Amazing Stoat Rescue

As many of our visitors have come to appreciate, one of Dartmoor Zoo's best assets is its wonderful, woodland setting. We do our best to keep is as natural as possible to encourage local wildlife. Recently our efforts were rewarded when we managed to capture on film a fascinating example of nature at work.

Two baby stoats had managed to find themselves exposed and without parental protection right in the middle of our walk-through enclosure.

At the time we were getting some footage for our Behind the Scenes DVD with Dominic from Viewhear. As our curator, Colin Northcott explains, we were incredibly luck to witness the events at all, let alone catch them on film.

A sparring log for Sovereign

Today we have been busy in the jaguar enclosure, which is of course home to Sovereign. We wanted to give him some large new logs to scratch and clamber on. One of these in particular was very heavy indeed and so a good size for this big cat. We also wanted to secure a hanging log that Sov would be able to tussle and spar with. We hoped that the movement of such a large, strong object would provide much stimulation and activity.

As you can see from the photos, we secured a rope between the two trees (easier said than done!) and then used a small length of chain to attach the log to that. The log had long eye bolts screwed into it to allow the chain to be connected.

Sovereign's response wasn't as quite as dramatic as we'd imagined but, as you can see from the short video, he eventually got the idea of it! We hope he will use it much more in the future and have already had a few thoughts on how we can make it more appealing, such as wrapping it in horse fur. We had altered his enclosure a fair bit, so it's understandable because Sov did have lots of other things to investigate and, of course, scent mark!

Kiruna goes crazy for hanging enrichment

At Dartmoor Zoo we have a carefully designed enrichment programme which means that our animals receive a variety of different types of enrichment on a regular basis. We monitor and record their response to the items we provide so that we know what is successful with each species or individual, and what we need to change or withdraw altogether. A few weeks ago one of our keepers had the idea of hanging up a pelt for some of our small carnivores. They would normally have skin and fur present on their meat, but on its own, and hanging from a branch it encouraged a great deal of activity both from our female red fox Bramble and our female Siberian lynx Kiruna. Kiruna can be seen with this enrichment in the short video clip below.

Keepers' Snowy Week

This week at Dartmoor Zoo we have not escaped the heavy snowfall, icy roads and freezing conditions that have plagued the country. On Wednesday morning the treacherous driving conditions meant that many staff were unable to even get to the zoo. Hundreds of schools and offices in Devon have been shut for the last few days, but when animals are involved, life must go on as normal. They of course still need to be fed, watered, cleaned out and cared for, the same as every other day. Most of the keeping staff have made it in every day so far to do just this. Zoo keeping is hard work at the best of times, but this week that has been an understatement!

Water bowls have been freezing so hard that in some cases, keepers have been able to stand on them. As soon as we have broken the ice in every water bowl, they start to freeze up again. Although some of our animals, like the tigers and lynx are well adapted to these wintry conditions, many are not. For these species we have been providing extra large straw beds and heat lamps. Some, like the tapir, are being kept in overnight as well.

The biggest and least desired job every morning at the moment is breaking the ice on the Tiger Rock and Jaguar moats. In case you don't know, the moats are used instead of fencing on one side of each enclosure. Every day the ice gets thicker so we need to break it up first thing before we let the cats out. Normally the cats are out 24/7, but obviously this is not the best idea in these circumstances!

The keepers' favourite weapon is a long metal pole with a large bar on the end. It is very heavy and you can always tell who's done the cat round because they are collapsed over the table at break time!

Today is the first time since Tuesday that the van has been able to get to the main road (via the fallow field)! The drive is too slippery for any cars, which is one of the reasons why we are presently closed. As you can see from the video, it did need some help from the dumper on the way back, but we were running quite low on fruit and vegetables for our animals and so it was important to make the journey. The weather forecast for the weekend is more snow so we felt we had to take the opportunity to get some supplies in. Please telephone the zoo before you visit, to make sure we are open.

Josie's Birthday Video

It has only taken a little over two months! Finally I've been able to upload this onto the blog. I hope it is worth the wait.

