Kelly Kappen

Jennifer Dush Author

12/13/2018 Added

17 Plays

Description

Feeding the Zoo: Adventures in Exotic Animal Nutrition

Searchable Transcript

Search:

[00:00:00.320]It's a pleasure to have Kelly Kappen here today.
[00:00:03.930]She's the nutritional director,
[00:00:06.540]is that your personal title?
[00:00:07.373]Some kind of nutrition manager,
[00:00:09.000]it's a--
[00:00:09.833]Director? Yeah, titles are weird.
[00:00:11.320]At the Henry Doorly Zoo,
[00:00:13.490]and I knew Kelly when she took my class,
[00:00:18.910]do you remember what year that was?
[00:00:20.380]Oh, a while ago.
[00:00:21.240]Yeah, she was a natural resource major
[00:00:24.010]and took my nutrition class as an undergraduate
[00:00:26.750]and then went to Illinois and did her master's,
[00:00:30.040]and now she's back in Nebraska
[00:00:31.820]and she's going to tell us a little bit
[00:00:33.160]about what she does at the zoo.
[00:00:35.310]So thanks for coming, appreciate it.
[00:00:36.580]Yeah, thank you.
[00:00:38.387]So yeah, today I'm just going to give a brief overview
[00:00:43.270]of what nutrition programs in zoos in general look like,
[00:00:47.350]a bit more specifically about what we do in Omaha,
[00:00:51.275]and then a very meandering, rambling discussion
[00:00:55.413]of a variety of just weird things that come up
[00:00:58.383]on a day to day basis for us.
[00:01:02.330]So let's see if this works for me.
[00:01:06.892]It was working earlier, not anymore.
[00:01:12.457]Nothing works anymore.
[00:01:23.390]All right, so nutrition in zoos.
[00:01:26.320]This has not historically been an area
[00:01:28.740]that has been given a lot of thought by zoos.
[00:01:31.753]This is a role that was traditionally filled
[00:01:34.970]either by veterinarians or even keepers
[00:01:37.260]and curatorial staff,
[00:01:39.040]not typically people with a lot
[00:01:40.500]of dedicated nutrition training.
[00:01:43.440]And it's really just in the last few decades
[00:01:45.395]that zoos have been placing increasing focus
[00:01:48.534]on having a dedicated nutrition department
[00:01:52.620]to help with diets for the animals.
[00:01:55.440]Even today, there are relatively few zoos
[00:01:57.940]that have nutrition programs.
[00:02:00.420]There are over 200 accredited zoos in the US,
[00:02:03.657]and only about 25 of those have dedicated nutrition programs
[00:02:08.530]with either a PhD or master's nutritionists
[00:02:13.120]and of those 25,
[00:02:14.830]only about three of them have actively managed labs.
[00:02:18.230]We are one of those.
[00:02:19.790]Disney and San Diego also do,
[00:02:22.317]and there are a few other zoos
[00:02:24.333]that have some form of a lab,
[00:02:30.380]but really not a common thing.
[00:02:31.760]So we have a very unique program in Omaha.
[00:02:36.520]So since most zoos do not have dedicated nutrition programs,
[00:02:40.890]how do they get information?
[00:02:42.940]Their keepers and their curators can do some research,
[00:02:45.350]the veterinarians can help out,
[00:02:46.727]but there are also a variety of networks among AZA zoos,
[00:02:51.740]which is the Association of Zoos and Aquariums,
[00:02:54.800]that help with the transfer of information.
[00:02:57.677]One of those things are called Taxon Advisory Groups,
[00:03:01.280]so there are, say there's the felid TAG,
[00:03:04.410]that is a group of people that will advise
[00:03:06.970]any zoo that has any felid species,
[00:03:10.510]so those felid TAGs or the canid TAG
[00:03:14.560]or any of the Taxon Advisory Groups
[00:03:16.890]would have veterinary advisors,
[00:03:18.900]they would have nutrition advisors,
[00:03:20.916]so that any zoo with questions about diets or illness,
[00:03:25.500]whatever with those animals can contact
[00:03:27.920]those people and ask questions.
[00:03:29.580]There are also, for certain species,
[00:03:32.090]things called Species Survival Plans,
[00:03:34.540]which are typically for endangered species
[00:03:37.010]that are more actively managed in the zoos.
[00:03:40.690]So, for example, I'm the nutrition advisor
[00:03:42.640]to the serval SSP,
[00:03:43.920]so any zoo that has a serval,
[00:03:46.380]has a diet question related to that animal,
[00:03:49.280]they can contact me and I'll help them out.
[00:03:52.850]Which is kind of funny because for a while,
[00:03:54.420]Omaha didn't have any servals.
[00:03:57.750]We have one now, she's doing great.
[00:04:01.240]But yeah, so not all species are actively managed,
[00:04:03.520]but these are a few of the ways
[00:04:04.770]that we can share information with zoos
[00:04:06.860]who don't necessarily have their own on-staff nutritionist.
[00:04:10.720]Some zoos also will hire consulting nutritionists.
[00:04:16.890]There is a group called the Nutrition Advisory Group or NAG,
[00:04:21.800]for the AZA and we meet once every other year
[00:04:26.480]to share information with these other groups.
[00:04:31.870]So specifically at Omaha, like I said,
[00:04:34.070]we have a bit of a unique program here.
[00:04:36.510]We have three branches in our nutrition department.
