Zoo InternQuest is a seven-week career exploration program for San Diego County high school juniors and seniors. Students have the unique opportunity to meet professionals working for the San Diego Zoo, Safari Park, and Institute for Conservation Research, learn about their jobs, and then blog about their experience online. Follow their adventures here on the Zoo’s website!
If you think that you need to go all the way to Africa to experience the safari of your life, think again. This week interns had the amazing opportunity to go on the Caravan Safari with Senior Mammal Keeper Torrey Pillsbury at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. Through this incredible experience, guests have the chance to travel on an open-air safari truck through the African Plains and Asian Savanna exhibits of the Park and even feed giraffes and rhinos.
For interns, there was no better person to travel with than Ms. Pillsbury, who has worked at the Safari Park since 1979. Before we went on the safari, we saw the inside of the office for the keepers at the Safari Park. From training objectives to get animals more used to and comfortable with medical procedures to the red books that contain all the keepers’ notes and updates on the Park’s animals, this office was bursting with information. The Safari Park is unique from other zoos in that their exhibits are very large, so they have a lot more animals to keep track of. The African and Asian Plains exhibits are divided into north, south, east, and west sections to help the keepers distribute the enormous workload. Ms. Pillsbury has worked everywhere at the Park, and she is currently she working in her favorite section, the “north run.” The north run encompasses the Arabian oryx, the Przewalski’s horse, wild cattle, giraffes, camels, and other exciting animals.
After seeing the offices, interns excitedly got onto the caravan. As we made our way to the exhibits, Ms. Pillsbury told us a little bit about what her days look like. She begins work at six in the morning and starts getting all the hay and other food ready for the animals in her section. Herself and other keepers then take trucks out to the enclosures to distribute the feed. From there, different keepers have different assignments for the day. The day that we met with Ms. Pillsbury, a large portion of her assignment was checking on tuberculosis test results on animals who had received the test a couple of days prior. Ms. Pillsbury would say that she spends 98% of her day out in the field and 2% in the office because there are just so many different things that need to be done to care for the animals.
Once we made it to the Asian Savanna, interns were in for a treat. After seeing most of the animals in the exhibit up close, we made our way to the greater one-horned rhino pair of mother and daughter, Asha and Carol. Asha quickly came up to the caravan and interns fed her one of her favorite treats, apples. After that, we traveled to the African Plains and got the chance to feed very eager giraffes acacia leaves. This really was an experience of a lifetime and the fact that we had Ms. Pillsbury there, who has worked with these animals for over thirty years, made it that much better given her extensive knowledge.
One thing that Ms. Pillsbury wished every single person knew about the Safari Park is how it is a safe haven for animals. What used to be the wild that they lived in is now full of human encroachment, habitat loss, poaching, and other dangers. An example that Ms. Pillsbury brought up was the Arabian oryx. In the late 1960s, these antelopes were extinct in the wild. The first one arrived at the Safari Park in 1972, and now over 400 have been born there. Ms. Pillsbury also hopes that the public had more knowledge about all the reintroduction programs that the Park is apart of, like the one that brought the Arabian oryx back into Oman and Jordan.
The animals at the Safari Park do not have a safe place anymore in the wild, so the Park provides that for them. It is also a way to educate the public, generate interest, and provide aid for conservation efforts. As Senior Mammal Keeper, Ms. Pillsbury plays such a big part in making sure the Park does all those things and runs smoothly. There is no doubt that being so close to giraffes, the tallest land mammal, and rhinos that look like modern-day dinosaurs, that makes you want to do something more for their species. That being said, the Caravan Safari is an experience that everyone should do if they can.
Emma, Real World Team
Week Six, Winter Session 2019
