So today was my last day at the zoo... for now. Luckily, pending the results of a negative TB test this summer, I will be able to return back to the zoo as an animal department intern in August when I return to Clemson to start my senior year! I'm so happy I will be able to return and see all of the animals and keepers again and continue to learn and grow as an intern in the department.
For my last day, I did something really new and worked farmyard/kitchen. I had briefly worked farmyard before, but I have never been in the kitchen so it was something completely new to me. Farmyard has 3 goats, 1 pig, a bunch of chickens and ducks, and a great-horned owl. I got to help with the morning cleaning of the pens and barns and then I went by myself to feed the chickens and ducks. I even managed to get a huge bruise on my leg from hopping the fence, but I'm just choosing to call it my battle bruise. (:
In the kitchen, I helped Greg to prepare the diets. We prepare the afternoon diets and the following morning's diets so that the animals have food for the night and the next morning. I mainly helped with primate diets, so that meant preparing the food for the spider monkeys, lemurs, guenons, colobus monkeys, orangutans, and siamings. After chopping, measuring, weighing, and combining all of that food, I moved on to the carnivore diets and got the meat ready for the lions, leopards, owl, vultures, and ocelots. I was really getting my hands dirty as I was elbow-deep in that horse meat... but it was definitely worth it to make sure the animals were getting well-fed.
I really actually liked being in the kitchen. At first I was a little disappointed because it meant I wouldn't get much animal contact on my last day, but I ended up really enjoying it. We were busy the entire morning and we got to have some good conversations and I learned a lot about animal diets!
I'm really looking forward to a great summer and to returning to the Greenville Zoo in August. For now, I'm headed home for a week. Starting May 12th, I'll be down in Baltimore as the official new marine mammal training intern at the National Aquarium! I'm really excited to learn about the other side of animal care (the aquarium side) and to be able to work with the dolphins and their trainers at the aquarium. I'll be posting about my days on here, so be sure to stay tuned for more exciting "tails!"
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Asia, for a Change
This week at the Zoo I switched things up and worked with Greg in Asia. Since I haven't been in Asia in a while, I was excited to be back there and work with the hornbills, red pandas, squirrels, siamings, leopards, and orangutans!
There was some big news that has happened since I last was at the zoo, and that is the fact that Oscar and Ella, the siaming gibbons have welcomed a baby siaming into the zoo family! It's still too early to tell whether it is a boy or a girl, but the baby seems to be healthy and I was lucky enough to get a glimpse! He/she was hanging onto Ella's stomach and looked up at Greg and I as we fed the siamings. This is the first birth I have experienced since working at the zoo, and it was so exciting to share in such wonderful news with the zoo family and Greenville community. I'm excited to see the baby grow and learn what his/her name will be and what role they will play in the family dynamic of the siamings.
For the rest of the day in Asia, we cleaned and fed all of the animals. It wasn't too busy of a day, so Greg and I did a lot of talking about animals, conservation, and travel. I recently just got back from a Spring Break trip in India studying biodiversity and conservation, so I shared with him and the other keepers a lot of details of my trip and even showed them the picture of the wild tiger I saw!
All in all it was a pretty good day at the zoo. I had a lot of great conversations, got to meet a new baby, and obviously worked hard and enjoyed myself. I only have a few weeks left until the end of the semester, so I'm hoping to make the most of them and enjoy the time I have left working at the Greenville Zoo. See you next time for more "tails!"
There was some big news that has happened since I last was at the zoo, and that is the fact that Oscar and Ella, the siaming gibbons have welcomed a baby siaming into the zoo family! It's still too early to tell whether it is a boy or a girl, but the baby seems to be healthy and I was lucky enough to get a glimpse! He/she was hanging onto Ella's stomach and looked up at Greg and I as we fed the siamings. This is the first birth I have experienced since working at the zoo, and it was so exciting to share in such wonderful news with the zoo family and Greenville community. I'm excited to see the baby grow and learn what his/her name will be and what role they will play in the family dynamic of the siamings.
For the rest of the day in Asia, we cleaned and fed all of the animals. It wasn't too busy of a day, so Greg and I did a lot of talking about animals, conservation, and travel. I recently just got back from a Spring Break trip in India studying biodiversity and conservation, so I shared with him and the other keepers a lot of details of my trip and even showed them the picture of the wild tiger I saw!
