In my opinion, we interns concluded our program days at the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park with the best “end-of-term” present ever: we traveled through Asia and Africa, all in the span of a couple of hours! Not literally of course; we traveled unbuckled in the rear of a field keeper’s truck to meet up close and personal the rhinos, giraffes, deer, cattle, and other animals that live in the Park’s Asian and African enclosures. Field keeper Torrey Pillsbury was the tour guide during our visit, while her fellow field keeper, Michelle Gaffney, was our dedicated chauffeur.

As we bumped along, awed in wonder by the zigzagged horns of the addax and the smooth, caramel coat of the Javan banteng clone that we were a mere ten feet away from, Ms. Pillsbury explained to us her role as a caregiver to the hundreds of animals that roam the exhibit. Like a mother who must account for the daily whereabouts of her children, Ms. Pillsbury must note the actions of all the animals under their watch. Like a parent, it is essential for the field keepers to take notice of the health, appetite, and socialization patterns of the animals. But, in addition to those tasks, a lot more often than the human mother, Ms. Pillsbury must mark in their field keepers’ diaries any births or deaths that occur in the giant multi-species herd. And just as any human mother would bring her child to the doctor when he or she isn’t feeling well, so too do the field keepers call for medical assistance when an animal is under the weather.

The animals especially appreciate their “moms” when it’s feeding time. We helped distribute afternoon snacks by serving the rhinos mouthful after mouthful of apples and the giraffes strings of acacia leaves. Serving the majority of these animals is probably even more messy than feeding a child. The rhinos weren’t too much of a trouble to feed. Plopping the red apples in their mouth was more like a basketball shooting game than the monotony of spooning the baby food into the mouth of an infant over and over again. But the giraffes were quite a different story, yet still fun to feed. Their long, busy, and never shy tongues would find food wherever it lay. We had to make sure we held their snack up and out of the truck or else in a blink we would be eye-to-eye with one of the many long-necked creatures that circled the vehicle.

As we exited the field, I thought about all that these seven weeks have treated me to. Not only have I discovered so much about the beauty of animals, as we saw on our mini safari, I have also discovered the wonders of the endless horizon that is science. Thanks Zoo InternQuest- you’re more than I ever imagined!

Andrea, Real World Team

The San Diego Zoo does not just have plants for the beauty, the environment, or the setting of the enclosures at the Zoo. Many of the plants are just as endangered as the animals at the Zoo. Some plants are grown for the benefit of certain animals. For example, the Zoo uses banana trees to grow many things for endangered gorillas. Not only do they give bunches of bananas to the gorillas (as well as many other primates and birds) they also give them the leaves and the trunk. The leaves and trunk provide more tropical atmosphere as well as enrichment. Another example is the siamang, which is another type of endangered ape. In addition to getting bananas, the siamangs are presented with another important plant. The hibiscus! You may think that the hibiscus just gives the Zoo a charming atmosphere but the siamangs know the importance of these yummy flowers. The hibiscus is a colorful flower shrub that is found in tropical regions throughout the world. But it’s also found blossoming around the Zoo grounds and in the food dishes of the siamang. This flower is also a form of enrichment.

Enrichment is an important part of conservation. Enrichment is when keepers provide animals with opportunities to express social, mental, and/or physical stimulation. It is designed to keep the animals healthy, happy, and comfortable. By using food, leaves, and trunks the Zoo can give the animals a better habitat and make them feel like they are in wild. Providing enrichment, like tree trunks for the gorillas, helps the animal feel less stressed. This can result in more animal births at the San Diego Zoo. And more births means a greater chance for survival for these incredible species. In part, thanks to the bananas that grow in the Zoo!

Sarrah, Conservation Team

Let’s go to the Zoo to see the . . . plants? When I think “Zoo,” I do not picture the array of plant species that inhabit the Zoo grounds. Images of exotic animals are what come to mind: orangutans, lions, snakes . . . It seems as if I overlook the vegetation that lines the pathways, which also call the San Diego Zoo home.

Christy Powell, the plant propagator at the Zoo, revealed a whole new green side of the Zoo grounds to us. At the nursery, Mrs. Powell introduced us to a touch-sensitive plant called the Mimosa pudica. What it did was fascinating; its leaves folded inwards less than a second after I gently stroked it and just picking up the plant caused all of its leaves react likewise. Although scientists are not sure of the purpose for this movement, many think it may act as a defense method against predators. Insects with the intent to eat it may be taken aback by its movement and leave the plant alone.

