Raptor Handling 101

Harris's hawk on glove at the Vermont Institute of Natural Science

"Raptor" comes from the Latin word "rapere," meaning to snatch or grasp. Raptors, or birds of prey, have three distinct characteristics: forward-facing eyes with binocular vision, a sharp, hooked beak, and strong, grasping talons. Raptors are handled using operant conditioning, a type of learning that increases or decreases the probability of a behavior recurring based on the subsequent consequences. Positive reinforcement is an example of operant conditioning most commonly used with raptors; this same type of training is used when you call your dog and praise him for coming when called. I learned how to handle raptors at the Vermont Institute of Natural Science, an avian rehabilitation facility where we conducted multiple flight-shows each day for public education programs. I also took an avian husbandry, handling, and propogation class at Cornell University, and I continue to handle raptors at the Binghamton Zoo.

In this photo with a rough-legged
hawk,  the anklets, jesses, leash,
and glove are visible.

Falconry has existed for over 4,000 years and is the source for most of the handling and husbandry techniques used for raptors today. Falconers use a variety of equipment, but most handlers in zoos and rehabilitation centers use the same standard equipment: anklets and jesses around the bird's ankles, a glove to protect the handler, and a leash that secures the jesses to the glove. Flighted birds also wear telemetry (radio transmitters). Gloves typically go on the handler's left arm, and the bird stands on the forearm held at a right angle from the body. The handler's gloved hand makes a loose fist with the thumb on top. The jesses (leather straps) have small slits cut into the ends, which are clipped to the leash. The jesses and leash are then wrapped around the gloved ring and pinkie fingers of the left hand, and the remaining leash is clipped to a ring on the glove or tied with a falconers' knot. Handlers holding a bird always have the right of way. People should pass on the right side (the arm without a bird) and should stay 2-3 feet away from the bird.

With a red-tailed hawk

One of the main problems when handling a raptor is bating. Bating is a bird's attempt to fly from a glove or perch to which it is tethered. It's never pretty. During the bate, the handler is responsible for keeping the bird from hitting anything with its wings or feet and preventing injury to the bird or other people. Birds can often get back on the glove by themselves, but sometimes the handler has to put her ungloved hand on the bird's back and reposition the bird on the glove. The handler should then move the bird away from whatever loud noise, frightening object, or stressful situation caused the bird to bate. Birds can also easily become too hot if they are on a glove and unable to seek shelter. Handlers should watch out for panting or droopy wings. Another danger of handling raptors is being 'footed' or bitten. A frightened or aggressive raptor will strike out with its talons or beak to defend itself, so the handler should be confident and competent to prevent injury.

Flying HaHa, the Harris's hawk, to
catch a fake rabbit lure

Handlers must build a relationship with a bird (or any animal) in order to train it. A Harris's hawk (HaHa) at the Vermont Institute of Natural Science definitely put me to the test. Harris's hawks are actually highly social raptors (an unusual characteristic), and they hunt in packs like wolves. Because HaHa was the only Harris's hawk at the Vermont Institute of Natural Science, the handlers were his pack. Naturally, HaHa wanted to be alpha bird over any new handlers, so he made me 'run the gauntlet' to assert my dominance and become a new handler. I was bitten and footed more times than I can count, but I sucked it up and kept working with him. Finally, I gained his respect and he began training for me. And I knew I was part of the pack when a new handler started and HaHa began picking on her instead!

With a snowy owl

Raptors take time and motivation (food!) to become acclimatized and desensitized to standing on glove. Generally, a glove is first placed over a perch in the bird's enclosure, and the bird's food is placed on the glove, so the bird begins to associate the glove with positive experiences. Then a handler is present in the enclosure while the bird is eating. Eventually the handler wears the glove and holds it in the same place as the stationary glove perch. The handler slowly begins to move around the enclosure with the bird standing on the glove. For flight programs, two handlers wear gloves and the bird first has to step between gloves. Then the handlers slowly get farther away from each other so the bird has to make short flights between them. Every time the bird does something correctly, it receives a food reward. Every time the handler tries something new and the bird responds correctly, it receives a jackpot (a much bigger reward). I won't go into nitty-gritty details about training in this blog, but be on the lookout for a detailed blog on operant conditioning coming soon!

