Bulletin From the Barn: February 2012
Giant Anteater Update From Keeper Marie Magnuson
Usually winter is a quiet time at the anteater barn. but this year has been a little different. The unusually mild temperatures have meant that the anteaters have been getting outside pretty regularly, even if only for an hour or two some days. Pablo had his first birthday on December 7 and celebrated by doing a little finger painting.
The press made a big fuss over the pandas doing some painting, and many zoos have elephants that paint, but our Pablo is also an animal artist. To help him out we (the keepers) used blue painters tape to fasten some watercolor paper to a large piece of cardboard. We smeared different colored paints on the cardboard surrounding the paper. Since anteaters see the world with their noses and tongues, we used safe, non-toxic tempera paint. Then we let Pablo in and encouraged him to walk through the paint and onto the paper using peanut butter as a reward. He was great! His painting turned out to be an abstract composition in brilliant oranges and reds and he used his tail to add a little blue as well. Pablo’s birthday painting will be part of an art show later this year. I’ll give you the details on this later, when we know exactly when and where.
When Pablo was done being moved by his muse, he and his parents Dante and Maripi each enjoyed some anteater birthday “cake.” Actually it was a gelatin mold with fresh fruits in it. They seemed to enjoy it a great deal, especially Dante.
Even though the weather has been great so far this winter, we have had some days when it was too cold for anteaters to go outside. Since we have three anteaters and the barn has three stalls, the days when they have to stay inside can be a little tricky when it comes to cleaning. And if and when Maripi goes into estrus Dante will have serious objections to another male, even a sub-adult like Pablo, anywhere near her. This could be dangerous for Pablo, so we decided that it would be better all around if he moved into the Great Cats building.
We fixed up a couple of cozy dens inside, as far away from the cats as we could. They were furnished with his same familiar sleeping crate, his toilet tub, mulch on the floor, and of course plenty of rotten logs. The move itself went very smoothly. Pablo has heard lions roaring and tigers bellowing all his life. He just had never heard it quite so loudly before. Between the noise and the strong smell of cats it was quite an adjustment for him, but adjust he did, in an impressively short time. In about three days he was eating normally and happily tearing up his logs. We also emptied out a storage area and fixed it up with logs and mulch. It is much larger and gives him the opportunity to get some exercise and really stretch his legs-Pablo’s Patio.
While we know that Pablo will soon have to go to Nashville Zoo since his parents are on loan from there, we are enjoying this time with him very much.
I’ll keep you posted about the animal art show!
