Only Interns...

Name: Keitha Lear
Class Year: Senior
Hometown: London, Ohio
Internship: Keeper Development Intern
Location: Dallas, Texas  

In this blog, I will talk about the special things that an intern at the Dallas Zoo gets to do! But before I do that, I wanted to share the things I have been doing in KDS. Overall, I help everyone where they need an extra set of hands. I have really been enjoying that because I am not in one place all day and it makes the day go by super fast! I do random things like change light bulbs, clean cobwebs, and disinfect the fridges. I have also gotten to do a lot of fun things like walk a goat named Sugar and hold a bald python named Abe. For those who don’t know me, I used to be terrified of snakes a year ago and now I am comfortable around them and can hold them with no problem! The more I am here, the more I get attached to the animals and it is going to be so hard to say goodbye in August to the animals and to the keepers who have been doing an excellent job of teaching me everything there is to know about zoo keeping! Even though I have known everyone for 3 months, I love everyone, and I am very grateful to have gotten to know everyone as great coworkers but even better friends.

    As an intern, there are many more things we do besides help take care of the animals in our assigned section. One of the things that the Dallas Zoo offers is professional development classes. The classes occur a couple times a month and they are for us to learn more zoo knowledge! The classes I attended were, Zoo Nutrition, My First Zoo Job (How to Create a Resume), The History of Zoo Exhibit Design, Wild Side of Finance, and How to Use ZIMS (Zoological Information Management System). These classes are super helpful because I will already have a basic knowledge of how a zoo is run when I get a job as a zookeeper!

Another thing that us interns got to do is raise money for a conservation organization. Each semester, the zoo chooses an endangered species for us to raise money for and to raise awareness to the public on that specific animal for a week in July. This summer, it was the vulture! This could not be more perfect because vultures are my favorite bird! The conservation organization that we are donating to is the Peregrine Fund. Twice a week, all of the interns would get together and plan out how we were going to spread awareness of vultures for that Conservation Action Week. It was a lot of fun getting to know the intern this way and seeing their creative side come out! During the week of July 6 to July 14, we sold t-shirts, wristbands, and other goodies. We also had a silent auction where people donated vulture/animal related objects and a donation wall if people did not want to buy anything but wanted to donate to the Peregrine Fund. We also had face painting and a photo booth to get kids to learn about vultures! This was a great way for us interns to see if we wanted to work for a conservation facility and for us to see by our actions that we are making a better world for animals!

The last thing (and my favorite thing) that Dallas Zoo interns get to do is do “intern swaps.” This gives interns a chance to shadow other departments that aren’t the ones we were assigned to. This is super helpful for those who want to see all parts of the zoo and for those who don’t have a clear idea what kind of animals they want to work with (like me)! I did a swap in the Middle Wilds of Africa department which have hoof stock and other animals like Eland, Somali Wild Ass, and Rock Hyrax. Most of these animals can only be seen on the monorail. I highly recommend going on the monorail if anyone is visiting the Dallas Zoo! The next intern swap I did was at the hospital. The animals that they had there were ones that were recovering from surgery or illnesses and animals who were in quarantine. Then, I did an intern swap in the Upper Wilds of Africa which consisted of Hippo, Okapi, Bongos, and more! And yes, Adanna the baby hippo, is VERY cute in person! The last intern swap I did was in the carnivore department. I got to see how keepers took care of the Tigers, Lions, Anteater, Otters, and the African Painted Dogs. Everyone in each of the departments were so welcoming and I got to help them out a lot more than what I was expecting! For instance, I got to reward Boipelo the hippo during the training demo and I got to make ice treats for the lions! I loved going to different departments to see what the interns have been doing the whole summer. And I hope the other interns have enjoyed their day at the children’s zoo as much as I have!

               I have loved every minute of being an intern and I will recommend to everyone who is interested in being a zoo intern to go to the Dallas Zoo! They do a great job making sure that the interns are treated like an employee and they will jam-pack all the learning opportunities possible! It has made my summer go by so fast, but it will be the summer to remember! This internship has made me want to apply for a job when I graduate because I loved it that much! My last blog will be about the fun things I have done on my weekends around Dallas! By the next blog, I will be back in Ohio! Thank you for reading! Bye Y’all!

