Thanks to the Wild Animal Park’s own Dr. Jeff Zuba, who has remained in contact with Phoenix Zoo veterinarians and kept me, and ultimately all of you, up to date on his progress. And, gratitude and appreciation also goes to Phoenix Zoo veterinary staff. They have given Harry the possibility of a second chance to once again soar majestically over the beautiful Grand Canyon, healthy and free as he had for a decade prior to his illness.

As always, we appreciate all of you for your continued concern and support for the California Condor Recovery Program. Look for more condor stories in upcoming blogs, including the latest by Joy DiGenti about our newest member of the condor program.

Valerie Stoddard is the senior administrative assistant at the Wild Animal Park’s Harter Veterinary Medical Center.

Condor keepers monitor hatching eggs every hour around the clock. On odd hours we do a “tape and tap” where we encourage the chick by playing a tape of vulture vocalizations and lightly tapping the egg with a tool made of a hanger and masking tape. On even hours we sample behaviors described in a focal egg ethogram (vocalizing, rocking, pushing, poking, nibbling, rotating, etc.).

For those of you interested in the statistics for this particular egg, it was laid on January 14 and pipped (broke the shell) 54 days later on March 9. The egg was about 4 inches (105 millimeters) long and was 2.6 inches (67 millimeters) wide. Eggs loose weight during incubation as water evaporates through the porous shell. This creates space for air at the tip of the egg, which is called an air cell. The weight of Egg 0601 (Shatash #1) was 9.5 ounces (271 grams) on the first day of incubation and 8.3 ounces (234.3 grams) on the pip date. This represents a 13.7 percent weight loss, within the target range for condors of 12 to 14 percent.

The first condor chicks of the season are puppet-raised because condors only raise one chick per year. When we remove the first egg from the condors’ nest box, the female will often recycle, laying a second egg about 30 days later. The parents of our first chick, Sisquoc and Shatash, are incubating their second egg now. We are looking forward to observing that egg hatch next month on our new state-of-the-art digital cameras that can zoom in to see every little speck on the egg and chick! We owe our new camera system to all of you who donate to the Zoological Society of San Diego, as more than half of it is paid for with donation money. Thank you!

Joy DiGenti is a condor keeper at the Wild Animal Park.

Here’s video of the chick!
Here’s more information about the California Condor Recovery Program.

Over the next few years we hope to unravel secrets of the mating strategies male and female koalas employ to make sure that they raise as many young as they can. Our study site is an island some 15 miles (24 kilometers) off the coast of Mackay in Queensland, Australia and I will be spending quite a lot of time there.

The koalas we are studying are from the same subspecies as those housed at the San Diego Zoo, so other than a few different shades of coat colour, they look exactly the same.
Fortunately, most of Cyclone Larry (we have cyclones, in the U.S.A. they are hurricanes, I believe) went to the north of the island, so other than plenty of rain and some rough weather, the island was spared any ill effects.

I am currently writing a report on the prevalence of infection with chlamydial disease on the island. The koalas at St. Bees do have the disease, but appear healthy and rarely suffer any effects. Maybe this is because their laidback island lifestyle is low stress, but these are some of the things we are aiming to investigate.

My next trip to the island is at the beginning of May, when I will be leading an Earthwatch Expedition there. During that trip we will be monitoring the activity of the koalas intensively through the daylight hours. As some people know, koalas often spend long hours doing relatively little, so the excercise of monitoring them can be somewhat tedious. However, although they sit quietly, they are not always asleep during the day and I am interested to see how they move around in the canopy of the tree in response to day temperature and sunlight. I have a student who is looking at the microclimate of koalas to find out how much they can use their surroundings to modify their exposure to cold or heat. This work all began a while ago when I was watching a koala on a very hot day. It was holding onto the trunk of a large eucalypt tree (E. tereticornis). Although the day was hot, the tree’s trunk was cool, so I wondered if the koala might use the tree as a heat sink, but that is another story.

For now, I am doing a lot of writing and reading and I guess the koalas are sitting back, relaxing until my next visit, when they will come under some close scrutiny…….

Dr. Bill Ellis is a Conservation Research Fellow at the San Diego Zoo’s department of Conservation and Research for Endangered Species (CRES).

Here’s more information about Bill’s project.

