update two of two

Sorry, I didn't have my camera for this one. We got to feed the Nile Crocodiles on Friday. Not just prepare their raw chicken and fish, but actually throw it at them from a safe distance. So now I can say I actually did get to feed the animals at Disney World.

First, a little background info. There are 27 Nile Crocodiles at the Animal Kingdom. They're all males and they're all in the same exhibit on the Kilamanjaro Safari ride. The exhibit also contains some small fish that breed and that the crocs munch on every once in a while, along with the occasional vulture or local egret. There's a trick bridge that goes past the crocs' open exhibit that kinda rotates and makes you think you're going to fall into the croc pond when you're riding in the Safari truck. It's maybe six to eight feet above the surface of the water and there's a fence under the bridge so the crocs can only hang out on one side. It was from this bridge that we fed the crocs.

We started off around 7 AM with several large containers of about 320 pounds total of raw chicken halves and tilapia. When someone threw the first chicken, all the sleepy-looking crocs slinked into the water to grab what they could. I was hoping they would catch the fish in their mouths like a dog would catch a hot dog, but they usually just grabbed it after it landed. There was a lot less aggression in the exhibit than you'd expect with 27 male crocs, but the croc keeper said that's because there are no females for them to impress. You'd see two crocs going for the same chicken and whoever got there first was the winner; there just weren't any fights. (Once again, I'm sorry I don't have any pictures!)

The crocs liked the chicken better than the fish, of course. They have good taste. They even left some of the fish at the bottom of the shallow pool to look for more chicken, and you could see some of the small (living) fish feeding on it. After the feeding "frenzy" (it wasn't really a frenzy) was over, some of the more dominant crocs started looking around for the scraps that everyone left behind. The little fish swam away when the crocs came to grab the leftover tilapia from the shallows.

Crocs have great eyesight, and although they're not terribly agile, they are quite fast. Crocs have the same magnetic-sensory thing that sharks have in their heads that allows them to find their prey, but the awesome difference between crocs and sharks in this respect is that the croc has this sense all over his body--it's not restricted to his head. Crocs are also omnivores. Surprising, right? They've been known to eat fruit from low-hanging branches in the wild, and the crocs that we met love tomatoes. So this sort of made my morning. :)


I finally downloaded my pictures from the Lodge, so I'll post some of them soon, too!

update one of two

far back row: Stephanie, me, Ben, Bethany, Annie, Doug
middle row: Debbie, Katie, Liz, Stephanie, Nancy, Emily, Karen
front row: Shannon, Lisa, Gary

That's a picture of most of the people I work with. In guest clothing (as opposed to costumes). A few weeks ago, Gary (one of the two Nutrition Center managers) took us on a backstage tour of two scary rollercoasters at Hollywood Studios: the Hollywood Tower of Terror and the Rockin' Rollercoaster.

Our tour guide, T.J., has worked at the Tower of Terror since it opened. Apparently the ride tends to malfunction when he's not there. The Tower likes him. Anyway, he showed us the security area where they monitor the ride and make sure that no middle-aged women try to jump out of the elevator car before the scary drop part. He also explained the random drop sequence selection to us and how the Disney World Tower of Terror is different from the one at Disney Land California (the elevator car at Disney Land doesn't leave the shaft like ours does). He told us that Tower was the most expensive ride in Disney World... until Test Track's track had to be rebuilt three times. Tower also had the most computers of any ride in Disney World... until Test Track decided the solution to their problems was more computers! TJ also told us about some of the antiques in the lobby of the Tower (ToT).


The chairs set at this table date back to the 1500s(?). They're Portugese. The ToT Imagineers found them at an estate sale in California and bought them for super cheap because the descendants of the recently deceased owner didn't know what they had. Another cool thing about this photo is the attention to detail. The story behind the Hollywood Tower Hotel is that it was struck by lightning in the 1930s and was then transported into the Twilight Zone. Although the bellhops are destined to stay there forever, many of the hotel guests were able to make it out in time. You can see that a lady left her handkerchief and gloves on the table and that there's an imprint of her lipstick on the wine glass. The plates are antiques, too, but some of the smudges on them are from the pastries the couple was enjoying when the disaster occurred. The cobwebs were made from hot glue. The lampshade was made from an old 1920s flapper's dress. There's a company that specializes is making dead silk flowers.



MahJong (I think that's how it's spelled)--the Chinese? tile game--was gaining popularity in America at this time. The two men who were playing the game ran out of the hotel without cleaning up their game.



