Zoo Too Do

Editor: Megan McKane

Not your average zoo

Chimpanzees swing from trees at the

Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. Cheetahs pace
and nap at the National Zoo in Washington,
D.C. Giant pandas eat pounds and pounds of
bamboo shoots at the San Diego Zoo.
All these animals have one thing in common.
They are all in danger of disappearing in their
natural habitat, and zoos are trying to help save
them.
Zoos across the country are changing these
days. They arent just places to see wild
animals in cages anymore. Zoos are working
harder than ever to save endangered animals
around the world.
Sometimes, zoos efforts take scientists
around the world. For example, the Wildlife
Conservation Society (WCS), which is
headquartered at the Bronx Zoo in New York
City, is working with local officials in Malaysia
to stop people from hunting exotic birds to sell
their feathers.
We have to learn how to live in harmony
with the animals around us and how to just
think a little bit more before we do certain
things, said Sara S. Marinello, of the WCS.
The San Diego Zoo just opened the
Conservation and Research for Endangered
Species Center. The $22 million center gives
scientists cutting-edge instruments and plenty
of room to do their work.
The California zoo is famous for its work
helping to save Chinas giant panda. Three
panda cubs have been born at the zoo already.
The San Diego Zoo now has the largest
population of giant pandas outside mainland
China.
But the zoo has many other projects few
people hear about. Scientists with the zoo
are working to save iguanas in the Turks and
Caicos Islands in the North Atlantic Ocean.
They study African wild dogs in Zambia and
forest birds in Hawaii.
Farmers in Africa think the spotted cheetah
is an annoying pest. So they trap and kill them.
Now cheetahs are in danger of disappearing

Living in harmony with the wild

Chimpanzees swing from trees at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. Cheetahs pace and
nap at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.
Giant pandas eat pounds and pounds of bamboo shoots at the San Diego Zoo.
All these animals have one thing in common. They are all in danger of disappearing
in their natural habitat, and zoos are trying to
help save them.
Zoos across the country are changing these
days. They arent just places to
see wild animals in cages anymore. Zoos are working harder
than ever to save endangered animals around the world.
Sometimes, zoos efforts take
scientists around the world. For
example, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), which is
headquartered at the Bronx Zoo
in New York City, is working with local officials in Malaysia to stop people from hunting
exotic birds to sell their feathers.
We have to learn how to live in harmony
with the animals around us and how to just
think a little bit more before we do certain
things, said Sara S. Marinello, of the WCS.
The San Diego Zoo just opened the Conservation and Research for Endangered Species
Center. The $22 million center gives scientists
cutting-edge instruments and plenty of room
to do their work.

The California zoo is famous for its work

helping to save Chinas giant panda. Three
panda cubs have been born at the zoo already.
The San Diego Zoo now has the largest population of giant pandas outside mainland China.
But the zoo has many other projects few
people hear about. Scientists with the zoo are
working to save iguanas in the Turks and Caicos Islands in the North Atlantic Ocean. They
study African wild dogs in Zambia and forest
birds in Hawaii.
Farmers in Africa think the
spotted cheetah is an annoying
pest. So they trap and kill them.
Now cheetahs are in danger of
disappearing forever. The National Zoo in Washington, D.C.
is trying to change that through
the Cheetah Conservation Fund
in Namibia, Africa. Scientists
there are showing farmers that they dont have
to kill cheetahs to keep them off their farms.
Scientists at the Houston Zoo are working
with people in Venezuela to save the tapir, an
animal related to the rhinoceros that looks a
lot like a pig. But its hunted for its thick hides
and its losing its habitat in South Americans
forests to development.
We are part of the web of life, said Marinello. We forget that sometimes. But we are
animals and our earth is supporting us and its
all connected. Its a balancing act and we need

Zoos are
working
harder...

