October 11, 2024 • 31 mins
Yun Chuan and Xin Bao have been at the San Diego Zoo for a few months, so hosts Rick and Marco wanted to check out how they are adapting to their new surroundings. To do so, our hosts are visiting Panda Ridge and speaking with Nicki Boyd, curator of mammals, ambassadors, and applied behavior at San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, to find out more about their new habitats and the benefits of outcome-based husbandry. Additionally, the San Diego Zoo and San Diego Zoo Safari Park are celebrating Kids Free in October; kids under the age of 11 can enter for free with adult admission!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hi, I'm Rich Schwartz, but uses the world.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
I'm Marco Wentz.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
Welcome to Amazing Wildlife, where we explore unique stories of
wildlife from around the world and uncover fascinating animal facts.
This podcast is a production of iHeartRadio's Ruby Studio and
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, an international nonprofit conservation organization
which oversees the San Diego Zoo and Safari Park.
Speaker 4 (00:27):
Oh Senor, It's October and that means we both have
been doing a lot of interviews for Kids Free Month
at the Zoo and the Safari Park.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
Oh, I know, I know what you mean.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Kids Free Month in October, the Autumn Festival to Safari Park.
How Gloween is the San Diego Zoo. We have been
busy letting everyone know all the details.
Speaker 4 (00:44):
I mean, I guess we should let our audience know
that too, huh. I mean, just in case anyone hasn't
heard yet. During the month of October, kids ages eleven
and under can get into the San Diego Zoo or
the Safari Park for free with a paid adult ticket.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
It's true that it's true.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
And the Autumn Festival it's a Safari Park that's on
Saturdays and Sundays. And Howgloween at a zoo that's on Fridays,
Saturdays and Sundays, and both are included with your admission
to either park. But you know what, I have to admit, Marco,
every time I do an interview about Kids Free or
Hogloween or whatever, they always ask about the giant pandas.
Speaker 5 (01:18):
Oh, friend, I know what you mean.
Speaker 4 (01:20):
I mean it's usially like, oh, how are the pandas doing?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Or do you get to see the pandas every day
since you work there?
Speaker 6 (01:27):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:28):
I know. And then there's the popular Hey, can you
give me behind the scenes to see the pandas?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
I know that's right.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
I mean, sure, they're not birds, but you know, they
are truly a special addition to the zoo, and you know,
everyone wants.
Speaker 5 (01:40):
To know how they're doing well.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
As much as I would like to offer a special
behind the scenes panda tour to all of our listeners,
their family, their friends, that's just not something we're going
to get approval on.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
So I'm thinking we should do the next best thing.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
You mean, like an aviary tour. Oh, Marco, alright, I'm
just kiddy.
Speaker 6 (01:56):
I'm just kiddy.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Although it does give me an idea.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
No Marco, no my aviary tourists, but we should go
into the zoo and talk to someone who knows a
lot about giant pandas, their behavior and how they're settling
into life at the same Diego Zoo.
Speaker 4 (02:10):
All right, fair enough, I guess we should head to
the zoo and hey, I'll tell you what.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
If you're good during the interview, we'll stop at one
of the aviary's on the way out.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Okay, oh goody.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
I am Nicki Boyd. I am Curator of Mammals, Ambassadors
and Applied Behavior.
Speaker 5 (02:26):
That's a lot of stuff there, Nikki.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
As far as your title goes, we're actually here to
talk about pandas.
Speaker 5 (02:31):
I didn't hear pandas in that.
Speaker 6 (02:32):
Title their mammal Okay, fair enough.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
Well, as I mentioned, Nikki, we are here to find
out an update on the pandas, and I do know
actually you work quite a bit with the pandas and
the teams that work with the pandas, and part of
what your title is also behavior, which is also important.
We're going to get into all of that, but first
and foremost, i'd love to hear your immediate thoughts on
how are the pandas doing right now.
Speaker 6 (02:58):
They're doing really well. The mail is pretty chill, you know,
you and Chwan, he's pretty fun to watch. He just
loves to pile the bamboo all over himself and set
up on his climbing structure. I know, I was laughing.
I'm like, he loves his bamboo and I'll turn around
all you can see his bottom feet stick it out
of green. So yeah, they're really fun to watch. They're
(03:19):
really getting playful, like you see all the panda videos
if you do, like all my reels are just panda
videos now then rolling downhills and why were they not
extinct because they're you know, always falling off of things.
And he was just like rolling through the habitat with
one of his logs. So part of our outcome based
husband is to feed them in a way that creates
like a bamboo grove where they have to pull it out.
So we have these logs that have holes killed in
(03:40):
them and all the bamboos stuck in there. And well
he pulled all the bamboo out and then he started
rolling on his back and rolling the log over and
flipping it and running up and climbing his tree. We
call it a bonzai tree, but it's a really big
squatty pine tree, and he climbs up and looks out
the top and it looks like he's like driving his
space ship. It's really very buddy. So yeah, so he's
(04:00):
like he's chill, but then he's also starting to have fun,
like coming to his element.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Oh cool, that's really great.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Yeah, I can't ask you that you really quick in
case our listeners aren't aware when you said outcome based husbandry,
Like what do you mean by that?
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Like, what's a quick way to describe that.
Speaker 6 (04:12):
So a lot of people are familiar with like zoos
do enrichment. So now we talk about experiences, and so
when we do an experience, we try to mimic some
of the natural behavior of an animal in the wild.
And so we have inputs, which are things that you
put in, but we're looking really for the outcomes. And
so if you want to pana to eat bamboo like
a panda wood in the wild, how do you create that?
(04:33):
What's the input which is those logs as I mentioned,
with the holes jill in them, and you just stock
the fresh bamboo in there, and then the outcome is
them just sitting and processing food longer like they naturally would,
So we consider that an outcome, and the way that
we manage animals is called husbandry, and so outcome based
husbandry is just a term that we use in the
zoo and kind of cool that San Diego Zoo has
(04:54):
kind of like coined this phrase and we teach it
around the world and a lot of people are focusing
on that because it's about the closest thing you can
to having natural behavior of a wild panda. So it's
really cool and we use it for so many different species.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
Oh yeah, I love it.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
I mean, I remember one scenario. Another bear like grizzly
is an example, and you can correct me if I'm wrong.
But the little thing seasonal for instance, buds will start
coming out of a flower, right, and that'll be a cute.
The springtime is coming and perhaps you know, maybe fish
will be coming at a certain point depending on the season,
And so that's really great that you guys do that.
Speaker 6 (05:23):
Yeah, I love the different seasonal ones. We have a
forest fire one, we have the spring fruiting experience. The
fish one you mentioned will do a dry season where
the water will get lower in the pool and then
it's easier to catch the fish, so then we have
like river rock in there, and then the grizzly go fishing.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
So it's not just throwing a ball in a habitat.
Speaker 6 (05:39):
Right, Yeah, trying to get away from that, and so
it's fun to talk about it because it might not
be as obvious to just the person walking by a habitat.
But I just need you all to know that it's
a very thoughtful process that we're doing all the time
with a bunch of different species. And so when you
get to see an animal being a bear or a
diraffe that's foraging for multiple hours, it's part of our
(06:00):
thoughtful outcome based systry process.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
Thanks for explaining that, and hopefully now our guests when
they're coming to the zoo of the park, they can
take a little more extra time and kind of see
all the nuances of what a wildlife care specialist does.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Right, And you were mentioning Yu and Chuan, what about Singbao?
How is she doing out there?
Speaker 6 (06:14):
So she's been a character since she got here. Oh yeah,
even when they went to China and to visit her,
she was rolling down the hill and she had this
little stomp off the wall and give a little side eye.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Like I used to do Panda side eye.
Speaker 6 (06:26):
Yeah, Canda side eye. So everyone and in a while
Gaileen will be like, oh, she just gave us a
side eye. So it's just her being very aware of
her environment. So she has I like to describe the
two habitats as once more of Chinese mountain side. So
she's got this great hill landscape. In the very beginning,
she was laying at the very top checking out her kingdom,
you know, her purview. She could see people making her bamboo,
(06:48):
so she was kind of really watching out for the
bamboo to arrive. Now she's down front and center.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
You know.
Speaker 6 (06:55):
Sometimes on hot days she was the air conditioning. But
they love their climbing structure, and so she's all over
the habitat. Un Schwan's in what I like to call
the intimate forest view have a habitat. So you'll see
the two different sides, and we're actually gonna rotate them.
