One of the ladies that I work with at Sea World also works at the San Antonio Zoo in the large mammal department. So, the department invited our department to come visit and go behind the scenes. First we were able to go in the elephant barn and watch a demonstration of some of the trained behaviors.
This is Lucky the Asian Elephant. She is 50 years old. Mike the keeper showed us how he gets her to lift all her legs up and how to get her to climb the fence.
Also he had her do some vocalizations. They noticed that she would do a trumpet sound when she laid down so he has her lay down first to demonstrate the trumpet vocalization.
She really was amazing with him.
Then we got to go into the training facility for the cheetahs. This is Mandy and they showed us some of the behaviors they have been able to get her to respond to.
The keeper, Naomi, hand feed her meat and played frisbee with her. She was so beautiful.
Next we went over to the Hippo pool and got to go through some secret tunnels that come out through the fake rock walls. We got to watch them feed them from above the pool....
And then we went down through the keeper area and got to stand where they usually feed them. This is the female approaching the gate we were standing by.
Then the keeper feed them and I was standing right next to her, literally 2 feet away. I was so close that they got food remnants on me.
Then we went over to the rhinoceros enclosure and the keeper got a white rhinoceros to side up and we got to pet it.
It's skin was so rough and it patiently stood there eating its alfalfa and not really noticing us.
The mammal curator Jon was the one who showed us around, but after that we just walked around the park on our own. We saw big cats and monkeys and the usual zoo animals and met some very pushy goats. Too bad they weren't fainting goats, that would have made the day complete.
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