This couch is not a genuine antique, but it has its own cool story. When the Imagineers were looking for furniture for the Tower, they happened upon a furniture advertisement from the 1920s. They called the number on the flyer, and the company was miraculously still in business. Still more surprising was that the company still had the means to make the sofa that the Imagineers saw in the ad. So they bought two identical new-antique sofas... and that's one of them!

I didn't really hear the significance of the rest of these photos, but they're still cool to look at. :)

Easter Excitement

Today started like any other day with the morning meeting at 5 AM in the Animal Nutrition Center break room. No terribly interesting announcements were made, but at the end of the meeting, the manager/proprietor, Debbie, announced that there were Easter eggs hidden all over the building for us to find. And there were. Free Easter candy for the interns! After we emptied the eggs we found in the hay room, Doug and I put random not-candy items inside them and re-hid them. Some of the treats we put into said eggs include the following: pen caps, tacks, paperclips (all courtesy of Doug), dried currants and apricots, grapes, and cooked sweet potato (my idea). We were just going to hide them empty, but we thought this would be more fun. Debbie will be re-filling the eggs with candies and re-hiding them on Tuesday night for the folks who work on Wednesday. What surprises they will find!

Today was different from any other day yet this semester. I went on deliveries with Doug. This job involves taking large bags of feed, bales of hay, and all of the diets to the barns. Which also means we get to see the animals.

The first barn we went to was the lion barn. We totally peeked at the lions, and they stared at us like lions do. They started roaring when we left. Awesome. Then we went to the tiger barn. One tiger was chilling and wasn't really interested in us, but another looked like it was about to pounce. Fortunately there were fences and electricity between the tigers and us. Or else they totally could have killed us.

The rest of the morning went well, and at some point we went to the hippo barn. All the hippos in this barn were males, and apparently they don't always get along that great when they're all squashed into the exhibit together. So one of them stayed behind, and Moe the hippo keeper invited me to meet him! Moe grabbed a heart of celery and led me over to the hippo's face (mind you, there are 12-inch concrete poles between us and the hippo). He raised his arm (this is a hand signal they use for training) and the hippo opened his mouth. Moe rubbed the hippo's tongue and threw two long stalks of celery into his mouth. The hippo's teeth were huge. Blunt, but huge. And apparently this hippo's teeth aren't as big as some of the other hippos' teeth. The hippo spat out the celery, but Moe patted his head anyway. I scratched his forehead and he flopped down on the ground. Moe rubbed the hippo's side and this lathery, sudsy whiteness showed up, as if the hippo had just been bathed and still had soap on his skin. But they hadn't just bathed the hippo; apparently hippos make their own sunscreen. I rubbed the hippo's side, too. His skin was soft... like a cactus pad without the prickly hurts. I pet a hippo today. :D

Later that afternoon we delivered diets to the Avian Research Center (ARC). This is a behind-the-scenes bird barn whose primary purpose is to breed rare and endangered bird species. One of the keepers there gave me a quick tour when I told her I was totally into birds. I got to see Fred, the geriatric raven; some gorgeous Micronesian Kingfishers; a pretty female green junglefowl, which the keeper said is kind of like a smart chicken; the enormous Victoria crowned pigeon; a medley of wee little weavers; some carmine bee-eaters; Indian and African Pygmy geese with cute little bills; and a ton of other birds I can't even remember the names of right now. We toured the incubation facilities, too. It was neat to see that they'd had some success breeding these rare birds while other zoos have failed. Then Doug and I went over to Conservation Station and talked to the parrots, which happen to be rather personable and friendly.

The last cool animal interaction of the day was at Conservation Station. There are a bunch of random mammals housed here, including a tamandua (a rather small version of an anteater) with diabetes, two agouti (think of a guinea pig about the size of a normal house cat), some bunnies, hedgehogs, a possum, and more random animals. I didn't get to pet any of these creatures, but they were cool to look at! Especially the tamandua, who had just awoken from her nap.

I know, what an amazing day! But it doesn't end there. At some point during our casual conversation in the truck, I mentioned to Doug that I need to get rabies shots for vet school. He said that I could get them for free here. "Free?" I replied, skeptical. "I think so. Ask Debbie. Or Nancy," was his cryptic response. I didn't get my hopes up, but I talked to Nancy at the end of the day. She confirmed that I could get free rabeis shots simply because I work in Animal Programs. Wow. Free. That's a $516 value. Absolutely free. So I went straight to the first aid trailer (i.e., the work-related medical services facility) after work and got the first of my three-shot series of pre-exposure rabies vaccinations. For free. I have to go back next week and two weeks after that. But it's free. I'm not complaining. I can't get over this. It should have cost me at least $172 today and it didn't cost me one cent. That's my kind of Disney Magic.

