(majestic music)
(lion roaring)
(wolf howling)
(lions roaring)
- Hi everybody,
welcome to the Animal Park at the Conservators Center,
we're gonna take you on a little behind
the scenes tour just to take a look at
how we are functioning during the COVID-19 pandemic.
So without being able to have our public tours here,
the animals are definitely getting
a little bit less attention than they're used to.
Thankfully our staff is committed to their behavior
and their health.
Ah so what were doing to protect
the animals is wearing masks
and covering our hands in gloves.
The mask that I am wearing right now was actually made out
of autoclave material
and donated by one of our local veterinarians.
So thankfully as we are an all weather facility,
the keepers have had to wear face masks around
the animal just to be able to protect ourselves from
the cold or any kind of nasty wind.
So the animals have been pretty well desensitized.
I wouldn't say that they are totally used to it
and they don't love it.
They do use a lot of facial cues to be able
to kind of communicate with us.
Thankfully, within our team we're really well trained
and we know to kind of be ready for that.
And the bigger thing for us
to be able to show them is more our eyes
and our attitude.
And we just make sure to take our time
and either use it as a training tool or change our husbandry
so that the animal stays as comfortable as possible.
Being a behavior specialists we are able
to actually share space with our wolf pups.
They just turned a year old about a week,
maybe two weeks ago.
And we've been with them
since they've been about eight weeks old.
(wolf barking)
- Oh. - Oh.
For the bubble bath
that we're providing them with,
kind of provides a lot of different stimulus.
Our northwestern wolves are very interested
in water in general.
So any time that we can make that water
a little bit more exciting is gonna give them something else
to think about within their environment.
By adding something as simple as bubbles,
now they can't really see the bottom
of the pool.
It adds another texture,
another smell,
and just a general complexity to their environment.
Something that they don't engage
with every single day makes it
so that it's a little bit more interesting
when we do provide it for them.
One of our large concerns here
of course is how long this quarantine is going to last.
Making sure that we keep track
of things like our supply chain,
the animal health,
keeping our veterinarians up
to date on everything that's going on.
We've been kind of limiting
how many resources we are using at a time
to ensure that we can use them for as long as possible.
Thankfully as a small nonprofit we are still able
to keep all of our paid staff employed right now.
But everybody is doing things that are
a little bit outside of their normal task regimen.
They're helping out in construction more,
they're helping out in animal care when they can.
It's more of our social animals may get
a little bit more needy if they are just used
to seeing the same people over and over again.
So changing how we engage with the animals,
may be taking our lunch break with them,
taking a book out to read.
The longer that this goes on it's basically just
the more creative that we're gonna have to become.
So as you can see,
we provide the animals the choice
in control to be a part of their therapy.
So while I had the light on Lena,
for just a quick moment to see how she felt,
she left the area and I didn't follow after her.
Versus Oz who if you do anything
that's on the ground,
he just wants to be part of your life.
And he doesn't even really notice that there is a light
or any kind of therapy or anything happening
on his back end.
Careful.
Now he wants to say I love you
or pee on me, yeah.
I want to thank you all for joining us today
on our little behind the scenes tour.
We cannot wait to have visitors be able to come back
on grounds and join us for
a real tour here with us and with the animals.
In the meantime,
if you have anything to spare we are
so grateful for any kind of donation.
You can find a lot of our options on our website
animalparknc.org.
You can also follow us on social media.
We have Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram,
and even some really cute videos on TikTok.
If you have time to reach out to any
of your local institutions as well,
We are all in this together.
(upbeat music)