Among the wild things

Alison Skelton, 4, of St. Louis, gingerly pets an African hedgehog Sunday at the Midwest Museum of Natural History. The spiny mammal was cute, she said, but not soft. "It was kind of poky," she said. "Like a hairbrush."

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SYCAMORE – It might not make the macaw very happy, but the kinkajou was the hands-down favorite at the Midwest Museum of Natural History Sunday.

The kinkajou, a nocturnal mammal from Central and South America, was the last animal Rick Anderson of Summerfield Farm & Zoo in Belvidere brought out as part of his presentation at the museum Sunday afternoon. The educational hour also included several tortoises, an armadillo and a hedgehog.

And, of course, Miguel the blue-and-gold macaw.

The large parrot seemed content to sit on Anderson’s arm flapping its wings during its segment, but latched in his cage before and after, Miguel gave frequent ear-splitting screams. Anderson finally let him perch on the door of an open cage, but the bird still squawked disapprovingly as the room full of children and adults cooed over the kinkajou.

Tristan Smith, 10, of Sycamore was one of several children who said Miguel was his favorite animal of the presentation until the kinkajou appeared. He had never seen an animal like that before, he said.

“It was pretty cool,” he said.

Brooklynn Scott of Sycamore and Calista Arhos of DeKalb, both 8, also couldn’t get over the kinkajou, even if they couldn’t remember what it was called and just referred to it as “the monkey.”

“I’ve only seen [animals like that] on TV,” Arhos said.

The girls were also among the dozens of children who had crowded into the front of the room to touch the tortoises and the hedgehog. They said the hedgehog felt like a comb or stiff brush.

“It was kind of poky,” 4-year-old Alison Skelton said of the spiny animal. “It was like a hairbrush.”

The presentation was part of the museum’s Kids Science Series, a monthly program November through April that brings child-friendly science presentations to local children.