All in all it was a pretty good day at the zoo. I had a lot of great conversations, got to meet a new baby, and obviously worked hard and enjoyed myself. I only have a few weeks left until the end of the semester, so I'm hoping to make the most of them and enjoy the time I have left working at the Greenville Zoo. See you next time for more "tails!"
Sunday, March 8, 2015
Visitors to the Zoo!
Today was probably one of the highlights of my time at the zoo. I finally got to show my family and friends what it is I do at the zoo and tell them all about the animals that I love to work with.
I started working in Africa in the morning with Ben. We had a normal morning where I cleaned the giraffe barn, helped with training, checked on tortoises, you know, all that fun usual stuff. However, once it hit lunchtime, the day was far from ordinary!
I met my mom and my three friends, Allie, Alli, and Kaitlyn, at the zoo entrance around 12:00. I then gave them a tour of the zoo and told them about all of the animals! I showed them primate row and pointed out my favorites (the spider monkeys) and then we walked through Africa and said hello to Chuma and Saied, watched Kiko drink Kesi's pee (ew), and saw Bubba being his typical tortoise self. We then went up through Asia and saw the siamings and the red pandas as well as Jade and Clover, the leopards. At 1:00, Ben said that we could meet him in the keeper room and we could have a giraffe feeding session!
I loved being able to have my friends and my mom get to spend some quality time with the giraffes. They are the animals I get to spend the most time with and work with the most, and I'm so happy that others could see how truly awesome they are. My friends and mom all said that it was one of the coolest things they've done in their lives. Hodari was being extra obnoxious and trying to steal all the food, and Kesi and Kiko spent a lot of time trying to win over our attention. I took a lot of pictures of my friends and mom feeding the giraffes, and Ben even took some time to talk to us about giraffes and conservation issues in general. We spent over an hour up with the giraffes, and it was so much fun!
After our giraffe feeding, we did a quick walkthrough of the rest of the zoo and I showed them South America, including the lagoon, and the Farmyard. I left with them around 2:30 because I had to drive my friends back to the airport since they were visiting from other states.
I am so thankful for the opportunity to share what I love with some people that I love. I know that the keepers trust me and like me, which is why they have given me so many incredible opportunities. I can't wait to see what the next few weeks have in store at the Greenville Zoo!
I started working in Africa in the morning with Ben. We had a normal morning where I cleaned the giraffe barn, helped with training, checked on tortoises, you know, all that fun usual stuff. However, once it hit lunchtime, the day was far from ordinary!
I met my mom and my three friends, Allie, Alli, and Kaitlyn, at the zoo entrance around 12:00. I then gave them a tour of the zoo and told them about all of the animals! I showed them primate row and pointed out my favorites (the spider monkeys) and then we walked through Africa and said hello to Chuma and Saied, watched Kiko drink Kesi's pee (ew), and saw Bubba being his typical tortoise self. We then went up through Asia and saw the siamings and the red pandas as well as Jade and Clover, the leopards. At 1:00, Ben said that we could meet him in the keeper room and we could have a giraffe feeding session!
I loved being able to have my friends and my mom get to spend some quality time with the giraffes. They are the animals I get to spend the most time with and work with the most, and I'm so happy that others could see how truly awesome they are. My friends and mom all said that it was one of the coolest things they've done in their lives. Hodari was being extra obnoxious and trying to steal all the food, and Kesi and Kiko spent a lot of time trying to win over our attention. I took a lot of pictures of my friends and mom feeding the giraffes, and Ben even took some time to talk to us about giraffes and conservation issues in general. We spent over an hour up with the giraffes, and it was so much fun!
After our giraffe feeding, we did a quick walkthrough of the rest of the zoo and I showed them South America, including the lagoon, and the Farmyard. I left with them around 2:30 because I had to drive my friends back to the airport since they were visiting from other states.
I am so thankful for the opportunity to share what I love with some people that I love. I know that the keepers trust me and like me, which is why they have given me so many incredible opportunities. I can't wait to see what the next few weeks have in store at the Greenville Zoo!
Sunday, February 22, 2015
A New Kind of Africa
I was a little nervous about returning to the zoo this morning. I hadn't been to work in two weeks since I was out of town the past two weekends, so it had been a while since I had been to the zoo. A lot has changed in those two weeks - Jackie, the keeper who I usually work with in Africa left for a new job and the zoo was closed for 10 days to do renovations and routine maintenance. This new maintenance impacted Africa in that there were shade structures and new wiring built in the giraffe paddock.
