New Year, new animals to share. A brief overview of the last year, since my blog wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole: Being a shift supervisor at the Bagel Factory brought me nothing but stress and... really just stress. In May, I got my way out- the Pittsburgh Zoo offered me a seasonal position in their Grounds Dept. Less pay, but I thought about fresh air and animals watching me work, and I couldn't resist. That position ended in November, and I won't say much about it. The work wasn't bad, and I liked the zoo itself, but I was ready for the season to end. One very positive thing came out of that five months: I applied for an internship at Water's Edge, where the polar bears, tiger sharks, and sea otters live.
Intern mornings begin with the chopping and weighing-out of the otters' and bears' daily ration of fish. Fun Fact: Sea Otters are the only marine mammal without blubber. That means that in order to keep warm, it has the densest fur in the world and an incr
edibly fast metabolism. Alki and Chugach, the Pittsburgh otters, eat five large meals a day, as well as snacks of shrimp and pollock. They are also the most dangerous of Water's Edge's three species, from sheer unpredictability. With the polar bears, there will always be a sturdy barrier between keeper and animals, whereas the keepers will actually enter the sea otters' enclosure with them because most of the time it's safe. Our otters are highly trained, and as long as they think food is about to appear, they probably won't attack. The moment food is gone, all bets are off. That cuddly, adorable demeanor masks a fiercely territorial nature! Despite all this, the keepers are far from immune to their charms: yesterday when I arrived in the morning, the first person I saw was a keeper staring in at the otter window. Upon seeing me, she instantly pointed through the window, all the while grinning and making the "hehehe" sound of the truly besotted auntie. I looked, and the otters weren't doing anything we hadn't seen them do a hundred times, and yet I too was reduced to a doting puddle.
The bears are currently playing out one of those animal soap operas I love to write about. For years, the Pittsburgh Zoo polar bears have been a pair of brothers, Koda and Nuka. Recently, however, the boys celebrated their sixth birthday, a very important number in a male polar bear's life. In short, the boys were now The Men. Polar bear populations being what they are, this meant that it was time for Koda and Nuka to take the AZA's version of sex ed (essentially, being throw into the deep end and told to tread water). Nuka flew to another zoo where a beautiful new enclosure and a stunning new roommate awaited him, and a female named Kobe flew in from Arizona to meet Koda. That was when I came onto the scene as an intern. I've been lucky enough to witness a lot of the big moments for these two: the first day Kobe explored the exhibit, the first time they interacted through one door instead of two, and the first time they were fully allowed together. Since then, we've watched their affections wax and wane. For a time, they couldn't get enough of each other, and I wish I had posted while that was going on. Right now, however, there's waning and a lull in their breeding activity. Kobe has a limp, and she's blaming Koda for it. She must have blamed him with some vehemence, because he actually seems to be avoiding her at the moment.
The sharks are our least dangerous charges. There are five, and they are mostly referred to by numbers, except for Female One, Large Marge. She and Female Three are the most food-motivated of the bunch, and have special tricks for stealing fish from the others. Male Two, who is believed to be the oldest, has taken to staying near the bottom, theoretically to avoid being bitten. Female Two is annoyed with us this week for feeding a species of squid that she doesn't like. [Disclaimer: I'm blatantly anthropomorphizing for fun. A part of me would prefer to go Behaviorist and tell you everything in terms of "X displayed behaviors A and B in response to C stimulus" but I have a feeling no one would enjoy that.]
The only other thing I want to add for now is a shout-out to my grandmother, Elizabeth Merriam Schmidt, who turned 100 years old on the 7th of this month! She doesn't read blogs, but I think a feat like the 100-year mark deserves recognition either way: Happy Birthday Besty!
