and there’s diverse animals that can only be found there, and with all the bush fires, there have been so many animals that have been injured or worse and the people trying to help them have limited supplies. We may be a small [group] of 20-40 people, but every little bit helps,” she said.

The four joeys are among the animals cared for by the Barn Hill Preserve of Delaware, an organization that travels across the north Mid-Atlantic area to schools to introduce students to exotic or otherwise uncommon animals.

The organization also has a lynx, hedgehogs, bearded dragons, pythons, alligators, parrots, two-toed sloths, and armadillos.

“We do a lot of mobile education programs throughout the country. We go to schools and do free educational programs with a lot of small mammals, reptiles and birds so we can teach all the kids around the country about some of these unique animals that they don’t [typically] get a chance to see,” Azejzak said.

Barn Hill Preserve has created a GoFundMe page for the Australian bushfires, which can be accessed at https://www.gofundme.com/f/australia-wildlife-relief-from-wildfires.

The organization has also created an Amazon Wishlist to purchase supplies like hand sanitizer, wipes, pet supplements, animal respirator masks, formula for infants and burn gels at https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/27R2FC5R4H3OB/ref=hz_ls_biz_ex.

The Eastern Shore Healing Arts Center has 12 different organizations combined into one facility that uses the work of “holistic and integrated practitioners.”

“We have everything from acupuncture, physical therapy, meditation for adults and kids and reiki and so much more,” Earhart said.