First Official Week (and then some)

Hello faithful readers! This entry will be jam packed with information so hang in there! Here are the highlights:

"Area:" This is what we call opening and closing the zoo. Half of our class, including my roommates and me, are responsible for Area Sundays through Wednesdays. The other half is responsible for Wednesday through Saturday.  Up until yesterday, my side of the week had been shadowing different Areas, or sections of the zoo, learning what is involved in working in each one. This morning we had our Area quiz on all the things to remember about day to day life in the zoo. Which animals are possessive of their enclosures, which are trainer responsibility only, which require heaters plugged in and at what temperatures, how to go about checking locks in Primates vs the other areas, and the list goes on and on and on. It is quite a lot to remember.

After taking our quiz this morning (at 6:30 a.m. I might add...) we dispersed into the zoo to join our second years for our first official day on Area! Each week we are assigned somewhere new. Today and all of next week, I am assigned to Primates. This morning we cleaned the Capuchin Troop's enclosure! I stay on Primates Sunday through Wednesday next week, then I have the rest of the week off of Area before starting in Nutrition the following Sunday, prepping diets for the animals.

"Daywatch:" As part of our Zoo Skills class, which doesn't actually have a meeting time, we have to do something called Daywatch. This refers to a two hour chunk of time every week that we are assigned to come to the Zoo and do chores and projects. I am assigned to the Tuesday 2-4 shift. Last week I spent half the time manning the phones and the other half doing a Round. Rounds occur every hour, and they involve doing a thorough walkabout of the zoo and checking each animal for the four L's: Life, Lock, Liquid, and Looks. At each enclosure we must assure that the lock is secure, that the animal is alive and present, that the enclosure is in order and nothing is out of place or potentially harmful, and that the animal has adequate water. Rounds also involves filling water dishes if necessary, checking and recording temperatures, misting some of the reptiles, and putting ice bottles in with some of the smaller mammals if it is too hot. My friend Ashley and I attempted a Round for the first time yesterday without a second year to supervise. We didn't make it all the way through the zoo, but it felt pretty awesome to be out helping the zoo run by ourselves!

Classes: Classes this semester include -
Care and Handling Lab (this is where Area happens in the mornings and afternoons, and where we learn things like how to tie a falconry knot and how to walk the emus or Nick the mini-horse)
Care and Handling Lecture
Animal Diversity Lab and Lecture (notorious for requiring students to memorize the latin classification of over 30 species per week - Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and Species. I am proud to say that I now know that a Salmon Crested Cockatoo is Phylum Chordata, Class Aves, Order Psittaciformes, Family Cacatuidae, scientific name cacatua moluccensis. I can also do that with 31 other species so far!)
Health and Safety (where we learn about proper zoo safety guidelines and zoonotic diseases)
Conservation
Wildlife Education and Lab (where we learn about how to do shows in the zoo and practice our public speaking skills)
Anatomy and Physiology of Mammals.

So far I really like all my classes. It's a LOT of information to absorb very quickly - we had three tests so far this week and we've only had a few classes so far - but I feel like I am learning so much.

Cool things I did this week:

~ Learned how to walk Nick the mini-pony and got to clean his hooves.
~ Went to the LA zoo with a bunch of our friends:

At the entrance to the Zoo

~Adopted a new two year old corn snake named Pandora!

And the most exciting part of my week, yesterday I was tested on the falconry knot and got to handle the birds of prey for the first time!! Check out the awesome pics:

That's all the updates I have for today.


One more note: Sometime in the next couple of weeks I would like to dedicate a blog post to answering any questions that readers may have about the program, my life out here, or anything about animals or me in general! Leave your questions in the comments and I will do my best to answer them.  


Thanks for reading!

Love and bellyrubs,

Christy

Orientation

As of Friday, the class of 2015 has officially made it through our orientation week!


As of this morning, most of us have been to the zoo as official students.


Orientation week was a whole lot of scattered information thrown at us with many promises of "you'll learn more about that later." We learned how to do rounds, which means walking around the zoo and checking every single enclosure for the four L's - Life, Liquid, Lock, and Looks.  Rounds happen every single hour, and especially as first years it will probably take us more than an hour to get through the whole zoo.

We also learned about Daywatch, a two hour shift once a week when we will be assigned to the zoo and given a list of tasks to split up.

We received a lot of helpful advice from our not-always-older but definitely wiser second years.

