What goes down must come up

Feb 092012
 

Keepers were in the habit of giving the sea lions various toys to keep them occupied. A favorite toy was an ordinary kid’s rubber ball. The ball was small enough to fit in their mouths, and it floated. The sea lions would spend hours tossing the ball around or dragging it to the bottom of the pool and chasing it to the surface.

Occasionally, however, one of the sea lions would accidentally swallow one of the balls. The first few times this happened the keepers were concerned, but over the years they found that the animal would cough up the ball within a few days with no harm done.

The director was passing the pool one day and happened to see one of the sea lions swallow a ball. He notified the keepers of what had happened. and told them that he wanted to sedate the animal and remove the ball surgically. The keepers explained that this had happened before and the animal would be fine in a few days. The director was unconvinced, but eventually he agreed to a compromise—if the ball hadn’t shown up in two days they would operate.

Keepers kept a sharp eye out for the ball but as the deadline approached there was no sign of it. Finally, still convinced that the surgery was unnecessary, they found another ball identical to the one that the sea lion had eaten and secretly threw it into the pool.

When the director saw the ball he agreed that the keepers had been correct and canceled the surgery. And a few days later, as they had predicted all along, the keepers found the original ball floating in the pool and the sea lion in perfect health.

 Marine Mammals

Dry land at last

Feb 092012
 

The hose feeding water into the tapir moat had been left on accidentally and it had run all night. Ordinarily, that wouldn’t have been a problem, as the excess would have overflowed into the drain in the adjacent stall containing the African crested porcupines. This night, however, the drain had become plugged with food and hay and the porcupine’s stall had flooded.

When keepers arrived at work in the morning they found the porcupines frantically swimming for their lives. The animals were nearly exhausted—they had probably been swimming for most of the night. In fact, they probably would not have survived but for the buoyancy provided by their hollow quills.

Attempts by the keepers to clear the drain with a rake were unsuccessful so one of the keepers volunteered to go in and do it by hand. It was not an easy task. His arms were just long enough to reach the drain while barely keeping his face (and mouth) out of the tapir manure filled water.
To complicate matters, however, while he was attempting to execute this delicate maneuver, the porcupines, seeing a resting spot at last, were trying to scramble onto his head.

Eventually, the keeper managed to discourage the porcupines long enough to clear the obstruction. When the water receded the exhausted porcupines flopped down for a long overdue rest and the keeper went home for a much needed shower.

 Small Mammals

Pelican sticks the landing for a 10

Dec 252011
 

A keeper responding to shouts found a strange sight in the bushes surrounding the duck pond. A young boy, nine or ten years old, was lying on his stomach in the grass pounding his hands and feet on the ground and bawling his eyes out. On his back, wings spread for greater leverage, a large pelican was jumping up and down as if on a trampoline.

The keeper shooed the bird away and returned the scared but otherwise unharmed boy to his parents. They immediately began yelling at the keeper about how the zoo shouldn’t have dangerous animals around, and that something should be done before somebody got hurt.

The keeper, a fairly new seasonal employee, was doing his best to handle the situation, but wasn’t succeeding very well. The parents finally quieted down when several other visitors, who had witnessed the entire event, reminded them that the area the boy had been in was clearly marked “Do Not Enter,” and the parents had simply watched as he climbed past the sign and started harassing the bird. The boy had apparently chased the cornered bird in circles for several minutes before it had turned and run at him. It was only after he had tripped and fallen that the bird jumped on top of him.

 Birds

Strike one!

Dec 242011
 

A man and his young son appeared outside the zoo’s perimeter fence, which is eight feet high with barbed wire on top. They began yelling at a female Asian elephant to turn around and face them. The elephant, busy eating, ignored them. The son began throwing rocks over the fence at her backside to get her to move.

A keeper immediately told the boy to stop throwing rocks and to let the animal eat in peace. The boy did stop, but to the keeper’s amazement, as soon as he walked away, the father began tossing rocks. Before the dumfounded keeper managed to say anything, the elephant casually picked up a palm-sized rock, did a quick 180° turn, and let fly. The rock sailed across the yard, over the fence, and cracked the man right on the head. The keeper heard the resounding crack 40 feet away.

The man let out a startled cry and grabbed his head, ironically oblivious to the fact that he had, in fact, succeeded in making the elephant turn around. The elephant, meanwhile, turned calmly back to her dinner and continued eating as if nothing had happened.

 Pachyderms

Final straw

Dec 222011
 

A keeper looking out into the addax yard through an open stall door noticed a Canada goose grazing near the herd. A curious yearling addax nervously approached the strange creature, tensed to flee at a moment’s notice. The goose kept moving away but each time it did the young addax became a little bolder and approached a little closer.

Before long they moved out of the keeper’s field of view, but apparently the addax persisted, for a few moments later the keeper heard a loud honk and looked up just in time to see the addax, with its tail literally tucked between its legs, gallop past the doorway with an angry, hissing goose flying just inches behind.

 Hoofstock

Escape? Who, me?

Dec 222011
 

One winter after a heavy snow, night keepers reported for several nights in a row that they had caught glimpses of what appeared to be an arctic fox near the small, moated grotto that housed that species. Each morning, however, keepers found all of the animals present and accounted for. It was assumed that the animal the night keepers were seeing was a native fox.

Finally one night, however, the night keeper turned a corner and managed to get a good look at the elusive animal in the headlight beam. It was definitely an arctic fox. As the keeper watched, the fox darted back to the grotto and jumped easily back in, where it was calmly waiting the next day to be counted.

 Carnivores
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