You know, AZA was like $124 or something. It was really high. It was a pricey thing, you know. So I joined the a DA and then that was a little leap in getting to know people and interacting with people in the, and you know, that we were all… Read More
That’s what we went through, kind of developing the operations. So it wasn’t like we developed a long-term plan, a plan or anything like that. We might have done a five year plan, but you know what, I’d seen five year plans before. And it always changes. If you stick… Read More
So eventually, you know, my philosophy of zoo and my philosophy of conservation developed, and that was guided in part by things that happened at the zoo and the research that was going on. Kathy Rall’s research on inbreeding and captive breeding and that sort of thing. It was also… Read More
And gradually things started to take shape in terms of a plan and process. Read More
How do we choose species and who has inputs and all that, sort of, what are the criteria?… Read More
Well, I didn’t have any expectations, to be honest with you. I was there, you know, I was a fuzzy cheek little kid kind of learning the ropes. I’d only worked in a zoo for, what was it, two and a half years at, at Brookfield. So it was all… Read More
And we got Przewalski’s horses and that’s how the, and then we got European bison wisent, they were endangered. But you know, it was, we just didn’t have the money to launch in-situ two conservation projects on those species, you know, on all of those species. But that’s how the… Read More
Did Front Royal fulfill ultimately your expectations of what it should be?… Read More
So that was a highly successful program for the National Zoo as well as the center. I mean, we all played a role in it. So that’s how that species came out. And then the hoof stock was kind of like kind of hit and Miss Larry had to get… Read More
And I think John realized that it would be pragmatic to do a project. I mean, if this is what Reed wanted. They’re interesting animals. There’s been very little work done on them. Let’s think this one out. So he convinced Devra to go back on her opinion and she… Read More
She wanted to get graduate students and have them come in and work on that. So Ingrid Porton came in to do a study of it. You remember Ingrid and Chuck Brady came in, he ended up being direct. Is he still at it? Was it at Tennis? Memphis entire. Read More
But Ted Reed got that being as bonnet by going to Jersey and who was it at Jersey that followed Jeremy Mallinson Mallinson. Jeremy Mallinson. And he heard about the bull line, the GLT and the problems it was facing. So he came back and he wanted to help. And… Read More
Well, let’s just take the South American canids, the bush dogs, the maned wolf and the crab eating fox. Those were these three species that Devra had worked on in, in London when she did her PhD with Desmond Morris. And so she wanted to continue that work. And the… Read More
How did they come, how did these animals come then to front Royal?… Read More
Was it Ted Re’s decision?… Read More
And well, the first question then would be, did you, you had other animals other than the ungulates, how were they chosen to come?… Read More
The Bush dogs, the maned wolf, did, was this a decision you made?… Read More
It was always for meetings, not looking at exhibits. But, but he had all these problems and they were kind of, of his own making because he had this highly technical educated staff that we challenged him on stuff that, that jumped up at me when you asked that question. Read More
And I remember one time Ted had been to Europe and he’d seen a beaver exhibit and it was, it had like a glass window into the lodge and the lodge was made out of cement with fake logs in it and everything. And the beaver used it and he… Read More
They’re domestic. There are no wild Bactrians left in the wilder. If there are, there’s, you could count ’em on two hands. And so he was getting resistance to ideas like this. And you know, Bill Xanten was kind of in on it too. He was, and Miles was another… Read More