We're going to give them a couple of months to
acclimate into the spaces they're at now, and then we'll
swap them. Because the male actually normally have a bigger territory.
(07:18):
We felt when we first got to know her that
she would benefit from having a bigger space. If she
wanted to retreat, she could. He was a lot more chill,
and she was kind of honking at us at first,
which is a vocalization of why are all these people
looking at me? And not that there was that many,
but we acclimated them pretty slowly with like six people
and she was fine. And ten people come in, she
(07:38):
look at everybody and do a little honk, and so
we were like, okay, she's telling us like, what are
you doing in my space? And then eventually she just
go back to eating her bamboo and she realized everything
was fine. So we slowly brought more and more people
in and now she's totally fine. But we were very
thoughtful about which habitat they could each go in, and
our Chinese colleagues were here and they wanted him to
(07:59):
have bigger space right off the bat. Not only is
that natural behavior where the male has a bigger territory,
but it builds up their strength for breeding, which is
going to happen down the road, not this year. We
were able to negotiate and say, you know, we really
think she would benefit from this bigger space, and so
they were like, that sounds reasonable. We'll give them two
or three months and then we'll swap them and see
how they do. So that's the plan.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
That was one thing you just mentioned that talking back
and forth and negotiating like what would be the best
for the individual animals. I want to dive a little
more into the collaboration that it's taken, because obviously there
were people in China taking care of the pandas before
they got here. But talk a little bit about the collaboration,
not only what we're experiencing now, but maybe just a
little bit of history on it too.
Speaker 6 (08:39):
Yeah. So you know, we had giant pantas here for
twenty two years before, and we had a great relationship
with our Chinese partners, and I just remember people saying
it was kind of like a homecoming when we went
back over there. It's a lot of the same people
were here. I know, you had Megan Owen on the podcast,
and so when she was there, you know, Paul was
describing it was like hugging in tears. And we've had
(08:59):
a long relationship, which is great for building trust and collaboration,
as you mentioned, And so this time we had some
people who had been there before and bringing some of
our newer folks, so doctor Meg c Eedlin Smith, doctor
Ben Nevitt, who's taking her place as she rolls into retirement.
Greg and Jessica, my boss and his partner in welfare
assess the bears and got to go with Gayleen who
(09:21):
had worked with the bears before. So it's kind of
this great collaboration with the Chinese colleagues going to China,
and then as they came over. We have about six
wilivecare specialists that are assigned to the panda area. Three
of them worked with the pandas before and three of
them are new, so we are also teaching, like our
next generation of wildfecare specialists how to take care of pandas.
(09:42):
And then the Chinese colleagues are right here with us
talking about how they do it in China, and two
of the new Wildfecare specialists went to China as well.
Jana and Jessica got to go over there and see
the bears before they came over, so they share a
lot of information of how they do stuff. But I
think they're also learning a lot from us too, like
the outcome bas when Jews we just talked, So I
think they're going to take some stuff back to China
(10:03):
that they've learned from us, and then I really look
forward to the conservation potential with this. So we have,
you know, our conservation hubs, and Asia is one of
the hubs, and I was an Asian Hub leader, So
I of course love red pandas. If anyone knows, I was.
Speaker 4 (10:19):
Just going to say, your absolutely favorite, and well, what
is the red panda really quick, just in case people.
Speaker 6 (10:24):
It's a small carnivore. They're called panda because both giant
panas and red pantas eat bamboo. Oh that's why Punya
is bamboo eater, and so panda came from Punya, which
is a name that they called them. I like to
call them the op the original panda.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 6 (10:40):
They're not related to each other. So giant pantas are
in the bear family and red pantas are in their
own family. It's called a lure po to day. And
so that's what's kind of fun about science, is like
it's sometimes changing and learning. The more technology you have,
the more you learn. So now there's actually two species
of panda. They used to be subspecies. So there's a
Chinese red panda and a West turn nor Himalayan red panda,
(11:01):
and so they have enough differences genetically that they are
considered two different species now, which just came out in
the last couple of years. So since Rick and I
were red panic keepers back in the day in the
old Yeah, that's great. String I moved up.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Yeah, podcast, Yeah, I.
Speaker 6 (11:21):
Want to hear you know, when you give your string
over to somebody, you really trust them.
Speaker 5 (11:24):
And for those listening, who so we're having a moment
here right now.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
The string is an area that a staff member wildlife
care specialist cares for.
Speaker 5 (11:33):
And in the area that I started in.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
Children Zu Nikki was a full time senior wildlife care
specialist at the time, and she trained me on it
was what red pandas otters. We had porcupine in one
of the habitats, we had naked morats and I'm trying
to think who else was over there, bandar was over there?
Speaker 5 (11:50):
They been wrong. Yeah, So and then we did the
back area that had the goody and the tamandoa.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Yeah. So that was what she means when she says
a string, that's an area we referred to as a
sort of string of habit attats.
Speaker 5 (12:00):
If you will that you take care of. I love
the history we had red pandas.
Speaker 3 (12:03):
Yes, And so to go back to the saying how
science change things, I think obviously, when I first started,
it was only considered one species of red panda with
a subspecies idea, and it had just been a few
years that they decided red pandas and giant pandas were
not related.
Speaker 5 (12:19):
At that time, it was like the late nineties, early
two thousand, right.
Speaker 6 (12:22):
Yeah, I've been writing an article for our like kids
call a club or a newsletter and saying, what do
you kids think? So that's what's fun about science is
it's changing and different scientists, you know, find different discoveries.
And so we've had scientific names change on us. You
memorize one for a long time and then it changes.
And you know, giant pandas and red pantas live in
the same habitat, and so they were thought, well, why
(12:44):
aren't they really they both eating.
Speaker 5 (12:45):
Bamboo, they have the bone and the wrists.
Speaker 6 (12:47):
Yeah, must be red. I bet, I bet it's still
up for debate, and I bet there'll still be some
scientists trying to decide if they should be in the
same family or not.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
Well, I'm glad he brought it up because I love
to remind people just diversity of animals and plants that
live in that area.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
I mean, giant pandas are amazing.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
As I'm a bird guy, you know, the Asian crusted
iyeb is endangered species at bird that really needs a
lot of help, so many others Chinese alligator as well,
So it's going to help a lot of species with
the work we're doing with the giant pandas.
Speaker 6 (13:14):
Right, absolutely, so, I think of giant pan as as
an umbrella species. And so if you save habitat for
giant pan as, you're helping the red panda, Chinese minol.
Any of the reptiles that might be in the lower elevations, well,
the main mountain viper is actually up there, and that's
you can see that if you come to Pandaridge, you'll
see this beautiful green viper that was only discovered since
I think the nineteen seventies, so I'm sure the indigenous
(13:37):
people knew about them a long time. I got, but
really like scientifically categorized and we've mastered breeding that ming
mountain viper. So our reptil team is amazing. And so yeah,
when you comee through panda ridge also see red panda,
So we have Cola the red panda over there, and
trying to let people see the habitat looks natural as
I described them already, but also some of the other
(13:58):
species that would live in that same habitat, because to
see a panda in the wild would be really hard,
almost impossible to write. Yeah, And so that's what I
think the value of zoos and getting people excited about
not only being able to see them and kind of
create that empathy and get to see those personalities as
we're just describing, you know, but also just see like
a habitat set up like it might be in the wild.
(14:20):
And our architects were very thoughtful about how we design
the space. Of course, the trees that went in, I know,
you had Adam Graves on here.
Speaker 5 (14:28):
It was amazing.
Speaker 6 (14:29):
Yeah, and you know, we have to approve every tree,
every plant that goes in there, and making sure that
you're never going to put a toxic plant in with
any animal, not just giant pandas. But it's quite a process.
I don't think people realize what it takes to set
up a habitat, you know, kidding.
Speaker 5 (14:43):
And then the maintenant once the pandas are in the yeah, right, Actually.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
With that, I wanted to ask you earlier.
Speaker 4 (14:48):
They're going to stain the existing habitats are in for
about what two three months? You were saying, yeah, and
then rotate them around. And we were talking earlier just
to remind guess that this is still a bear, right,
and these are more solitary animals for the most part,
because I remember when they had arrived here, a bunch
of guests are asking me why are they together? You know,
but if you heard the episode with Megan, you would
remember that, folks, this is a bear species, a solidary
(15:08):
bear species. So there are some behavioral nuances you and
the team have to do right when you're engaging with
these animals on a day to day.
