Gram is a lucky Indian rhino. His species is critically endangered, with an estimated 2,500 left in the wild, but Gram was born at the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park and now lives at the San Diego Zoo. The main reasons for the dwindling numbers of Indian rhinos are loss of habitat due to human expansion into previously undeveloped areas, and poaching of rhinos for their body parts, mainly the horn. The horn of a rhino consists of a protein called keratin, and some traditional medicinal beliefs claim the horn is an aphrodisiac. Scientifically speaking, the same aphrodisiac effect could be achieved by biting your fingernails; our nails are also made of keratin.

When we visited Gram during our Zoo InternQuest tour of the Zoo grounds, we got a thrill being face to face with him and rewarding him for coming to see us by giving him yams and apples. Feeding a rhino may be a cool experience, but how does this help people understand the conservation status of an animal? When returning home from the adventure of feeding a rhinoceros, it sank in that we had been up close and personal to a 5,000-pound giant. The next day, still in awe, we each had similar experiences at school. When casually asked by our friends what we did yesterday at that Zoo internship, we replied with, “I fed a rhino named Gram!,” grinning at their jealous expressions. They replied, “You fed a what? I want to feed one!”

Most high school kids don’t talk about rhinos and wildlife conservation and the impact of buying too much stuff and resource use during lunch break. Last week, we did, thanks to Gram, and our Zoo educator guide, Sunni Robertson, who gave us information we can use to get people to care.

- Sarah and Chelsi, Real World Team

Sunni Robertson gave us a fantastic and in-depth tour of the World-Famous San Diego Zoo and answered our questions about how to land a job as a Zoo educator/guide. Being knowledgeable about the Zoo and the animals is a requirement for Zoo educators, of course. Ms. Robertson has a bachelor’s degree in biology which gave her the basis for knowing a lot about animals in general. It also helps to be able to interact with people and animals. Ms. Robertson worked in a veterinary office for awhile and then attended Moorpark College, participating in their exotic animal training and management program. After graduating from Moorpark, Ms. Robertson started working at the San Diego Zoo.

Her daily routine is never the same, but usually includes tours for visitors of all ages, spending time with the animals she is trained to work with, and keeping up on the happenings around the Zoo. She is also a leader for the Zoo’s teen participation program called Zoo Corps. She gets to mentor the Zoo Corps members, and most of them want to work with animals when they grow up, so she can give them advice about college and volunteering opportunities.

People come to the Zoo to have fun and feel connected to the animals. Zoo educators like Ms. Robertson have the challenge of communicating the right mix of information and inspiration to leave them feeling like there is hope for habitats, animals, and people.

- Justin and Melissa, Careers Team

From peacocks to Indian rhinos, the San Diego Zoo houses a spectacular assortment of animals sure to impress people of all ages. In addition to the animals, the Zoo maintains a collection of rare, exotic, and endangered plants. But, as we learned this week, the purpose of the Zoo is not merely to amaze visitors but also to give people a reason to care about our precious animal and plant neighbors.

When you come to the Zoo and see the animals and plants from other parts of the world, it is a chance to feel like you have gone to a far away place. It is also a chance to help conserve wild places, far and near. The Zoological Society of San Diego supports conservation programs to help animals and habitats around the world. Conservation and Research for Endangered Species (CRES), the research division of the Zoological Society of San Diego, is involved in focused efforts in the lab and in the field to prevent animal extinction.

If our guide, Ms. Robertson, had not told us about them, we would not have known about the CRES staff working to prevent extinction of the Panamanian golden frog, whose major threat is an infectious disease caused by a fungus. Several Central American frog species have already become extinct in the past few decades because of this fungus! And the efforts to avert extinction of California condors have been ongoing for over 20 years, longer than we interns have been alive! Most of the condors in the wild are ones that were hatched in captive breeding programs and released into protected habitat throughout the southwest United States and Baja California, Mexico. Conservation biologists from CRES and other facilities recently released 28 condors into the wild. This is not the kind of thing that you see on the TV news, so finding out this information from our guide was exciting - and then we were motivated to read more about it on the San Diego Zoo’s Web site!

The education department at the San Diego Zoo communicates to people of all ages about the needs of animals, the importance of conservation, and ways in which all of us can help the Zoo achieve its goals. The audiences include special VIP tours, overnight camps for kids, and catered business parties. Some animals are trained to travel to schools, nursing homes, and other places off the Zoo grounds to help spread the message. The most important facet of all of these programs is keeping it fun. Employees are constantly thinking of new and creative ways to bring connect people with animals. In doing so, visitors are able to build a relationship with the animals and therefore, more people become interested in helping in any way that they can.

Zoo visitors can do their part by recycling, being well informed consumers, and good neighbors to the cool animals that we share the planet with. But you can also have fun at the Zoo and leave with interesting facts – like the fact that rhino horn is made from the same protein as our fingernails - that will make you appreciate animals even more!

- Keesha and Marika, Conservation Team

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