I think you’ve got to do both. I don’t know that there’s an equal percentage. I think it just depends on what makes the most sense for the species involved. So, you know, we don’t breed manatees basically ’cause we’re not permitted to, but we wouldn’t breed them anyway ’cause… Read More
Because the critics will say, the message that you’re sending is, it’s okay to handle, fill in the blank, whatever animal it is. You don’t wanna encourage that. You don’t want people to go out and buy that animal and have it in their backyard. Yes, you’re right. And we’ve… Read More
You gotta be careful with that. Animal encounters. I give them a higher mark than I do shows and animal ambassador encounters because I think it’s again focused on the animal’s natural behavior and its natural history. That’s why you have them do those. There’s no tricks involved, there’s no,… Read More
They love to be as close as you and I are, but what messages are we sending?… Read More
You know, just because they show up and do their thing doesn’t mean they’re not stressed. So let’s find out where the stresses are, if there are any, maybe there’s some species that shouldn’t be in shows that we’re doing shows with right now because they do get stressed out. Read More
I think the public appreciates it. So I like them. I don’t think you need to get crazy with them. But you know, it’s all about the dwell time. Having people stay at your zoo as long as possible. So sometimes those 20-minute shows make a big difference in keeping… Read More
Animal shows, yeah, I’ll tell you, you definitely need showmanship because they can be deadly boring or disinteresting if the person who’s on stage isn’t good at performing. This was reinforced by the now CEO of ZooTampa who said we need someone with an entertainment background to be on stage… Read More
Can you gimme some pros and cons of animal shows?… Read More
Okay. All right. Yeah. Read More
Did I answer your question or did I miss part of it?… Read More
And by the way, the Omanis track these animals, they’re with them all the time in Jeeps, following them around. He went seven days in one direction looking for rain. And they tracked that, he didn’t find it. He turned around and came back to where he started. And that’s… Read More
So those are probably the two big ones. And then we attempted captures, giant Eland and Senegal. We were not successful with that for a variety of reasons. There’s been some bird importations that we didn’t necessarily participate in the capture. There’s been some rhino work, again, we didn’t bring,… Read More
But that’s been validated by the Omanis. So that was certainly one of the big success stories was doing that. There’s been California Condor certainly would be number two as far as releases into California and Baja California. And participated with the LA Zoo in that. And we supported it… Read More
Yeah, I think the big one in San Diego was the Arabian oryx. We were the clearing house for Arabian oryx going back to Oman in the Middle East for release into the wild, terribly successful program. We participated in that for 10 or 15 years and each subsequent release… Read More
So now next generation will know. Read More
Can you give us some examples both in San Diego and possibly Tampa of captive propagation and reintroduction?… Read More
We feed them fish and there’s a certain amount of insects you’ll put into that too, you know, into the dish. And then mom will pick ’em up, and feed it to the chick, and then the chick eventually picks it up. But then these meatballs turned out to be… Read More
What does a shoebill stork eat in captivity?… Read More
So on and so forth, but weren’t gonna take any chances. Anyway, successfully raised the chicken. And it could not have been happier with the results. Now, we have not replicated that. We’ve replicated egg laying but we have not had a chick since. So we have a different pair. Read More
The old question is how did you catch ’em?… Read More