If you can contain the situation, you have time to work on things and understand and move resources where you need to move them. When a situation is very fluid, it’s a lot more difficult. So they were in the building, they were contained. So I got there real quick. Read More
And again, I would have calls from other zoos, “Oh, you got animals from Kapama. How are they?… Read More
Good guys? Is it right?” “Yes. I’ve been there. I’ve talked to the people. I think it’s worthwhile.” Obviously, you’re not gonna get every lion from there, but that was very rewarding, having found the place, having worked for that and then being able to bring them back to the… Read More
So speaking of lions, can you tell us about the handling of the midnight escape of the lions and lessons learned?… Read More
Well, I think the thing of course, as we’ve talked about that in animal escapes, you hopefully have a protocol that you’re dealing with to handle these kind of things. And communication is always gonna be vastly important. And to go over it quickly, essentially I get a call and… Read More
So this is a question probably asked a number of times, but do you have a favorite animal?… Read More
Not really. I guess I would say I certainly have had an affinity toward elephants. I’ve had some good elephant buddies over the years. I’ve had some great apes, gorillas that seemed to think I was a pretty nice guy. And in my time as curator and the curatorial role… Read More
So you’ve been involved in a lot of acquisitions, transfers and everything, what animal species would you consider to be the most significant that you acquired in your career?… Read More
Well, from the standpoint of being selfish about it, the elephant shrews that took me many years to find a person who actually could catch these little guys and ship them in the correct manner. So they arrived alive and in good condition to the Lincoln Park Zoo. They were… Read More
Well, I think that, number one, the wild is shrinking in a lot of places all over the world. And whether it’s on land or water, there’s a lot of things going on that people have to be aware of. And I think zoos have to take a leading step… Read More
And I think the wildlife in Africa, as opposed to the Amazon or some other places is so much more readily seen and very heavy on mammals and so forth. So it was always a place that I thought was really wondrous. I mean, it was so different from anything… Read More
Obviously, there are other places too, but that’s just one. Yeah. Yeah. Read More
I wonder if you talk about your consultation with the Jakarta Zoo and gorillas?… Read More
Well, I think what happens is sometimes, you have a degree of expertise in a subject matter that people actually recognize. And Howletts Zoo Park who was one of the premier gorilla facilities in England and in Europe had loaned four male gorillas to the Jakarta Zoo. And they had,… Read More
You’re one of the big players here. I’d never seen the Jakarta Zoo. I’d never been, again, in seeing what’s out there, I had never been to that part of the world to experience the pluses and the minuses of what the zoo had to offer, Komodo dragons and all… Read More
I’m just curious, what is your strong interest in Africa and its wildlife?… Read More
And the only organization in China that had gorilla experience was the Beijing Zoo who had a pair of gorillas. So I talked to the people at Lincoln Park and sold them on the idea, again, learning, learning, learning that if we could bring the vet from the Shanghai Zoo… Read More
And I’ll say one thing with sharing information. Early in my career, Dennis Merritt, then the curator at the zoo who I worked for for a number of years was very big about his mantra about publishing and sharing the information that you have. And Dennis was one of my… Read More
But that was an important step from someone mentoring me and teaching me to say, “This is important. And this is why it’s important.” And I’ve shared that with other people. Everybody’s not gonna publish, I get it. But you could give a talk at a thing. You can do… Read More
And he said to me, “Remember, you know more about your subject matter than any of these people do ’cause you’ve studied that.” And he introduced me. He said, “Here’s the dead end kid from Chicago.” Broke the ice. And I gave my first major presentation. But the point is… Read More