Another Zoo Story

I realized that I told you that I fell in love with the rhinos while working at the zoo, but I never actually told you the story behind that.

I was at the zoo for three months as a Vet. Tech. intern. Four days a week I was working in the hospital, but one day a week I got to go out and work with the keepers. One of the first animals I got to work with outside of the hospital were the rhinos. The zookeepers obvious favorite was the baby. She was full grown by the time I was working there but she was born at the zoo and was still the youngest rhino there, so she was the baby. She had vitiligo (the Michael Jackson disease), so she had large pink spots all over her body. This meant that she couldn't go on exhibit because she couldn't be in the sun for that long.

The keepers had made it their morning ritual to go say hello to her before starting their day. They all crowded around petting her and cooing. When they left to do their work, she'd cry for awhile, sad to lose all of the attention. But they'd come back periodically throughout the day to say hello.

This is Tucker (not Rudy), but he was pretty darn cute too. 

Being new to the group and not a normal keeper, I hung back during their morning love fest. I'm glad that I did, because if I hadn't I never would have met Rudy. I glanced over and there he was, a huge male rhino with the longest horn I'd ever seen on a rhino (admittedly not a huge accomplishment, seeing as how the only rhinos I'd seen at the time where the 4 at the zoo). He was standing there looking at me between the bars with his horn pointed away from me (as if he was trying to let me know that he wouldn't hurt me) and the back of his head facing the bars, like a cat waiting for you to scratch it behind the ear. How could I resist? I stuck my hand through the bars and scratched him on the soft spot behind his ear. He pushed his head closer to the bars and even rubbed them alittle (once again, like a cat begging to be pet). I stayed as long as they would let me, scratching all of his soft spots (behind the ears, under the eyes, the armpit, belly, groin...). Eventually, they made me stop petting Rudy and actually do some work. Every time I walked past his enclosure he would walk with me on the other side of the fence. You can imagine that rhino enclosures are somewhat large and it was nice to have the company for the walk.

I spent my lunch break petting him and playing with him. You know that game you play with dogs where you run really fast then suddenly jump and face him and the dog gets really excited and play bows? Rudy did that.

After that day, we were best buddies. He'd always come up to the fence to say hi, even when he was on exhibit. I'd go out to the public area to "get a drink" and he'd see me and come over. Even though he couldn't get close enough to get a rub down or a tasty morsel, he still wanted to say hello- the visitors loved that. I loved it too. The medical crew had a different uniform than the other employees and the animals knew that the ones in blue were the ones that caught, poked and prodded them. The  other animals hated us, the gorillas would run up and pound on the bullet proof glass every time we walked by (another thing that the visitors loved), but Rudy didn't care, he liked me no matter what my job was.

The kiss of death?

There are only three species of venomous snakes that live in Iowa and all of them are endangered or threatened in that state, so I never really had to worry about them before. Now that I've moved to Texas, I do have to worry about them. Venomous snakes are just as common here as the nonvenomous ones. In fact, the only snake I've seen so far was venomous. I think it might have been a cottonmouth, but it was getting dark and hard to be sure.

I can't identify which species of snake I'm looking at yet, but I do know how to tell if they are venomous or not. Most people know to look at the shape of its head. Venomous snakes have a more diamond shaped head while nonvenomous snakes have a rounder head.

But there are exceptions to that rule. So you have to look at a few other things to know for sure. Nonvenomous snakes have round pupiled eyes, a curved "nose," and larger scales on their head.
The Venomous snakes have slit pupils (like a cat), a pointed "nose," and small scales on their head

A Zoo Story

Doing my interview at the primate sanctuary has me thinking about my time at the zoo. I thought some of you would enjoy this story.

One of my projects during my internship at the zoo was to help train a gorilla to let us take his blood. Before entering the gorilla housing area they explained the rules to us. This is the short version of what they told us:
Don't look them in the eyes- that's considered a threat. Don't stand taller than them- that's considered a threat. There are lines painted on the floor, stay between those lines because if one of these guys can even get a finger on you- he'll rip you to shreds before we can even react. And (now that I've scared the crap out of you), they are going to charge you, don't act scared- that'll only make it worse. Keeping in mind the fact that I was scared enough to piss my pants at that point- how do you walk crouched down, staring at the floor and not look scared?