[00:04:39.570]One is the animal commissary,
[00:04:41.110]where they actually have to prepare all the diets
[00:04:42.910]for the animals every day,
[00:04:44.357]and we have six full-time staff there.
[00:04:47.500]We also have our browse department,
[00:04:50.410]which, if anyone's familiar with the difference
[00:04:53.670]between browsing and grazing herbivores,
[00:04:55.440]browsing would be more of the leafy tree material,
[00:04:58.380]so we have Ronnie Deaver is our browse coordinator.
[00:05:01.270]She is in charge of procuring as much
[00:05:04.810]as our elephants, giraffes, apes,
[00:05:06.848]all of the other hoofstock can eat.
[00:05:10.340]And then we have the nutrition lab,
[00:05:12.370]which is me, and Devon,
[00:05:14.790]our currently part-time but hopefully soon
[00:05:17.610]full-time lab technician,
[00:05:19.440]and then Dr. Cheryl Morris
[00:05:20.650]is the vice-president of conservation at the zoo,
[00:05:23.880]but she also still spends a portion of her time
[00:05:26.730]directing the nutrition department.
[00:05:31.220]So, like I said, those three branches.
[00:05:33.380]One our diet kitchen,
[00:05:34.810]literally involved in all of the logistical challenges
[00:05:37.830]in feeding, we have over 6,000 animals,
[00:05:43.950]not including invertebrates and fish.
[00:05:47.830]So they have a lot to do every day
[00:05:50.700]in terms of storage and distribution,
[00:05:53.500]and in addition to those six full-time employees,
[00:05:55.730]we typically have anywhere between zero and four interns
[00:05:59.960]at any given time.
[00:06:02.620]Definitely more in the summer,
[00:06:03.820]so if anyone's interested in internship opportunities
[00:06:06.400]during the school year, please let me know.
[00:06:10.275]And then they also have a rotating cast
[00:06:12.410]of about 30 volunteers who work anywhere
[00:06:15.070]from two hours a week to we have a couple volunteers
[00:06:17.860]that do 30-hour weeks with us.
[00:06:21.080]So between all of those people, that incredible team,
[00:06:24.600]they push a lot of food out to the zoo.
[00:06:27.380]The browse program is relatively new,
[00:06:30.510]this really, the push for this happened
[00:06:32.580]when we got in six new African elephants,
[00:06:35.770]since they consume a lot of browse.
[00:06:39.177]And in that first couple years,
[00:06:40.530]we planted, I think, 80 trees in the first year
[00:06:43.760]and maybe a couple hundred the next year,
[00:06:46.050]and then we have since discovered
[00:06:48.080]the wonder of willow,
[00:06:50.560]where you can just shove a stick in the ground
[00:06:52.850]and it will grow,
[00:06:53.683]and now we're planting more like 3,000 trees a year.
[00:06:57.340]So that department, or that section of our department
[00:07:00.100]under Ronnie has to plant a lot of trees,
[00:07:02.820]harvest trees,
[00:07:03.653]she's also working on outreach to the community,
[00:07:06.400]working with tree-trimming companies,
[00:07:08.900]Omaha Public Power,
[00:07:10.610]trying to get people to,
[00:07:11.920]instead of taking the trees
[00:07:13.830]when they get cut down to a landfill,
[00:07:15.344]they can bring them to us.
[00:07:16.210]Use them for animals.
[00:07:18.730]So the nice thing about this is we are feeding
[00:07:20.580]our animals for a reduced cost,
[00:07:22.460]but we're also diverting a lot of waste from the landfill.
[00:07:26.020]So that's a big portion of that job.
[00:07:30.006]I thought I put in some of the numbers.
[00:07:31.480]I think we used something like 65 tons
[00:07:36.090]of browse material this summer alone,
[00:07:39.270]and probably about half of that was donated material
[00:07:41.870]and half of that is us actually going out to cut it.
[00:07:47.193]And another really important part of that
[00:07:49.460]is identifying which of those plant species are toxic
[00:07:53.610]and which are not toxic to be able to feed to our animals.
[00:07:56.820]So there are certain things like red maple,
[00:07:58.984]or oak, excuse me, that are actually toxic,
[00:08:03.020]so we can't feed to our animals,
[00:08:05.730]so it's really important that we are
[00:08:07.080]positively identifying every piece of browse
[00:08:09.870]that actually goes into the animal exhibits.
[00:08:12.669]And because our browse department has been so successful
[00:08:16.017]in providing large quantities of browse,
[00:08:18.560]we're actually able to start making it
[00:08:20.330]a regular part of our animals' diets.
[00:08:22.790]In the past, browse has more been used as enrichment,
[00:08:26.530]so we have the typical diet that we feed
[00:08:28.107]to the animals every day,
[00:08:29.380]and then if we happen to have some browse,
[00:08:31.680]we throw that in there, they love it,
[00:08:33.850]it's a good portion of the diet,
[00:08:36.060]it's enriching because they spend
[00:08:37.729]more of their time manipulating that feed,
[00:08:40.740]so they're having to strip leaves and peel bark,
[00:08:44.130]rather than just shoveling in a feed concentrate
[00:08:47.380]or a pile of hay.
[00:08:50.030]So this summer we were actually able to cut certain
[00:08:53.960]portions of animal diets and make browse
[00:08:56.350]an actual piece of that diet,
[00:08:57.880]which both saves us money, is better for the animals,
[00:09:00.730]again, our browse program does a lot
[00:09:02.240]of really good work with that.