Speaker 6 (15:15):
Yeah. And a lot of people don't realize like such
a small breeding window too, so it's like, yeah, three
days once a year, so.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
We've three days once a year, right, Yeah, wow, I know.
Speaker 6 (15:24):
So I appreciate that you said that, because we do
want to focus on natural behavior, right, So it wouldn't
be normal for them to live together, and you know,
they've been side by side and two habitats and they
know each other's there. They have an amazing sense of
smell hearing site, and so they could actually if they're
in the right angle we have a gate open or something,
they can kind of see each other. They know each
other's there, but they're happy in their own spaces. So
(15:47):
when it comes to you know, introductions and stuff, we
had six cubs before, so we're obviously pretty good at it,
and a lot of like I mentioned, those people that
were here before, are going to help teach the next
generation of pandora if care specialists how to take care
of them. So a lot of what we do is scientific.
It's understanding nutrition and horticulture, but understanding behavior, natural biology,
(16:08):
ecology and wrapping that all together. So I have the
most respect for wilfecare specialists. I know we have all
been wildfecare specialists, but it's just everyone's taken it to
the next level and it makes me really proud to
work here. So I know you guys too.
Speaker 5 (16:22):
Of course, of course I want to touch on the
top of it.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
We mentioned your title has the word behavior, and if
we've mentioned it quite a bit as we go through
this process, what are some of the behaviors that we're
working on with the pandas now that they're here, or
did they come with everything already like downloaded they know
everything to do.
Speaker 6 (16:38):
That's a great question, and we just had a meeting
this week, so it's very appropriate that we talk about
it right now with the updates. So we love for
animals to cooperate in their own health care, and so
we're working with our wildlife health teams and say, okay,
what's our priority. So voluntary blood jaw that'll be great
to do. And so we have this really cool like
blood sleeve that you can safely train a bear to
(16:59):
put its arm in and access veins and do a
voluntary blood draw. So that was one of the top priorities.
A mouth open behavior so that you can look at
the teeth on a regular basis. Mouth opens one of
the harder behaviors for me to train.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
Actually haven't trained myself.
Speaker 6 (17:12):
It's really hard. It's easy to get them to kind
of open quickly, it's the duration and holding. We trained
it on all the bears that we had before. I
know it could be done pretty easily, but I always
joke it's the bane of my existence. I've tried to
train it on cats and cats it's one of the
harder ones. It took us like a year and a
half to train it on Diego with us a lot
and it finally what got in was so sometimes you
(17:33):
use props and things, and so I had tried like
a ball or tongs and different things, and it was
a rock for him.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
So whatever works right.
Speaker 6 (17:42):
A lot of times with bears, we do diluted honey
sometimes as a high value reinforcer. So that's basically like
the treat they want the most, and so they'll open
their mouth for that, and so sometimes you can capture it,
which is, you know, a tool in training that you
can bridge and reinforce for the appropriate response. The duration
is where you have to have your patients and they
have to have patience because sometimes so like oh, you
just want me to open my mouth, but you quickly
(18:03):
have to ask them to hold it open a little
bit longer. Maybe get a flashlight so you can see
all the teeth, so mouth open will be a good
behavior to have, especially a lot of people don't realize
giant pants have the strongest jaw strength of any bear
because they're chewing bamboo like twelve hours a day, so
the super super muscles in there, but they also have
to break through that calm, and so they've got great teeth.
(18:24):
Our vets that went over to China got to do
it what we call appreciament exam. Make sure that they're
all healthy and that everything is good to go. So,
but as they get older, like we have. You know,
bears will live about thirty years. So we had bears
that teeth start to wear out, and so you want
to keep an eye on that. You might not want
to give them giant calm to eat, which is the
big stalky part of the bamboo. So being able to
(18:44):
keep a close eye on that, and sometimes you just
get something stuck in your teeth and so you know,
if you ever want to look in an animal's mouth,
it gives you a lot of information.
Speaker 5 (18:52):
No, totally.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
I mean I've trained my dog, your brush, your teeth
every day.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
You know.
Speaker 6 (18:55):
I did that with my puzzle.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
Oh you did that.
Speaker 4 (18:57):
It's are we talking before or we're talking about conditioning
certain behaviors or animals.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
We were doing promotions, right and someone out of town.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
Do you want to say, well, yeah, so, Nikki, we
got stumped. I think it was the first time Marco
and I have done video tours. You're locally for a
couple of years now multiple times a year, and this
one question stumped us because we just didn't know. The
question the DJ gave us during the morning interview was
did the pandas need to learn English for their behaviors?
So we're giving English commands or did our staff learn Chinese?
(19:30):
Or were the bears taught English commands before they.
Speaker 5 (19:32):
Came over, because there are some basic.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
Behaviors the bears already knew obviously, so we will pose
that question to you because we didn't know the.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Answer to that.
Speaker 6 (19:42):
Yeah, well it's funny and I might be overthinking a
little bit, but I'm laughing because you know, they don't
actually know English or Chinese. You know, they don't speak
the language. So somebody asked me that as well. And
so the cues that you give in training, you often
have a visual cue. So you might want an animal
to target, which might look like a little round, you know,
lollipop target we call those, or like a little ball
(20:05):
and a stick or a buoi like you might see
in a pool. And so by presenting that boui, you
know you're reinforcing the behavior you want. So you can
give a short command or que is what we should
call it really, So we give a queue and so
you might say target and you're actually showing the target.
So do they understand the word target? Probably not as
much as they understand they need.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
To touch a body pop.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Right.
Speaker 6 (20:28):
So I've watched training all over the world, and I
can understand what the person wants even if I don't
speak that language, because I can see the visual. Whether
it's a turn for an elephant, you might put your
hand out to your side with a flat palm, and
so that's what's most important, is what was the visual
que and then pairing it with a short, consistent que.
(20:48):
So for a dog, when you say sit, it's not
that the dog speaks English, but he starts to understand
that the tone of the word sit, and then you're
probably using a visual queue some way, and then he
gets reinforced when he does it right, So then he
starts to put those together and learn. So, yes, they
will learn cues, but learning the language is a little far.
But I think we just started off with our expectations
(21:12):
and so they just had to learn our system. So
maybe that's a better way to put it, is they
learned our system, so they learned English. Are they knew Chinese,
but they probably had different cues. We are probably taking
to another level just because we have a lot of
goals in mind and we love that cooperative care and
they're very phone motivated, so that makes our job. So Yeah,
they're ready to go. They love little bits of apple yam. Yeah,
(21:36):
we got a couple of things approved for a recall.
We're going to try working on a tone that's basically
a cow bell.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Can you describe the recall?
Speaker 6 (21:43):
Yeah, we train a lot of recalls here around the
zoo when we want to bring animals in for whatever reason,
a tree could fall, you know, we want to make
sure that we can bring them in when we want,
no matter what's happening in the habitat. And so the
way you do that is you have a special tone.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
You have usually a.
Speaker 6 (21:59):
Daily recall, and then you have a special tone recall
that you can bring them in in case you really
need to do it, no matter what's happening in the habitat.
So you have something super high value that you save
just for that tone. So some of our ears we
have a recess bell, like at tigers or polar bears
or gorilla and then for the pandas we just have
(22:19):
a cow bell. The reason we have recess belt some
spaces is they have a water feature and it's pretty loud.
We got to make something really loud over a waterfall,
and the cow bell you can hear through the whole habitat.
So when we do the daily recall, we pair that
with the cow bell sound and then they get the
really high value reinforcers. So we've got an approved currents nectar.
We don't give yam as much as we give carrots,
(22:40):
so we're going to hold back yam and use that
because they really like yam. And we even got to
test out some sugarcane. So just for this special recall
that we want to do, and that is a tool
in our toolbox. And if you need to bring a
bear in quickly and there might be something distracting out
like a tree fell or some loud noise, and so
this tone hopefully is so embedded that I'm going to
(23:02):
get the best thing ever.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
You know.
