Zoo!
I've been interning at the zoo for almost a month now (holy crap, how is this possible!), so I thought I should maybe actually write about it a bit.
It's one of those weird things where when I think about getting up and going I feel sort of "Weh, I don't wanna, I'd rather sleep in," about it. But when I'm actually there, I completely love it.
I might be strange, but I really enjoy when I get behind-the-scenes access to things. Whether it's being back stage at a play or at a museum...it just sort of tickles me to have access to places you don't normally get to see. So of course I love this job. I get to see all the behind the scenes stuff PLUS there are animals back there!
I work in the education room, so while I don't get to work with any larger animals, I get more direct contact with the animals than any of the other interns will be getting.
I'm still learning their names, but these are the critters I get to play with: Melvin the hedgehog, Marombe the tenrec, Luigi and Canole the ferrets (love these guys), Eb the bunny (I'm allergic to him - boo), Alabama and Chico the chinchillas, Jenny the cockatoo, Brock the Amazon parrot, Carolina and Turtinski the box turtles, Zaba the tortoise, Pokey the much older and larger desert tortoise, Dither the tree frog, Megan the gecko, Rusty the chuckwalla, Eartha Kitt the bearded dragon, and then we have Azul the skink, a bullfrog, a Chaparral the gopher snake, Sunkist the corn snake, Majapa and Tut the king snakes, two ball pythons, some hissing cockroaches, a couple millipedes, and a tarantula. Oh, and Olivia the Great Horned owl. She scares me.
General daily duties consist of setting up outdoor cages, cleaning cages, changing water bowls, misting tanks, taking tank temperatures, preparing diets, cutting down tree branches, feeding the animals, helping to medicate them, and more cleaning and tear down at the end of the day. I also get to take the ferrets for walks, take the lizards and snakes out to sun, cuddle with the bunny (sadly no more), go down to the commissary to get various food items (fruits, veggies, crickets, mealworms) and generally wander around the zoo.
Last weekend I was helping my keeper, Leo, take Pokey to the vet (he scratched his eye) and when we walked in, the vet was holding this teeny tiny baby squirrel monkey on a stuffed animal. His mom just died, sadly, so they were hand feeding him and trying to get him to nap. He was all squeaky and adorable and I almost died right there from the cute.
I've also gotten to help feed the otters, pet a 120 year old Aldabra tortoise, and check out the elephant barn (GIANT).
I work with two keepers, Chris and Leo. They both actually started as volunteers there. Chris is awesome, she spent 16 years working with the elephants before she moved over to the education room, and she promised me she'd take me up there sometime when they're doing the daily check-ups. She also asked me to bring in my camera and take pictures of all the animals, so those will be coming up at some point.
Leo is more difficult to work with because he's a lot quieter and sometimes I feel more like free labor with him instead of, ya know, being a volunteer. Plus he once asked me to go get a rabbit for Olivia at the commissary and I was thinking it would be one of those tiny pink ones, but when I opened the box it was just...a dead frozen full grown fuzzy rabbit. I think if I had expected that, it would have been...okay, but I ended up returning empty handed because I couldn't get myself to pry it apart from the other frozen rabbits to pick it up. But he's nice and I think it's getting better the more I know what I'm doing. They are both trusting me to do a lot more stuff on my own, which is cool.
The thing I actually have the most trouble with is touching the mealworms and crickets. They ick me out.
One of the requirements of this program is to do some sort of project and write up a short report on it. I think I'm going to work with the ferrets and come up with an enrichment activity for them to do. Some sort of foraging/maze type thing. They are incredibly curious and active, so I think it should be fun. I'd love to do something with the hedgehog, but he mostly just sleeps all day. :\
So, overall, thumbs up. It's great just being outside and not staring at a computer screen all day. I love all the animals and every single person there is nice. Maybe it has something to do with them loving their jobs, but I have not come across one person who did not have a genuine smile for me when we crossed paths.