[00:09:04.560]So the nutrition laboratory,
[00:09:06.430]we do a few different things in there.
[00:09:09.200]One of those things,
[00:09:10.033]we do quality control analyses
[00:09:11.590]on some of the feeds that come in,
[00:09:13.700]so we're running proximate analyses
[00:09:15.340]on how dry matter, organic matter,
[00:09:17.498]food prep, fat, pre-protein, gross energy,
[00:09:21.820]and we are also set up to grind total dietary fiber.
[00:09:24.980]Does anyone know the difference
[00:09:26.860]between different fiber methodologies?
[00:09:28.610]I assume that quite a few of you do.
[00:09:30.110]So typically in animal feeds,
[00:09:31.552]we're going to be using crude fiber,
[00:09:32.970]NDF, ADF, in human nutrition
[00:09:36.840]is where total dietary fiber is usually used.
[00:09:39.880]But total dietary fiber gives us a much more
[00:09:42.560]big picture of what fiber and what types
[00:09:45.180]of fiber are actually in the diet,
[00:09:48.220]especially for anything that has any soluble fibers in it,
[00:09:52.450]so that is what we can run in-house.
[00:09:54.590]We do still send out to a lab in Omaha
[00:09:59.330]for NDF, ADF on a lot of our forages
[00:10:01.737]'cause it's just not worth running TDFs on forages,
[00:10:06.630]and then any mineral or microbe analyses
[00:10:09.350]we also send out to another lab.
[00:10:13.110]But then the other big part of what we do
[00:10:15.030]in the lab is diet formulation.
[00:10:17.010]So really, quality control, really important,
[00:10:19.500]but the bulk of what we do, I think,
[00:10:21.778]is just trying to manage diets for those 6,000 animals
[00:10:26.510]of more than 1,000 different species,
[00:10:29.520]or I always forget the numbers, it's a lot.
[00:10:32.520]It's hard to keep track of all of them.
[00:10:34.730]So really what we're doing is trying to pull information.
[00:10:37.070]What do we know about any of these species
[00:10:41.040]and how do we apply it to the animals
[00:10:43.850]we're working with right now?
[00:10:45.430]And there are a lot of different factors to consider,
[00:10:48.610]and let's see, yeah.
[00:10:51.340]Let's skip that 'cause I don't want you guys,
[00:10:53.720]so where do you guys think we should start?
[00:10:55.280]If we have a new animal that comes into the zoo,
[00:10:58.650]how do we decide what to feed it?
[00:11:03.389]Google.
[00:11:04.222]Google!
[00:11:05.083]What is Google going to tell me about the animal,
[00:11:07.220]like what specific information am I looking for?
[00:11:16.160]Similarities between species
[00:11:18.470]that we know something about.
[00:11:19.960]Sure, so we're looking for similarities
[00:11:23.080]in feeding habit or digestive tract morphology.
[00:11:27.510]So what does their digestive system look like?
[00:11:30.270]Is there maybe a domestic model that would be similar to
[00:11:33.911]that we know a lot more about?
[00:11:36.020]Or what do we typically see it eating in the wild
[00:11:39.230]if someone has taken the time to observe
[00:11:41.150]that species in the wild and see what they're eating,
[00:11:43.750]and then is there a similar species that we know more about?
[00:11:48.760]So we want to look at their natural history,
[00:11:50.420]like what does their environment look like?
[00:11:52.700]What do we think they're eating in the wild?
[00:11:56.030]But sometimes that is an incomplete picture,
[00:12:00.440]like, for example, we typically thought of crocodilians
[00:12:04.380]as being obligate carnivores.
[00:12:06.690]But now it seems like more information is coming out
[00:12:09.490]that suggests that they actually
[00:12:10.660]have quite a significant portion of vegetative material
[00:12:14.620]in their stomachs.
[00:12:16.030]So whether that is intentional
[00:12:18.100]or unintentional consumption,
[00:12:19.620]maybe that's something that we need to be
[00:12:21.060]looking at closer in our captive diets.
[00:12:25.160]But 20 years ago, we were thinking of them
[00:12:28.380]as obligate carnivores because typically
[00:12:30.490]when you think of a crocodile,
[00:12:31.800]they eat meat in the wild.
[00:12:33.730]So good to start with what we know about them in the wild,
[00:12:37.257]but also, if we want to know more
[00:12:40.020]nutrient requirements,
[00:12:42.090]we want to look at a domestic model,
[00:12:44.067]and that is entirely based
[00:12:45.681]on what does their digestive system look like?
[00:12:49.490]So I want to know what it is,
[00:12:51.770]what is the anatomy and the physiology tell me,
[00:12:53.870]like maybe dental structure, GI tract.
[00:12:57.280]What are their feeding strategies and behaviors in the wild?
[00:13:00.590]If we know that, and is there a model species
[00:13:02.940]with published requirements?
[00:13:06.150]What does it eat in the wild?
[00:13:08.350]But we don't always know,
[00:13:09.850]so does anyone know what lemurs
[00:13:12.100]typically eat in Madagascar?
[00:13:15.880]They're primarily frugivores,
[00:13:17.730]so they eat almost entirely fruit in Madagascar,
[00:13:22.290]so does that mean that we should feed them fruit in zoos?
[00:13:28.490]Do we know what the nutrient composition
[00:13:30.630]of the fruits that they're eating in Madagascar?
[00:13:33.840]And if we don't know that information,
[00:13:35.840]can we assume that the fruit that's available
[00:13:37.930]in the grocery store is the same as that?