Speaker 6 (23:03):
It's like the ice cream trucks, you know, And so
they come in and you can secure them and give
them that high value reinforcer.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
I have to say to you just how impressive it
is that our teams do this so well. A few
years ago we were filming for the Animal Planet show
over at Tigers and they're like, this is going to
be a big test, and they let us, you know,
show up to film it, like see if it works.
Speaker 5 (23:24):
We didn't know for sure.
Speaker 3 (23:25):
We had put a carcass in with the tigers, so this,
you know, there's a full buffet of yumminess that this
cat now has pulled into an area where it feels
safe and slightly undercover, enjoying this carcass. And then they
do the recall sound and that tiger was like what
oo and up there right away and inside and I
was like wow, because when you understand for a carnival
(23:47):
like a tiger, what that carcass means to it versus Nope,
this high reinforcer is much more valuable. I can come
back to this later if I have to. It was
very impressive and I great tool.
Speaker 6 (23:56):
Yeah, I have that video and I use it all
the time we did it, so yeah, that was really
impressive that it worked at that time, and that was
one of the biggest tests we'd ever tried it on.
And it was funny. You saw the tiger's face looking
around like, wait, I heard the dough, I gotta go.
So yeah, it just showed the power of that conditioning
and how strong it was, and so definitely a really
(24:17):
good tool. And we have an academy class that we
teach it teaches other zoos how to use it too,
so that you know, we're talking collaboration, like we collaborate
with so many other zoos and these kind of tools
other zoos use as well. But after I presented at
a couple conferences and I showed that Animal Planet video,
I got a lot of calls that next week I
had to do that. I want to do that, we
(24:38):
need to do it.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
At our So yeah, I want to jump back real quick,
and we're getting close to time, so I want to
be senstive of that. I know you had a lot
to do, You're very busy, but I want to jump
back to what we're talking about with the cues for
training and verbal words in different languages, and you had
mentioned that they're really more visual. They're picking up on
what we're doing more than what we're saying, and I
(24:58):
just wanted to highlight that for our AUDI It's because
I think a lot of people as a very sound
centered and visual centered species where we're looking and listening
for language and what's being said, versus working with species
marcos mostly birds, but I know you've worked with other
animals as well. Nick and I both have worked with
multiple species, and from the human side of it's a
matter of understanding their body language nuances.
Speaker 5 (25:20):
A little details of a subtle stuff.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
But then in return, because that's what they read in
each other as when we're working with them, it's the
visual cues usually that can have more communication value than
whatever word we choose to pair with it.
Speaker 5 (25:32):
So I thought that was really cool that you brought
that up.
Speaker 6 (25:34):
Yeah, I'd love behavior watching behavior. It's a study of
one and so you could have you know, we had
four pandas go through a hearing study we did last time,
which helped understand the threshold they could hear, so that
we could tell conservationists in China or where the giant
pantis were building their den sites. This is the level
of hearing. So don't build a road you know, too
(25:55):
close to this, or don't do construction while they're doneying
with cubs. And so each was slightly different. And I
just remember Bay you she would be like, give me
my food now, and she would be like ripping the
target off the wall, and we had it like you know,
she had to touch her nose to the target when
she could hear the tone. So we learned she needed
to eat half an hour before, so we gave her
like a bit of bamboo like twenty minutes before tick
(26:18):
the edge off, and then she was like, now I
can focus on training.
Speaker 4 (26:22):
I feel yeah, a lot of people right now, yeah,
before I get like you said, every animal is different,
there are some nuances, like to your point in Rick,
regardless of the species.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
There's a tools in our.
Speaker 4 (26:31):
Toolkit that we can apply for all these different species,
you know, and everyone's so excited about giant panic. The
energy has been amazing right here at the zoo. So
really thank you for all that. Is there anything like
specific you want to communicate to her guesting that you
want them to know about these two giant pans living here?
Speaker 6 (26:46):
Well, I think if you can come and see them,
if you haven't already, come back, because every day's different.
But they will steal your heart. People say that's the appeal?
Why is this pandemonium and everything? And then they watch
them and they go, I get it now, I just
there's just something about them. It's the pattern, it's the personality,
the way they eat. They yeah, they'll like sit like
(27:06):
a Buddha and they like their crumbs are falling on
their chest. I don't know, there's something relatable. People joke
it's every guy in a panda suit in there. Just
watching them is just it's so kind of cool that
they can be that attractive to people, and that they
can be this umbrella species for conservation for all these
animals in that habitat of China. So I think if
(27:28):
you come, you'll find that they'll steal your heart and
you'll understand the appeal if you don't already understand it,
and you'll get to see them really. As we already said,
they're settled in now. But if you come when it's cooler,
they're very active and you'll see them smell the crowd.
Sometimes somebody walks in with some strong perfume. You'll see
them get up and lift their nose in their They
(27:48):
have all these senses and if if you just take
time to watch any animal, really, but if you spend
a little bit of time watching, you'll get a window
into what we're talking about here, where you get to
watch them behavior and you can go, oh, I see
now what they're doing, or wow, I can see that
ipposable thumb work in that bamboo. So it's fun to
watch me. It's I mean, it's fun just to watch
them like play in the pool, just lay there. It's
(28:10):
like people are just so excited to be able to
see them with their own two eyes. And pretty soon
we're gonna be the only zoo in North America have them,
and so we hope that people enjoy them, they get
to come, get inspired, and then everybody that comes helps
support our mission. Right, so the more people that come
see them, the more we have resources to do our
conservation work.
Speaker 5 (28:27):
Yeah, exactly. Well, thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Nick.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
You don't appreciate your time today.
Speaker 6 (28:33):
I'm hanging out with you guys. Thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
Now that was a giant panda update, right.
Speaker 4 (28:41):
And not just a giant panda update. We learned a
lot more about the behaviors, the enrichment experiences, a little
about red pandas, and the fact that you took care
of red pandas back when you first started at the
San Diego Zoo.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
Yes, yes, I did, along with many other species of wildlife.
But I have to say, for me, I thought it
was interesting how Nikki also shared with us a lot
of the work our teams are doing to better understand
nutritional needs, biological needs, and all of the behavior studies
we do.
Speaker 4 (29:09):
Oh I know, and the behaviors that they're working on
so the pandas can participate in their own care.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
But we like the open mouth behavior for tea checks or.
Speaker 4 (29:17):
The voluntary presentation of the front leg for blood draws.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
Yeah, it really speaks to how much our teams are
doing behind the scenes and just how smart the pandas
are to learn all of these new things and participate
in their own care.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
Right moin intil the hint that indeed, And because we
talked about Kids Free Month at the start of the episode,
I wanted to add when people come to the zoo
to see the pandas, you know you got some options,
that's true, right, Yeah, I mean first and my personal favorite.
Once you're in the zoo, just scan the QR code
on the sign to get your time ticket. You can
sign up for a specific time to get to see
(29:49):
the pandas.
Speaker 5 (29:50):
At Panda Ridge.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Oh that's that's also my favorite option.
Speaker 5 (29:52):
Honestly, Oh really, oh nice.
Speaker 4 (29:53):
You know the other option, Rick is to head down
to Panda Ridge and get into the stand byline. You
will have to wait in line, but it's an option
for people, and sometimes people pick it and seems like
it's something they want to do.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Yep, exactly.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
And you know, Marco, we did mention too with the
whole kids free thing and coming to see the pandas
that Paul Gloween is happening at the Zoo, our family
friendly Halloween themed weekends in October that tend to be
more fun than freaky and scary.
Speaker 4 (30:16):
Yeah, you're absolutely right, but you might also see some
cool decorations like I don't know, like a giant spider
or something.
Speaker 3 (30:23):
Well, that's true, and there is a real fear or
phobe ga people have with regards to spiders.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
I mean, I don't want to bring out my husband
in this, but you know that's a definite fear for him.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
But but you know, you can sometimes get over a
fear of something once you learn more about it.
Speaker 3 (30:37):
Ah, And that gives me an excellent idea for our
next episode.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Oh really like like spiders spiders?
Speaker 3 (30:44):
Be sure to subscribe and tune into our next episode,
in which we learn more about.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
The amazing world of web spinning and rack nototes.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
Marco Wentz and.
Speaker 5 (30:54):
I'm Rich Schwartz.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
For more information about the San Diego Zoo and San
Diego Zoo Safari Park, go to SDZWA dot org. Amazing
Wildlife is a production of iHeartRadio. Our supervising producers are
Nikia Swinton and Dylan Fagan, and our sound designers are
Sierra Spreen and Matt Russell. For more shows from iHeartRadio,
check out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
(31:22):
listen to your favorite shows.
