Zoo InternQuest is a seven-week career exploration program for San Diego County high school juniors and seniors. Students have the unique opportunity to meet professionals working for the San Diego Zoo, Safari Park, and Institute for Conservation Research, learn about their jobs, and then blog about their experience online. Follow their adventures here!
Which came first, conservation or the egg? You’ll find the answer to this age-old question isn’t quite so simple. At the San Diego Zoo’s Avian Propagation Center (APC), conservation—quite literally—begins with the egg.
The Avian Propagation Center’s mission to foster the survival of bird species across the globe is not an easy one. This week Jessica Theule, an APC keeper since 2007, guided the intern team through an in-depth tour of the facility and described the significant role the APC plays in modern avian conservation. Specifically, the Center specializes in the incubation, hatching, and rearing of chicks which range from hummingbirds (who can lay eggs even smaller than peas) all the way to harpy eagles (whose eggs can reach up to three times the mass of a large chicken egg). And with hundreds of eggs hatched each year at the APC, it’s easy to see why the Center has been leading the way in bird conservation efforts since its establishment in 1980. As Ms. Theule led the intern team inside the APC incubation room to begin our visit, she informed us that the very first condor to be born in captivity was “hatched right here in the APC.” Now more than ever, the Center is focusing on the bird species that need the most help.
The incubation room is equipped with about a dozen incubators, many of which look like over-sized toaster ovens with extra dials for precise temperature and humidity. Eggs require just the right conditions to develop properly, and these conditions vary from species to species. A lot of factors go in to how an egg develops, Ms. Theule explained to the team, and these range from temperature and humidity to how often the eggs need to be rolled over. Yet such precise attention to minute details is key, because some of the eggs in that room are absolutely vital to species survival. One such egg belongs to a kiwi, an endangered species from New Zealand. According to Ms. Theule, it’s the farthest along, developmentally speaking, that a kiwi egg at the APC has come in a very long time. She enthusiastically reported to the team, “It will be very exciting and very big news if we hatch this [egg].”
With the future of birds like the kiwi riding on its shoulders, the APC approaches the hatching process with great care. To demonstrate this, Ms. Theule showed the team the extensive records for a single egg belonging to a bird called a red-billed malkoha. The spreadsheets, notes, and charts possessed an overwhelming amount of data. This vast source of information, updated on a daily basis, gives APC keepers the best possible chance to hatch this malkoha egg.
Careful attention is not only given to every single egg in the incubator room, but also to the eggs that don’t develop. Interns were given the chance to scientifically examine undeveloped eggs by carefully removing the shell and membrane to look for signs of development. This process allows APC researchers to identify problems and solutions for the incubation process. This scientific approach illustrates that the APC takes its role in avian conservation very seriously.
Clearly conservation begins with the egg, but it definitely doesn’t stop there. After chicks are hatched, APC keepers become the adoptive parents, sometimes to more than 50 chicks at once. Raising an endangered baby bird, however, can be even harder than hatching one. It is essential for endangered chicks to be able to recognize other birds, not humans, as their family. The scientific word for what keepers need to prevent is called imprinting. If a bird imprints on a human keeper, it loses its natural behavior of interacting with members of its own species and therefore… no babies. Ms. Theule showed the intern team a box full of “anti-imprinting” bird-head puppets that fit over a keeper’s hand during the delivery of a meal. Chicks’ enclosures also have Mylar sheets over the glass so keepers can observe the chicks without the chicks observing the keepers. Sometimes keepers even wear “ghosts”—sheer leaf-patterned blankets that keepers drape over their heads if they need to handle the chicks. In the end, all of these measures ensure that a chick can develop as normally and healthily as possible so that they can go on to breed. One day, this practice may save a species from extinction.
So which came first, conservation or the egg? If one thing is clear, the two are inseparably linked, and the Avian Propagation Center is hard at to work to ensure the prosperity of both.
Sierra, Conservation Team
Week Four, Winter 2012