Ben has replaced Jackie as the weekend keeper in Africa. I've worked with Ben several times before, and I really enjoy not only working with him, but also talking to him about zoos, conservation, and a variety of other subjects. He's very well informed on a variety of topics, so we always seem to have great, intellectual conversations. He also always has answers to my questions, and if he doesn't know, he looks it up for me!
We finished all of our cleaning in the morning, so in the afternoon we had some free time. We hung out with the giraffes, did a Kiko feeding session with some other staff, went down and looked at the trees that fell over the lagoon during the storm this week, and talked about his career and my future career. I also got to help with Kiko training again, which is always a treat! It was a great day, I had lots of animal interaction, lots of interesting conversation, and the weather was finally nice! The zoo environment is a constantly changing one, and I am excited to see where these new changes take me on my journey as the animal department intern!
Ben has replaced Jackie as the weekend keeper in Africa. I've worked with Ben several times before, and I really enjoy not only working with him, but also talking to him about zoos, conservation, and a variety of other subjects. He's very well informed on a variety of topics, so we always seem to have great, intellectual conversations. He also always has answers to my questions, and if he doesn't know, he looks it up for me!
We finished all of our cleaning in the morning, so in the afternoon we had some free time. We hung out with the giraffes, did a Kiko feeding session with some other staff, went down and looked at the trees that fell over the lagoon during the storm this week, and talked about his career and my future career. I also got to help with Kiko training again, which is always a treat! It was a great day, I had lots of animal interaction, lots of interesting conversation, and the weather was finally nice! The zoo environment is a constantly changing one, and I am excited to see where these new changes take me on my journey as the animal department intern!
Monday, February 2, 2015
Running Around the Zoo
This week at the zoo was by far the busiest day I've experienced. I was exhausted by the end of the day, not only from running all around, but also from doing a lot of hard, manual labor! We were down two zookeepers this Sunday, which meant that everyone else had to step in and take care of certain areas that they usually do not have to. They were eager for my help this week as I helped to open Africa, Farmyard, and Asia!
Opening Africa and Asia was the same as usual, I took care of the tortoise enclosure, the giraffe yard, the lion's den, the orangutan enclosure, the red panda enclosure, and the hornbill den. However, a new experience I had this morning was that I got to experience the Farmyard area of the zoo. In the Farmyard, there are chickens, ducks, a pig, and goats. We went down in the morning and cleaned the yards, fed all the animals, and made sure they were ready for the day. This was a lot of fun, because it was a new area of zoo and because I got to pet and feed the animals! I also was able to experience a veterinary procedure in the morning with Owlice, the great horned owl at the zoo. She has a problem with her eye, so I watched the keepers catch her up and the vet tech give her drops in her eye to try to fix her problem. This was really interesting, and it was the first time I was able to witness something like this!
After lunch, I went to South America to work on the aviary. We are building a new exhibit for the South American birds, but this is taking a lot of time and hard work. First, we transplanted plants and replanted them inside the exhibit. Then, we mulched the floor and cut fencing to patch some fence areas. I was exhausted by the end of this, especially because this was definitely the most manual labor I've done since interning at the zoo! However, this was a great experience and it's really cool that I will be able to say that I helped get the aviary read for all of the animals!
Finally, it was the end of the day and it was time to close Africa and feed all of the animals before we went home. I fed all the giraffes, helped bring the lions in, and then packed up to go home. This was the last time I would work with or see Jackie before she moves to her new job, so I made sure to say goodbye to her. I was really sad to see her leave and say goodbye, but I'm very excited for the opportunities that she will have at the Phoenix Zoo. I gave her a card and gift card to show my thanks to her, because she has taught me so much about the zookeeping field and also let me have a lot of fun, and for that, I am so thankful!
So, there you have it. My crazy, exciting, sad day at the zoo. As I've said before, the world of zookeeping is an ever changing place and there's always something new, exciting, or crazy going on, which is why I think I am so intrigued by the field. I'll be taking a 2 week break from the zoo as my best friend is coming next weekend and I'm visiting my family the following weekend, but I'll be back with more stories to share with you in a few weeks! Until then, stay wild (:
Sunday, January 25, 2015
Africa, Animals, & Action
Once again this weekend I worked in Africa with the lions, giraffes, and tortoises. I won't bore you anymore with the details of the cleaning I do each week, but trust me, there was a lot of it! I found out some sad news today, Jackie, the keeper in Africa that I usually work with, got a new job in Phoenix and will be leaving Greenville in a few weeks. I was obviously pretty bummed when she told me the news, but I'm also really excited for the opportunities that Arizona will bring her!