I really need to take a shower because the hay made me itchy, so I'm going to go do that now. Goodnight, my loyal fans! <3

Zootrition!

On Saturday, the nutritionist, Eduardo Valdes, gave us a lecture on zoo nutrition. He used to work as nutritionist at the Toronto zoo, and was formerly a zoo keeper and has a background in horse nutrition research. In his lecture, he emphasized that what we don't know about zoo animals is so much greater than what we do know, and that what we don't know can sometimes end up being fatal for the animal. There's so much variation among zoo animals, and they're so different from well-studied animals like horses, pigs, chickens, and cattle that it's difficult to use a domesticated animal like that as a model.

Another challenge of zoo nutrition is replicating a diet in the wild; for example, it's difficult to create the African savannah in Florida. The grasses here are green and highly digestible; the grasses in Africa are brown and very difficult to digest. That sounds like a good thing, right? Florida grass is more nutritious than African savannah, so it would be better for the elephant and the giraffe and the impala and the gazelle to eat. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Each of these animals has developed a very specialized digestive system that gives them a specific niche in the African plains. The giraffe prefers to pick leaves from trees rather than eat the brown grass that the elephant can't get enough of. So instead of feeding the elephant lush green Florida grass, we feed him straw. The elephant needs that mass of mostly indigestible material in his gut to make sure it functions properly--that's how he's designed to eat.

The way the animals eat is also important. The giraffe needs to stretch out its neck while he is eating. If you offer the giraffe the best leaves you can find and put them on the ground, he's not going to eat them. We have to hang his leaves up high so that he has to stretch to reach them. This, too, ensures proper functioning of his digestive system.

Eduardo is a clinical nutritionist, so he also showed us pictures of nutrient deficiencies and toxicities. You can find vitamin A supplements in the reptile section of Petsmart, but too much vitamin A will make your turtle lose its scales. Too little vitamin A, on the other hand, will make your frog's tongue lose its stickiness. Too much phosphorus and not enough calcium in the diet will force your iguana to absorb its own bones. This is an irreversible problem.

We didn't get to see a great number of clinical photographs because Eduardo had already been lecturing for two and a half hours at this point, but I think he may kidnap us interns again sometime in the future to finish his presentation. I miss learning things... so I'm that much more excited about going to vet school in August. :D

Bat Tour

malayan tapir hiding in the bushes :)

I believe I'm approximately at the half-way point of my internship, and I feel like there's still so much we haven't done yet. Two weeks ago we were going to see a crocodile feeding (i.e., we were going to throw raw chicken at the crocs from a reasonably safe distance and watch them devour it), but that was canceled for some reason I can't recall. We did, however, get to see the bats.

Rodriguez Flying Fox

We have two species of bats at Disney's Animal Kingdom: the vampire bat and the Rodriguez fruit bat, also known as the flying fox. One of the bat keepers gave us a short lesson on bats and showed us their enclosure (the part that's behind-the-scenes) and their exhibit (the part that you see as a park guest). I wasn't allowed to take pictures behind-the-scenes; sorry! If you notice in the picture above, there are all sorts of random ropes and whatnot hanging all over the exhibit. There's also a long rope path leading from the indoor enclosure into the exhibit. The bats don't fly in at night or fly out in the morning--they climb and crawl along the ropes to get where they want to go. There are ropes that touch the ground both in the exhibit and in the indoor enclosures that allow the bats to climb back up high if they fall for whatever reason.

All of the bats here are males. As with any animal, too much testosterone in one place will inevitably lead to an occasional brawl. The bats have their own hierarchy that changes every day. Each bat has two specific places that it likes to hang out; one spot in the exhibit and one spot in the indoor enclosure. The higher the bat's hangout, the higher his status. The location of that hangout doesn't really change unless one of the lower bats decides to challenge a higher bat.

When a bat feels intimidated, he spreads his wings so that he looks bigger. He'll also curl his lip and snap like an angry dog would. (side note: a bat's face looks a lot like a dog's face, but bats are most closely related to primates. wow!) The bats' wings are highly vascular, so they will spread and flap their wings to cool off in the Florida heat. This isn't a threatening move, but it's pretty cool to see them when they're not folded up.

