Woodland Park Zoo Blog

Posted by: Pattie Beaven, Zookeeper and Member of Puget Sound Chapter – American Association of Zoo Keepers Zookeeper Pattie Beaven gives an elephant-sized shout out to American Association of Zoo Keepers (AAZK).  This week is a special week for many of us at the zoo. This week is National Zoo Keeper Week celebrated by the American Association of Zoo Keepers . So what's it mean to be a zookeeper? Words aren't enough to describe this amazing job and the amazing animals. You know that feeling you get when your dog wags its tail in greeting when you come home? Imagine having a pack of wolves greet you in a similar manner! Wolf greetings. Photo by Dennis Dow/Woodland Park Zoo. Cats purr when they are content, and it can give us great pleasure to have our kitties sit in our laps, eyes closed, purring away. Now imagine having an 8,000-pound elephant purr with contentment upon seeing you. These are the joys of being a zookeeper. An elephant gets a scrub from a z...

Posted by: Pattie Beaven, Elephant Keeper Chai playfully balances a boat bumper on her head. Photo by Ryan Hawk/Woodland Park Zoo. Our elephants have a number of toys, or, in zoo-speak, Environmental Enrichment Devices (EED) that are designed to bring out their instinctual behaviors, along with all the naturally enriching elements in their exhibit like trees, logs, leaf piles, water and different ground coverings. The elephants have quite an array of EEDs, and one of their favorites is a boomer ball, which we often fill with treats. But constantly purchasing more boomer balls (since the elephants can be a bit destructive with them) can be a little costly. So, what’s a zookeeper to do? We think outside the box, er, ball. With a background working with marine mammals, I thought back to my days of playing with dolphins. We would throw boat bumpers and buoys in with the 800-pound critters, and play endless games with them. So, how would an 8,000-pound animal react to one? ...

Posted by: Pattie Beaven, Zookeeper Clockwise from top left: Keeper Laura McComsky works with a giraffe (photo by Brittney Bollay/Woodland Park Zoo), keeper Celine Pardo works with Humboldt penguins (photo by Matt Hagen), and keeper Edgar Fortune works with red ruffed lemurs (photo by Ryan Hawk/Woodland Park Zoo.) The zookeeper’s profession by nature occurs mostly behind the scenes, so it can be hard for us keepers to find time outside of Woodland Park Zoo’s regularly scheduled Keeper Chats to meet and talk with zoo visitors. That’s why, in celebration of National Zoo Keeper Week, the Puget Sound Chapter of the American Association of Zoo Keepers hosted two days of activities here at Woodland Park Zoo where a zookeeper was available throughout the day to answer visitor questions about what it is like to be a keeper and what we do on a daily basis to care for the more than 1,000 animals that call Woodland Park Zoo home. As part of the activities out on zoo grounds, we set up a t...