Life at Reid Park Zoo

Savannah Kerns
Class of 2021
Lakeview, OH
Elephant and Andean Bear Intern
Reid Park Zoo, Tucson, AZ


I am well past the midpoint of my time here at Reid Park Zoo, and I cannot believe how fast time has gone by. In our Zoo classes at Otterbein, we talk a lot about enrichment. I think I have truly come to understand how important enrichment is for zoos through this internship. I work on enrichment based projects every day. It has been great to be able to broaden my knowledge on enrichment and enrichment for specific animals and behaviors. 

Early morning swims in the pool

About four weeks ago I switched over to being solely an Elephant Barn Intern, but not before I had some more great experiences and learning moments at the andean bear/tapir/anteater area. I started out this internship by just observing the andean bears, but slowly I was able to see more of the husbandry side. I also go to learn about anteater and tapir husbandry. Which includes a lot of cleaning, creating diets, cutting browse, and deciding on enrichment. I have lots of fun hiding and spreading various foods and scents around the habitats. Both the andean bears and anteaters love honey.

While working at andean bear one day, I saw that there was a dead black crowned night heron in the moat. When the care staff went down to check it out, there was also another live juvenile night heron and a mother duck with her eggs! They ended up giving me the juvenile night heron to take to the health center because he was dehydrated and starving. My Ohio Wildlife Center knowledge came in handy when figuring out the best way to carry him! They are extremely loud though when they are stressed, so I tried to calm it down as much as possible. He ended up recovering fine.

Making target sticks.

I had some down time once to create some target sticks. I made them out of PVC pipe and small buoys. I cut the PVC pipe into various lengths and then hot glued a small buoy to the end. There were three colors of buoys, red, white, an yellow, and each animal responds to certain colors differently. The length of the PVC also varies on what animal the target stick is for. For example, the anteater gets a long target stick, whereas the lions get a short target stick. These target sticks are used for training.

Lion King paper enrichment!
Not pictured: painted balls and cubes with pellets inside 

Sometimes in the afternoons when I was at andean bear, I got to experience some of the lion husbandry as well. One specific afternoon I got to watch the care staff give SQ fluids to the male lion, Shombay. He gets a whole 3000 ml of SQ fluids. They use a large water basin to create a sort of 'stall' to help him stay laying down against the mesh. Then, one of the staff feeds him while the other gives the fluids. It was an amazing experience. It would take me a while to get used to being around lions. Their size always takes me by surprise and they are so fierce.

I love creating enrichment for the elephants. Most of it is food based, but I enjoy the challenge of trying to create more sensory based enrichment. The elephants can also get essential oils, so they are a helpful non-food tool. I use a lot of boxes and paper bags when creating elephant enrichment. I also like to use hay cubes and balls. I have been able to help turn an old water drum into a complex elephant feeder, by inserting firehose on the inside in a crisscross fashion. Firehose is also a helpful enrichment tool. I enjoy making 'burritos' for the elephants too. It consists of me adding bran, veggies/fruit, and pellets to a paper bag and then folding it up. I like to hide them around the stalls. I also created special breakfast enrichment for Sundzu, Mabu, and Lungile. I was able to observe them in the morning when eating breakfast, and mark down on a chart how well they used it and what behaviors it was creating. All of them turned out to be successful! We also create enrichment for specific events! For the 4th of July we created colored sand to put out, and we also created Lion King themed enrichment for when the movie came out. In the theater here, they showed videos of the Reid Park Zoo lions before the movie.

On a browse run for the elephants!
We go to local parks to cut browse. In this load we have
mesquite and pistache. 

Recently I have been able to do some more diverse elephant things. I was able to participate in a meet and greet with Sundzu, where I was able to feel the velvet softness and the prominent veins on the back of his ear. I have been able to toss burritos to a couple elephants, and I have also been able to use a hose to give water to Mabu and Sundzu! I have also been able to lock and close certain doors by myself which is a big responsibility.

I am so thankful for all the wonderful experiences I am having and all the people and animals I have met.

My Research Project and Even More Animals!