There is plenty of room in the exhibit for each bat to spread out and not hang near the bats he doesn't particularly care for, but the indoor enclosure isn't quite as spacious. Instead, one of the bat keepers designed a system of "curtains" that blocks the bats' view of each other so that more bats can be kept in one small area. Essentially, no one bat has any idea that three or more of his enemies are hiding just behind the curtains. Not that he would be bothered by such matters anyway, as there are all kinds of parrot toys and cloths and random ropes to distract him from such a disturbing thought.

Another neat thing that the bat keeper showed us was training. Each bat is trained to touch his nose to a stick with a big red ball on the end of it, and they get to lick some tasty jelly from a bowl as a reward. I think the two main reasons they do this is a) to familiarize the bats with humans, and b) to distract them so they can be examined physically without putting the vet's appendages in danger. They're working on training the bats to crawl to and hang on a scale (think a grocery store scale with a hanging hook instead of the hanging basket) so that they can get a voluntary weight from them at any time. So to anyone who thinks I can't train my cats, I say, it is possible to train any animal!

Animal Interactions!

One of the downsides to my job is that I'm not really supposed to have any animal interaction. I prepare the diets; I don't feed them. But one of the upsides to my job is the research component. Usually this involves running samples of different types of feed (e.g., hay, squid, grass, etc.) through some sort of analysis or entering said analyses into a database. Last week on research day, we visited the Animal Kingdom Lodge (which shall henceforth be referred to as "the Lodge") to take paddock grass samples. We couldn't exactly shoo the animals off of the "savannah" while we were obtaining these samples, so we mostly just worked around them.

Keep in mind, these are wild animals, and although most of them have never known anything but a zoo habitat, they're still potentially dangerous. The Lodge animal manager, Leisl, was with us to make sure no one got hurt (animals and humans alike). Most of the animals shied away when we ran the gas-powered grass cutter, but the ostriches were a little more curious and a little less afraid.

There are several ostriches at the Lodge and all of them are female. Like many animals, birds tend to start their breeding season when food and daylight are plentiful. In a zoo, that means year-round. Leisl said the ostriches lay fewer eggs in the winter, but they never stop laying eggs. (I imagine the outdoor lights at the Lodge probably play a role in increasing the amount of daylight the ostriches perceive, but that's just speculation.) Anyway, that's just a roundabout way of explaining why the ostriches were less afraid of us: they wanted to flirt. With no boys around, these girls will try to impress anyone! They strutted up to us one or two at a time, bowed, and sort of flapped their wings. It was really cute. After a few minutes of showing off ("presenting," as our research specialist called it), the ostrich would sit on the ground and munch on the grass.

I've heard that one kick from an ostrich can kill you, but Leisl told us that they've never been aggressive without proper provocation (like restraint for blood sampling). The biggest problem they've had is their curiosity--they'll peek inside the truck windows and swallow whatever they can find. So every once in a while, an ostrich has to go to the hospital to have a pen or some other foreign body removed from her esophagus.

The ostriches were peaceful when we met them, but the zebras were another story. The young male has been picking fights with the rest of his herd lately, so we got to see some of the action. This was actually kind of bad because the zebras weren't really paying attention to where they were going when the girl was trying to kick the boy in his face. They could have easily stampeded us had we not jumped in the van. Leisl drove the van and one of the keepers in a golf cart helped her herd the male away from the rest of the zebras so that they would stop fighting, but we left that area and went to sample the grass elsewhere. The blesbok that was chilling near our "elsewhere" didn't seem to mind, but every animal is potentially dangerous, so it's always a good idea to be cautious and watchful.

Anyway, it was really cool to actually see some of the animals that we make diets for. In addition to the aforementioned animals, we saw little Thompson's gazelle (which look like dogs when they run around and play!), the big male Kudu (his horns make a sort of corkscrew shape and he walks in a proud, stately manner), the giraffe, impalas, West African crowned cranes, Abyssinian Ground Hornbill (a type of bird), and so many more. Research day is a nice break from making diets, and it makes it more interesting when you can actually picture the animal eating what you're preparing for it.

I'll try to get some of the pictures that we took that day off of Katie's computer and I'll post them here when/if I do! I got some good shots of the ostriches presenting and the zebras fighting, so hopefully I will succeed!

Waterfowl + Lemur

African Crested Crane

Stork

Lesser Pelicans

Lemur

Reptiles and Birds

Scratch what I said before about dragons; there's a Komodo Dragon, too.

Golden Pheasants (in the back) and Blue Crested Pigeon--the largest pigeon species.

Yellow-faced... bird...? Sorry, I don't remember this one's name.

Mandarin Duck couple. The female is on the left and the male is on the right. They were protecting their nest from the yellow-faced thing (above) when I first saw them.

more animalz.