I didn't have a digital camera at the time. This is a picture that the other

 intern took-they're teaching this gorilla to let them do an ultrasound of his heart. 

It ended up not being that bad and I'm glad that they told me all of that or I probably would have done something dumb and gotten myself into trouble, but at the time it seemed sort of silly to tell us all of that then say "Don't act scared."

Kicked, Bitten & Scratched

A Book Review

A fantastic book for animal lovers, especially those working in the animal care field.

This is a non-fiction book about a reporter who attends Moorpark Community College's EATM program (a school for exotic animal trainers) for one year and writes about her experiences.

The book covers some pretty heavy topics, but overall the author (Amy Sutherland) keeps it light hearted and fun. Although, you don't have a main character to fall in love with and really care about, you find yourself rooting for each and every one of the students and animals.

***Warning: This book may cause impulsive urges to quit your job, pack up everything you own and drive to California to enroll in these classes.

Animal Alphabet

I actually stole this picture from a friend of mine who writes a blog about his adventures teaching abroad. Ignorance Is Bliss. I got a kick out of it and I thought you might enjoy it as well.

Monkey Business- Working Interview

I just got back from a working interview at a primate sanctuary. I'll save you the suspense and let you know that I was offered the job and I do intend to take it. I thought that some of you might be interested in knowing what a normal day of work would be like for me.

Oh- before I get started, I should probably mention that I had to sign an agreement saying that I wouldn't post any pictures that I took at the sanctuary (this is standard operating procedure at most sanctuaries), so none of these pictures were taken by me.

I flew into town the night before my interview. The sanctuary does supply temporary on-site housing for it's employees. An oil boom in the area has caused an influx of workers and there just aren't enough places to live. The other new animal caretaker started a few weeks before my interview and she told me about some of the places she had looked at already. One apartment complex was charging $800 a WEEK per person! She did end up finding an affordable apartment but there was quite a wait. So the fact that the sanctuary provides housing is a huge help.

Another obstacle to   moving there is that it is a very rural area. It's approx. an hour and a half drive from the airport to the sanctuary and we stopped 20 minutes into the drive to get groceries for my stay. All I could think was "There's no way I'll be able to support my ice cream addiction here." It turns out that the gas stations carry most of your grocery needs there just aren't as many options. This, I can handle- I'll just need to learn to plan ahead alittle better. Right now I live a block from the grocery and only buy food for 1-3 days.

Anyway, this is going to become a very long blog entry if I don't start telling you about my day. The days there start at 7:00 (alittle early for my taste, but I'll get used to it). Everybody punches in at the office then heads over to the feed room where food was counted out the night before. Here, we split into two groups. The first group went off to feed the main enclosure, pelka (named for one of the original monkey's descendants who split off from the main group and made her own. Eventually, her group grew large enough that they needed their own enclosure) and the semi-natural enclosures (used as temporary housing for new primates and when introducing primates to each other, so they can be better monitored). I went with the second group to feed the Northwest enclosure, baboons, long tails and cats (yes, cats. I'll explain that in a bit).

We did Northwest first. It was pretty straight forward, we basically transferred all of the food from the crates to a wheelbarrow then walked around inside the enclosure, stopping occasionally to throw food out to the monkeys. There were also some large water tubs that needed to be dumped, cleaned, and refilled. During this time we tried to look at all of the monkeys and note abnormal behaviors or injuries. There were two blind monkeys that we had to find and hand some food to.

Next we did baboons. I did not get to go in with the baboons (nor did I want to. I don't have a lot of experience with primates, but I have enough to be scared of baboons).

Instead there is a small part of the enclosure that is gated off with guillotine type doors so we could close the doors and lock the baboons out of that area. Then we go in and clean up the old food, give fresh food, and clean water. Once we were done, we opened the trap door and the baboons came in to eat.