Name: Keitha Lear
Class Year: Senior
Hometown: London, Ohio
Internship: Keeper Development Intern
Location: Dallas, Texas  

I am halfway through my internship! It has gone by so fast; I still feel like it is my first week here! Since my last blog, I went back to the routes I have been on to learn how to disinfect their enclosures, food dishes, and enrichment items. In the Keeper Development Section, we have a full week where we disinfect everything because there aren’t enough hours in a day to disinfect each animal’s enclosure before we have to put them out by the time the zoo opens. So, we get a week to get it all done. After that week, I went back to work with the goats in the Blue Barn for a more in-depth tour and to learn their names (all of them are named after cities in Texas and I am really bad at geography)! I also went on a browse run, which is required for keeper who are in the “Blue Barn” route (shout out to Dr. Lehman and his “Trees of Ohio” class where I got to use my knowledge of identifying trees to find food for the goats). Then this past week, I helped out in the Program Animal Room (or PAR). These animals are only seen during summer camps and when the Education departments have talks. Therefore, these animals are found behind the scenes. We have many species in PAR, from Rabbits to Guinea Pigs to Scorpions to Blue Tongue Skinks and many more! I helped with the usual feeding, cleaning, and giving out enrichment. I have not yet learned how to handle them, but I hope to by the end of my internship! The only issue is that I am allergic to rabbits and guinea pigs, so I have to wear a face mask every time I enter the room. It is really a bummer for me because all of them are so cute and irresistible!

In this blog, I want to talk about my research project. All interns are required to complete a project by the end of their internship. Some interns have a research project, while others have a project that needs done in their section/ around the zoo. It was assigned to the intern by their mentor. My project is research based. The Dallas Zoo got a pair of Keel-Billed Toucans a couple months ago and just 3 weeks ago, a family (Mom, Dad, and Son) of Bearded Emperor Tamarins were introduced to the toucans. This mixed species habitat has never been done before and it is my job to study the behavior of the toucans and tamarins and where they are in the enclosure, then analyze the data. I practiced recording the behaviors for my first two weeks, then I am going to be taking observations for 8 weeks, then finally I analyze my data and present it to my section in my last two weeks. I am very honored to have gotten assigned this project and I can’t wait to share the results, despite being nervous about presenting in front of the Keeper Development Section! I’d like to thank Dr. Young for having my class do behavior observations at the Columbus Zoo my freshman year, without having that knowledge and practice, I would have been even more nervous! I have been using a tablet that has the pre-set behaviors on it. That way, I don’t have to worry about writing down the behaviors; I can just touch a few buttons and keep focus on the animals!

In my next blog, I will share more routes that I will get to go on and then the other perks of being a Dallas Zoo Intern as well as more animals I got to work with outside of KDS! Thanks for reading! Bye Y’all!

Week Five: Lab work and Strikes

Name: Ashley Uselmann

Class Year: Junior

Hometown: Carmel, IN

Internship: National Pretoria Zoo

Pretoria, South Africa

Our group at one of the national heritage sites in Mokopane

These last few weeks have been packed. Every day Tia and I get up and go to the student research center to start our day. This last weekend was a blast with I, Tia, Marriane, Dr. Jeff, and Dr. Michelle going to the Mokopane park once again. Dr. Jeff is another current resident in the accommodations house that Tia and I stay at. He is an American vet from Florida. Dr. Michelle also brought her family along, so we had a packed house. However, we had an amazing time going on a safari through the park and exploring the national heritage sites of Mokopane. We saw an array of animals on our trips. We saw giraffe, zebra, bushbuck, roan antelope, eland, nyala, kudu, springbok, monkeys, wildebeests, baboons, mountain hyrax, mongoose, and bush babies. Back in the states, we don’t have many large, wild antelope species. It was a beautiful site seeing these large animals in the wild. We also visited a national heritage site in Mokopane. This national heritage site consisted of a vast array of caves. Each with their own story to tell. One cave was an old limestone mining operation that was halted after the discovery of bones fossilized in the rocks. Another cave was a hideout for native Africans when they started a war with one of their neighbors. We found out that the chief survived the war and actually faked his death, and later the area was named after him. We finished the great weekend with a Bri, or a barbecue as we know, and made our way back to the zoo.

