Keeping Busy

So last week I spent four days at Newquay Zoo to gain some more experience in husbandry and enrichment ready for being at Tasikoki Wildlife Rescue in November. The experience from Newquay Zoo was to specifically focus on primates and carnivores. It was a very full four days – it is strange how quickly four days can go. It definitely finished too soon at Newquay Zoo!

I feel like I learnt a lot while I was there, but I can’t specifically place what. Just spending four days working with the passionate keepers, watching and listening to them and what was going on. Learning what they do with their animals, why they do it and why they think it needs to be done. It gave me a great insight, and should help me answer many of my own questions of what’s best for these animals when I get to Tasikoki.

It was a great week and full of many things; such as seeing many of Newquay Zoo’s more secretive animals, trying out enrichment with the Fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox) (with interesting results), trying to avoid my fingers being bitten off while attempting to pass food through to some excited Lynx (Lynx lynx carpathica) kittens, being locked in the Squirrel Monkey (Saimiri sciureus) exhibit by a keeper (accidentally, I hope), and being punched in the face by a pair of Capuchins (Cebus xanthosternos)!

All in all it was excellent week, learnt a lot, and met some great people. Hope all goes well for them and the Zoo and hope to see them and the Zoo again when I come back.

Next is the start of two weeks at Paignton Zoo.

Ta ta!

Newquay Zoo: One of a kind

So I went Newquay Zoo yesterday to talk to the Head of Animal Collections and meet the keepers, as I will be starting a week of “Work Experience” on Tuesday to get some experience with their macaques and small carnivores before I head out to Tasikoki. I also got to talk to the Director again which is always good.

I always love visiting Newquay Zoo, it is truly a one-of-a-kind place. It may be small, only covering 13 acres, but it certainly breaks the mould for a traditional zoological collection. Zoos are almost becoming identical, to quote the film Fierce Creatures “…Zoos popping up everywhere, all exactly the same. Leopards on the left, rhinos on the right, monkeys in the middle, sea lions in the centre, ferrets in the front”. Newquay Zoo does have the animals which draw in the crowds like the big cats, the primates, the carnivores. But there are subtle differences, for example; Their big cat collection consists of Lions (Panthera leo) and Carpathian Lynx (Lynx lynx carpathica)… wait a minute Carpathian Lynx, who keeps these? Newquay Zoo, that’s who! They keep the rare and obscure species. Why? Because they are interesting, they need our help, and because they can. One of the better examples of this are their Owston’s Palm Civets (Chrotogale owstoni), ever heard of them? Probably not. There are 18 of these amazing creatures worldwide; Newquay Zoo has 7 of them and none have been seen in the wild in the past 3 years! Newquay saw that they needed our help, and have successfully bred them regularly since they got them. The Director even helped set up a Carnivore and Pangolin Conservation Program in Cuc Phuong National Park in Vietnam, to help these animals.

Newquay Zoo has many of these species not usually seen in Zoological Collections such as; Fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox), Six-banded Armadillos (Euphractus sexcinctus), Kinkajou (Potos flavus), Black Wildebeest (Connochaetes gnou), and Hoffman’s Sloths (Leopus hoffmanni). On top of this, they are very successful with their husbandry and their breeding.

More Zoos around the world should take a page out of Newquay Zoo’s book and take in more of the animals that need our help more urgently than many of the “people pleasers”. And if you haven’t managed to visit Newquay Zoo, it is definitely worth a trip.

Ta Ta!

Researchers, Keepers, and other Animals

Right, well I have now done the presentation at West Midlands Safari Park. It went well. The people who attended seemed to be quite interested, and there were many questions and ideas for further research. Hopefully this will lead to more long term studies at the park and more communication of “goings on” between departments. The presentation also gave other departments an idea of what their Researchers do.

I often feel like Researchers and Keepers are two species of the same genus. They are both adapted to fill similar niches, the improvement of husbandry and the welfare of the animals. However, they have different adaptations (methods) to do this. Researchers often have the knowledge of husbandry and caring for the animals, and want to make sure the animals are well cared for. They keep their observations of the animals filed and look at these in depth and develop changes. But they have traded in their shovels for a pen and a clipboard. On the other hand, keepers, they obviously have the husbandry knowledge. Every day they are with their animals and observe them. They have the ability to pick up a clipboard but they don’t because they appear to be intimidated by the word Research. They shouldn’t be, they do it every day without knowing. In more and more organisations keepers and researchers should work together more for the animals.

But I digress… haha!