[00:13:39.910]We probably can't.
[00:13:41.640]Luckily, at Omaha, our genetics department
[00:13:43.810]spends a lot of time in Madagascar,
[00:13:45.770]so they actually followed lemurs around
[00:13:48.120]and collected plant samples from all of the things
[00:13:50.990]that they were observed to be eating,
[00:13:53.090]and several years ago, this is was before my time,
[00:13:56.700]they analyzed all of those things for nutrient composition.
[00:14:00.020]They found the fruits that they were eating
[00:14:02.400]would be totally unrecognizable to humans as fruit.
[00:14:06.860]They're very fibrous, they have thick, waxy coatings,
[00:14:10.530]they're higher in fiber, and they are very low in sugars
[00:14:14.550]compared to anything that we have in our grocery store.
[00:14:18.500]So if we look at nutrient composition
[00:14:20.690]of the fruits that they're eating in the wild
[00:14:22.270]and nutrient composition of our vegetables
[00:14:24.650]that are available to us in the grocery store,
[00:14:26.820]the vegetables are actually a lot closer
[00:14:28.760]to they would be eating than our fruits would be.
[00:14:31.500]So more and more zoos right now are pushing
[00:14:33.420]towards either fruit-free or low fruit diets for primates
[00:14:37.938]because those high sugar contents in diets
[00:14:41.590]can cause issues like obesity, diabetes,
[00:14:44.801]even some food aggression.
[00:14:47.950]So we really need to be aware of what those nutrients are.
[00:14:51.280]Now sometimes that information isn't available,
[00:14:54.040]so they have to make some educated guesses.
[00:14:57.070]And then, this kind of ties in to that,
[00:14:58.920]what feed is available for us in this location,
[00:15:01.960]like I cannot feed Malagasy fruits in Omaha.
[00:15:05.440]I can't go and find some tropical leaves
[00:15:08.880]to feed some of our folivores.
[00:15:10.620]I have to work with what's available in the grocery store
[00:15:13.090]or what we can grow here in the Midwest.
[00:15:16.850]And this is going to vary.
[00:15:18.040]Some zoos in California or Florida
[00:15:19.890]have access to more tropical fruits than we do,
[00:15:23.040]so that has to be determined on a case-by-base basis.
[00:15:26.290]So a lot of what we do is SWAG,
[00:15:29.540]scientific wild ass guessing.
[00:15:31.905](audience laughing)
[00:15:33.130]We make a lot of educated guesses
[00:15:35.240]based on the information that we do have.
[00:15:38.370]There's a lot of critical thinking
[00:15:39.520]and problem solving involved.
[00:15:41.500]So no requirements,
[00:15:44.080]you guys are familiar with the NRCs,
[00:15:47.003]these are published nutrient requirements
[00:15:48.860]for a variety of primarily domestic species.
[00:15:52.608]AAFCO, American Association of Feed Control Officials,
[00:15:55.390]also regulates the pet food industry,
[00:15:58.290]and has some recommendations for dogs and cats,
[00:16:02.510]and then AZA is working on putting out
[00:16:05.430]animal care manuals for a variety of species.
[00:16:08.760]These are still a work in progress,
[00:16:10.580]but basically for each species
[00:16:12.907]for which there is currently an animal care manual,
[00:16:16.190]there are a lot of chapters involving husbandry,
[00:16:18.490]veterinary procedures, training, enrichment,
[00:16:20.790]and there's a nutrition chapter
[00:16:22.880]in each of these animal care manuals.
[00:16:26.020]So some of the nutritionists from the NAG,
[00:16:30.560]the Nutrition Advisory Group,
[00:16:32.380]will work together to write those chapters
[00:16:34.860]and those are usually based pretty heavily
[00:16:36.760]on the NRCs as well as any information
[00:16:40.650]that we actually have about the specifics
[00:16:42.990]of that species in captivity.
[00:16:45.820]So there are a variety of really unique challenges
[00:16:49.150]involved in feeding exotic species.
[00:16:51.240]We talked about the limited data
[00:16:52.920]on nutrients of wild ingredients,
[00:16:55.620]and limited data on their actual requirements.
[00:16:59.460]We also are dealing with management constraints.
[00:17:02.610]So some of our animals are group-housed,
[00:17:05.240]some of them are in mixed-species exhibits,
[00:17:07.660]so I have to make sure that the armadillo diet
[00:17:11.450]doesn't have anything in it that the owl monkey diet
[00:17:13.870]can't have because the owl monkey
[00:17:15.360]is going to go everywhere in that exhibit
[00:17:17.210]and there's no way that I can keep the food away from them.
[00:17:19.760]Now on the other hand,
[00:17:20.850]if there's something the armadillo can't have,
[00:17:22.780]I can absolutely put that in the owl monkey's diet,
[00:17:25.280]as long as the keepers put it up high
[00:17:27.860]so the armadillo can't get it.
[00:17:29.859]So there's some weird things involved in feeding,
[00:17:33.990]if I have, like, for example that owl monkey is diabetic.
[00:17:37.570]So every other animal in that exhibit
[00:17:39.730]has to be on a low-fruit or low-sugar diet.
[00:17:44.573]We also have limited ingredients available regionally
[00:17:47.900]so we've got to get a little creative with that.
[00:17:50.470]And then I can formulate the perfect diet,
[00:17:53.770]but unlike some formulated commercial feeds,
[00:17:57.280]we try to feed a varied diet.
