Great Fun

turkeyvulture, originally uploaded by Lostfiniel.

I was able to make it to the volunteer orientation meeting. It was more of a tour than anything else. The actual volunteering won't begin for a while for me. We have a bunch more paperwork to fill out, fingerprints to get done and another "official" orientation meeting to complete before we can even ask about being volunteers.

But, the tour was priceless. Mary Crede, who is in charge of the volunteers, was very nice and let us all know many times that the work is dirty, physical and not very animal involved. That didn't seem to bobther anyone there.

We got a back-stage tour of the zoo and some more information about the animals that I didn't know. The ocelot, Ozzie, is a confirmed bachelor who enjoys his solitary existence. More often than not, he can be found sleeping in the highest hollow log. The red-tailed hawk was kept in an old-school style exhibit (meaning mostly concrete and bars) for 20 years. She was let into a new enclosure 2 weeks ago and, while it frightened her at first, she now loves the fact that she can be in the sun and she flies all of the time.

The bald eagle from the San Francisco zoo is in poor shape, when they got him years ago he was missing his right eye and his right wing is broken beyond repair. He cannot fly. The male mule deer was castrated too early by the vet students at Cal State Davis. They did it in the wrong season and now his body doesn't function like it should. His antlers should shed each year like most deers, but they don't. They are disfigured and occasionally bleed when they are hit. The male mule has lost 30 pounds this last week after his life-long mate passed away. They aren't too sure how he is going to come out of it.

We were introduced to one of the mountain lions. He was a beautiful cat that came back to the holding area at the call of his keeper (he was looking forward to food.) While he did hiss a lot, we were told he is one of the friendlier mountain lions you will find in captivity. Even as such, nobody ever enters the enclosures with them or the bears.

Speaking of the bears, I got to feed one! Sure, just some grapes and a bit of banana. But, how awesome! The bears are now some of my favorite animals at that zoo. After seeing all the character they have, wow.

We got to hear a little about each animal there. Some of it surprised me. Like, the turkey vultures are frightened of any people that attempt to get near them. I had always assumed carrion-eaters would have a little back-bone....but I guess that is why they eat the dead, right?