Tapir! She's actually kind of huge and she eats a lot.

















The bat is on the left. His bok choy snack is hanging next to him.

















BLOOD PYTHON! :)

Dino Sue and the Asian primates

Dino Sue! This is the only cast that was made of the largest dinosaur ever discovered.

Mommy and baby Siaming.

White-Cheeked Gibbon family. Mum is brown and dad is black. Baby is black, too.

Gibbons in love <3

Apparently I can only post four photos at a time.

Giant Anteater

the only dragon in the park...

Nile Crocodile

DINOSAUR!

Birds! and a turtle.

Black-Necked Swan

Box Turtle?

Scarlet Macaws

Military Macaw

Indian Spot-Billed Duck

I couldn't get more than one photo on this post. Sorry.

Animal Kingdom species!

I went on a self-guided tour of the zoo portion of Animal Kingdom last Wednesday after my class. Here are some of the animals I saw! (The name of the animal is below the photograph.)

African Spoonbill!

Patagonian Cavy. I think it's the fourth largest rodent in the world?

Muntjac (a type of small deer with a funny name). We have a male and a female.

Babirusa (a type of pig; their diets are fun to make). We have a male and a female of these, too!

Rhinoceros Iguana.

I'm still here!

I haven't updated in a while, but I have an exciting, picture-filled update coming soon! (I'd put it up now, but my internet connection is awful and I don't have time to wait for the photos to upload.)

I'm really happy because I got to talk about chickens with the guests last weekend while I was working at the nutrition center window. It's fun when they're surprised to hear that it takes 26 hours for a hen to lay an egg. :) I'm supposed to be advancing conservation, but why not mix in a little agriculture, too?

I miss you, my friends, and I look forward to seeing you when you come to visit me. ;)

yet another post that has little to do with Disney

I went to Athens this weekend because I had four consecutive days off. It was great to be out of Florida; to see trees without leaves; to see my parents, my neighbors Ray and Elaine, and my other cat Charlotte (who elected to stay in Athens). It was especially great to see Ashley and Alyssa. I really miss them.

And I realized that I really like Athens and the surrounding agricultural towns. Madison. Bishop. Watkinsville. On the way back to Orlando, I passed just-harvested cotton fields, chillin' dairy cows, quiet chicken houses, massive timber forests, grazing horses, and all other manner of heartbreakingly beautiful farmland colored by the rising sun.



(So I cheated... I took those back in October when I went on a short personal road trip toward Madison; I didn't take them today.)

The kid who gave me a tour of the vet school did a really great job. Even though his... "concentration" was exotics, he was very knowledgeable about the large animal and small animal concentrations, as well. I think I'll send him a thank-you note along with the one I was planning to send to the admissions advisor.

On top of all that, I got to pretend to be a vet student for a day, thanks to Alyssa (consider this your thank-you note)! I sat in on virology (? I'm pretty sure I heard Alyssa ask, 'What class is this?' when it started. It seemed like physiology, though...) before the tour, then rassled some normal Earth goats and some monster alien sheeps in anatomy lab. I wish I'd gotten pictures of those sheeps. Their heads come up to your chest. A normal sheep might be able to nose your hip with some dificulty. But these sheeps were just... enormous freaks.

Traffic was GREAT today. No kidding. That's all I have to say about that.


Still no news from ISU in the mailbox... but I did get an application for a $7500 low-interest student loan that is not associated with the government! I need to fill that out before May 1st. And do my taxes, my FAFSA, look up/apply to other possible loans and scholarships, etc. I'm going to start those things now.

<3

I found something to do!

Friday night I went to Christa and Winnie's place and we had dinner and watched Terms of Endearment. It was actually kind of a bad movie, but it was fun to hang out with them. Christa is a dancer, so we went to Hollywood Studios on Saturday to watch the national high school dance competition in the Indiana Jones Theater. It was really awesome. One of the groups danced to a hip-hop version of the Phantom of the Opera and they all dressed up like the Phantom with the masks and everything. Another group took an 80s approach and did a Michael-Jackson-meets-hip-hop number (they were all hip-hop dance groups, by the way). We also watched the Muppets 3-D show, then hopped on a bus to Magic Kingdom to ride Space Mountain and Haunted Mansion. Both were superfun, of course. I love Space Mountain. It was fun hanging out with them, but I had to leave kind of early so that I could meet Patrick for dinner.