[00:17:59.380]So if I formulate the perfect diet
[00:18:01.640]and then I find out a year later,
[00:18:03.390]the keepers say, oh, they never eat the lettuce,
[00:18:06.370]they're only eating the bananas, so, (laughs)
[00:18:09.670]that didn't work very well.
[00:18:11.430]So there's a lot of back and forth
[00:18:12.770]between me and the keepers,
[00:18:14.840]and we have to make sure that whatever
[00:18:16.330]that perfect diet is that we formulate,
[00:18:18.360]they're actually going to eat it.
[00:18:20.660]And then cost is ultimately a big consideration as well.
[00:18:24.210]We spend about a million dollars a year
[00:18:26.522]on food for the zoo,
[00:18:29.129]which is a lot, but also we have a lot of species to feed,
[00:18:33.780]so cost is ultimately a consideration.
[00:18:36.310]We want to provide a varied diet
[00:18:38.617]that's going to meet all of the nutrient
[00:18:40.830]and behavioral needs of the animals
[00:18:43.460]but we also need to stay within budget.
[00:18:46.640]And that's the other thing
[00:18:47.473]I didn't really much earlier.
[00:18:49.820]In addition to meeting nutrient requirements,
[00:18:51.650]we have to meet behavioral needs as well.
[00:18:54.150]So there are nutritionally complete primate biscuits
[00:18:57.750]that I could feed as an exclusive feed source
[00:19:01.150]to, say, our gorillas.
[00:19:02.650]But then a gorilla would get
[00:19:04.680]maybe a volume about this big per day of feed.
[00:19:09.230]They would eat all of that within about half an hour
[00:19:11.390]and then they would sit around, bored and angry.
[00:19:14.670]We would probably have a lot more behavioral issues
[00:19:16.680]in group-housed animals.
[00:19:18.080]We could definitely have
[00:19:19.450]some more aggression towards keepers
[00:19:21.380]who would have more issues
[00:19:22.300]with what we call stereotypic behaviors,
[00:19:25.300]or unhealthy, repetitive behaviors
[00:19:28.040]indicative of poor mental health.
[00:19:30.910]So instead, even though it is very much more expensive,
[00:19:35.080]we feed huge volumes of leafy greens,
[00:19:37.330]which are not calorically dense,
[00:19:38.850]so they get 40 pounds of leafy greens
[00:19:42.300]instead of four pounds of biscuits,
[00:19:45.451]so that gives them a lot more opportunities
[00:19:47.390]to exhibit natural feeding behaviors,
[00:19:50.930]foraging through their exhibit
[00:19:53.390]and spending more of their time
[00:19:55.540]looking for and consuming food,
[00:19:56.960]which is more like what their activity budget
[00:19:59.100]would look like in their natural environment.
[00:20:04.050]Little glitch again, there we go.
[00:20:06.007]All right, so, what does a panda's digestive tract
[00:20:09.830]tell me it should eat?
[00:20:14.540]Does anyone know what a panda's digestive tract looks like?
[00:20:16.930]Or what are some of its closest living relatives?
[00:20:20.150]We all know what pandas actually eat,
[00:20:22.570]but is that what their digestive tracts are designed for?
[00:20:26.140]So this, if you look at the stomach
[00:20:28.430]and GI tract for this animal,
[00:20:29.630]it looks like a carnivore.
[00:20:32.200]It's got a short, not very complex large intestine,
[00:20:37.730]simple stomach.
[00:20:39.600]So when all they eat is bamboo,
[00:20:43.100]how well do you think that's digested?
[00:20:46.750]I feel like a human trying to eat only grass.
[00:20:51.240]This is panda poop.
[00:20:53.037](audience laughing)
[00:20:54.110]It doesn't look like they got much out of it, right?
[00:20:57.880]Pandas digest less than 20%
[00:21:00.790]of the dry matter content of bamboo.
[00:21:03.694]Most of it just passes straight through undigested.
[00:21:07.580]So what nutrients do you think
[00:21:08.920]they're actually absorbing from this?
[00:21:13.580]It's all of the cell contents, right?
[00:21:15.413]None of the cell walls.
[00:21:17.470]They're getting over 90% protein digestibility in this.
[00:21:22.150]There's not a whole lot of protein in bamboo
[00:21:23.870]but they're very effective at extracting what there is.
[00:21:26.520]So they have to eat really large volumes
[00:21:28.890]and then their gut transit time
[00:21:30.050]is only around four hours, four to eight hours, maybe.
[00:21:33.340]So they're eating really large volumes,
[00:21:34.820]pushing it through really fast,
[00:21:36.010]extracting whatever simple carbohydrates
[00:21:39.052]and proteins they can get,
[00:21:41.520]and getting rid of all of the excess.
[00:21:46.170]So we talked about comparing things to domestic species
[00:21:49.610]where there are published nutrient requirements.
[00:21:51.907]So what do you think our top one should be?
[00:21:54.580]This one's pretty simple, right?
[00:21:56.660]It's a cat, and it's a cat.
[00:22:00.000]Cats are fairly simple,
[00:22:00.940]they are obligate carnivores,
[00:22:02.190]they all have fairly similar diets
[00:22:04.230]and nutrient requirements.
[00:22:06.290]What about bears, do we have a domestic omnivore model?
[00:22:11.180]Dogs.
[00:22:12.013]Yeah, domestic dog.
[00:22:13.230]So that one makes sense.
[00:22:14.480]A lot of other canids as well.
[00:22:18.390]What do you think, I'll just get to this one.
