But you know, it begins to add up and it’s that connection that you can make with them that hopefully they go, well, I’m gonna support the millennials. I wanna support conservation somehow I think it has a benefit. Well, that was a long answer for that. Oh, no. Short… Read More
You know, the, the type of story that we wanted to get across to them about their conservation and why we had them and how they were acting in its ambassadors for giraffes of the wild. So that feeding aspect allowed us to connect with the guest in a greater… Read More
And did you know giraffe are more endangered than rhinos are right now?… Read More
And as I was leaving, we never got it engaged. But I felt the giraffe thing was great and I’d, I’d love to see more as long it was controlled environment like that. And that there was a purpose that we were trying to get out of it. Not just… Read More
But while we were there, the staff would engage with the guest and we’d talk to them about giraffe and what’s going on. Read More
Well, we did that and we created draft feeding at Brookfield while I was there. And what it allowed us to do, well, first of all, it allowed the public to get close. ’cause otherwise the drafts were out in a big paddock and they did come over where the… Read More
And did they tear some of the exhibit up? Sure they did. We had to go to repair. But that’s part of it. So we created a middle, a a a a level of randomness that allowed them to engage with the exhibit that then engaged with the public. You… Read More
I don’t know, Zus feed programs for animals giraffe feeding, you know, what is the message you feel this should convey?… Read More
They would hide stuff everywhere. Different every day. So when the bears came out, what they had to do, well, they had to go out and browse. Read More
They, they had to go find it, you know?… Read More
Well, the bear had to come up and do this and knock it out and they got a reward. And well, you should have seen the activity. And the public loved it, you know, it’s like, oh, the bear’s doing something. And it was a natural behavior that, that, you… Read More
How could the bear get to it?… Read More
So we created what we called a wobble tree. And at the top of the wobble tree, which we, we dug a pit and we, we put in a pole. We didn’t even try to make it look like a tree, but the pole was set on a rubber mount… Read More
But you’ll see ’em, they, they get up on a tree and they knock things down, right?… Read More
Or you know, a road cone or something that they wanna put out there. So I look at it and go design your enrichment program for purpose to create choices and activity that are natural and playing is important. I understand that. But to make enrichment for the sake of… Read More
I wanna provide an animal choice and activities. I want to create some ran. I don’t want absolute randomness because that’ll drive an animal crazy. But I wanna create things that the animal could do that changes every day. I don’t wanna boomer ball, go out here in the woods… Read More
But the whole idea was to create naturalistic enrichment that did things. So we created a ball, it wasn’t a boomer ball, it looked like a rock. But we counterweighted the rock. So if the animal pushed it or rolled it, it didn’t roll forward. It, it did this. And… Read More
I want you to look at welfare and say, why am I doing it?… Read More
But I just spent, you know, a million dollars making this look natural exhibit. And you wanna put cardboard boxes out there to get an action. Read More
And by the time they’re done, they go, well, you know, I walked a mile and a half and I saw two active animals. So when you design an exhibit, if you can look at, not so much the fact that it’s a great artificial environment, but it’s, it’s an… Read More