Now that I have finished at West Midlands Safari Park things aren’t slowing down. Still sorting things for Tasikoki and all is going well. On top of this though, starting tomorrow I am volunteering alongside some keepers at Newquay Zoo, for a couple weeks, to get some experience with similar animals before heading off to Sulawesi. Not sure what animals I am going to be dealing with at Newquay, probably their Sulawesi Crested Macaques (Macaca nigra) and maybe some of their small carnivores, one of their specialties. Once that is over I’ll be volunteering alongside some keepers at Paignton Zoo from September 25^th with their Macaques, Slow Lorises (Nycticebus pygmaeus), Anoa (Bubalus depressicornis), reptiles and maybe more. We’ll see.

Not a moments rest... I wouldn’t have it any other way!

Ta Ta!

Dissertation: The Sequel

Just when you think university is over and your dissertation is behind you... It comes back to haunt you, though maybe in a good way (is there a positive way of haunting?).

After doing my third year dissertation on the impact of visitors on Ring-tailed Lemurs (Lemur catta) at West Midlands Safari Park I never really thought I would be doing follow-up work.

After my dissertation was submitted WMSP (West Midlands Safari Park) asked if I could prepare a poster for a poster presentation at this year's (2012) BIAZA Research Symposium, unfortunately I was unable to be there in person. My work didn't stop there, soon WMSP asked for me to carry out a shorter follow-up study. This had benefits, threefold; a second set of results could check the validity of last year's work, they can see whether visitors do impact the behaviour of their lemurs, it was also a alpha test for using undergraduate students to carry out research they want doing. It did have benefits for me too; it gave me more practical experience to put on a CV, I may have actually helped the husbandry of these lemurs at the park, I may have help establish many future long-term research projects at the park, and finally it gave me something to do for a month so while I was looking for more long-term work.

Having only just finished my follow-up research for West Midlands Safari Park my work still isn't finished. I now have to prepare for a presentation I am part giving with the research officer at WMSP, and a fellow researcher who helped with observations, visitor questionnaires (seemed to be his forte) and many other aspects. That is still not all. After this I have statistically analyses and some write-up. At least there is a hope of this study being published in the near future (a year or so), hopefully get my name on a scientific document.

Yet, more busy days to come.

Ta Ta!

Wild Fact Files

So I thought making species fact files to learn some of the basics of the animals out in Tasikoki would be a helpful endeavour. They sent me over a list and at first glance it seemed like a good list and it wouldn't be too taxing to get the basic information I wanted... As it turns out it wasn't as simple as I thought.

I thought the best places to find the information I needed on the internet would be the IUCN Red List, ARKive, and Encyclopedia of Life. So I started off with making a basic template that would be easy to get the information off of when reading. That was the most successful part of the task.

Indonesia covers 1% of the world's land mass, and is host to 17% of the World's animal species! It is comprised of approximately 17,000 islands and is one of the most biodiverse countries in the World! Yet, from my search of species at Tasikoki, it must have the most, least studied animals in the World. I would say that most of Tasikoki's animals are "popular" animals as most are confiscated from the illegal pet trade, and yet at least half of the species there either have no available information on them or are described as the least studies of their respective genus in Indonesia.

Perhaps I need a trip to the Natural History Museum in London before I leave the country in November.

My degree in Animal Behaviour is certainly going to be tested as I appear to have to work from scratch on many of these in the coming year.

TTFN!

Wild Indonesia

If it's possible, people who are interested should try and catch the BBC's mini documentary Wild Indonesia. Managed to download them and watch them a couple days ago, as they were unavailable anywhere else. They are good documentaries covering where I am going, and is one of the few I can actually find, either them or the 1985 "Wildlife on One" documentary Sulawesi: Island of Discovery.

It was very good and made me more excited to go.

If you can't catch them on TV you might be able to stream them from here:

1. Island Castaways
2. Underwater Wonderland
3. Magical Forests

Ta Ta!

Job Description

Hmmm, how should I start this blog off? I suppose I best start off with what I am actually going there to do.

Tasikoki Wildlife Rescue's plan for the enrichment coordinator's job involves the research and observation of the wild counterparts of the species currently housed at the sanctuary: how would they spend their days in the wild, look at the captive enclosure, look at the animal individually, and propose different kind of enrichment that target certain behavioural or physical aspects needed to rehabilitate in order to either release or move to sanctuary care. It would be the coordination of the environmental and nutritional enrichment. One of their goals is to be able to change all the feedings into enrichment. They would like to change as far as possible the enclosures too in order to meet, where possible, the 5 freedoms of animal welfare.

Cannot wait to start and start adding to the Sanctuary.

Scott Out!