We met a lot of the staff and our teachers for the first time.

Friday, we had our first "work day," which is a bit of a confusing moniker because every day is a work day at the zoo. In this case, however, work days are days in which the whole zoo gets together in our grubbiest street clothes and tackles a huge list of big projects all day. There are three "work days" per year: one at the end of orientation week and two around the time of Spring Spectacular (more on that later.) Of course, projects are still being done year round, but these three days are special times for the whole zoo to come together and tackle a whole lot at once. My roommate and I were assigned to Parrots. I spent the first two hours of our day sifting through shovelfuls of dirt, pouring it through strainers to remove the big rocks so it could be safely put in the bottom of the enclosures. All in the hot, merciless sun. Meanwhile, Carrie and one of our second years were weeding, organizing and cleaning shelves, and putting WD-40 on all the locks. We also re-did the rock borders of the walkways, took down an old fence and put up a new one, trimmed an overgrown bush, and hauled the half-ton bin of sifted dirt up the hill. It was hot and exhausting, and my muscles still hurt, but there is a definite sense of pride that comes with completing a day full of manual labor like that. And the area, if I do say so myself, looks pretty dang good.

Saturday I had a day off, so I decided to use it to get some MORE work done! I woke up early and right away started tackling my to-do list. Two loads of laundry hummed away while I removed everything from our huge rat cage, cleaned it off, and rearranged the shelves and hammocks in different spots to give our rats a nice little change. I also started stringing wire through the top of the cage, hoping to keep Miss Zazu from crawling out quite so frequently. She is a sweet little thing, though. I hadn't quite finished with the project by the time we decided to walk down the hill for some ice cream, but Carrie and I decided to leave them in their big cage while we were gone as a sort of trial run. When I got home, Zazu was happily perched on top of the cage, waiting for her Mama. I walked over to her and she scampered up to perch on my shoulder, then curled up behind my neck under my hair - her favorite spot. What a sweetie.

Today, we all dressed in our official EATM uniforms for the very first time and reported to the zoo at 7:45 am. This was our very first class - Animal Care & Handling. After going over the syllabus, we headed to Carns to learn how to move an animal into the Arena. The arena is basically a super huge enclosure where the carnivores get to have some extra space to explore and play. We didn't actually move anyone today, but we did practice as if we would be moving Kiara. After a few practice rounds of opening the arena door and pretending to open Kiara's enclosure, she began to clue into what was going on and got super excited, thinking she was going to get to play. She was pacing back and forth, bouncing around excitedly, and making her moan-y lion noises. At one point, I was leaning towards her enclosure to see more clearly what was going on on the other side, and suddenly I looked down and saw that Kiara had paused next to me and was looking straight into my eyes, her enormous head less than two inches away from my elbow.

I couldn't say anything to the gorgeous lioness herself, so all I could do was turn to my roommate and mouth "wow." It is a truly incredible feeling to be so close to such a powerful animal, and it was the moment all of this suddenly seemed very real. Over the course of our two years, each student is allowed to work with only one of the big carns - Savuti the hyena, Spirit the mountain lion, or Kiara the lioness. I had made up my mind early on that I wanted Spirit. He is the only one out of the big three that is able to leave his enclosure and go on walks with his trainers. Kiara and Savuti are both protected-contact animals meaning that there must be a barrier between you and the animal at all times. However, looking straight into Kiara's eyes today, I got the feeling that she could change my mind.

Tomorrow is a big day - Care & Handling starting at 6:30 am and classes all day until 5. Despite the intimidating schedule, however, I have never been so excited to go to school.

More updates later!

Love and bellyrubs,

Christy

New Babies!!

My roommate Carrie and I picked up our new baby rats today! One of our first projects involves teaching these little guys to run a maze. Right now they are only a couple months old and SUPER sweet.

This is Zazu. She's one of my rats. She has slightly wavy fur, curly whiskers, and a lightning bolt on her forehead. She looks like she stuck her paw in an electrical socket :)

This is Ziggy, my other rat. She's a little more mellow than Zazu. I love the line of spots down her back.

Zazu is a crazy girl. She loves exploring and climbing and trying new things, so I think she will be more enthusiastic about tackling the different obstacles in the maze. However, I'm a little concerned her independence will make her less likely to take direction. 