Here are some phone pictures:
Ferrets
Canole
Luigi (and Canole, 'though it's hard to tell)
Brock the parrot
Jenny the cockatoo
Either Carolina or Turtinski, I can't tell from this picture
Old man tenrec
It's one of those weird things where when I think about getting up and going I feel sort of "Weh, I don't wanna, I'd rather sleep in," about it. But when I'm actually there, I completely love it.
I might be strange, but I really enjoy when I get behind-the-scenes access to things. Whether it's being back stage at a play or at a museum...it just sort of tickles me to have access to places you don't normally get to see. So of course I love this job. I get to see all the behind the scenes stuff PLUS there are animals back there!
I work in the education room, so while I don't get to work with any larger animals, I get more direct contact with the animals than any of the other interns will be getting.
I'm still learning their names, but these are the critters I get to play with: Melvin the hedgehog, Marombe the tenrec, Luigi and Canole the ferrets (love these guys), Eb the bunny (I'm allergic to him - boo), Alabama and Chico the chinchillas, Jenny the cockatoo, Brock the Amazon parrot, Carolina and Turtinski the box turtles, Zaba the tortoise, Pokey the much older and larger desert tortoise, Dither the tree frog, Megan the gecko, Rusty the chuckwalla, Eartha Kitt the bearded dragon, and then we have Azul the skink, a bullfrog, a Chaparral the gopher snake, Sunkist the corn snake, Majapa and Tut the king snakes, two ball pythons, some hissing cockroaches, a couple millipedes, and a tarantula. Oh, and Olivia the Great Horned owl. She scares me.
General daily duties consist of setting up outdoor cages, cleaning cages, changing water bowls, misting tanks, taking tank temperatures, preparing diets, cutting down tree branches, feeding the animals, helping to medicate them, and more cleaning and tear down at the end of the day. I also get to take the ferrets for walks, take the lizards and snakes out to sun, cuddle with the bunny (sadly no more), go down to the commissary to get various food items (fruits, veggies, crickets, mealworms) and generally wander around the zoo.
Last weekend I was helping my keeper, Leo, take Pokey to the vet (he scratched his eye) and when we walked in, the vet was holding this teeny tiny baby squirrel monkey on a stuffed animal. His mom just died, sadly, so they were hand feeding him and trying to get him to nap. He was all squeaky and adorable and I almost died right there from the cute.
I've also gotten to help feed the otters, pet a 120 year old Aldabra tortoise, and check out the elephant barn (GIANT).
I work with two keepers, Chris and Leo. They both actually started as volunteers there. Chris is awesome, she spent 16 years working with the elephants before she moved over to the education room, and she promised me she'd take me up there sometime when they're doing the daily check-ups. She also asked me to bring in my camera and take pictures of all the animals, so those will be coming up at some point.
Leo is more difficult to work with because he's a lot quieter and sometimes I feel more like free labor with him instead of, ya know, being a volunteer. Plus he once asked me to go get a rabbit for Olivia at the commissary and I was thinking it would be one of those tiny pink ones, but when I opened the box it was just...a dead frozen full grown fuzzy rabbit. I think if I had expected that, it would have been...okay, but I ended up returning empty handed because I couldn't get myself to pry it apart from the other frozen rabbits to pick it up. But he's nice and I think it's getting better the more I know what I'm doing. They are both trusting me to do a lot more stuff on my own, which is cool.
The thing I actually have the most trouble with is touching the mealworms and crickets. They ick me out.
One of the requirements of this program is to do some sort of project and write up a short report on it. I think I'm going to work with the ferrets and come up with an enrichment activity for them to do. Some sort of foraging/maze type thing. They are incredibly curious and active, so I think it should be fun. I'd love to do something with the hedgehog, but he mostly just sleeps all day. :\
So, overall, thumbs up. It's great just being outside and not staring at a computer screen all day. I love all the animals and every single person there is nice. Maybe it has something to do with them loving their jobs, but I have not come across one person who did not have a genuine smile for me when we crossed paths.
Here are some phone pictures:
Ferrets
Canole
Luigi (and Canole, 'though it's hard to tell)
Brock the parrot
Jenny the cockatoo
Either Carolina or Turtinski, I can't tell from this picture
Old man tenrec