Hi, I'm Rich Schwartz, but uses the world.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
I'm Marco Wentz.
Speaker 3 (00:08):
Welcome to Amazing Wildlife, where we explore unique stories of
wildlife from around the world and uncover fascinating animal facts.
This podcast is a production of iHeartRadio's Ruby Studio and
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, an international nonprofit conservation organization
which oversees the San Diego Zoo and Safari Park.
Speaker 4 (00:27):
Oh Senor, It's October and that means we both have
been doing a lot of interviews for Kids Free Month
at the Zoo and the Safari Park.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
Oh, I know, I know what you mean.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Kids Free Month in October, the Autumn Festival to Safari Park.
How Gloween is the San Diego Zoo. We have been
busy letting everyone know all the details.
Speaker 4 (00:44):
I mean, I guess we should let our audience know
that too, huh. I mean, just in case anyone hasn't
heard yet. During the month of October, kids ages eleven
and under can get into the San Diego Zoo or
the Safari Park for free with a paid adult ticket.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
It's true that it's true.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
And the Autumn Festival it's a Safari Park that's on
Saturdays and Sundays. And Howgloween at a zoo that's on Fridays,
Saturdays and Sundays, and both are included with your admission
to either park. But you know what, I have to admit, Marco,
every time I do an interview about Kids Free or
Hogloween or whatever, they always ask about the giant pandas.
Speaker 5 (01:18):
Oh, friend, I know what you mean.
Speaker 4 (01:20):
I mean it's usially like, oh, how are the pandas doing?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Or do you get to see the pandas every day
since you work there?
Speaker 6 (01:27):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:28):
I know. And then there's the popular Hey, can you
give me behind the scenes to see the pandas?
Speaker 2 (01:32):
I know that's right.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
I mean, sure, they're not birds, but you know, they
are truly a special addition to the zoo, and you know,
everyone wants.
Speaker 5 (01:40):
To know how they're doing well.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
As much as I would like to offer a special
behind the scenes panda tour to all of our listeners,
their family, their friends, that's just not something we're going
to get approval on.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
So I'm thinking we should do the next best thing.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
You mean, like an aviary tour. Oh, Marco, alright, I'm
just kiddy.
Speaker 6 (01:56):
I'm just kiddy.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Although it does give me an idea.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
No Marco, no my aviary tourists, but we should go
into the zoo and talk to someone who knows a
lot about giant pandas, their behavior and how they're settling
into life at the same Diego Zoo.
Speaker 4 (02:10):
All right, fair enough, I guess we should head to
the zoo and hey, I'll tell you what.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
If you're good during the interview, we'll stop at one
of the aviary's on the way out.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Okay, oh goody.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
I am Nicki Boyd. I am Curator of Mammals, Ambassadors
and Applied Behavior.
Speaker 5 (02:26):
That's a lot of stuff there, Nikki.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
As far as your title goes, we're actually here to
talk about pandas.
Speaker 5 (02:31):
I didn't hear pandas in that.
Speaker 6 (02:32):
Title their mammal Okay, fair enough.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
Well, as I mentioned, Nikki, we are here to find
out an update on the pandas, and I do know
actually you work quite a bit with the pandas and
the teams that work with the pandas, and part of
what your title is also behavior, which is also important.
We're going to get into all of that, but first
and foremost, i'd love to hear your immediate thoughts on
how are the pandas doing right now.
Speaker 6 (02:58):
They're doing really well. The mail is pretty chill, you know,
you and Chwan, he's pretty fun to watch. He just
loves to pile the bamboo all over himself and set
up on his climbing structure. I know, I was laughing.
I'm like, he loves his bamboo and I'll turn around
all you can see his bottom feet stick it out
of green. So yeah, they're really fun to watch. They're
(03:19):
really getting playful, like you see all the panda videos
if you do, like all my reels are just panda
videos now then rolling downhills and why were they not
extinct because they're you know, always falling off of things.
And he was just like rolling through the habitat with
one of his logs. So part of our outcome based
husband is to feed them in a way that creates
like a bamboo grove where they have to pull it out.
So we have these logs that have holes killed in
(03:40):
them and all the bamboos stuck in there. And well
he pulled all the bamboo out and then he started
rolling on his back and rolling the log over and
flipping it and running up and climbing his tree. We
call it a bonzai tree, but it's a really big
squatty pine tree, and he climbs up and looks out
the top and it looks like he's like driving his
space ship. It's really very buddy. So yeah, so he's
(04:00):
like he's chill, but then he's also starting to have fun,
like coming to his element.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Oh cool, that's really great.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Yeah, I can't ask you that you really quick in
case our listeners aren't aware when you said outcome based husbandry,
Like what do you mean by that?
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Like, what's a quick way to describe that.
Speaker 6 (04:12):
So a lot of people are familiar with like zoos
do enrichment. So now we talk about experiences, and so
when we do an experience, we try to mimic some
of the natural behavior of an animal in the wild.
And so we have inputs, which are things that you
put in, but we're looking really for the outcomes. And
so if you want to pana to eat bamboo like
a panda wood in the wild, how do you create that?
(04:33):
What's the input which is those logs as I mentioned,
with the holes jill in them, and you just stock
the fresh bamboo in there, and then the outcome is
them just sitting and processing food longer like they naturally would,
So we consider that an outcome, and the way that
we manage animals is called husbandry, and so outcome based
husbandry is just a term that we use in the
zoo and kind of cool that San Diego Zoo has
(04:54):
kind of like coined this phrase and we teach it
around the world and a lot of people are focusing
on that because it's about the closest thing you can
to having natural behavior of a wild panda. So it's
really cool and we use it for so many different species.
Speaker 5 (05:06):
Oh yeah, I love it.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
I mean, I remember one scenario. Another bear like grizzly
is an example, and you can correct me if I'm wrong.
But the little thing seasonal for instance, buds will start
coming out of a flower, right, and that'll be a cute.
The springtime is coming and perhaps you know, maybe fish
will be coming at a certain point depending on the season,
And so that's really great that you guys do that.
Speaker 6 (05:23):
Yeah, I love the different seasonal ones. We have a
forest fire one, we have the spring fruiting experience. The
fish one you mentioned will do a dry season where
the water will get lower in the pool and then
it's easier to catch the fish, so then we have
like river rock in there, and then the grizzly go fishing.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
So it's not just throwing a ball in a habitat.
Speaker 6 (05:39):
Right, Yeah, trying to get away from that, and so
it's fun to talk about it because it might not
be as obvious to just the person walking by a habitat.
But I just need you all to know that it's
a very thoughtful process that we're doing all the time
with a bunch of different species. And so when you
get to see an animal being a bear or a
diraffe that's foraging for multiple hours, it's part of our
(06:00):
thoughtful outcome based systry process.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
Thanks for explaining that, and hopefully now our guests when
they're coming to the zoo of the park, they can
take a little more extra time and kind of see
all the nuances of what a wildlife care specialist does.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Right, And you were mentioning Yu and Chuan, what about Singbao?
How is she doing out there?
Speaker 6 (06:14):
So she's been a character since she got here. Oh yeah,
even when they went to China and to visit her,
she was rolling down the hill and she had this
little stomp off the wall and give a little side eye.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Like I used to do Panda side eye.
Speaker 6 (06:26):
Yeah, Canda side eye. So everyone and in a while
Gaileen will be like, oh, she just gave us a
side eye. So it's just her being very aware of
her environment. So she has I like to describe the
two habitats as once more of Chinese mountain side. So
she's got this great hill landscape. In the very beginning,
she was laying at the very top checking out her kingdom,
you know, her purview. She could see people making her bamboo,
(06:48):
so she was kind of really watching out for the
bamboo to arrive. Now she's down front and center.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
You know.
Speaker 6 (06:55):
Sometimes on hot days she was the air conditioning. But
they love their climbing structure, and so she's all over
the habitat. Un Schwan's in what I like to call
the intimate forest view have a habitat. So you'll see
the two different sides, and we're actually gonna rotate them.
We're going to give them a couple of months to
acclimate into the spaces they're at now, and then we'll
swap them. Because the male actually normally have a bigger territory.