Gaining knowledge about plants is great, but the most overlooked quality about them is that they are attention-loving and require hands-on nurturing. “Thousands,” is Mrs. Powell’s answer to the question, “How many plants have you propagated?” And planting the seed is just one step to producing a healthy plant. Mrs. Powell explained that each type of plant requires unique care. Some plants need to be kept sheltered from the winter rains; others need a humid, wet environment. Some thrive in shady areas. Others do best in abundant sunlight.

Two interns touch the Mimosa Pudica

At the plant nursery, we got a handle on plants, re-potting eucalyptus and acacia trees which were less than a foot tall and skinnier than a pencil, into larger pots. The roots of the baby trees, expanding, need more room to grow, required larger containers. Eventually, when big enough, they will be planted inside of the Zoo or at the browse farm that the Zoological Society operates in north San Diego county, for the sole purpose of feeding the animals at the Zoo and Park.

Getting dirt under my fingernails, and soil on my shirt, the work was grungy, but enjoyable. It’s exciting to think that the very plant you are re-potting will one day be a solid and large tree, part of the landscape of the Zoo. It’s similar to having a garden, whether it consists of roses or vegetables. Getting soil stains on your pants or calluses from pruning your plants is all a part of the labor. But when the yellow roses bloom in spring, or you take a bite of a juicy, succulent Roma tomato, it’s nice to truly enjoy the fruits of your labor.

Celena, Real World Team

Picking up a chunk of apple, I tossed it into the huge awaiting mouth of the rhino standing next to our truck. I watched as he noisily ate it up, making hilarious crunching and smacking noises. As we sat back down, and the truck began to move away from the rhinos, we resumed our busy work of plucking the leaves off of some browse. This was for our next visit. The tall giraffes loomed over us, and then just lowered their heads right into the truck with us. I never knew that giraffes were this bossy! It was mesmerizing to watch their long tongues stretch out towards the leaves we had for them.
For Ms. Torrey Pillsbury and Ms. Michele Gaffney, feeding rhinos and giraffes is an everyday occurrence. As senior keepers at the Wild Animal Park, they take care of the animals out in places like Heart of Africa and Asia Plains. As we continued driving, Ms. Pillsbury told us about some of her daily activities as a keeper. “In the morning, we drive out to our sections, (all of the fields are divided into sections and some keepers are put in charge of each section), and do a head count, to make sure that all the animals can be accounted for. We also check to see if any animals look hurt, or if anyone is getting picked on by the rest of the herd.” Sometimes, this morning check can be quite exciting. In fact, on this morning in particular, the keepers could not find one of the sixteen addaxes when they were doing their head count. Finally, they found the missing animal in a ravine and discovered that she had given birth to number seventeen! “That’s my favorite thing about this job; every day is different. You don’t know what to expect, and you never know what is going to happen.”

Ms. Pillsbury and Ms. Gaffney get to have a number of spectacular experiences as senior keepers. In Ms. Pillsbury’s section, a baby rhino was recently born, and she plays a role in its feeding process. The calf puts away six huge bottles of milk every day! This is not the first time Ms. Pillsbury has been involved in raising a baby rhino. “The most amazing part of my job has to be raising the baby rhinos. Who else can have an experience like this at their office?”

Ms. Pillsbury has been a keeper at the Park for twenty years now. She attended Cal Poly as an undergraduate. “That’s not how I got this job, though,” she explained. Ms. Pillsbury began volunteering and working at the Zoo when she was nineteen. Through years of working her way up the ladder, and by having animal experience, she has reached the coveted job of senior keeper at the Wild Animal Park. Now, however, the Zoological Society of San Diego is stricter about having a degree. Most zoos recommend a bachelor’s degree in a life science if one is considering becoming a zoo keeper. So get studying!

Becky, Careers Team

Have you ever transplanted a tree the size of your middle finger? Christy Powell, a plant propagator at the Zoo, supplied us with some hands on horticulture by helping us do exactly that. Ms. Powell has been employed at the Zoo for seven years and at present works primarily in the green house area. She first became interested in horticulture in high school, where she participated in horticulture contests through FFA. In these competitions she was required to identify different plant species, and after winning the state, she and her team went to compete in the nationals.

Ms. Powell was able to get scholarships in horticulture, which made it easier for her to settle on going to Purdue University in Indiana where she got a master’s degree in agriculture extension and education. She had focused her study and experience on commercial agriculture because of her location in the heartland of America. It was when she applied to work at the Zoo, that she learned that there were professions relating to horticulture at zoos throughout the world. Ms. Powell’s job at the Zoo includes growing plants that will be used as food and enrichment for the animals as well as working with the plant collections throughout the Zoo. She informed us that her favorite part of being a plant propagator is educating people and seeing the new plant seedlings as they are beginning to grow.

