So I think that those things have changed over the years, that in Lincoln Park was the same. There should be less species, but more concentration on what you do with those species. Do you have to show every cat in the world? Maybe not. Maybe you show one or… Read More
You don’t have to have, your reputation doesn’t depend on, “We have the most rattlesnakes species of any zoo in the world.” So what?… Read More
I knew I had to have leaf cutting ants and I did put an exhibit together for that, not the one I wanted to because that would’ve, using their behaviors, I knew what we could have done, but we had that. At the same time, I just knew that a… Read More
What do you think is going on?… Read More
Well, I think part of it is the idea of, and again, so many things I’m saying are not necessarily new, but I think the idea of a postage stamp, one of this, one of this, two of these, one of these has moved past. And now, zoos are trying… Read More
Do you have other genetic lines that you’re looking at?… Read More
They didn’t need me. And I was proudest of that That the team was so well trained that they could do it without me. They didn’t need anybody leaning over their shoulder on what to do. So from the standpoint that I missed it, I feel bad. But from the… Read More
So in all your long years at Lincoln Park Zoo, is there anything that you would hope to accomplish, but were unable to finish?… Read More
The only thing that I wanted to do at Lincoln Park Zoo and I never had the opportunity and I tried was to build an insect pavilion, to build a butterfly aviary, ’cause I knew it was dramatic. I’d seen them around the world, again, visiting. And I knew that… Read More
And literally at the end, we had all kinds of video cameras to record the birth. We, not knowing when it would occur. And we had volunteers every night watching the monitor, every night. And of course, after X number of months, they’re coming in and going, “Mark, what’s the… Read More
As it turns out, I happen to be at one of those teaching assignments for this Smithsonian, I was out of the country and I missed the birth. Oh geez. But the important thing there, I think is that people said to me, “Mark, you must feel bad that you… Read More
What could happen in this instance?… Read More
What would happen if this happened?… Read More
And we were able to tell the story to people about the hunt and what was going on. So I was brought on as expedition photographer, not for my skills in snake handling, absolutely not. Well, you were still there. (laughs) Another significant birth that we really haven’t touched on… Read More
Can you talk about that?… Read More
The, one of the big deals was the elephant birth and we didn’t have a male, but we, again, this is long term planning. You’d never know what’ll happen. We brought a female elephant to the Springfield Missouri Zoo to meet a male, Onyx, who was a breeding male. We… Read More
Then we could, everything was contained. So the idea’s I think lessons learned is again, same thing. When there’s an emergency, you gotta have protocols, you gotta know what you’re doing, you have to make sure that you can contain the situation, get good as much good communication as you… Read More
“Here’s what we do,” so. Yeah. But that’s not to say that your adrenaline is not going sky high because this is a stress situation, but you have to be the cool person or at least the person that’s kind of keeping, calming things ’cause people are gonna be a… Read More
How does this happen from a mammal guy?… Read More
Well, I think that it’s relationships. I was on the, Marlin Perkins, when he was director of Lincoln Park Zoo, used to go on snake hunts. Now, probably taking animals out of the wild like that would not be the correct thing to do. But at the time, that’s what… Read More