Zoo Charities

Cheyanne Mountain Zoo

www.cmzoo.org

Aquarium of the pacific

www.aquariumofpacific.org

Chigaco Zoolology Society

www.brookfieldzoo.org

Como Friends
www.comozooconservation.org

Brimgingham Zoo
www.briminghamzoo.org

Cabrillio Aquarium
www.cabrilloaquarium.org

Meet Noelle

Noelle, a three-and-a-half-month-old tiger

cub with saucer-size paws, strains at her pinkand-purple leash. She seems to know whats
coming as animal trainer Kelsey Johnson
pulls out a warmed bottle of specially made
formula. The cub suckles it greedily, and three
visitors to Dade Citys Wild Things, a Florida
sanctuary and zoo, are called up one by one
to get their pictures taken as they stroke the
thick fur on her back, their faces alight with
amazement.

Zoos saving endangered animals

Most zoos are not only great places to get
up close to wildlife, but many are also doing
their part to bolster dwindling populations
of animals still living free in the wild. To
wit, dozens of zoos across North America
participate in the Association of Zoos and
Aquariums (AZAs) Species Survival Plan
(SSP) Program, which aims to manage the
breeding of swpecific endangered species
in order to help maintain healthy and
self-sustaining populations that are both
genetically diverse and demographically
stable. The end goal of many SSPs is the
reintroduction of captive-raised endangered
species into their native wild habitats.
According to the AZA, SSPs and related
programs have helped bring black-footed
ferrets, California condors, red wolves and
several other endangered species back from
the brink of extinction over the last three

decades. Zoos also use SSPs as research tools

to better understand wildlife biology and
population dynamics, and to raise awareness
and funds to support field projects and habitat
protection for specific species. AZA now
administers some 113 different SSPs covering
181 individual species. To be selected as the
focus of an SSP, a species must be endangered
or threatened in the wild. Also, many SSP
species are flagship specwies, meaning that
they are well-known to people and engender
strong feelings for their preservation and the
protection of their habitat. The AZA approves
new SSP programs if various internal advisory
committees deem the species in question to be
needy of the help and if sufficient numbers of
researchers at various zoos or aquariums can
dedicate time and resources to the cause.

Top 10 Zoo Rank1. Toledo Zoo - Toledo, Ohio

2. St. Louis Zoo - St. Louis
3. Cincinnati Zoo - Cincinnati
4. Memphis Zoo - Memphis
5. Columbus Zoo - Columbus, Ohio
6. Henry Doorly Zoo - Omaha
7. Houston Zoo - Houston
8. Brookfield Zoo - Chicago
9. Dallas Zoo - Dallas
10. San Diego Zoo- California

Whats a zoo to do?

Zoos are created specifically to exhibit

animals to the public. They collect animals,
taking into consideration conservation needs,
the potential for scientific research, and
which species the public likes best. Zoos
buy, sell, trade, borrow, loan out, and breed
animals. Many animal welfare advocates
believe that zoos, even those with scientific
and educational aims, exploit animals by
keeping them in captivity and exhibiting
them to the public.

Whats Virga got to say?

Dr. Vint Virga likes to arrive at a zoo
several hours before it opens, when the sun
is still in the trees and the lanes are quiet and
the trash cans empty. Many of the animals
havent yet slipped into their afternoon ma
laise, when they retreat, appearing to wait out
the heat and the visitors and not do much of
anything. Virga likes to creep to the edge of
their enclosures and watch. He chooses a spot
and tries not to vary it, he says, to give the
animals a sense of control. Sometimes he
watches an animal for hours, hardly moving.
Thats because what to an average zoo visitor
looks like frolicking or restlessness or even
boredom looks to Virga like a lot more
looks, in fact, like a veritable Russian novel
of truculence, joy, sociability, horniness,
ire, protectiveness, deference, melancholy
and even humor.The ability to interpret

animal behavior, Virga says, is a function of

temperament, curiosity and, mostly, decades
of practice. It is not, it turns out, especially
easy. Do you know what it means when an
elephant lowers her head and folds her trunk
underneath it? Or when a zebra wuffles, softly
blowing air between her lips; or when a colobus
monkey snuffles, sounding a little like a hog
rooting in the mud; or when a red fox screams,
sounding disconcertingly like an infant; or
when red fox kits chatter at one another; or
when an African wild dog licks and nibbles at
the lips of another; or when a California sea
lion resting on the waters surface stretches a
fore flipper and one or both rear flippers in the
air, like a synchronized swimmer; or when a
hippopotamus dung showers by defecating
while rapidly flapping its tail?