They are both very affectionate and are quickly bonding with me. Whenever I go up to their cage they run over to say hi and nibble my fingers. 

Zazu being a troublemaker. The black rat and the one with the brown hood are Carrie's rats - Chester and Chewy. 

Chester and Ziggy

Zazu exploring

Their super awesome big house! They're still too little to live here full time since they can slip through the bars, but within another month or so they'll be too big to do that. In the meantime, they play here under supervision and hang out in their small houses overnight and when we're not around. 

The gals cuddling in one of their smaller houses.

Closeup of Zazu's lightning bolt. Her curly whiskers don't really show up in pictures but they are pretty darn cute.

Cuddle pile.

Biiiiiiig stretch!

I am having so much fun with these guys. I haven't had small mammals as pets in a long, long time and I just love watching them and seeing how smart and social they are. It really is true what they say - rats are a lot like mini dogs. They all have such different personalities already.  My girls like to curl up in the hood of my sweatshirt, play with my hair, and nibble my ear :)

I have already decided on a whole list of things I want to teach them. Aside from their maze, I want to teach them to circle, stand up, play fetch, come to my hand on command, give kisses, use a litter box, and recognize their names.  It's going to be a fun time with these little guys!!

My New Home

The front of our house!

View from the front door

Close-up of our pool :)

Our hot tub. Currently not working, but rumor has it it will be fixed soon!

Other side of back patio with the garage

Kitchen, which opens up onto the patio. So much storage space!!

Living room, which also opens onto the patio

Our pet corner! Two chinchillas and four rats over here!

And my room!

Desk and critter shelves.

Half of my enormous closet :)

My awesome matching dresser. I put in hooks above it to hang my jewelry.

That's my new place! I still need to get some photos of the gorgeous surrounding area. Maybe when I'm out looking for a job after orientation!

Check out my next post for pictures of our fuzzy new babies!!

Settling In

Well, the unpacking is finally almost over.  Yesterday during the day my roommates and I met up with some other EATM first years at Point Dume State Beach in Malibu. After a long and strenuous hike over a cliff we arrived at the tide pools on the other side and set up camp. We soaked up the sun, got to know each other, dug holes in the sand, and laughed a lot.

We hiked over this cliff!

Stunning views from the top.

Sea Lions!!

Our Group :)

On our way home we stopped at Custom Melt for dinner, a little sandwich place in campus plaza which was DELICIOUS.  I got a sandwich with bacon, grilled onions, chipotle aioli, and crispy fried mac n cheese on it. Oh my goodness. This place also starts you off with a free bottomless basket of the most amazingly delicious potato chips I have ever tasted with a creamy hot cheese dip. I could have made a meal out of those alone.

Shortly after dinner I went to Camarillo with another first year to pick up the desk I bought on craigslist. It was WAY bigger in person than it looked in the pictures. Thanks to some impressive teamwork and a pretty good understanding of physics, we were able to get it into the bed of her pickup truck, but getting it up to my room was an entirely different story. My two strong male roommates helped, but we ran into SEVERAL roadblocks.  First the top of the desk was too tall and kept getting wedged under where the ceiling over the staircase juts out. So I removed the very top piece and we got it up the stairs. However, during the struggle, the far right panel somehow got caught on something and ripped almost all the way off so I removed that too to get it out of the way. Then the hardest part was trying to get it around the banister, through the narrow hall outside my room, and around the corner through my door.   This proved to be 100% impossible no matter how hard we tried. We were all covered in sweat, our muscles were aching, and we were pretty much at our breaking points. All sorts of crazy thoughts were going through my head.  Just get a saw and cut it into pieces and we can glue them back together later!!

In the end, I managed to un-do the screw locks on the underside of the desk so that the table top and attached hutch came off the base. At this point it was resting on the banister, perched precariously over our heads, and one wrong move could have resulted in someone being crushed to death. But we FINALLY made it! It is nestled in the corner of my room, put back together as well as I could manage, and holding all my school supplies. My arms and shoulders ache today, but I am proud of us for getting it done. My roommates are awesome for helping me out with that!

This morning I woke up early and went to the DMV. My new California state ID is on the way!! I also registered to vote in California, which on top of my lease agreement and rent payment should be enough for me to establish residency next year :) :)

As promised, I will post pictures of the house tonight when I have the last few bits of unpacking done and everything cleaned up. Miss you all!

Love and bellyrubs,

Christy