[00:22:22.100]So we have hindgut fermenters,
[00:22:23.400]we have a lot of hindgut fermenters in the zoo.
[00:22:25.960]There are a variety of these,
[00:22:27.210]tapirs in the jungle,
[00:22:29.930]zebras, that's kind of an easy one.
[00:22:31.930]Rhinos are also hindgut fermenters,
[00:22:33.770]our elephants are hindgut fermenters.
[00:22:35.974]So we have a lot of different
[00:22:37.300]hindgut fermenters at the zoo,
[00:22:40.720]but all of those still,
[00:22:41.820]we need to consider their natural histories,
[00:22:43.500]so an African rhino that is primarily eating dried grasses
[00:22:48.200]is going to have a very different diet
[00:22:50.370]than a Malayan tapir,
[00:22:52.450]who lives in the jungle
[00:22:53.360]and eats a lot of really (coughing obscures speech) forages.
[00:22:59.180]There are a variety of nutritional concerns
[00:23:01.030]for hindgut fermenters.
[00:23:02.070]These are the same for our animals
[00:23:03.610]as they would be for a horse.
[00:23:06.363]So colic, mineral imbalances,
[00:23:08.400]we see this pretty commonly in rhinos,
[00:23:10.920]especially black rhinos,
[00:23:12.880]they have iron storage disease
[00:23:15.019]because their typical diet,
[00:23:17.450]and actually this is an interesting one.
[00:23:18.860]So we don't really see this issue in white rhinos.
[00:23:21.830]White rhinos are grazers, black rhinos are browsers.
[00:23:26.050]And I'll have a bit more of a discussion
[00:23:27.960]of the difference between those later.
[00:23:29.420]But the browse contains a lot of tannins
[00:23:32.160]which will bind to iron in the diet
[00:23:33.810]so it makes sense that the animal whose natural diet
[00:23:36.850]would be high in tannins, high in fiber,
[00:23:39.910]would have more of an issue with iron overload
[00:23:42.540]on a captive diet than a grazing animal.
[00:23:45.280]Grazers are far easier to feed in zoos than browsers are
[00:23:48.520]because dried grass hay is very readily available to us.
[00:23:53.370]And then over time carbohydrates
[00:23:55.120]can lead to things like Cushing's disease, laminitis.
[00:23:58.730]What about ruminants?
[00:23:59.650]We have a lot of ruminants as well,
[00:24:01.700]the gaur, the okapi, the bongo, the giraffe,
[00:24:06.220]and there are a huge variety of ruminant animals,
[00:24:10.320]so we also, in addition to the domestic cow,
[00:24:13.960]we have goats as another model for small ruminants.
[00:24:18.220]So, okay, all of these are canids,
[00:24:20.651]so in theory we would compare all of them
[00:24:23.240]to the domestic dog,
[00:24:24.970]but what if we consider their diet in the wild?
[00:24:27.600]Are you guys familiar with any of these species?
[00:24:29.890]This first one is an African painted dog.
[00:24:33.400]The middle one is a maned wolf and then on the right,
[00:24:35.908]we have the bat-eared fox.
[00:24:38.780]So the African hunting dog or African painted dog
[00:24:41.690]is a strict carnivore, it only eats meat.
[00:24:44.720]So really, we're looking at something closer to a cat
[00:24:48.210]than we are to a dog.
[00:24:50.400]The maned wolf consumes up to 70% vegetation in its diet,
[00:24:55.670]so if we tried feeding that a diet that would work for,
[00:25:00.070]say, the African hunting dog,
[00:25:02.160]those animals have a lot of health issues in zoos
[00:25:06.060]primarily because of that.
[00:25:07.860]And then bat-eared foxes eat basically exclusively insects.
[00:25:13.430]So the nutrient composition of typical insects
[00:25:17.460]is going to be different than that of carrion,
[00:25:19.860]so we're looking at probably a lower fat,
[00:25:22.360]higher protein diet for them.
[00:25:25.380]What about this one?
[00:25:27.690]What's a domestic model that we can use for raptors?
[00:25:36.170]What would be a domestic bird model?
[00:25:38.960]Chicken.
[00:25:39.793]The chicken.
[00:25:41.140]Do we feed a chicken and an eagle the same way?
[00:25:44.340]No. (laughs)
[00:25:45.950]So, then, well, let's look at feeding habit then.
[00:25:49.180]So this is an obligate carnivore,
[00:25:50.710]so what's our domestic carnivore?
[00:25:55.430]Cats. Cats.
[00:25:57.550]So the chicken cat.
[00:26:00.835](audience laughing)
[00:26:02.159]We have to look at little bit differently
[00:26:04.336]at what nutrient requirements
[00:26:06.740]should we be looking to the chicken for
[00:26:08.540]and what should we be looking to the cat for.
[00:26:12.660]So there's some odd combinations that go on here.
[00:26:16.070]This is another really weird one.
[00:26:17.810]It's a primate, so we can feed it like a non-human primate.
[00:26:20.840]Feed it kind of like a human.
[00:26:23.030]But it has a four-chambered stomach.
[00:26:26.510]So really, if we feed a higher-fruit diet to this primate,
[00:26:31.570]that could cause some serious problems.
[00:26:34.080]We really need to feed it more like a cow,
[00:26:36.620]and like a human,
[00:26:37.453]it's going to have some higher protein requirements
[00:26:39.391]than a cow would.