While Tia and I love working with the vets, we still have work that has to been done in the lab. Thankfully, I have been making great progress with the bushbuck microsatellite project. Dr. Sonia has been a patient teacher in helping me understand microsatellites and what are the best techniques to use in a lab setting. I give a big thanks to all my lab courses, because these last few weeks I have been micro pipetting… A Lot. These last few weeks consisted of me, under the watchful eye of Dr. Sonia, extracting DNA from bushbuck samples, combining said DNA with the experimental microsatellite primers, putting them through PCR, and analyzing how these said microsatellites interact with each other after amplification.

This current week has been interesting to say the least. Due to a recent change of management, the Pretoria zoo is in the middle of the transition. As a result of the transition, many promised changes are slow to happen. Apparently one of those changes was creating equity among the workers’ wages. Since that promise has not happen yet, many of the zoo’s staff decided to go on strike… Tia and I did not see that coming. Because of many keepers becoming part of the strike, the zoo enlisted the research center to help out in keeper duties. On the first day back, my fellow roommates and I were also enlisted to help in keeper duties. The first day of keeper duty was hard work. Jamie and I were assigned to the penguin enclosure. There are about 50 African penguins in this enclosure. Each of them have their own name and identification tags. The first part of penguin duty was quite the work out with us cleaning out the penguin pool. Imagine a small drain on one side of the pool that you are trying to push water down. Even if you pushed a lot of water towards the drain, most of it would miss the drain and bounce off the wall. It took an hour for me, Jamie, and one of the keepers to brush and fully clean the pool. It took rounds of soap and bleach, to fully clean the pool. I would take scooping my cat’s litter box over this any day.

Me cleaning the penguin enclosure

 The second part of penguin duty consisted of de-thawing the fish and stuffing supplemental pills in the gill slits. After we are all done, there are two buckets of fish. One bucket has all the supplemental fish with pills, while the second bucket has regular fish. Each penguin has to have one from the supplemental fish, but can have fish from the other bucket if they are still hungry. The penguins have three feeding sessions a day. If one penguin does not feel like eating at one session, they can try another session.In order to properly account which penguin eats, the keepers hand feed every penguin. The keeper sits down with a clip board and records every penguin that gets a fish, how many fish, and at what time. It was incredible that the keeper knew every single penguin by just how they look and ate. The last part of penguin duty consisted of us gathering lavender that the zoo grows and depositing it in the penguin enclosure. Apparently, they like to use lavender as nesting material and when we came back the following day, all the lavender was gone. 

The sweet African penguins that I was assigned to

Another section that our group was enlisted to help was the seal section. There are about 18 seals in this section. 13 of the seals are South American fur seals, while 5 of them are Cape fur seals. The South American fur seals are smaller than the Cape fur seals, but don't let their size fool you. Both the keepers and the seals themselves have demonstrated how much personality they have, especially if they don't want to do something. Seal duty was a little more extensive than penguin duty. The day starts similar as the penguins with de-thawing the fish. However, seals have a more intricate diet. They get two types of fish, squid,and gelatin. Each seal gets different amounts of all food based on their species and size. In addition, the seals are also given supplemental pills inside their fish specific to each seal. After the food is prepared, the seals are called in their respective, smaller enclosures. The seals are than let out and fed one-by-one based on personality. You have to let out the seals with the dominate personalities first, so they do not get competitive with other seals. Once the seal eats all its food, the keeper yells, "All done, [insert name]", and open the door to release them into the bigger pool area. If the seals do not follow the command and decided to wander the feeding area, you are directed to ignore them until they decide to follow the command. If they don't gain anything, they won't want to stay in the area. The head keeper, Elsie, also works with each seal on training. While feeding the seals, she uses the food as positive reinforcement when giving commands. These training sessions prepare the seals for vet visits. The importance of the gelatin was something I didn't know before. The seals actually require a great amount of salt in their diet for a healthy seal. The gelatin contains salt and is fed to the seals along with the fish. In addition, the seals require salt water to swim in. One of the common health problems in these seal species is blindness. The blindness is a greater risk if the seals don't regularly swim in salt water. This internship has been a dynamic time. I have been with the researchers in the lab, in the enclosures with the keepers, and in the operating room with the vets. No one knows how long the strike will continue, but one thing is true, you really don’t know what to expect here in South Africa!