Patrick is a close friend of Travis McReynolds, whose family has been friends with my family for as long as I can remember. I met him during the weekend of Travis and Stacy's wedding, and saw him again at the McReynolds family Christmas (or was it New Year's?) party a few years ago. He was visiting his parents this weekend. They live in Eustis now, which is apparently not far from Orlando, so we met at a Thai restaurant in Orlando. We talked and ate... the food was good, but the service was kind of slow even though everyone was rather accomodating. He seems like a nice kid. I guess I might see him again in a few months if he decides to stay with his parents.

I slept in super late today (again, because I had nothing to do). I'll do laundry and go grocery shopping tomorrow while everyone is at work.

I'm really looking forward to next weekend because I'm going back to Athens for a few days. Hopefully I'll get to see some of my friends again and I'll finally go on an official tour of the UGA vet school. Maybe I'll bring Charlotte back with me.

Next week, I have one day of research, two days of training, and one day on my own. These food prep stations take a long time to complete.

Still waiting to hear from ISU.

I never thought I'd say this, but I have too much time on my hands.

I washed my five Disney-issued costumes the other day and hung them all in my closet. It was then that I realized that I am a cartoon character. I think I know how Doug feels now.

It's great that my workday is 11 hours long. That gives me a couple hours to spend at home in the evening, but not too much time because I have to sleep. I like to stay busy. But because my workday is so long, I only work 4 days each week. Normal people would rejoice over a 3-day weekend. At the moment, I have nothing to do with my 3-day weekend. No Ashleys to hang out with, no one to go to the park with, nothing to study, no projects to work on, no dead birds to put into their designated trash cans. That's okay. I can make things to do.

I tried really hard to spend as much time sleeping as I could simply because I knew I had nothing to do, but my body started convulsing or something and I realized that too much sleep can be a bad thing.

Saturday, I found a library. It was a pretty crummy library, but what can you expect from the state of Florida? Their DVD collection was larger than their book collection. All the kids there were crying because they didn't want to be at the library, and the adults who were there never learned how to read because they were too busy talking. But I managed to block them out and search for scholarships. I found a few that I might be eligible for, and I found a low-interest loan for female GA residents that looked promising. Then I went home and printed applications and sent letters to those that didn't have websites.

I'm going to have to find something to do with all this extra time. I cleaned my apartment. I did some laundry. I knitted. I watched TV. I went for a jog. I looked up dual degree programs, assistantship opportunities, and curriculum at ISU vs. UGA (ISU is looking better and better, sorry Mum and Dad and Ashleyz). But I'm not in yet.


Tomorrow is Research Day! Yay! Last week we learned how to analyze hay samples on the Near-Infrared (NIR) Spectrophotometer. I was delighted to learn that I wouldn't have to apply my knowledge of organic chemistry to be able to use this machine (Katie, the research specialist, pointed out that I'll never have to use o-chem again. hallelujah!). Each of the four of us is responsible for updating the diets of certain animals in the park; naturally, I'm responsible for all the birds. :D And some other species like Axis deer or something. We're each going to have a big research project, too, but I'm not entirely sure yet how that's going to work. In the meantime, we'll also do hay samples and freeze-drying and stuff.

For the rest of the week, Bethany and I will be learning "Prep 2," or "Food Preparation Station Number 2." This is where a lot of the herbivore diets are made. Apparently this is the most time-consuming station. We'll see how it goes. Then I have another three-day weekend.

Iowa State University College of Veterinary Medicine

This has nothing to do with my internship, except in the sense that I was granted three days off to go to ISU to interview for admission into their College of Veterinary Medicine. Except that isn't actually why I was given three days off... I had already been scheduled to have those three days off, so I guess things work out really well like that sometimes.

I left early Saturday morning for Des Moines and arrived on time with no plane delays. My first view of Iowa from the plane window was surprising. The plane broke through the thick layer of white clouds to reveal sheets of snow arranged in neat squares between the black roads. To someone who has not yet been disillusioned to the horrors of snow, it was beautiful. I made it through the airport and had some horrible complications with the rental car. My dear parents graciously tried to help me resolve the issues, but in the end I ended up hitching a ride with a girl named Kara who, like me, was also interviewing at ISU. At this point, I'm starting to think it was more than just luck that got me to Ames.