We did some fun things today while working in Africa. We put some paint on Bubba's (the tortoise) foot and made a footprint on a canvas for Jackie to keep as a souvenir. We also met with a family for a private giraffe feeding, and afterwards Jackie took some more pictures of me feeding the giraffes! This was a blast, as it always is, and the picture of me feeding Walter is even the new background on my phone! There was also some orangutan fun in the mix when we had Chelsea help us paint a canvas. It was an action packed day between the cleaning, preparing diets, and working on the special projects, but it made the time pass quickly and the day way more fun.
I'll keep you updated on the changes going on throughout the zoo as there is a keeper transition and some animals come and go. One thing I've learned by interning at the Greenville Zoo is that the zoo world is an ever-changing place. People and animals are constantly coming and going and there's not much that stays constant for too long. It makes for an exciting job, but it also makes for some tough goodbyes. I'm glad that I am getting this experience and learning these types of lessons, because it is helping me prepare for a career in the field.
As always, if you have any questions or comments, feel free to let me know in the comments section below. Until next time, stay wild!
We did some fun things today while working in Africa. We put some paint on Bubba's (the tortoise) foot and made a footprint on a canvas for Jackie to keep as a souvenir. We also met with a family for a private giraffe feeding, and afterwards Jackie took some more pictures of me feeding the giraffes! This was a blast, as it always is, and the picture of me feeding Walter is even the new background on my phone! There was also some orangutan fun in the mix when we had Chelsea help us paint a canvas. It was an action packed day between the cleaning, preparing diets, and working on the special projects, but it made the time pass quickly and the day way more fun.
I'll keep you updated on the changes going on throughout the zoo as there is a keeper transition and some animals come and go. One thing I've learned by interning at the Greenville Zoo is that the zoo world is an ever-changing place. People and animals are constantly coming and going and there's not much that stays constant for too long. It makes for an exciting job, but it also makes for some tough goodbyes. I'm glad that I am getting this experience and learning these types of lessons, because it is helping me prepare for a career in the field.
As always, if you have any questions or comments, feel free to let me know in the comments section below. Until next time, stay wild!
Friday, January 16, 2015
Returning to the Zoo
After a nice, relaxing Winter Break at home in Pennsylvania with my family, I returned back to the Zoo on a chilly Sunday morning to see all the animals and zookeepers again. I was very happy to be back and even more excited to get back to working with the animals again. It was really nice to say hello to everyone and see how excited all the keepers were to have me back interning with them again!
I worked in Africa once again this week, and got to spend time with my favorite lions, giraffes, tortoises, and vultures. It was a pretty slow day since it was so cold, so we spent a lot of the morning waiting until it was warm enough to let the animals outside for the day. I did the typical cleaning in Africa, got to watch Kiko's training session, and gave the giraffes snacks in the middle of the day.
During lunch, one of the keepers called me "one of the best interns" which I loved to hear. I really enjoy going to the zoo and working with the keepers and animals and I'm glad to know that the feeling is reciprocated. I also got a great letter of recommendation from Keith, the General Curator of the zoo, so that I can use it for internships this summer. Working at the zoo has been one of the best experiences I have had during college, and I am looking forward to a spring semester filled with lots of fun "tails" to share with all of you!
I worked in Africa once again this week, and got to spend time with my favorite lions, giraffes, tortoises, and vultures. It was a pretty slow day since it was so cold, so we spent a lot of the morning waiting until it was warm enough to let the animals outside for the day. I did the typical cleaning in Africa, got to watch Kiko's training session, and gave the giraffes snacks in the middle of the day.
During lunch, one of the keepers called me "one of the best interns" which I loved to hear. I really enjoy going to the zoo and working with the keepers and animals and I'm glad to know that the feeling is reciprocated. I also got a great letter of recommendation from Keith, the General Curator of the zoo, so that I can use it for internships this summer. Working at the zoo has been one of the best experiences I have had during college, and I am looking forward to a spring semester filled with lots of fun "tails" to share with all of you!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)