You've never seen...Bear Style!

Names: Eileen Connon and Lindsey Keehn

Class Year: 2019 and 2020

Hometowns: Mandeville, LA and Crystal Lake, IL

Internship: Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding

Location: Chengdu, Sichuan, China

Ni hao again! We’re checking in from the Panda Base as the weather gets even hotter and the pandas get even cuter. Our observations are getting both easier and harder as we go along- easier, because we’re more confident in our data recording skills, but harder, because it’s getting a little more repetitive. It can be a little difficult to stare at a sleeping panda for half an hour at a time without falling asleep yourself! In some ways, though, the boring focal sessions are a relief compared to the ones where your focal panda keeps moving and you have to run around, standing on your tiptoes and (politely) pushing through crowds just so you don’t miss your point-time sample. 

The nice thing about the past few weeks has been the ability to really get into a rhythm here. Our first few weeks in China, everything felt so strange and foreign and different that it never seemed like we would find ourselves making a home here. Now, though, we’re regulars at a couple of restaurants, we have friends who live nearby, and Lindsey can recognize every single street cat on our commute to work (ask her about how many cat photos are on her phone. seriously). We also have control over our own schedules, so that if one of us hits a roadblock- usually keepers cleaning at an odd time that cuts into our focal time- we get to choose to wait it out or go back to our office to work on data entry or other computer-based work like these blogs! This in independence has been nice over the past few days as the temperatures has started to pick back up. House 1, where we spend half of our time, has almost no shaded viewing for the outdoor yard, so when the pandas are outside on a sunny, 35 degree (no Fahrenheit here) day with 90% humidity, we can choose to remain inside and double up on observations at House 2 or work on data entry. We always check in with James, but we typically get to decide for ourselves. 

We were also lucky enough to take a day off of work a couple of weeks ago and have a field trip to James’s old workplace: The Chengdu Bear Rescue Center! The Bear Center is a sanctuary mostly for Asiatic black bears, also called moon bears, as well as a few Tibetan brown bears and Tibetan macaques. We got a private tour from one of their wonderful employees, Ryan, who we found out has also worked at the Cheetah Conservation Fund in Namibia! We were very excited to share that a couple of our classmates are there this summer as well. During the tour, we were able to see their bear hospital, commissary, teaching vet hospital, education building, and, of course, lots and lots of bears. Most of the bears have been rescued from horrifying conditions in bile farms. We don’t want to get too detailed here, as the treatment of the farmed bears and the methods of harvesting bile are really gruesome, but suffice to say, the bears have a much better life at the Center. If you’re looking to expand your knowledge of international animal welfare issues, bile farming is a big concern here in Asia, and we definitely recommend you read up on it! 

An Asiatic black bear!

Don't you wish you could get this comfortable?

A Tibetan brown bear- an extremely rare subspecies 

A moon bear missing a paw from mistreatment in a bile farm

One big change that’s happened recently is that our friend Miranda went back home to New York! The trials for her project wrapped up last week, and we took her last day off to explore Chengdu with her one last time before seeing her off to the airport. It was definitely a bittersweet day. We’re going to miss Miranda a lot, but now we each get our own room! 

Before we sign off from this blog, since we really want you all to get a feel for how hard this stuff can be, we thought it would be fun to help you all learn a bit about how to tell pandas apart! Making sure we’re watching the right panda is still one of the toughest things about our job, but some are easier than others. So: there are a few different ways to tell the pandas apart. 

The first, and the most convenient, is distinguishing features. Only a few pandas have traits that are so different from the others we can tell who they are immediately. The easiest one to see is Qi Yi, who has a little tuft of fur sticking straight up on her head. Before we knew who was who, we used to call her Alfalfa! The other easily distinguishable trait is the black line on the side of Fu Lai’s face. Mao Tao has somewhat distinct traits, but they’re a little more subtle. He has white armpits that you can see behind his arms when he walks and on his chest when he lies back, and he has a scrunched up nose that gives him a good rugged handsomeness, like a movie bad boy with a mysterious past. His twin Mao Dou, on the other hand, has a much darker chest than all of the other pandas, and his “white” parts are also a bit of a darker color. Ya Yun always has some raggedy looking fur around her mouth and sometimes on one paw due to a licking behavior, and Ya Zhu has extremely wide-set eyes and a noticeable overbite that makes her snout look very pointy. 

