OLE MCMORRIS' FARM HOLDS SURPRISES

Maurice Schlosser, owner of Ole McMorris' Farm near Kelso, stood between a zebra and an emu.

KELSO -- Marge and Maurice Schlosser's place is a zoo.

The zebras try to kick each other, the bison shed and the camels spit indiscriminately.

The Schlossers are the proprietors of Ole McMorris' Farm, a working farm east of Kelso with a number of unusual inhabitants: 37 bison, eight white elk, 26 brown elk, four camels, two zebras, seven fallow deer, a white-tail deer, an emu, eight donkeys, five llamas and two wallabies.

There are so many exotic animals on their 160-acre farm Maurice forgets the peacocks, geese, ducks, pheasants, seven or eight fainting goats, Zica deer and black swan while enumerating them.

Ole McMorris' Farm started innocently 12 years ago, Maurice says, when he and Marge went to visit friends in Poplar Bluff. On a whim, they went to an exotic animal auction in nearby West Plains.

Marge left her seat to get a soda, saying: "Don't do anything stupid." She left the sale that day part-owner of a donkey, a pair of ostriches and five fallow deer.

Marge eventually knew Maurice was getting serious when he brought home some ostriches and incubators. She soon found herself watching over 100 chicks.

Maurice's four children christened his menagerie Ole McMorris' Farm and erected a sign to that effect along the county road they grew up on.

Children are frequent visitors at Ole McMorris' Farm. School buses often can be seen parked in the driveway. Marge usually leads the informal tours.

Some people wonder why they don't charge for the tours. Maurice reasons that taking children to a zoo can be expensive, and he likes to see kids who came by the farm years ago all grown and bringing their own kids.

"I didn't do this for money," he says.

He occasionally sells an animal to Grant's Farm in St. Louis or to an individual. His next-door neighbor just bought some ostriches.

Maurice grew up on a farm, the third of 14 children. Two of his brothers and both his sons are farmers. Besides the exotic animals, he also has a herd of beef cattle.

Maurice grows corn, alfalfa, soybeans, wheat and grass hay, so food for most of the animals is taken care of. The exceptions are the wallabies, which require a special marsupial feed.

His children and seven grandchildren help with the feeding when he and Marge go on a trip.

A few animals haven't worked out. Maurice had water buffaloes for awhile but got rid of them. "They wouldn't let me out in the pasture," he explains. "They'll try to kill you."

Maurice considered getting a giraffe, but giraffes require a heated environment in the winter. All of his animals are suited to life in Southeast Missouri.

Few of the animals have names. Beauty, one of the buffaloes, has a new calf, one of six born in the herd so far this spring, and all the kids in the area know their donkey Jake.

Maurice still goes to exotic animal auctions, but the donkeys he brought home last fall were his most recent purchase. "Now when he goes I hope he doesn't get anything," Marge says.

There really aren't any exotic animals he wants that he doesn't have, Maurice says.

"A guy offered me a hippopotamus one time, Maurice said. "I said, 'I don't want no hippo.'"