When working with some of the most endangered species of birds on the planet, it is impossible to be too clean. Incubation and chick feeding areas must be as sterile as a hospital operating room. The shell of an egg does not always protect the growing embryo from all forms of bacterial or fungal infection, so we take great precautions to make sure that incubators are completely antiseptic. Our wooden incubators are first cleaned with an antifungal fumigating chemical, then wiped down with an antibacterial cleaning agent, and finally sterilized with UV radiation to ensure that there are no harmful pathogens to infect the delicate embryos. Similar steps are taken with the hatchers and brooders that maintain the chicks for the first few weeks of life.

We also check and double check the heating elements and settings of our incubators, making sure that the temperature is exact for ideal embryo development. All of our incubators have emergency back-ups to the heating elements that will shut down the heat if the temperature rises even half of a degree. These systems are tested and re-tested before the eggs are placed in incubators.

This extensive cleaning process is well worth the effort when our first chicks of the year hatch. With the rarity of many of the birds in our care, each chick is a tangible reminder that we are making a difference and are one step closer to saving a species that was here long before the human inhabitants arrived on the Hawaiian islands.

Jeremy Hodges is a Research Fellow with the Hawaii Endangered Bird Conservation Program.

This will begin to change soon as Su Lin more frequently samples the bamboo, biscuits, fruits, and vegetables that make up her mother’s diet here at the San Diego Zoo. It will require more participation on her part to get her nutrition and to learn what’s good to eat and how to manipulate it. Bai Yun will also be teaching her cub about water and bathing in the dirt, and we’ll be seeing more interaction between them, and Su Lin awake more, as these activities commence.

If you see Su Lin napping in the trees on Panda Cam, be glad you have seen her. As spring approaches, the Chinese elm tree will leaf out and she will be nearly invisible, hidden by the leafy branches. Many of you have experienced this before, especially with Mei Sheng. At one point during the same age period he was only visible from the Skyfari aerial tram traveling above the panda exhibit! It’s not very viewer-satisfying, but it’s what pandas do. How wonderful that we now have the experience to expect this and that cubs born here feel comfortable enough to just be panda cubs!

Several years ago, I had the great privilege to visit pandas at Wolong, China. As our tour bus left the reserve, I looked back to see a cub, about Su Lin’s age, curled up atop a 16-foot (5-meter) post, peacefully, blissfully asleep. It was a bit cloudy, the mist was settling, and it was a sight I shall always treasure. Whether at a zoo, reserve, or via Panda Cam, to see a giant panda is a rare and precious event.

Ellie Rosenbaum is a panda narrator/educator at the San Diego Zoo.

Get the latest updates on Su Lin on our Panda News page.

In the wild, tiger cubs will stay with their mother until they are 1 ½ to 2 years of age, which is when they are old enough to hunt on their own and hold their own territories. I am not sure how long Rimba and Mata will stay with Mek in Tiger River, as they will most likely be sent to other zoos for breeding programs when they are old enough. Until then, I will be keeping a watchful eye on how well everyone is getting along and if I start to see a lot of aggression over food, toys, or sleeping spaces, the boys may need to be separated from Mek. Thankfully, everything has been going great so far. Mek has slowly been distancing herself from her cubs and she will occasionally growl or bark at them if they are disturbing her, but there has not been any physical aggression that has been of any concern. As the boys continue to grow, Mek will most likely want to have more and more space to herself. Soon, Mata and Rimba will be bigger than her and we won’t be as concerned about aggression from her towards them- it may be the other way around!

Bridget Mulholland is a senior mammal keeper at the San Diego Zoo.

Here’s Bridget’s previous blog about the tiger cubs.

I spent three hours at the San Diego Zoo’s Giant Panda Research Station last Friday in hopes of catching Su Lin on the ground. It was very cold for me but Su Lin did not seem to mind in the least. There was a chill in the air and rain felt imminent, with large dark clouds overhead. Su Lin spent the whole time in the trees while I waited. Mostly she was awake, walking around among the leaves. At one point, while reaching for a branch to nibble on, she almost toppled to the ground (moment pictured above)! She caught herself and remained aloft where she prefers to be. After a few hours she slowly shuffled down a thicker branch and wedged herself in between thick trunks and dreamed panda dreams…and that signaled the end of my attempt to photograph her for that day. I took a few shots of the sleeping baby and left her to her nap. So hope that helps you all understand a bit more about why there have been less photos of Su Lin….it is not at all that we don’t want new shots of her. They are just not all that easy to get these days. But we’ll keep trying!

Tammy Spratt is a photographer for the Zoological Society of San Diego.

View pandas on Panda Cam.

Check out blogs from other areas of the Zoo and Wild Animal Park!