[00:26:41.770]The fiber requirement is going to be much higher,
[00:26:44.750]we really need to monitor sugar and starch in this diet.
[00:26:48.679]So you can't always tell just by looking at an animal
[00:26:51.320]what you should be feeding them.
[00:26:52.940]Does anyone know what this animal is?
[00:26:55.210]Rock hyrax.
[00:26:56.090]It's a rock hyrax.
[00:26:57.480]Do you know what its closest living relative?
[00:26:59.480]Elephant.
[00:27:00.313]The elephant, yeah.
[00:27:01.430]This is such a weird one.
[00:27:03.430]This is one of my favorite trivia things.
[00:27:06.680]But the rock hyrax,
[00:27:07.880]whose closest living relative is the elephant,
[00:27:10.419]has a very strange digestive system.
[00:27:14.360]It has a three-chambered stomach
[00:27:16.640]and also enlarged ceca and large intestine
[00:27:19.710]for hindgut fermentation.
[00:27:21.940]So when Cheryl, Dr. Morris, first got to the zoo,
[00:27:25.800]they were having some issues with their hyrax,
[00:27:26.940]so they had a lot of diarrhea,
[00:27:28.880]they were losing weight,
[00:27:30.380]they could not get them to gain weight,
[00:27:32.100]but their favorite foods were bananas and grapes.
[00:27:34.660]So they fed them more bananas and grapes,
[00:27:37.020]and they just kept getting sicker.
[00:27:38.530]They could not figure this out,
[00:27:40.860]so Cheryl came in, she's like, well,
[00:27:43.310]it's sort of a ruminant, it's sort of a hindgut fermenter,
[00:27:45.610]you absolutely should not be feeding grapes and bananas.
[00:27:49.060]Let's switch up their diet,
[00:27:50.180]and lo and behold, they got much healthier.
[00:27:52.890]So we're going to be looking
[00:27:54.530]at a combination of requirements for horse,
[00:27:57.260]rabbit, and small ruminants for this.
[00:27:59.740]So kind of an interesting case.
[00:28:03.710]We have an incredible variety of ruminant animals.
[00:28:07.610]Some of them are tiny, tiny,
[00:28:09.560]like little one to five-pound animals over here,
[00:28:13.410]and some of them are much larger,
[00:28:14.860]like say the giraffe or the gaur.
[00:28:18.840]And there are a variety of different
[00:28:20.150]feeding strategies for these animals,
[00:28:22.120]everywhere from completely concentrate selectors
[00:28:25.550]to completely grazers or grass and roughage eaters.
[00:28:31.470]So we have a couple different models
[00:28:32.800]that we get to use here,
[00:28:33.690]and the goat is a pretty convenient model for browsers.
[00:28:37.160]And the cow is a pretty convenient model for grazers.
[00:28:41.153]And there are a variety of differences
[00:28:43.520]between those two animals.
[00:28:45.030]So browsers have an increased rate of fermentation,
[00:28:48.330]increased liver size to deal with some of those
[00:28:51.620]toxic compounds that are sometimes found in browse,
[00:28:55.210]increased salivary glands for buffering,
[00:28:58.410]and then they eat more throughout the day.
[00:29:02.050]And this is important because again,
[00:29:04.130]most of what we have available to us in zoos is grass,
[00:29:07.930]so we could feed a lot more alfalfa,
[00:29:11.557]or we can try to feed as much browse as is available,
[00:29:14.910]but we need to be aware of the differences
[00:29:16.900]in how these two feeding strategies
[00:29:19.810]are going to affect the dietary needs for that.
[00:29:22.540]And we talked a little already
[00:29:24.420]about white versus black rhinos
[00:29:26.560]and how that probably is why we have many more issues
[00:29:32.760]with iron storage disease in black rhinos.
[00:29:38.140]Another really weird ruminant, the yellow-backed duiker.
[00:29:42.060]Typically in the wild it's going to eat a lot of seeds,
[00:29:44.650]fruits, like a lot of fruit,
[00:29:46.550]a huge portion of its diet.
[00:29:48.880]And then small animals or carrion.
[00:29:52.120]Are ruminants supposed to eat meat?
[00:29:55.690]Typically no,
[00:29:56.523]and when the USDA inspects the zoo, absolutely no,
[00:29:59.750]our ruminants never have access
[00:30:01.740]to any meat products whatsoever.
[00:30:04.890]Definitely not,
[00:30:05.930]and even though our duikers are housed
[00:30:08.010]with meat-eating birds,
[00:30:10.151]they definitely would never eat that, right?
[00:30:14.294]That's what we tell the USDA.
[00:30:15.751](audience laughing)
[00:30:17.520]So what nutrients are going to be different
[00:30:20.460]from a typical ruminant diet?
[00:30:21.700]So what do we need to be thinking about
[00:30:23.080]for the yellow-backed duiker?
[00:30:24.370]They're going to have a higher proportion
[00:30:25.790]of highly-fermentable carbohydrates in their diet
[00:30:27.940]than we would feed to, say, like a sable antelope.
[00:30:32.630]And maybe instead of dried grass hays,
[00:30:35.660]we're going to have more moist forages,
[00:30:37.820]more chopped hays,
[00:30:39.080]and they're definite going to have
[00:30:40.090]a higher protein content in their diet.
[00:30:42.846]So again, this is just a lot of examples
[00:30:45.750]of why you can't ever look at just one thing.
[00:30:48.206]You can't look at just natural history,
[00:30:49.830]you can't look at just gut morphology.