Kara and I snuck in late with this other kid and caught the last half of the welcome presentation. She left to go on a tour and I stayed behind and watched the financial aid presentation. I learned a TON at this. First of all, I need to turn in my FAFSA by March 1st to be eligible for loans. Because I am a professional student, I have to file independently. This is good for two reasons: 1) I officially can't burden my parents with that financial responsibility, and 2) it increases my financial need, which makes me eligible for certain loans (financial need = tuition - expected family contribution; so maybe there is a slight benefit to the high out-of-state tuition). My expected family contribution will probably be zero if I can't get a part-time job in the hospital. There are two great loans with very low interest rates that are need-based, and there are two others that are not need-based. Plus, there's always scholarships! So. Since I have a lot of free time, I'm going to look for free money. :)

After the financial aid presentation, I had my picture taken for the class composite (it felt like elementary school picture day) and had my lab coat sized. Then I waited in another room for my interview. They had an informative magazine thing that told the history of the school. ISU has the oldest vet school in the country. It was founded in 1879. The black and white photos from that time were pretty fascinating. I don't know when the lab coat was invented, but all the vet students in this old pictures were dressed in 1870s garb, watching their prof float the teeth of this anesthetized horse that was lying on a huge wooden table. They have a very rich history, but they're also on the cutting edge of teaching. There are tons of learning resources available to their students, and one of my interviewers said that they continue to provide those resources even after graduation (i.e., one of his former professors agreed to do a difficult surgery on a cow that no one else could perform, but only if he would observe the surgery and thus learn how to do it himself).

I finally got called in for my interview. My interview committee consisted of three veterinarians. Two were practicing large animal vets (a man from Iowa and a woman practicing in Southwest Wisconsin), and the third used to be a professor at the university, but is now an administrator. I had prepared beforehand by finding previously asked questions on the internet... but they asked me a couple that I hadn't seen before and the rest of them were worded kind of differently. I think I managed to answer them all fairly well. The one that I hadn't seen before was whether I had ever seen anyone cheating before, and I told them I hadn't because I choose study partners who are just as dedicated to studying as I am. The dairy vet asked me about Proposition 2, which is a law passed last year in California that restricted certain agricultural practices. It was not supported by the American Veterinary Medicine Association and is widely accepted as the final nail in the coffin for California agriculture. I told them why I didn't support it, but if it turned out to do good things for California agriculture, then maybe we should look into expanding animal welfare programs. And now I'm thinking of other things I could have said... but anyway. That was a knowledge-based question, and the interview was supposed to be more behavioral-based. I don't know whether that really counted, but hopefully I gave them a good impression.

After the interview, I went on a tour of the school and the teaching hospital. ISU has just expanded their large animal treatment facilities and will soon be breaking ground on an expansion of their small animal facilities. The new large animal area is "open," but they're not using it yet. The first-year tour guide told us she hoped that she would be able to use the new small animal facility when she begins her clinical rotations in two years. It's kind of nice that everything is accessible indoors. It wasn't unbearably cold this weekend, but it was twenty below last week. It's nice that they have seasons, I think.

The office staff were kind enough to find me a cab to get me to my hotel. I spent much of the night on the phone with my friend Alyssa, who is currently studying at UGA's vet school, but applied to Michigan State last year as well. We fantastized about living in the midwest and the inconveniences of living in the cold and talked about Obama's inauguration and other random things. I got up early and took the same cab back to the airport. I waited in the airport for several hours because I couldn't get on an earlier flight (which is probably a good thing because it would've cost me $50). When I finally did get on the plane, I had a window seat. It was surprisingly sad to leave, but not because I was going back to the only state I might dislike more than California. I really like Iowa, and Ames is a charming town.

Unfortunately, I developed a sinus infection over the weekend (it started before I left--I can't blame it on the Iowa cold...). The plane ride was kind of agonizing, and I'm almost deaf in my right ear now. But I'm on steroids and antibiotics so hopefully it'll clear up soon!

Knives, Browse, TB, tour

We arrived today at 4:30 AM only to learn that the free coffee room would not be accessible until 4:45. They also have free hot cocoa, of which I am a huge fan. They gave us a free thermos on Monday, too, so we don't have to waste paper cups.

The first thing we did today was the 5:00 AM meeting. Then we went on a tour of the facilities and learned where everything is and how it's organized. We learned how to use and sharpen knives and we got our very own knife kit! I'm super excited about using cutlery every day.

Mike took us on a tour of the browse fields. Disney has the largest browse fields of any zoo in the country, with over 200 acres of browse that they harvest to feed to their animals, and most of it is exotic species that grow quite rapidly. For comparison, the 2nd largest browse field operated by a zoo in the U.S. is 40 acres. I'm beginning to see the benefit of working at a zoo that's as well-financed as Disney's.