Stripe and Blotch enjoy the simple things in life

Well, it's taken so long to get videos onto the blog and now in one afternoon three have been accepted! The clips below show Stripe, one of our 8 year old Amur tigers, playing with a large cardboard tube covered in strong smelling spices. Stripe, her twin sister Blotch, and their younger brother Vladimir love anything they can rip up and destroy! For this reason we have to carefully consider enrichment we give them so they do not come to any harm.

We frequently use olfactory enrichment with the cats (enrichment which stimulates the sense of smell) because this sense is really important to them. In the wild, tigers would spend a lot of their time patrolling their territory and scent marking. In order to encourage this natural behaviour we put various scents in the enclosures and on enrichment items. Some of their favourites are catnip, curry powder, mixed spice and cumin. We also use herbs and perfumes. These give the animals something different to analyse and they then cover up the foreign smell with their own odour, either by rubbing themselves all over it or, of course, by spraying!

The videos were taken a few weeks ago, but these photos of Blotch and the new hanging boomer ball were taken on Thursday. This time four straps of fire hose were used as a sling and it was hung from a tree by a long chain. When the lions had it recently, it only had two straps and Solomon managed to pop the ball out and it rolled down the hill! Hopefully this won’t happen with the tigers because it will end up in the moat if it does, and the keepers do not enjoy trying to retrieve it from there!

Thursday was a feed day so we put the ball up while the tigers were in their houses. Vlad came out and got his food, sat down and ate it. Stripe came out and got her food, sat down and ate it. Blotch however, came out and played with the Boomer ball! We had to call her away to make sure she got her food and one of the others didn’t eat it.

Video update

You may remember in an earlier blog I explained that we were having some difficulties uploading videos onto this site. As it turns out, Blogger has been experiencing technical problems and the only answer seems to be plenty of patience and persistance! Unfortunately I am still unable to upload Josie's Birthday Party video but the service has begun to accept some of our other enrichment videos. These will be posted whenever possible! The first is below and shows Tazmin, our 13 year old Amur tigress. When she lived at Tiger Rock, Taz would often cool off in the moat up there; however, since her move to Tiger Ridge a year ago, the keepers haven't seen her using the pool in this enclosure at all. In an attempt to encourage her into the water we made a raft, chained it to two breeze blocks at the bottom of the pool and placed some of her meat onto it when she was fed. For several weeks we would return later in the day to find the meat gone so hoped for the best; then the following footage was taken.

Unfortunately, as can be seen in the clip below, Tazmin cleverly manages to keep her paws largely dry as she stretches and swipes to reach her meat. We have since tried lowering the level of the water and the raft whenever we clean the pool but so far she always finds a way to get the food - even if we use many small peices instead! There is a large boulder in one corner which would allow Taz to step down into the pool gradually but she remains unconvinced. Having said that, it is only quite recently that Vlad, Blotch and Stripe have started using the moat at Tiger Rock, and of course they moved at the same time as Tazmin. Perhaps she just needs a little more time...

Solomon steals the limelight at Josie's party

On Saturday we celebrated our lioness Josie's 9th birthday. As explained in a previous blog we threw her a party with lots of enrichment. Josie and her father Solomon had their meat cut into small peices and hidden in hessian sacks with straw (one of which we hung from a tree). It was also concealed in birthday boxes and tubes, these are just cardboard but covered in colourful wrapping paper. We also gave them the hanging boomer ball and stuffed meat behind the fire hose straps (see previous blog for further details). Finally the lions had ginger, thyme, and Josie's personal favourite, catnip, scented in their enclosure.

Josie was quick to demolish the boxes and the hessian sack but Solomon amazed the watching crowd as he swung off the hanging sack and tore it down. He spent a lot of time getting the meat from the hanging boomer ball; using his great weight and strength he even managed to pop it out of the sling. He looked puzzled as it bounced down the enclosure, but was later seen rolling it around on the ground. This design will need adapting before it is given to our tigers next!

We have made a short video which we had hoped to include below, however numerous technical issues currently prevent this! We hope that in time videos will become regular features of the blog. Come back to the blog soon if you were unable to visit on Saturday, hopefully you will enjoy a few clips from the afternoon.