Part of a horticulturist’s job is to replant flora into larger containers as they grow and address the needs of specific plants on display in the Zoo, sometimes moving them to different locations in the Zoo. One plant that must be moved yearly is a specific type of orchid that grows in the Zoo. These orchids are relocated to the green house during the winter because they are susceptible to the occasionally chilly winter weather of San Diego.

Most plants do rather well in the southern Californian climate though, allowing the Zoo to grow a wide variety of plants, including many endangered plants from tropical regions. Most people do not realize that, just like animals, some flora are also endangered in the wild. One such plant native to Hawaii is commonly known as cabbage on a stick. This plant that grows on the Hawaiian cliff sides is critically endangered in the wild to the point that only one plant remains. The species is vanishing because their moth pollinator went extinct within the last century, due to human development on the islands. The good news is that people throughout the world can still enjoy this exotic plant as they are easily pollinated by hand, so the species is thriving in captivity but is living on the edge of extinction, and of a volcano, in the wild. Maybe in the future people will replant these unusual flora back in its native environment, in the same way the San Diego Zoo and other conservation organizations release endangered animals back into their natural habitats.

Danielle, Careers Team

Picture large, metal, cylindrical containers inside a passcode and temperature controlled room and you are beginning to visualize the Frozen Zoo at the San Diego Zoo’s Institute for Conservation Research. But, the true marvels are the animal body cells, sperm, ova, and embryos that sit within these hefty containers! These are preserved because they may be needed to aid in reproduction of a species in the future. For example, if the gene pool of a group of animals at the Wild Animal Park is too small to continue breeding (i.e. they are all related to each other), then sperm of that species in the Frozen Zoo can be used to fertilize a female in that group. Essentially, by using stored sperm, the genetic diversity is increased. More genetic variability enables a species to better survive.

Intern Andrea is observing Tule elk sperm under the microscope

We applied this judging process to Tule elk (a species native to Northern California) sperm samples in the lab. Under the microscope, we estimated how many were moving and how many were inactive. To determine whether the acrosomes were intact or not, we analyzed our sample using the method of flow cytometry. A machine called a flow cytometer rapidly passed each of our sperm cells in front of a laser. The light-scatter from the cells produced graphical evidence that our sperm sample’s acrosomes were not intact. This lengthy process of counting the sperm and analyzing it is beneficial in the end to determine the sperm’s condition, especially whether it is fit enough to be used for fertilizing an egg. Sometimes, the sperm and egg are fertilized outside of the female animal. After, the cells divide and develop into a blastocyst; this is implanted into the female to grow into a fetus, otherwise known as in vitro fertilization. Ms.Van Dien explained that some women who have trouble with conception can opt for in vitro fertilization. In fact, in vitro was developed first for humans. Now it is used to help animals that have difficulty breeding reproduce.

Despite its seemingly cold and bitter presence, The Frozen Zoo plays an incredibly important role in heating up the gene pool—not literally of course. The growing collection of ova, sperm, and DNA enlarges the gene pool for species to draw from. In a world that often constricts many endangered species, it is nice that the Frozen Zoo acts as a sanctuary for the genes to help them continue to thrive.

Celena, Real World Team

The Frozen Zoo is one resource that the San Diego Zoo uses for conservation efforts. It is located at the San Diego Zoo’s Institute for Conservation Research. The Frozen Zoo is a room filled with big silver freezers that hold millions of different cells from various species and subspecies of animals. By freezing cells, like reproductive cells, the Zoo has access to many different genes that, if necessary, can help an endangered species increase in number and prevent bottleneck effects in populations of animals. Bottlenecking is a genetic event in which a rapid reduction of genetic variety occurs. This effect may result in inbreeding in a population.

The Zoo is currently using these cells for valuable research through various techniques including flow cytometry. Flow cytometry is just one process the Institute uses in order to determine what cells are preserved after being in the Frozen Zoo. This process helps find viable and active sperm. This sperm can eventually, if needed, be used in artificial insemination.

Artificial insemination is not commonly used at the Zoo, but has been used under certain circumstances. One of these situations was with the giant panda. When the first two pandas from China came to the San Diego Zoo, Bai Yun (a young female born in a panda conservation center in China) and Shi Shi (an adult male found injured in the wild with wounds too great to be re-released) were not exactly a match made in heaven. The couple had one offspring (the first baby panda born in the western hemisphere) at the San Diego Zoo. Hua Mei was this baby, a female, born through the process of artificial insemination. Hua Mei is now the mother of six more giant pandas. Bai Yun continues to have more children, including her fifth cub born this last August. By using the modern scientific techniques of artificial insemination, the San Diego Zoo has contributed to the conservation of this ancient and beloved species and many others.

