Primates

Apologies for the slightly late and shorter post this week.

Yesterday I started work on the primate section of the zoo. Unfortunately, the head keeper was called away to do something else which meant that due to my lack of experience on the section I didn't get to do anything very exciting.

I started off the morning working in the rainforest section of the zoo. This is a section with tamarins and other small monkeys, and also, one of my favourite animals... a two-toed sloth, called Mr Jingles. First task of the day was to clean all the windows. This fascinated the residents of the enclosures:

It was then off to the lemur enclosures to help clean them out. Now, I can honestly say this was probably the least pleasant experience of my zoo career so far. The smell was horrible. Unfortunately I didn't manage to get any nice photos but here's one for the bars of the enclosure.

The rest of the day was spend sweeping and washing up dishes. Hopefully next time I work on the section I'll be able to get a bit more involved and get some nicer pictures (especially one of the sloth).

The last picture of the day, is not a primate. The afternoon was warm and sunny and I couldn't resist taking this picture of one of the cheetahs warming itself in the sun.

Small mammals

Today, I got my wish to work on a different section of the zoo so that I could show you some of the other animals when I was put on the small mammal section for the first time.

I started the day by visitng the coati enclosure to carry out a quick clean and to give them fresh food and water. Two of them were still in bed, but the other was more than happy to wander around and find out what was going on. Here are a couple of spots I managed to take:

After the coatis, Ricky and quickly cleaned out the corsac foxes and then it was over to the meerkats. There are actually two families of meerkats at the park in different enclosures and are a very popular attraction. There were about four different sets of people on the meet the meerkat experience today alone.

Now my Nova Scotia friends will remember my excitement of racoons. Today I got close to them, but unfortunately I wasn't able to go into the enclosure with them. Apparently the females are being aggressive at the moment so I had to make do with cleaning their indoor enclosure and look at them throught the cage bars... Next time.

I had a fantastically enjoyable morning which was topped off by getting the opportunity to hand feed one of the red pandas. They are really beautiful. Here's a picture of one of them which I took a few weeks ago:

The rest of the day was spent preparing the animals feeds for next time (cutting up large amounts of vegetables and other ingredients - no cat food for these meerkats), doing general cleaning and sweeping around the zoo (because of all the meet the meerkat experiences that Matt had to do we didn't get to do the thinks we'd hoped).

My last chore of the day was to help out the people working on the bird section by getting rid of some stinging nettles that had been growing down the side of one of the enclosures. It was a really tight gap which required you to stand sideways (and step over metal bars). However the real challenge came from the scarlet macaw occupying the adjacent cage who insisted on following me around the cage. This is a picture taken with no zoom at all which hopefully will give you some idea of just how close this parrot was! I was quite nervous of her.

A final piece of good news before I sign off for the day is that one of the penguin eggs hatched out on Tuesday. I was shown a photo and it is really cute. In three to four weeks it will hopefully come out of it's nest so that the public can see it; though I'm hoping to have that honour next week...

Pigs

I was working on the farmyard again this week and once again I was entertained by Nancy following me around the edge of the enclosure and making me feel really guilty when I ignored her or had to leave to go and do something else. When I went to put spme hay in her enclosure she snuffled against my legs and climbed up me. I'm used to it with dogs but I never thought I'd have a pig do it to me!

The pigs are easily my favourite animals on the farm section and I was actually quite surprised to find out how intelligent they are.

This is T playing with his ball and pushing it aound his enclosure. I believe he's just over a year old and Josh has trained him since birth (he is actually the son of Nancy). He takes part in the 'Animal olympics' show and is trained to do things like sit and jump over hurdles based on different hand signals. Apparently he knows exactly which keepers he can get away with showing off with and has once before run off and gone back to his enclosure.

In other farmyard news,  the baby rabbits are doing well and are a lot more active now, running about their enclosure and interacting with the people around (although they're still a bit nervous about being touched). The lamb is huge - I had meant to take a photo to show you but I forgot.

The other animal I wanted to share with you today is my favourite resident of 'Bunny Town'.

This is Crystal who is a hare. You can't see it very well here but she is a beautiful reddish brown colour and has these fantastically huge feet and big ears!

I like working on the farmyard, but I'm hoping for something different next week... Otherwise I might run out of things to write about!!

Looking after the penguins

Today I worked on the bird section of the zoo and spent most of the time with the Humboldt penguins.

My first penguin task of the day was to help Claire catch three of the penguins and put some cream on their feet. This is because their feet are becoming cracked. The cream has to be put on twice a day. Two of them we caught easily, one by tempting him with some fish, the other by cornering them in their enclosure. The third penguin refused to be caught and went swimming instead. This meant when he finally was caught we had to wait for him to dry before rubbing on the cream.

I then had to hose down the rocks while Claire hoovered the pool (with a wet vacuum cleaner).

After we were done, I left the penguins for a while and made up the feed pot; a mixture of carrot and cabbage that the public can buy in bags and feed to a number of animals around the park.

In the afternoon, I finished off my work with the penguins by getting to feed them which Liz gave a talk to the public. I say getting to feed them... Actually only one was hungry so I only really fed the one... But it was fun anyway! :) This is me feeding Vera below:

It was a great day and the penguins are lovely. I also went with Liz to check on the two penguin eggs they have incubating. They're quite hopeful at the moment and they hope they'll hatch 15-18 May so fingers crossed for the safe arrival of chicks soon!

Injuries and baby rabbits

It was a very wet day today and once again I was working on the farm yard section of the zoo.

The day started off much the same as the week before, cleaning out one of the enclosures, and then the chicken coops (which was new to me) and chinchilla cages.I was however brutally attacked by Rodney the rooster, who it transpired was hinting that it was time for breakfast! The culprit and my injury (a single peck to the knee) can be seen below:

After our morning break Deborah and I headed down to 'Bunny Town' to clean out the rabbit hutches; a task which isn't usually on my favourites list simply because it takes so long. Today was made much better however due to the baby rabbits who were finally visable.

These gorgeous bundles of fluff are 4 weeks old:

The afternoon was spent feeding the pigs and goats (I discovered that the pig without a name from last week is called Nancy) and doing some general sweeping around the farm section of the zoo.

One final picture to finish off. Please forgive the reflection of the glass but hopefully you'll be able to see it clearly (I hope to try and clean it up a bit). This is one of the lemar enclosures which is situated next to the farm where they currently have two babies. Here is one of them:

 That's it for today. Lets hope for sunshine next week!