Then we did the long tails. These guys had one natural enclosure, which was done similar to Northwest and a few semi-natural enclosures. The long tails were all ex-research and prone to getting worms because they were raised in such sterile conditions, so they are fed on feeding tables instead of on the ground.

Finally we did the cats. This enclosure has about 40 cats that have been abandoned at the sanctuary over the years and then bred. The enclosure is meant to keep predators out not to keep the cats in, but the cats stay in because that's where they are fed. I should also mention that the monkeys can get out of the natural enclosures. This is done on purpose so that if one monkey is being picked on, they can get away. So there are a few free roaming monkeys around the sanctuary. Those monkeys are called "the trustees."

After that we went back to the feed room to count out dry food and wait for the produce truck, which comes every Wed. I'm told that this weeks truck was a small one, but by the time we were done my arms were shaking and I was out of breath.

Once the truck was unloaded into the cooler, we went to lunch. Normally, they bring their lunch and eat on property, but since I was there it was a special occasion and we went out. We went to one of the small towns near by and ate at what I gather was one of the two restaurants in town.

After lunch we counted out produce for the next day then the manager took me around to see the enclosures that I hadn't worked with in the morning, she also showed me the construction being done so they could take in 130 primates from another sanctuary that has gone bankrupt, and pointed out all of the things that she hoped to improve in the existing enclosures.

Then it was time for meds. There are two monkeys with arthritis that get a pain reliever every night as well as a rotating de-worming schedule.The arthritic monkeys are weary of new people so I didn't get ot give them their meds, but I did get to hand out the cherry flavored de-wormer. One of the females decided that one "cookie" wasn't enough and she grabbed my arm trying to get another. It wasn't a violent grab, but her fingernails dug in and she left a bruise.

The last thing I got to do at my "interview" was to hand out bananas to all of the semi-natural enclosures and the trustees (so the don't try to steal them from the semi-natural enclosures). Some of the monkeys would come up and take the banana from me, others I had to toss it in for them. The only black crested macaque at the sanctuary was one of them that would take it from my hand. There are lots of snow monkeys, long tails, baboons, and bonnet macaques, but only one black crested macaque. As the odd ball out- he was instantly my favorite.

This picture is really cool. The black crested macaque stole 

someones camera and took a picture of herself, then gave it back. 

While handing out bananas, I also met a snow monkey who came from a zoo where he was housed with no other monkeys and therefore needs to work on his social skills. He's in transition so he is still in an enclosure by himself where he can see the other monkeys but he can't reach them. He's conflicted. He so desperately wants to be groomed, but he knows that he shouldn't be interacting with humans. So he'll offer his back to be scratched but once you start scratching he'll turn around and show his teeth in a threat. Sure enough, that's exactly what he did when I made my rounds. What do you do when a monkey is threatening you? You  avoid eye contact, hand him his banana, and move on. 

At the end of the day I was tired, soar, bruised, scratched, dirty, and happier than I can remember ever being. 

Land of the Leopard

The Russian government has created a new national park. It opened on April 9th in the Russian Far East and it's 1,011 square miles will be a safe place for critically endangered Amur (Siberian) tigers and the Far Eastern Leopard, which is the worlds rarest big cat (there are only approx. thirty surviving today). The park was created through the merger of three existing protected areas and the addition of some previously unprotected land along the Chinese border and in the northeast portion of the leopards range.

This park is one of 13 new national parks and 9 new national reserves to be opened in Russia!! That will mean that 3% of Russia's landmass will be protected. Some of you might be thinking 3% isn't that much, but keep in mind that Russia is HUGE. 3% of Russia's lanndmass is 197,784 square miles, for all of you Americans who read my blog- that's approx. the size of Texas. 

WAY TO GO RUSSIA!!! 

On a completely unrelated note: My personal life is very busy right now, so I apologize in advance if it takes a few weeks for me to post anything new to my blog.