It's been a busy week! I'm in basic ZOO training for the first 2 weeks: meeting everyone, learning my way around, reading up on all the animals, prepping talks and meeting the zookeepers for each section. On Wednesday we all got to go meet keepers and see animals behind the scenes. I forgot the camera but next week I'll have another chance when we tour the "Predators of the Serengeti", and the "Bears" exhibits with keepers. Meanwhile, here are a couple pics from yesterday:
Nothing like a good head scratching first thing in the morning
(Amur Leopard)
Saturday: the first day the sun's been out since I started.
Giraffes don't like the cold/wet.
Each Naturalist chooses 4 different topics (one from each zone in the zoo) and writes up a program to give. We have access to all kinds of neat props: pelts, skulls, posters, craft materials, etc. I'm starting with Gray Wolves, African Painted Dogs, Weaver Birds, and Amur Tigers as topics and trying to come up with themes for each. It's fun learning about all these beautiful critters!
Themes might be:
- Hyena or Painted Dog? They might look similar at first glance, but they're really very different.
- The Amur Tiger is the biggest cat and it faces some big challenges.
I love getting to walk around with the more experienced Interpretive staff, because they have so many neat stories about the animals. Yesterday in the Asian Elephant exhibit Charis (the head of the ed. dept. and a 25 yr veteran at the ZOO) was showing us the jaw bone of an elephant--I didn't realize they only have 4 teeth at a time! Each tooth is about a foot long and weighs about 10 lbs. Imagine being a dentist for an elephant... Speaking of which, there is an awesome video at the zoo website of Tusko (male elephant) getting worked on. He had a vertical fracture in his tusk and they had to do an extraction. Now THAT is a drill!
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