diff --git a/zoocfg.py b/zoocfg.py
index 926fba5..374b219 100755
--- a/zoocfg.py
+++ b/zoocfg.py
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ def __getattr__(self, name):
 
 class ZooCfg(dotdict):
 
-    _defaults = {
+    _defaults = dotdict({
         'globalOutstandingLimit': 1000,
         'preAllocSize': '64M',
         'snapCount': 100000,
@@ -37,7 +37,7 @@ class ZooCfg(dotdict):
         'maxSessionTimeout': 20,
         'electionAlg': 3,
         'leaderServers': 'yes'
-    }
+    })
 
     @classmethod
     def from_file(cls, file_name):