Sarrah, Conservation Team

When the San Diego Zoo has to transport animals, the first thing to be done is to get the animal off-exhibit. Even though moving animals doesn’t always require vets to tranquilize the animal, vets are always on hand to monitor the stress level and health of the animal. In the past, Zoo veterinarians like Meg Sutherland-Smith DVM might have had to tranquilize animals at a distance using a compressed-air gun. But keepers now have applied some of the behavior management skills we learned about last week to train the animal to go into a crate. This is safer and much less stressful for the animals. Training animals takes a long time; it took months to get the elephants in Elephant Odyssey ready for their move. (Although it would have been really cool to have the elephants walk from the Wild Animal Park to the Zoo!) The work the keepers do with the animals pays off in surprising ways sometimes. When several Siberian musk deer jumped out of their exhibit, and were wandering in the bushes at the Zoo the keepers managed to coax them back into their exhibit with food.

Once the animal is off-exhibit, animals are also moved to the Zoo’s private quarantine facility. Here, incoming and outgoing animals are kept and monitored for a short time. Outgoing animals require a check up from Zoo veterinarians. For Dr. Sutherland-Smith this is one of her favorite parts of her job because she gets to work outside of the Zoo’s hospital. At the quarantine area, she often works with hoofstock at a contraption called the tamer. This contraption cradles hoofstock so veterinarians can examine them. A blindfold is put on the animal to reduce their anxiety during the examination.

The San Diego Zoo was involved with the re-introduction of addax and scimitar-horned oryx and had a program to breed these animals at the Zoo and Park. When the Zoo was releasing these animals to a captive reserve in Tunisia, numerous individuals had to go through the tamer to receive veterinary clearance. Both the addax and scimitar-horned oryx are critically endangered animals that live in the parts of North Africa. These animals are also tested for diseases like foot and mouth or blue tongue disease. This is important because these diseases could threaten the livestock in Tunisia and hurt their economy. The disease could even hurt wild populations of addax or scimitar-horned oryx. This way, veterinarians are essential to conservation because they are able to monitor and take care of the health of threatened animals.

While watching the astounding African elephants get examined, it amazed me that Dr. Tracy Clippinger and the other veterinarians at the Zoo and Wild Animal Park can carry on a check up for such big creatures.

The keepers play a large role in the check ups of elephants as well as many other animals. Their job requires them to train the animals to complete special commands. These commands allow the vet to perform the examination properly and safely. The keepers feed the elephants treats of vegetables and pellets to reward them for good behavior as well as keep them happy and preoccupied while the vet is working on them. Also, it is the keepers’ responsibility to recognize any abnormal reactions to the procedure. It is their job to keep both the veterinarian and the animal safe.

During  any visit from the veterinarian the elephant’s eyes, ears, mouth, and feet are always examined. The veterinarian checks the eyes to be sure that they are dilating properly by shining a light into them. In relation to the thick skin that covers most of the elephant’s body, the skin of an elephant’s ears is soft and much thinner. The blood vessels that run through these ears are close to the surface, which allows the animal to cool off by flapping its ears. These clearly exposed vessels are also an excellent place for the veterinarian to draw blood from. Looking into an elephant’s mouth you can see that is has four large molars used to grind their food, which consists of large quantities of vegetation. The end of the elephant’s feet are made of dead cells that lack both blood vessels and nerves, similar to our fingernails or a horses hoof. The foot pad must be repeatedly evened out using large files, clippers, and other tools in order to prevent lameness and other problems. Their feet must be checked at least once a month, though some individuals need their feet worked on every week. Veterinarian and pedicurist all in one job!

Veterinarians use a large variety of equipment when they work on their patients. One incredible implement that the Zoo veterinarians sometimes utilize when working with the elephants is the “hugger”. This gentle restraining device is a large square pen that can be used as a way to safely contain an animal while an examination is occurring, especially when the animal needs a mild sedative to keep it calm. The sides of the pen are able to move in and out as well as can be angled in different directions. Though the enclosure is identified as a ‘restraining’ device the animals are still involved in the examination. The animal participates at different times in the procedure. For instance, when the doors are closing, when the animal needs to move into correct placement, or when one of its feet must be positioned for inspection.

Danielle, Careers Team