Working with raptors has been an incredibly enjoyable and challenging experience for me. They are such intelligent animals, and I think they have trained me more than I have trained them.

Panda Cub Update

Photo courtesy of Binghamton Zoo guest, PJ Harmer

Zhin-Li is now exploring his outdoor exhibit and becoming more independent. He is still trying to nurse in addition to eating solid foods, but Mei-Li keeps batting him away and leaving him alone for longer and longer periods of time. In the wild, this cub would already know how to fend for himself! He is still a little unsteady on the propping in his exhibit, but he is figuring out how to climb slowly but surely. Except for the occasional mishap!

What's Round, Orange, and Fun All Over?

Photos and video courtesy of the Binghamton Zoo

PUMPKINS!

Binghamton Zoo's tigers, Terney and Koosaka, celebrated Halloween early this year. On Monday, the keepers gave them each a forty-pound pumpkin. The tigers rolled on them, bit them, scratched them, and kicked them. They chased each other around the yard and stole each other's pumpkins. Terney even dumped hers in the pool! Then Terney decided she wanted the pumpkin out of the pool, so she sunk her teeth in, and effortlessly pulled it out. A forty-pound pumpkin. That took two keepers to carry. This just reinforces why we don't go in the exhibit with these girls!

There aren't many toys that can withstand being batted around by a tiger. No wonder Terney and Koosaka love pumpkins so much!

Who is a Zoo Curator?

A zoo curator is the head of the animal care department, also called a collection manager. In a large zoo, the keepers report to a senior keeper, who is supervised by a collection manager, who reports to an assistant curator, who assists a curator. All of the positions are based on seniority. In a large zoo (like the San Diego Zoo), there are often many curators: their management areas can be divided by the physical location of the exhibits in the zoo, by the geographic location where the animals are found in the wild, or by the taxa of the animals in the exhibits. In a large zoo, these curators then report to a general curator, then a director of animal care, then the director of the zoo facility. At the Binghamton Zoo, the seven keepers report to Curator Dave Orndorff, who is assisted by an animal care manager. Dave reports to the director of the zoo facility, Steve Contento.

Meet Dave Orndorff

Dave weighs Zhin-Li, the baby red
panda at the Binghamton Zoo in 2013

Dave Orndorff has been the curator of the Binghamton Zoo at Ross Park for a year this week. On a daily basis, he oversees the animal care department by facilitating the many needs of the keepers and teaching the keepers advanced animal care strategies. Dave also acts as a liaison between other departments on zoo grounds and with other zoos' animal management programs. Dave manages the animal collection by coordinating animal transfers with other zoos and encouraging propagation (baby animals!) among the animals currently in the Binghamton Zoo's collection. He also organizes vet rounds, facilities operations, and new exhibits, and represents the zoo to the media and donors. As the curator, Dave is instrumental to the overarching goals and direction of the zoo: he is on a long-range planning committee that seeks to uphold the zoo's mission of conservation and education by planning the new animals and exhibits that will be coming to the zoo and by conducting field work and in situ conservation projects.

Dave, age 15, holding a lion cub he hand-raised at his first
job at Lion Country Safari

The career path that led Dave to the Binghamton Zoo was complex and exciting. Dave attributes his success to being in the right place at the right time, and based on his career, I would say he possesses precognition. Dave began as a high school volunteer explorer scout at Lion Country Safari in California in the 1970's. He acted as a nursery keeper, and hand-raised many exotic animals. Lion Country Safari eventually hired Dave, and he left high school every day at 11am to go work full-time caring for animals. In the late '70's, Dave was hired by SeaWorld in Florida. He worked as a keeper, aquarium supervisor, aviculture supervisor, and senior animal care specialist. Dave helped create the original SeaWorld Orlando Park and trained the staff to care for the animals at SeaWorld standards. He was often sent to the Florida Keys to collect sharks and other marine animals for the SeaWorld collections. He spent days at a time on a boat and developed some of the first shark morphometrics (measurements to determine the age and health of a shark). Dave also documented the first Galapagos shark in Florida waters. Additionally, while at SeaWorld, Dave worked with a manatee population monitoring program that rehabilitated and released injured manatees. Dave was the first person at SeaWorld to hand-raise a baby manatee, and that manatee is still alive today at Disney.