The second way to tell the pandas apart, after identifying the more noticeable ones or if they’re all inconveniently turned away from the viewing area, is by the relative size and shape of standard traits. This may be the eyespots; some pandas have much rounder spots, some much longer, some are even particularly rectangular. This may also be the back band. This is really hard to use without another panda for reference, but it can come in handy. For instance, Cheng Shi has a very, very slim back band. Yuan Yue and Wen Wen have similarly-sized bands, but Wen Wen’s is very straight across his back, whereas Yuan Yue’s is slightly pinched in at the middle. You can also use the spots/cowlicks between their eyespots, but this is tricky to see at a distance. If all of the pandas are grouped together, you can also use relative body size. Cheng Shi is the biggest panda in House 1, and Ya Yun is the smallest there by far. 

A third way is just by process of elimination. This happens on those tough days when your focal panda is wildly far away, behind a bush, or sleeping on top of another panda, or, on really bad days, all three. Sometimes, all you can do is run around identifying all the other pandas just to figure out where the one you’re looking for is. This is the most common method used to identify Fu Shun, as well, because he lives with a group of pandas (Qi Yi, Fu Lai, Mao Tao, and Mao Dou) who are all very easy to distinguish, so it’s usually quicker to find the other four first.

The last way is not exactly reliable, but it is fun when you get it right. James calls it the “gestalt,” or the general feel/personality of the panda. It’s the vibe you get, you know? Sometimes you just know who a panda is because you see them walking and recognize them. It only really happens with animals you’ve worked with for a while, and its DEFINITELY pretty arbitrary, but sometimes it’s kind of easy. We’ve found that Ya Yun has a sort of anxious “gestalt” that you can recognize in the way she walks, how she looks around, the way she sits, etc. James also insists that Ya Zhu’s “gestalt” is stupid- he straight up taught us to recognize her as “the one that looks kinda dumb”- but we think she’s perfect the way she is. In any case, the “gestalt” is something we use to guess, but we never start recording until we confirm based on the physical traits.

So, what do you think? Think you could identify a panda with (seemingly) the exact same markings as every other one? Let’s give it a shot! We’ll put a couple of pictures here that we identify, and then a couple you’ll have to guess using the clues above. The answers will be posted with our next blog!

All of the pandas in Number 1: The far back left is Wen Wen, the two leaning on each other are Yuan Yue (left) and Ya Yun (right), the one in the back right is Ya Zhu, and the one in the front right is Cheng Shi.

All of the pandas in Number 2: Looking directly at camera is Fu Shun. To the right of him is Mao Tao. The one who you can see most of the back of is Qi Yi, and the one to the left of Fu Shun with just a 3/4 view of the head is Fu Lai. Mao Dou is hiding between Mao Tao and Qi Yi

So, who do you think this is? The one in front will be #1, and the one in back is #2. (hint: this is in House 1) 

How about this one? We think we gave you an easy one here for #3 (hint: this is in House 2)

Alright, #4 is a little tougher. Got a guess? (hint: this is in House 2)

And for our trickiest ones: #5 in front, and # 6 in back. You can do this! (hint: this is in House 1)

Check back in soon to see if you got them right! If you're struggling, don't worry! We took literally two full work weeks to identify them. All we did the whole time was just walk back and forth between number 1 and number 2, getting help from Miranda and James to figure out who was who. If this is the kind of challenge that you enjoy, maybe you'll want to come intern here!

Week One:Rhinos and Checkups

Name: Ashley Uselmann

Class Year: Junior

Hometown: Carmel, IN

Internship: National Pretoria Zoo

Pretoria, South Africa

It has been crazy since Tia and I landed in South Africa. We both landed in South Africa on the 18^th of May. Tia had just arrived after surviving a 16-hour flight! I met Tia after just arriving from my May-term travel trip in Malawi. We managed to find each other and our driver and were on our way. Both Tia and I were hungry after our trips and decided to stop at a restaurant on our way to the zoo. The first meal that both of us had in South Africa was a fast food chain called Wimpy. Not the most authentic meal we could have eaten. After a short drive, we have arrived in our new home for the next 10 weeks. We met our new housemates, Stefan and Nicholas, and called it a night. I was saying goodbye to one journey and hello to another.