After the browse tour was a tour of the recycling and composting facilities. Try to imagine how much garbage a resort as large as Disney creates in a day. Now imagine all that going into a landfill. Everyday. Disney World really is like its own World--it has its own composting and recycling plant. And it's massive. They sell a lot of their compost and recycled material to offset the costs of the facility. But they save some of the compost to give to their cast members (i.e., employees) for free. :D

Katie talked to us for a good while about the research component of our internship. We'll each be in charge of a group of animals as well as a list of several species that need close monitoring. We'll compile and update data on these species every week (if not more frequently). We'll also have our own research project and a presentation to give. Katie and the rest of our leaders are very open to questions and seem impressively organized, so I'm really excited to be working with them.

Shannon took us to have our TB tests read, then we went on a quick tour of Walt Disney World. She told us about secret passageways and showed us where they fired the fireworks over the castle in the Magic Kingdom and let us in on the exciting discounts and benefits we get as Disney cast members.

I guess that doesn't seem like much, but it made for a long day. I'm going to have to get used to going to sleep at 7 PM and getting up at 3 AM.

Smile!

My cat has these funny spurts of energy that she likes to expend by running like mad around my little studio apartment, leaping to the top of the enormous playground that my dad and I built for her, or climbing her 4.5-foot-tall scratching post as if it were a small tree. At the moment, she is perched like a hen (as Mike would say) atop her cat tree on the porch, looking around in short, rapid motions. She really looks a lot more like a bird than a cat at the moment.

It's my day off, and I've been spending it watching my cat and thinking about Iowa. I did some laundry and watched Juno, but mostly I've just been lounging. Probably a good idea because I'll be getting up around 3 AM for the next six months.

Yesterday we went on a tour of the Animal Kingdom park. Our trainers were very enthusiastic, like everyone who works at or visits the happiest place on Earth! We learned about some of the animals, heard the story behind Dinoland, U.S.A. and the Yeti(!), learned how the dragon idea was scrapped from the project back in the day, saw Festival of the Lion King, got greeted by Chip, and listened to Guitar Dan sing a song about our fellow interns Jess and Jess in Camp Minniemickey. They took us to Pride Rock for lunch and to meet our leaders, who were kind enough to pay for our meal.

We (me and the three other nutrition interns: Stephanie, Kim, and Bethany), met our leaders: Gary, Shannon, and Katie. They're all really nice and I'm excited about working with them. They took us to the health center for our TB test in a full-size van, then we went to the costuming and auditions building so that we could pick out our uniforms. We wear this lovely green outfit with cargo pockets all over the shirt and pants or shorts. It took a while for three girls to pick out the clothes that fit right, but we all made it out eventually. After that, we finally got our first glimpse of the Animal Nutrition Center. Our quick tour showed us that the carnivore diets are prepared on a separate table than the herbivore diets, that the fruits and vegetables fed to the animals are of the same high quality as that which they serve at the resort, and that the forage has its own freezer. I'll start my area-specific training tomorrow... if I get home in time to beat the Coconut Palms internet rush, I'll write a quick post about it. 4:30 AM - 3:30 PM! Yes!

Animal Kingdom Internship: Day 2

I think it's about time for an update, even if nothing exciting has really happened yet.

Wait--that's not entirely true. I found out yesterday that Disney will be paying me a relocation fee, which I didn't expect but that I'm extremely grateful for!

Anyway. Today I went to a four-hour orientation class that outlined the history of the company; the sexual harassment policy; the importance of safety, courtesy, efficiency, and show; among other things. I got my name tag and my ID, so that was cool. Yesterday I received my schedule and met some of the people that I'll be working with for the next six months. There are four girls interning in the nutrition center, including me. We'll all have an Animal Kingdom orientation with the other animal interns tomorrow from noon til five, and I'm looking forward to it.

Everyone here is really enthusiastic and happy, which is great. On the other hand, they aren't afraid to threaten us with "termination," as they like to call it, if we show up one minute late to any of these things that we're supposed to attend. It's like Jekyll-and-Hyde terrifying.


I'm looking forward to meeting my leaders, in part because I want to thank them for giving me a few days off to go to my vet school interview at Iowa State. I'm extremely excited about this interview, but also extremely nervous. I was practicing last night, and the longer I practiced, the more relaxed I became (that's good because the interview will be one hour long). It's hard to answer questions like, "Tell us about a time when you overreached and overloaded yourself and what you learned," or "Discuss a change or uncontrollable event that occured that caused you great stress and how you reacted to it." I met a vet student this summer who goes to Iowa State, and I was able to convince him to show me around the small town Ames this weekend. That's right. It's exactly seven days to the hour until I introduce myself to the interview panel. Yikes. I need practice.