Dave swimming with a shark at the SeaWorld Shark Institute in the 1980's

Feeding a captive-bred kagu in New
Caledonia

After his 12-year term at SeaWorld, Dave was hired by the same man who gave him his first job at Lion Country Safari to work at The Zoo in Gulf Breeze, Florida, as the curator of birds. Next, Dave worked as the Senior Tropics Keeper at the Beardsley Park Zoo in Connecticut. For the next 11 years, Dave worked at the San Diego Zoo as the bird department collection manager. While working for the San Diego Zoo, Dave participated in the first international meeting for harpy eagle conservation in Mexico. He also founded a national park in the southern province of New Caledonia for kagu preservation. Dave worked with local biologists and citizens to run the studbook and manage a captive kagu population for release. The national park still exists today. Dave also ran a studbook and captive Guam rail release program through the San Diego Zoo for five years as well as the AZA species survival plan for fishing cats. Additionally, he spent a summer in Kenya and Tanzania tagging and trans-locating elephants.

After exhausting his advancement opportunities at the San Diego Zoo, Dave moved to the Mill Mountain Zoo in Virginia as the general curator and then director for four years. Subsequently, he became the curator of birds at the Tracy Aviary in Utah, followed by the assistant curator at the Gulf Breeze Zoo in Florida. Dave then became the curator of Catoctin Wildlife Preserve and Zoo in Maryland, and finally became the Binghamton Zoo's general curator in October 2012.

Dave caring for a takin

After 41 years in the animal care business, Dave has done it all. Not only has he met Jane Goodall and Michael Jackson, but he has traversed the world, from Kenya, to Guam, to Iceland. He has hand-raised 365 penguin chicks, three Asian elephants, and countless big cats. When asked what his favorite aspects of being a curator are, Dave replied that as a curator he has "the opportunity to make a real difference with captive animal management." As a curator, Dave is able to participate in every facet of the animal care business, from keeping work to big-picture decisions. His favorite animal is "whatever he happens to be working with at the time." According to Dave, the only downside of being a curator is the fact that "the longer you are in the business, the farther removed you are from the reason for going into the business in the first place." Dave's curatorial job involves much more paperwork and much less one-on-one time with the animals than he would like. Additionally, every curator's dreams and ambitions are often curtailed by their zoos' budgets. It is difficult, even for innovative curators like Dave, to provide their animals with state-of-the-art facilities without excellent donor support.

According to Dave, a curator's job is whatever he or she wants to make of it. In the future, a curator's role may not change much in small zoos like Binghamton, but it may fluctuate drastically in large zoos. As the economy changes, the curator's job may become more multi-faceted as other positions are cut. That may be good news for Dave, who loves that no two days are the same; he still can't believe that he gets paid to pursue a 41-year hobby.

Dave with hand-raised chimpanzees

What Do Zoo Animals Eat?

Examples of ingredients used for diets at the Binghamton Zoo

Well, that depends. Everyone knows that animals can be herbivores, carnivores, or omnivores, but there are actually many specific feeding strategies. Some animals are frugivores, and eat only fruit, while other are sanguinivores, and only drink blood. Diets for zoo animals are based on research about the natural history of that animal and on detailed records about that animal's weight, coat condition, reproductive success, and fecal composition. However, zoo diet prep is a relatively new discipline.

In the 1940's, one of the major causes of death for captive animals was poor nutrition. In the 1950's, American zoos underwent five major changes that improved quarantine procedures, sanitation, treatment procedures, antibiotics, and feeding techniques. In the 21st century, zoo diets are culminations of research from behaviorists conducting field work, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums' (AZA) nutrition advisory group, vets, curators, and keepers.