            The start to our journey was a little slow. Many of the staff we were supposed to meet were gone on the weekend, so we had the weekend also to ourselves. However, besides to unpacking and eating, Tia and I were getting a little restless. The house we were staying at was as Tia said, “like Fort Knox”. We were given keys and actually struggled a good five minutes just to leave the house. The kitchen was beautiful and the rooms were huge. However, there is one snag. There is no WIFI…yah Tia and I had to adjust to that aspect a little bit. Yet, we knew there would be WIFI at the research center. We met another one of our housemates named Marianne. Our housemates are amazing. Marianne is a student from France who came to the Zoo’s research center to work on her Masters. Nicholas is a genetics student from Belgium who is also working on his Masters. Finally, there is Stefan from Austria. Stefan is at the zoo to coordinate with them on a project. He has been all around the world and has done so many things that I couldn’t possible list them all. The list of people we met don’t end with them. On Saturday, we met two new friends, Jamie and DD. Jamie is an intern at the research center and DD is a research assistant. Both of them were so kind and took us out shopping for groceries. Both Tia and I had to cringe when we saw the bill, but we knew these groceries were necessary.

            The first day on the job was interesting introduction. How do two zoo students start there stay in a zoo? Of course, they travel around the zoo! Tia and I woke up first thing in the morning and spent a couple of hours just wandering the zoo. I have to say that one animal in particular stole my heart on the first day. Goliath is a white rhino that lives at the Pretoria zoo. He shares an enclosure with another white rhino and a small herd of zebra. Goliath was just an infant when his mother was killed by poachers. He was taken in by authorities and hand-raised by zoo staff. He loves to race cars and people alike! He is a sweet boy! On that same day, Tia and I ventured around to find where were supposed to go. All facilities related animal feeding, animal health, research, and storage are in the same area. Plus, all the buildings look exactly alike! We got lost only a couple of times… After asking a couple of zoo staff, we finally made our way to the research offices. We met with the research coordinator Dr. Netshifhefhe. She briefed us on who we needed to talk to and led us to Dr. Dalton. She gave us our research projects. Tia was given a project that worked on genetic barcoding with different antelope species of South Africa. I was given a project that worked on the microsatellites of a South African antelope species called Bushbuck. We were informed that each of us would be working with a supervisor that would advise us in the lab work. Also, we are expected to write a paper on this lab work that should be publishable by the end of our 10 weeks. In addition to our individual projects, both Tia and I will work on a statistical analysis of penguin measurements taken at several facilities. We knew we had our hands filled. After meeting our supervisors, Tia and I ventured off to meet the zoo’s veterinarians. 

            It was exciting to final meet the veterinarian staff at the hospital. We met with Dr. Rob and Dr. Krisen who were responsible for the health of all the 600 animals in the Pretoria zoo. After a brief discussion about what we were working on with geneticists, the vets agreed that Tia and I could join them on anything they do. We planned on meeting them for morning rounds at 8 am, and will also join them on Wednesday went Dr. Rob plans to go to Mokopani Park. Mokapani Park is an extension of the Pretoria Zoo and Dr. Rob plans to do check ups on a few of the animals there. With that knowledge, Tia and I headed to bed after making a dinner of what’s going to end up our most reliable meal, pasta.

            The first day that we worked with the vets was packed filled. The day started at 8 am for morning rounds. The morning rounds consisted of the whole vet staff checking on the patients that reside in the vet hospital. Some of the patients included: two adorable genets that Dr. Rob himself raised that are waiting for an enclosure designed for them, 4 cockatoos, tow juvenile genets two parrots, a wild dog, a tortoise that had a nasty cut after having a run-in with a hedge clipper, and finally almost 100 confiscated leopard tortoises. 70 of those tortoises are baby tortoises that were just hatched after arriving. Later that same day, Tia and I would check on all 70 of those baby tortoises to make sure first that they were alive, and secondly to check on their body conditions. The few that we pulled out required closer monitoring because of not receiving enough UV light and calcium and as a result having softer shells. And has most of you back home know, a turtle with a soft shell is not good at all.