(07:18):
We felt when we first got to know her that
she would benefit from having a bigger space. If she
wanted to retreat, she could. He was a lot more chill,
and she was kind of honking at us at first,
which is a vocalization of why are all these people
looking at me? And not that there was that many,
but we acclimated them pretty slowly with like six people
and she was fine. And ten people come in, she
(07:38):
look at everybody and do a little honk, and so
we were like, okay, she's telling us like, what are
you doing in my space? And then eventually she just
go back to eating her bamboo and she realized everything
was fine. So we slowly brought more and more people
in and now she's totally fine. But we were very
thoughtful about which habitat they could each go in, and
our Chinese colleagues were here and they wanted him to
(07:59):
have bigger space right off the bat. Not only is
that natural behavior where the male has a bigger territory,
but it builds up their strength for breeding, which is
going to happen down the road, not this year. We
were able to negotiate and say, you know, we really
think she would benefit from this bigger space, and so
they were like, that sounds reasonable. We'll give them two
or three months and then we'll swap them and see
how they do. So that's the plan.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
That was one thing you just mentioned that talking back
and forth and negotiating like what would be the best
for the individual animals. I want to dive a little
more into the collaboration that it's taken, because obviously there
were people in China taking care of the pandas before
they got here. But talk a little bit about the collaboration,
not only what we're experiencing now, but maybe just a
little bit of history on it too.
Speaker 6 (08:39):
Yeah. So you know, we had giant pantas here for
twenty two years before, and we had a great relationship
with our Chinese partners, and I just remember people saying
it was kind of like a homecoming when we went
back over there. It's a lot of the same people
were here. I know, you had Megan Owen on the podcast,
and so when she was there, you know, Paul was
describing it was like hugging in tears. And we've had
(08:59):
a long relationship, which is great for building trust and collaboration,
as you mentioned, And so this time we had some
people who had been there before and bringing some of
our newer folks, so doctor Meg c Eedlin Smith, doctor
Ben Nevitt, who's taking her place as she rolls into retirement.
Greg and Jessica, my boss and his partner in welfare
assess the bears and got to go with Gayleen who
(09:21):
had worked with the bears before. So it's kind of
this great collaboration with the Chinese colleagues going to China,
and then as they came over. We have about six
wilivecare specialists that are assigned to the panda area. Three
of them worked with the pandas before and three of
them are new, so we are also teaching, like our
next generation of wildfecare specialists how to take care of pandas.
(09:42):
And then the Chinese colleagues are right here with us
talking about how they do it in China, and two
of the new Wildfecare specialists went to China as well.
Jana and Jessica got to go over there and see
the bears before they came over, so they share a
lot of information of how they do stuff. But I
think they're also learning a lot from us too, like
the outcome bas when Jews we just talked, So I
think they're going to take some stuff back to China
(10:03):
that they've learned from us, and then I really look
forward to the conservation potential with this. So we have,
you know, our conservation hubs, and Asia is one of
the hubs, and I was an Asian Hub leader, So
I of course love red pandas. If anyone knows, I was.
Speaker 4 (10:19):
Just going to say, your absolutely favorite, and well, what
is the red panda really quick, just in case people.
Speaker 6 (10:24):
It's a small carnivore. They're called panda because both giant
panas and red pantas eat bamboo. Oh that's why Punya
is bamboo eater, and so panda came from Punya, which
is a name that they called them. I like to
call them the op the original panda.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 6 (10:40):
They're not related to each other. So giant pantas are
in the bear family and red pantas are in their
own family. It's called a lure po to day. And
so that's what's kind of fun about science, is like
it's sometimes changing and learning. The more technology you have,
the more you learn. So now there's actually two species
of panda. They used to be subspecies. So there's a
Chinese red panda and a West turn nor Himalayan red panda,
(11:01):
and so they have enough differences genetically that they are
considered two different species now, which just came out in
the last couple of years. So since Rick and I
were red panic keepers back in the day in the
old Yeah, that's great. String I moved up.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Yeah, podcast, Yeah, I.
Speaker 6 (11:21):
Want to hear you know, when you give your string
over to somebody, you really trust them.
Speaker 5 (11:24):
And for those listening, who so we're having a moment
here right now.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
The string is an area that a staff member wildlife
care specialist cares for.
Speaker 5 (11:33):
And in the area that I started in.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
Children Zu Nikki was a full time senior wildlife care
specialist at the time, and she trained me on it
was what red pandas otters. We had porcupine in one
of the habitats, we had naked morats and I'm trying
to think who else was over there, bandar was over there?
Speaker 5 (11:50):
They been wrong. Yeah, So and then we did the
back area that had the goody and the tamandoa.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Yeah. So that was what she means when she says
a string, that's an area we referred to as a
sort of string of habit attats.
Speaker 5 (12:00):
If you will that you take care of. I love
the history we had red pandas.
Speaker 3 (12:03):
Yes, And so to go back to the saying how
science change things, I think obviously, when I first started,
it was only considered one species of red panda with
a subspecies idea, and it had just been a few
years that they decided red pandas and giant pandas were
not related.
Speaker 5 (12:19):
At that time, it was like the late nineties, early
two thousand, right.
Speaker 6 (12:22):
Yeah, I've been writing an article for our like kids
call a club or a newsletter and saying, what do
you kids think? So that's what's fun about science is
it's changing and different scientists, you know, find different discoveries.
And so we've had scientific names change on us. You
memorize one for a long time and then it changes.
And you know, giant pandas and red pantas live in
the same habitat, and so they were thought, well, why
(12:44):
aren't they really they both eating.
Speaker 5 (12:45):
Bamboo, they have the bone and the wrists.
Speaker 6 (12:47):
Yeah, must be red. I bet, I bet it's still
up for debate, and I bet there'll still be some
scientists trying to decide if they should be in the
same family or not.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
Well, I'm glad he brought it up because I love
to remind people just diversity of animals and plants that
live in that area.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
I mean, giant pandas are amazing.
Speaker 4 (13:04):
As I'm a bird guy, you know, the Asian crusted
iyeb is endangered species at bird that really needs a
lot of help, so many others Chinese alligator as well,
So it's going to help a lot of species with
the work we're doing with the giant pandas.
Speaker 6 (13:14):
Right, absolutely, so, I think of giant pan as as
an umbrella species. And so if you save habitat for
giant pan as, you're helping the red panda, Chinese minol.
Any of the reptiles that might be in the lower elevations, well,
the main mountain viper is actually up there, and that's
you can see that if you come to Pandaridge, you'll
see this beautiful green viper that was only discovered since
I think the nineteen seventies, so I'm sure the indigenous
(13:37):
people knew about them a long time. I got, but
really like scientifically categorized and we've mastered breeding that ming
mountain viper. So our reptil team is amazing. And so yeah,
when you comee through panda ridge also see red panda,
So we have Cola the red panda over there, and
trying to let people see the habitat looks natural as
I described them already, but also some of the other
(13:58):
species that would live in that same habitat, because to
see a panda in the wild would be really hard,
almost impossible to write. Yeah, And so that's what I
think the value of zoos and getting people excited about
not only being able to see them and kind of
create that empathy and get to see those personalities as
we're just describing, you know, but also just see like
a habitat set up like it might be in the wild.
(14:20):
And our architects were very thoughtful about how we design
the space. Of course, the trees that went in, I know,
you had Adam Graves on here.
Speaker 5 (14:28):
It was amazing.
Speaker 6 (14:29):
Yeah, and you know, we have to approve every tree,
every plant that goes in there, and making sure that
you're never going to put a toxic plant in with
any animal, not just giant pandas. But it's quite a process.
I don't think people realize what it takes to set
up a habitat, you know, kidding.
Speaker 5 (14:43):
And then the maintenant once the pandas are in the yeah, right, Actually.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
With that, I wanted to ask you earlier.
Speaker 4 (14:48):
They're going to stain the existing habitats are in for
about what two three months? You were saying, yeah, and
then rotate them around. And we were talking earlier just
to remind guess that this is still a bear, right,
and these are more solitary animals for the most part,
because I remember when they had arrived here, a bunch
of guests are asking me why are they together? You know,
but if you heard the episode with Megan, you would
remember that, folks, this is a bear species, a solidary
(15:08):
bear species. So there are some behavioral nuances you and
the team have to do right when you're engaging with
these animals on a day to day.