Examples of pre-processed grain
for zoo animals

You know the grain that is fed to a horse in a barn or the pellets you feed to your rabbit at home? Zoo animals also eat processed foods. Companies make pelleted food specifically designed for the nutritional requirements of exotic animals. This pelleted food is often much more economical than flying in exotic, perishable foods from all parts of the world on a weekly basis.

Prepared diets (clockwise from top): arctic fox,
mousebirds, rock hyrax, hedgehog, and
fennec fox

Diets must take into consideration the weight, fitness level, metabolic rate, and age of every animal that is being fed. For example, we can't feed an overweight, geriatric wolf a high-fat puppy diet. Additionally, we must consider the morphology of each animal. Lemurs can't eat large chunks of meat; they don't have the teeth to tear the meat or the GI tract to digest it. Red pandas actually have a very sensitive GI tract, so they are only fed bamboo, apples, grapes, and processed leaf-eater biscuits. Additionally, we must consider how to present
the diet. Arboreal animals, like golden lion tamarins, would eat fruit and insects high up in the canopy of South American rainforests. At the zoo, they would starve if we scattered their food on the ground, so we have a hanging food dish in a tree for them. Keepers also have to keep in mind whether the animal sticks its head in the dish to eat or uses a paw to hold the food item. How big should the pieces or biscuits be? Should the diet be in a pan or scattered around the exhibit? Is the animal pregnant or lactating? Will the animal eat all the parts of the food you are giving it? For example, if I don't gut the mice I feed to the owls, I come to work the next day to find guts smeared all over the walls of the exhibit. Finally, animals are as picky as people. Every book, website, and husbandry manual in the world might tell you that Chica, our Andean bear, should like strawberries, but because in reality Chica HATES strawberries, she will never eat them, no matter how hard I try. So I have to find something else that has similar nutritional value that she will actually eat.

Diet sheet for Binghamton Zoo's coatimundi

So, how does all of this work at the Binghamton Zoo? Every animal in the zoo has a diet sheet that lists how
many times a day that animal is fed, what it is fed, how big the pieces should be, what type of pan the diet should be in, and any food items the animal is not allowed to have. For example, the coatimundi is fed twice a day, and gets a different diet in the morning than he does at night. He is not allowed to have grapes in his diet because grapes are the special treat reserved for training sessions with the keepers. If he got grapes in his regular diet, he would be less willing to work for them during training sessions. Additionally, parrots cannot have avocado and canids cannot have grapes or raisins because these foods are toxic to those animals.

Diets are also made up of many parts. We don't just throw bones to the tigers every day and call it done. We have six wallabies at the zoo right now, so they get a very large, four-part diet, to ensure that each individual animal gets enough food.

Four parts of the wallaby diet

The diet consists of shredded kale and romaine, wallaby pellets, leaf-eater biscuits, and mixed produce in chunks large enough that the wallabies can hold the pieces to eat. Diets also have to take into account whether or not the animal is being medicated. Some animals, like Sylvia the mouflon, receive a joint supplement every day. She doesn't mind the taste, so the powder is just sprinkled over her grain each morning. However, some of our animals are much more finicky. Chica, our Andean bear, is quite the prima donna. Right now, she is receiving five pills a day to treat a possible uterine infection, but she hates the taste of her medication. The keepers originally tried hiding her meds in sherbet (one of her favorite treats), but she quickly caught on to that. I know that Chica really

Chica's peanut butter smoothie

likes sugar, so the other day I thought of a different way to hide her meds. This gross-looking picture is actually of a peanut butter, apple juice, honey, and cooked yam smoothie that I made Chica. I crushed her pills and stirred them into the smoothie; she slurped it up without ever knowing there were pills inside! Hopefully we can continue using this smoothie idea until the end of her treatment without her catching on...

Diets are made every day at the Binghamton Zoo, and they are one of the most interesting and sensitive parts of my job. The slightest change to a diet can have a big impact on the well-being of an animal. I constantly have to problem-solve to convince an animal to eat the food or medication I put in front of it. The most common question I'm asked is, "what does this animal eat?" When a little kid or an adult looks at an animal that is very different from a human, food is the easiest thing to relate to!