Kaycee & Zach Project Update

1. Two most interesting facts thus far: -It has been fun listening to the zoo keepers talk about the animals. They all seem really connected with the animals, and have areas that they prefer to work in. We talked to a woman in the monkey house who told us about the White-Cheeked Gibbons. After asking her a series of questions, we asked her if she had a favorite, but she said that she doesn't pick favorites and loves them all equally. We found it interesting that she would apply such a human-motherly approach to caring for the monkeys, who technically wouldn't care one way or another if she loved one more than another. We also talked to another keeper who told about several of the animals we are interested in, but seemed especially excited about the Pygmy Hippos. The one on display that day, called Annie, is apparently very friendly, and her male counterpart, Howie, is also very nice. They treat them to Romain Lettuce as a treat for doing well in training, or advancement. Keepers also switch out the hippos every other day, because they are solitary animals and do not do well together. Apparently there is a pool in a closed-to-public area where they spend the other days. He also told us his fondness for the Lynx's and the Leopard.

(Annie about to go swimming, still from a video) Basically this ties back into the anthropomorphism of animals that we talked about earlier in class. Even though this is looked upon as negative, it is still what humans naturally do in order to relate to animals. Zoo keepers are supposed to have limited contact with animals in order to maintain the animals natural instincts, and to rely less on human interaction. Despite this, the keepers tend to apply human characteristics to the animals, and develop fondness for them. So for our project, we think it will be very effective to "celebrate" animal birthdays via video in order to educate people about the animal and the species, at least to make them memorable and hopefully be more aware of and concerned about habitat conservation, without going too far and objecting the animal. Basically, the viewer will be introduced to the specific animal and learn about them without it seeming like we are selling a pet to them. We will be sure to have to integrity of the animal in mind. I (Kaycee) recently read an article about the side effects of humans wanting to make animals "smarter". While this would be a huge scientific feat, which they have already successfully done via a brain transplant on a chimpanzee, it also questions the motives and humaneness of this. I do not agree with this supposed "upgraded" intelligence, so celebrating the animal as an animal is key for our project.

(picture from article "Should we upgrade the intelligence of animals?") 2.We have found out specific information about every animal in our interest, except for the seal thus far. We asked the following questions: Does the animal have a name? Where were they born? How old is he/she? favorite foods? Where did they come from specifically, if known? Personal info (favorite activities, pet peeves, favorite spot in habitat?) Example info: -Gibbons-> Caruso and Berma are the parents of Sai, the almost one year old baby. He was born in the zoo. Caruso is from the National Zoo in DC, and Berma is from a zoo in Germany. We will be celebrating Sai's birthday. They get a different toy to play with everyday, and are involved in enrichment everyday, for fun and to train them how to cooperate for various check ups. They love bananas, grapes, raisins, and basically all fruit. We have also taken videos to use as backgrounds for green screening of every habitat we intend to use. 3. We need to find information on the seal, and plan out our scripts based on the specific information we have and general information about the animals and their natural habitats, which we are still in the process of finding. 4. I (Kaycee) am still trying to think of effective ways to design the map we are going to make with the QR codes on them. I have been drawing some designs, but nothing definite yet. Other than that, we are rolling right along.