Speaker 6 (15:15):
Yeah. And a lot of people don't realize like such
a small breeding window too, so it's like, yeah, three
days once a year, so.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
We've three days once a year, right, Yeah, wow, I know.
Speaker 6 (15:24):
So I appreciate that you said that, because we do
want to focus on natural behavior, right, So it wouldn't
be normal for them to live together, and you know,
they've been side by side and two habitats and they
know each other's there. They have an amazing sense of
smell hearing site, and so they could actually if they're
in the right angle we have a gate open or something,
they can kind of see each other. They know each
other's there, but they're happy in their own spaces. So
(15:47):
when it comes to you know, introductions and stuff, we
had six cubs before, so we're obviously pretty good at it,
and a lot of like I mentioned, those people that
were here before, are going to help teach the next
generation of pandora if care specialists how to take care
of them. So a lot of what we do is scientific.
It's understanding nutrition and horticulture, but understanding behavior, natural biology,
(16:08):
ecology and wrapping that all together. So I have the
most respect for wilfecare specialists. I know we have all
been wildfecare specialists, but it's just everyone's taken it to
the next level and it makes me really proud to
work here. So I know you guys too.
Speaker 5 (16:22):
Of course, of course I want to touch on the
top of it.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
We mentioned your title has the word behavior, and if
we've mentioned it quite a bit as we go through
this process, what are some of the behaviors that we're
working on with the pandas now that they're here, or
did they come with everything already like downloaded they know
everything to do.
Speaker 6 (16:38):
That's a great question, and we just had a meeting
this week, so it's very appropriate that we talk about
it right now with the updates. So we love for
animals to cooperate in their own health care, and so
we're working with our wildlife health teams and say, okay,
what's our priority. So voluntary blood jaw that'll be great
to do. And so we have this really cool like
blood sleeve that you can safely train a bear to
(16:59):
put its arm in and access veins and do a
voluntary blood draw. So that was one of the top priorities.
A mouth open behavior so that you can look at
the teeth on a regular basis. Mouth opens one of
the harder behaviors for me to train.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
Actually haven't trained myself.
Speaker 6 (17:12):
It's really hard. It's easy to get them to kind
of open quickly, it's the duration and holding. We trained
it on all the bears that we had before. I
know it could be done pretty easily, but I always
joke it's the bane of my existence. I've tried to
train it on cats and cats it's one of the
harder ones. It took us like a year and a
half to train it on Diego with us a lot
and it finally what got in was so sometimes you
(17:33):
use props and things, and so I had tried like
a ball or tongs and different things, and it was
a rock for him.
Speaker 5 (17:40):
So whatever works right.
Speaker 6 (17:42):
A lot of times with bears, we do diluted honey
sometimes as a high value reinforcer. So that's basically like
the treat they want the most, and so they'll open
their mouth for that, and so sometimes you can capture it,
which is, you know, a tool in training that you
can bridge and reinforce for the appropriate response. The duration
is where you have to have your patients and they
have to have patience because sometimes so like oh, you
just want me to open my mouth, but you quickly
(18:03):
have to ask them to hold it open a little
bit longer. Maybe get a flashlight so you can see
all the teeth, so mouth open will be a good
behavior to have, especially a lot of people don't realize
giant pants have the strongest jaw strength of any bear
because they're chewing bamboo like twelve hours a day, so
the super super muscles in there, but they also have
to break through that calm, and so they've got great teeth.
(18:24):
Our vets that went over to China got to do
it what we call appreciament exam. Make sure that they're
all healthy and that everything is good to go. So,
but as they get older, like we have. You know,
bears will live about thirty years. So we had bears
that teeth start to wear out, and so you want
to keep an eye on that. You might not want
to give them giant calm to eat, which is the
big stalky part of the bamboo. So being able to
(18:44):
keep a close eye on that, and sometimes you just
get something stuck in your teeth and so you know,
if you ever want to look in an animal's mouth,
it gives you a lot of information.
Speaker 5 (18:52):
No, totally.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
I mean I've trained my dog, your brush, your teeth
every day.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
You know.
Speaker 6 (18:55):
I did that with my puzzle.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
Oh you did that.
Speaker 4 (18:57):
It's are we talking before or we're talking about conditioning
certain behaviors or animals.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
We were doing promotions, right and someone out of town.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
Do you want to say, well, yeah, so, Nikki, we
got stumped. I think it was the first time Marco
and I have done video tours. You're locally for a
couple of years now multiple times a year, and this
one question stumped us because we just didn't know. The
question the DJ gave us during the morning interview was
did the pandas need to learn English for their behaviors?
So we're giving English commands or did our staff learn Chinese?
(19:30):
Or were the bears taught English commands before they.
Speaker 5 (19:32):
Came over, because there are some basic.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
Behaviors the bears already knew obviously, so we will pose
that question to you because we didn't know the.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Answer to that.
Speaker 6 (19:42):
Yeah, well it's funny and I might be overthinking a
little bit, but I'm laughing because you know, they don't
actually know English or Chinese. You know, they don't speak
the language. So somebody asked me that as well. And
so the cues that you give in training, you often
have a visual cue. So you might want an animal
to target, which might look like a little round, you know,
lollipop target we call those, or like a little ball
(20:05):
and a stick or a buoi like you might see
in a pool. And so by presenting that boui, you
know you're reinforcing the behavior you want. So you can
give a short command or que is what we should
call it really, So we give a queue and so
you might say target and you're actually showing the target.
So do they understand the word target? Probably not as
much as they understand they need.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
To touch a body pop.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
Right.
Speaker 6 (20:28):
So I've watched training all over the world, and I
can understand what the person wants even if I don't
speak that language, because I can see the visual. Whether
it's a turn for an elephant, you might put your
hand out to your side with a flat palm, and
so that's what's most important, is what was the visual
que and then pairing it with a short, consistent que.
(20:48):
So for a dog, when you say sit, it's not
that the dog speaks English, but he starts to understand
that the tone of the word sit, and then you're
probably using a visual queue some way, and then he
gets reinforced when he does it right, So then he
starts to put those together and learn. So, yes, they
will learn cues, but learning the language is a little far.
But I think we just started off with our expectations
(21:12):
and so they just had to learn our system. So
maybe that's a better way to put it, is they
learned our system, so they learned English. Are they knew Chinese,
but they probably had different cues. We are probably taking
to another level just because we have a lot of
goals in mind and we love that cooperative care and
they're very phone motivated, so that makes our job. So Yeah,
they're ready to go. They love little bits of apple yam. Yeah,
(21:36):
we got a couple of things approved for a recall.
We're going to try working on a tone that's basically
a cow bell.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Can you describe the recall?
Speaker 6 (21:43):
Yeah, we train a lot of recalls here around the
zoo when we want to bring animals in for whatever reason,
a tree could fall, you know, we want to make
sure that we can bring them in when we want,
no matter what's happening in the habitat. And so the
way you do that is you have a special tone.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
You have usually a.
Speaker 6 (21:59):
Daily recall, and then you have a special tone recall
that you can bring them in in case you really
need to do it, no matter what's happening in the habitat.
So you have something super high value that you save
just for that tone. So some of our ears we
have a recess bell, like at tigers or polar bears
or gorilla and then for the pandas we just have
(22:19):
a cow bell. The reason we have recess belt some
spaces is they have a water feature and it's pretty loud.
We got to make something really loud over a waterfall,
and the cow bell you can hear through the whole habitat.
So when we do the daily recall, we pair that
with the cow bell sound and then they get the
really high value reinforcers. So we've got an approved currents nectar.
We don't give yam as much as we give carrots,
(22:40):
so we're going to hold back yam and use that
because they really like yam. And we even got to
test out some sugarcane. So just for this special recall
that we want to do, and that is a tool
in our toolbox. And if you need to bring a
bear in quickly and there might be something distracting out
like a tree fell or some loud noise, and so
this tone hopefully is so embedded that I'm going to
(23:02):
get the best thing ever.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
You know.
Speaker 6 (23:03):
It's like the ice cream trucks, you know, And so
they come in and you can secure them and give
them that high value reinforcer.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
I have to say to you just how impressive it
is that our teams do this so well. A few
years ago we were filming for the Animal Planet show
over at Tigers and they're like, this is going to
be a big test, and they let us, you know,
show up to film it, like see if it works.
Speaker 5 (23:24):
We didn't know for sure.
