feeding, training and future plans

Expedition Madagascar has been so much fun. My greatest challenge is learning all of the animals names! So far, I have done lots of cleaning, feeding and training...like always. Madagascar has animals that I can get close and even interact with. Today, I got to feed our hog-nose snakes snakes some rats. This was a thrilling experience since I have never done this before. Snakes are really fast and very strong. Fortunately, our male hog-nose is very friendly and likes to slither between my hands and arms; sometimes all over me while I clean their display!

In addition to training, I train our lemurs every day. We use a PVC pipe as a target indicator, make the lemurs touch this with their nose and use a training clicker to let them know they did something right. We also use raisins as a tasty reward. However, we don't give them raisins every time so that they do not become dependent only on treats for a reward. When we train, we try to get them familiar with staying still on weight scales, a stand to receive a puncture from a needle and many more exercises. We do this because we want to make sure our lemurs are ready for anything we need them to do instead of being new to a certain procedure we need them to do. This is my favorite part of the day! :) I also like training since lemurs tend to me known as pick pocketers. They tend to sneak up behind me or crawl up my lag to steal some raisins from my pocket stash. Despite their rude manners, their cuteness overrides this.

Even though my summer is coming to an end, I feel like I have really found my niche in life is. I love the zoo atmosphere! Since I love doing this kind of work so much, I have already applied to get next summer's plans come to life. Hopefully I will receive another internship next summer here or in Denver, CO, or receive a summer keeper job in Omaha. Wish me luck!

I apologize for not having many pictures lately, but most of my work consists of "behind the scenes" in which I cannot show, however, I do have one picture from today that I can share with a lemur. I hope you like it!

an end is a new beginning

The Jungle was quite the experience! I cannot believe how much I have learned and got to do. I feel very blessed and lucky to have such an opportunity. My hard work and goals finally became a reality. Despite my last day was last Friday, I decided to go back and help out on Saturday even though that is my only day off. I cannot get away from the Jungle! I accomplished most of my goals that I wanted to do in the Jungle. I finished Jing's enrichment device (a new toy) for him and it was a strategic success, learn about the life of a zookeeper for all types of animals and meet some awesome zookeepers. They are such a crew! Even though my time there is done, I want to go back on Saturdays to help out still if I can. The only goal I have left is to get a painting down by Jing. I hope it all works out!

With all of the skills I learned in the Jungle, it has definitely made my life easier now that I've started in Expedition Madagascar. The same cleaning, diet prep and providing enrichment is very similar. So far, the only new things I have yet to master is getting to know the Madagascar crew and all of my new animal friends. So far, their personalities is the only thing I have in order to distinct between them all! In addition, I hope to learn even more in my next chapter of the summer. I only have 25 more days left until I'm back in the 563 and 608!

end of chapter 1

Tomorrow is my last day in the Jungle. I can't believe the time has already arrived. I feel like the animals knew about my departure. Lucky let me scratch her back and one of the howler monkeys let me play with her too. I will miss all of my animals. However, I look forward to meeting new friends and learning in Madagascar.

Today I had to work and was really fun. I got a chance to learn how to operate a steam train! Check me out on the job!

I hope Madagascar is ready for me on Monday!

a friendly visit

On my day off, I was fortunate to enough to have my adviser, Dr. Jeff Huebschmann to stop by in Omaha. I really enjoyed this since I could show him where I have been working this whole time. Unfortunately, we did not have enough time for me to show him the whole zoo and the line was too long to see the Kingdoms of the Night. This complex had his one and only favorite animal, bats.  However, he did enjoy the areas that I am currently interning at now and where I will be in two weeks for the remainder of the summer. Throughout the day, we talked about how cool this internship is and how this experience will really earn me competitive brownie points on my resume.....I mean, make me a good candidate for a future job. Jeff seemed to be really impressed by how much the zoo has changed the last time he has been there to now, how I know all the animals by name and be able to tell who is making the noises. In addition, we also talked about how I could possibly be a guest speaker to our university's biology club or talk to other biology students and inspire them to get involved with their major. I hope my achievements during my collegiate career will give UW-Platteville a good name and help others obtain their dream career.