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