Me with a baby leopard tortoise. Tia and I had to
inspect around 70 of these adorable creatures.

            After the morning round was finished, our first patient was a moderately high-profile case. An Oryx herd resides within the zoo. These antelopes are listed as a threatened species by the ICUN. Before we arrived, one of the oryx had a metal wire that tore into her hoof and the vets had to stich up the injury. That same oryx was not putting any weight on that leg, so the vets were going to dart her and reexamine the site of injury. After helping the vets dart and treat the animal, Tia and I acted as their scrubs/scribes. We were given charts and recorded: drugs given, doses, heart rate, temperature, breathing rate, etc. All the vets and vet staff work diligently to clean out the reopen wound, stich and wrap it up. Afterwards, she was moved to a stall so could be monitored for a while. Once we knew the oryx was stabilized we moved on to a harder part of the job, post mortems. Two birds, one flamingo and one parrot died unexpectantly and the vets had to determine the cause. We met another vet, Dr. Michelle, who specializes in pathology. We watched has both her and Dr. Krisen searched each animal for signs of illness or injury. It was fascinating how they went step by step at looking at all parts of the animal. With the two post mortems done, so was our day and went home to prepare for an early Wednesday.

A picture of Tia at 5 am. Excited for the day's trip!

            Our Wednesday started early, with waking up at 4 am. Dr. Rob planned for us to leave by 5:30 so we could get to Mokopani by a reasonable time. It was a packed car by the time we were leaving. The group consisted of: Tia and I, Jamie, Dr. Rob, Sabeth (vet tech), and Elizabeta, who is a student from Italy working on her Masters. At Mokopani, our group was led on a tour of the facilities. At the beginning of the trip we planned on darting 2 animals, and we left darting none. We planned on darting on a female Roan antelope and a lioness. The reason we didn’t dart the lioness for her check-up was because she was in heat and we wouldn’t be able to separate her from the male lion. The Roan antelope not being darted that day was a whole other story. We went out to the park’s preserve and left Dr. Rob, Tia, and the vet tech, Sabeth out in a hideout, so they could dart the roan secretly while she was eating. Sadly, right as they were going to dart her, Sabeth ended up sneezing…Loudly. All the roan scattered and we knew we wouldn’t be able to get near them again today. The best part of the day though was when Dr. Rob had to check up on a baby pigmy hippo. He and a couple of others had to pick up the baby, because he managed to sneak into the wrong pen. This pen had a male pigmy hippo and if they stayed together this would lead to a dangerous situation for the baby. Obviously, both baby and the mother of the baby pigmy hippo were angry at the staff for picking up the baby. So, what does an angry hippo mother do? She sprays poop all over the staff. Yah, Dr. Rob had to rinse off before we let him anywhere near the car. It was an exciting adventure!

The protective pygmy hippo mom in front
of her calf. She got Dr. Rob good!

            Thursday was more exciting if possible. Thursday consisted of not only the normal rounds but also with a full checkup of all marmoset monkeys. There were about 9 marmosets in total. First the keepers would gather the marmoset from their respective crates and we would gas them in a box to allow them to sleep during the check-up. Dr. Rob went over each individual’s body condition, head to tail, and we over x-rays. I became the scrub that wrote down all of Dr. Rob’s observations for the record. Tia became the X-ray assistant and would position all the marmosets for their x-rays. The process itself took hours.

            Friday was exciting in a different way. We had to dart a red kangaroo. This kangaroo broke his jaw in the past and the vets wanted to reexamine the wound for possible infection and signs of healing. This particular kangaroo is one of the dominant males of the group. The vets darted him and we were able to pull him from the enclosure without trouble from the other kangaroos. Once we secured him in the vet office, Dr. Krisen worked to clean the wound and reexamine it. It was healing quite nicely! They stitched him back up and we returned him back to his enclosure. Although, he was still unconscious as we were carrying him back into the enclosure. We happen to pass a huge group of school children on the way. Yup, that was fun seeing their reactions and telling them he is not dead, he just had a doctors appointment. There is never a boring day here at the Pretoria Zoo.