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!