But what happens when they do? How do adult bears communicate once they are in close proximity? When pandas are in close quarters, other types of communication come into play: vocalizations and posturing.

Our ethogram, which is a list of all behaviors we are interested in studying and recording, describes eleven different vocalizations that an adult might emit: the bleat, chirp, bark, moan, growl, honk, roar, chomp, huff, snort, and agonsitic (combative) squeal. The bleat and chirp are friendly sounds, made when a panda is not aggressive towards another, and very common during breeding encounters when both the male and female are receptive to each other. The honk is a signal of agitation or discontent, and bears often emit this vocalization when they are hungry, stressed or irritated. The bark, moan, and chomp are low-level aggressive sounds, serving as a warning to another bear that the signaler is agitated. The growl and snort generally come into play when bears are very agitated and aggressive, perhaps when lunging at another bear. The roar, as you might predict, signals a very high level of aggression and is generally only heard in the context of fighting. The squeal is heard in breeding encounters or fights when a bear is on the “losing end” of the battle.

In addition to the adult vocalizations above, our ethogram lists five vocalizations important in the mother-cub relationship: the cry, loud squawk, soft squawk, croak, and whimper. Our research has also focused heavily on how these vocalizations play a role in ensuring that the cub is well cared for by its mother, and how the mother invests her time while in the den.

Physical forms of communication also come into play when bears are in close proximity. Our ethogram describes “transactions,” or social interactions between bears, that range in character from friendly to aggressive. A bear can turn away from another when it wants to ignore a social partner. It can crouch low to appear submissive or unthreatening. It can certainly run away from another bear in response to a threat. At its highest level, aggression takes the form of a physical attack, replete with paw swats, bites, and wrestling. In the context of social play, most commonly seen among young bears or in the mother-cub relationship, our ethogram describes a “play face” that may be seen if a panda is trying to instigate mischief.

Although the panda is solitary by nature, they have a fairly diverse repertoire of social expressions that they can employ. Most of the elements of this repertoire come into play under very specific circumstances: during breeding encounters or during the maternal care phase of a panda’s life. As a result, you won’t see much evidence of this communication when watching captive pandas much of the time. Visit the facility during breeding seasons or when there is a young cub present, however, and you might be fortunate enough to get in on the conversation!

Suzanne Hall is the panda research technician for the San Diego Zoo’s Office of Giant Panda Conservation.

View pandas on Panda Cam.

Check out blogs from other areas of the Zoo and Wild Animal Park!

In November of 2004, Kelle was sent to the Wild Animal Park to breed with a male there named Masombi. In March of 2005 she was returned to her home in Ituri Forest, as it had been confirmed that Kelle was indeed pregnant. Keepers knew that it was going to be a long time before the baby was born, however, because okapis have a 15-month-long gestation!

Now that he is finally with us, the calf, named Kidomo, is growing amazingly fast! His latest weight was taken on March 7 and he was 70 pounds (32 kilograms)! Kelle and Kidomo are currently being housed together off exhibit in our maternity yard with access to the heated barn. Young okapis have difficulty keeping warm in cool weather, so it may be a couple of weeks before Kidomo is big enough to go out to the exhibit. But if the weather warms up, he may go out sooner than that, so I’ll keep you posted!

Bridget Mulholland is a senior mammal keeper at the San Diego Zoo.

Read a blog about okapis at the Wild Animal Park.

The emergency transfusion he received last week provided the extra time needed for veterinarians to continue with chelation (pronounced “key-LAY-shun”) therapy to remove the lead from his blood. Chelation is a method used to cleanse lead from the bloodstream with an intravenous solution of EDTA (Ethylene Diamine Tetra Acid), which is an amino acid with the ability to bind itself to metals such as lead, mercury, and calcium. The EDTA enters the bloodstream and attaches itself to metal-ion molecules. Usually within 48 hours, the body excretes these substances through the urine and the process of cleansing begins. This has been the treatment of choice for lead poisoning and other types of metallic poisoning for more than 20 years, not just for condors, but any animal, including humans. The next step for #9601 (a.k.a. “Harry”) will be to begin eating and drinking independently.

In the meantime, Harry is getting the best care available at the Phoenix Zoo and veterinarians are optimistic, though he’s not totally “out of the woods” just yet. We at HVMC were very pleased to get this encouraging news and be able to share it with all of you!

Valerie Stoddard is the senior administrative assistant at the Wild Animal Park’s Paul Harter Veterinary Medical Center.