Speaker 3 (23:25):
We had put a carcass in with the tigers, so this,
you know, there's a full buffet of yumminess that this
cat now has pulled into an area where it feels
safe and slightly undercover, enjoying this carcass. And then they
do the recall sound and that tiger was like what
oo and up there right away and inside and I
was like wow, because when you understand for a carnival
(23:47):
like a tiger, what that carcass means to it versus Nope,
this high reinforcer is much more valuable. I can come
back to this later if I have to. It was
very impressive and I great tool.
Speaker 6 (23:56):
Yeah, I have that video and I use it all
the time we did it, so yeah, that was really
impressive that it worked at that time, and that was
one of the biggest tests we'd ever tried it on.
And it was funny. You saw the tiger's face looking
around like, wait, I heard the dough, I gotta go.
So yeah, it just showed the power of that conditioning
and how strong it was, and so definitely a really
(24:17):
good tool. And we have an academy class that we
teach it teaches other zoos how to use it too,
so that you know, we're talking collaboration, like we collaborate
with so many other zoos and these kind of tools
other zoos use as well. But after I presented at
a couple conferences and I showed that Animal Planet video,
I got a lot of calls that next week I
had to do that. I want to do that, we
(24:38):
need to do it.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
At our So yeah, I want to jump back real quick,
and we're getting close to time, so I want to
be senstive of that. I know you had a lot
to do, You're very busy, but I want to jump
back to what we're talking about with the cues for
training and verbal words in different languages, and you had
mentioned that they're really more visual. They're picking up on
what we're doing more than what we're saying, and I
(24:58):
just wanted to highlight that for our AUDI It's because
I think a lot of people as a very sound
centered and visual centered species where we're looking and listening
for language and what's being said, versus working with species
marcos mostly birds, but I know you've worked with other
animals as well. Nick and I both have worked with
multiple species, and from the human side of it's a
matter of understanding their body language nuances.
Speaker 5 (25:20):
A little details of a subtle stuff.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
But then in return, because that's what they read in
each other as when we're working with them, it's the
visual cues usually that can have more communication value than
whatever word we choose to pair with it.
Speaker 5 (25:32):
So I thought that was really cool that you brought
that up.
Speaker 6 (25:34):
Yeah, I'd love behavior watching behavior. It's a study of
one and so you could have you know, we had
four pandas go through a hearing study we did last time,
which helped understand the threshold they could hear, so that
we could tell conservationists in China or where the giant
pantis were building their den sites. This is the level
of hearing. So don't build a road you know, too
(25:55):
close to this, or don't do construction while they're doneying
with cubs. And so each was slightly different. And I
just remember Bay you she would be like, give me
my food now, and she would be like ripping the
target off the wall, and we had it like you know,
she had to touch her nose to the target when
she could hear the tone. So we learned she needed
to eat half an hour before, so we gave her
like a bit of bamboo like twenty minutes before tick
(26:18):
the edge off, and then she was like, now I
can focus on training.
Speaker 4 (26:22):
I feel yeah, a lot of people right now, yeah,
before I get like you said, every animal is different,
there are some nuances, like to your point in Rick,
regardless of the species.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
There's a tools in our.
Speaker 4 (26:31):
Toolkit that we can apply for all these different species,
you know, and everyone's so excited about giant panic. The
energy has been amazing right here at the zoo. So
really thank you for all that. Is there anything like
specific you want to communicate to her guesting that you
want them to know about these two giant pans living here?
Speaker 6 (26:46):
Well, I think if you can come and see them,
if you haven't already, come back, because every day's different.
But they will steal your heart. People say that's the appeal?
Why is this pandemonium and everything? And then they watch
them and they go, I get it now, I just
there's just something about them. It's the pattern, it's the personality,
the way they eat. They yeah, they'll like sit like
(27:06):
a Buddha and they like their crumbs are falling on
their chest. I don't know, there's something relatable. People joke
it's every guy in a panda suit in there. Just
watching them is just it's so kind of cool that
they can be that attractive to people, and that they
can be this umbrella species for conservation for all these
animals in that habitat of China. So I think if
(27:28):
you come, you'll find that they'll steal your heart and
you'll understand the appeal if you don't already understand it,
and you'll get to see them really. As we already said,
they're settled in now. But if you come when it's cooler,
they're very active and you'll see them smell the crowd.
Sometimes somebody walks in with some strong perfume. You'll see
them get up and lift their nose in their They
(27:48):
have all these senses and if if you just take
time to watch any animal, really, but if you spend
a little bit of time watching, you'll get a window
into what we're talking about here, where you get to
watch them behavior and you can go, oh, I see
now what they're doing, or wow, I can see that
ipposable thumb work in that bamboo. So it's fun to
watch me. It's I mean, it's fun just to watch
them like play in the pool, just lay there. It's
(28:10):
like people are just so excited to be able to
see them with their own two eyes. And pretty soon
we're gonna be the only zoo in North America have them,
and so we hope that people enjoy them, they get
to come, get inspired, and then everybody that comes helps
support our mission. Right, so the more people that come
see them, the more we have resources to do our
conservation work.
Speaker 5 (28:27):
Yeah, exactly. Well, thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Nick.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
You don't appreciate your time today.
Speaker 6 (28:33):
I'm hanging out with you guys. Thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
Now that was a giant panda update, right.
Speaker 4 (28:41):
And not just a giant panda update. We learned a
lot more about the behaviors, the enrichment experiences, a little
about red pandas, and the fact that you took care
of red pandas back when you first started at the
San Diego Zoo.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
Yes, yes, I did, along with many other species of wildlife.
But I have to say, for me, I thought it
was interesting how Nikki also shared with us a lot
of the work our teams are doing to better understand
nutritional needs, biological needs, and all of the behavior studies
we do.
Speaker 4 (29:09):
Oh I know, and the behaviors that they're working on
so the pandas can participate in their own care.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
But we like the open mouth behavior for tea checks or.
Speaker 4 (29:17):
The voluntary presentation of the front leg for blood draws.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
Yeah, it really speaks to how much our teams are
doing behind the scenes and just how smart the pandas
are to learn all of these new things and participate
in their own care.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
Right moin intil the hint that indeed, And because we
talked about Kids Free Month at the start of the episode,
I wanted to add when people come to the zoo
to see the pandas, you know you got some options,
that's true, right, Yeah, I mean first and my personal favorite.
Once you're in the zoo, just scan the QR code
on the sign to get your time ticket. You can
sign up for a specific time to get to see
(29:49):
the pandas.
Speaker 5 (29:50):
At Panda Ridge.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Oh that's that's also my favorite option.
Speaker 5 (29:52):
Honestly, Oh really, oh nice.
Speaker 4 (29:53):
You know the other option, Rick is to head down
to Panda Ridge and get into the stand byline. You
will have to wait in line, but it's an option
for people, and sometimes people pick it and seems like
it's something they want to do.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Yep, exactly.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
And you know, Marco, we did mention too with the
whole kids free thing and coming to see the pandas
that Paul Gloween is happening at the Zoo, our family
friendly Halloween themed weekends in October that tend to be
more fun than freaky and scary.
Speaker 4 (30:16):
Yeah, you're absolutely right, but you might also see some
cool decorations like I don't know, like a giant spider
or something.
Speaker 3 (30:23):
Well, that's true, and there is a real fear or
phobe ga people have with regards to spiders.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
I mean, I don't want to bring out my husband
in this, but you know that's a definite fear for him.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
But but you know, you can sometimes get over a
fear of something once you learn more about it.
Speaker 3 (30:37):
Ah, And that gives me an excellent idea for our
next episode.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Oh really like like spiders spiders?
Speaker 3 (30:44):
Be sure to subscribe and tune into our next episode,
in which we learn more about.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
The amazing world of web spinning and rack nototes.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
Marco Wentz and.
Speaker 5 (30:54):
I'm Rich Schwartz.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
For more information about the San Diego Zoo and San
Diego Zoo Safari Park, go to SDZWA dot org. Amazing
Wildlife is a production of iHeartRadio. Our supervising producers are
Nikia Swinton and Dylan Fagan, and our sound designers are
Sierra Spreen and Matt Russell. For more shows from iHeartRadio,
check out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
(31:22):
listen to your favorite shows.
Hosts And Creators
Rick Schwartz
Marco Wendt
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