[00:30:53.630]And then, moving on.
[00:30:56.120]There are some other just oddball nutrients of concern.
[00:30:59.150]In reptiles, there's a lot of concern
[00:31:02.030]about having access to basking lights
[00:31:05.290]because some reptile species
[00:31:07.170]can synthesize their own vitamin D,
[00:31:09.240]some cannot.
[00:31:10.500]Some have to have it in the diets,
[00:31:12.090]some have to have access to a UV light,
[00:31:14.510]and there has historically been a lot of issues
[00:31:17.010]in reptiles with metabolic bone disease
[00:31:20.110]because they either don't have one
[00:31:22.010]or the other of those things.
[00:31:24.860]In insectivores,
[00:31:26.077]insectivores in the wild will eat
[00:31:27.590]like hundreds of species of bugs every day.
[00:31:32.150]We don't have access to hundreds of species of bugs.
[00:31:35.050]We primarily have crickets and mealworms,
[00:31:37.230]and crickets have a really wonky calcium phosphorus ratio.
[00:31:41.796]So if we are not actively supplementing those diets,
[00:31:45.650]which we do both by gut-loading the crickets,
[00:31:48.070]so we feed the crickets a calcium-rich diet
[00:31:50.620]in the 24 hours before they are consumed,
[00:31:53.560]so that their gut contents are high in calcium
[00:31:55.540]and we also will dust crickets
[00:31:57.900]with a calcium-rich mineral supplement
[00:32:00.872]in order to balance that ratio.
[00:32:03.040]So we try to feed as much variety as possible in zoos
[00:32:08.380]but we are ultimately limited by the things available to us.
[00:32:12.210]So we have to make sure that any time
[00:32:14.430]that's causing imbalances in the diet,
[00:32:16.230]we're correcting for it with supplementation.
[00:32:18.900]In nocturnal exhibits, so in our dome,
[00:32:21.900]the Kingdom of the Night in the basement,
[00:32:23.990]there is no natural light down there at all.
[00:32:26.740]So all of those species are getting a vitamin D supplement
[00:32:30.790]since they have no UV access.
[00:32:34.650]In piscivores that are eating
[00:32:36.520]exclusively fish in their diets,
[00:32:39.610]most fish, not all,
[00:32:41.730]have an enzyme called thiaminase,
[00:32:43.963]that as soon as the fish dies
[00:32:46.240]starts breaking down thiamine in that fish.
[00:32:49.740]Vitamin E also starts breaking down because,
[00:32:53.540]as an antioxidant,
[00:32:54.670]the high fat content in fish usually starts oxidizing
[00:32:59.590]and requires a higher vitamin E content
[00:33:02.960]so in piscivores we are having to make sure
[00:33:05.570]that we are actively supplementing vitamin E and thiamine.
[00:33:09.170]And luckily there's some really great companies
[00:33:11.240]that make supplements for zoos
[00:33:12.620]that have done a lot of research
[00:33:14.230]and do a lot of that thinking for you,
[00:33:16.180]and so we have a fish-eating mammal vitamin supplement
[00:33:21.263]that is a multivitamin
[00:33:22.690]but definitely includes a lot of that.
[00:33:26.260]And then in soft-billed birds we already talked about
[00:33:28.514]Indian and black rhinos with iron,
[00:33:31.320]but soft-billed birds also,
[00:33:33.560]they primarily will eat fruits in the wild
[00:33:37.390]and if they are on a pelleted diet in captivity
[00:33:39.860]that has too much iron,
[00:33:41.570]they, like the rhinos, can also have iron overload issues.
[00:33:48.770]So we're having to make sure that we're feeding
[00:33:51.070]specific diets for soft-billed birds
[00:33:53.110]not for insectivores or other things.
[00:33:57.298]So we talked about in the nutrition lab,
[00:33:59.160]we do our quality control analyses.
[00:34:01.010]We do a lot of diet formulation
[00:34:02.830]and I gave you a lot of different examples of that.
[00:34:05.240]We also try to contribute to the body of research
[00:34:08.460]that helps us better understand
[00:34:09.810]the specific nutrient requirements of these exotic species.
[00:34:13.696]So some of the projects that we've worked on recently,
[00:34:18.010]we've done quite a few things
[00:34:19.300]looking at diet effects on behavior.
[00:34:22.819]In our great apes,
[00:34:24.640]we have one gorilla and one orangutan
[00:34:26.890]that exhibit regurgitation and reingestion behavior,
[00:34:31.150]where they will just sit in a corner
[00:34:32.670]and they will vomit and just, just,
[00:34:35.300]it's really, really gross,
[00:34:36.710]especially doing observations on that
[00:34:38.960]to count how many times they're doing it
[00:34:41.420]and how much time they're doing it.
[00:34:43.217]And the orangutan is especially a jerk
[00:34:45.640]and if you're not behind glass,
[00:34:47.190]she'll spit little bits at you.
[00:34:50.880]So we want to look at, some zoos said,
[00:34:52.940]okay, we started feeding a biscuit-free diet,
[00:34:57.006]or we started feeding a low-starch diet,
[00:34:58.760]or we started feeding a fruit-free diet
[00:35:00.247]and that totally eliminated the behavior,
[00:35:02.610]you never have to worry about it again.
[00:35:05.051]And you say, okay great,
[00:35:05.920]do you have any information
[00:35:07.220]about rates before and rates after?
[00:35:08.970]And they said no, no, our keepers just know.
[00:35:11.650]They know that it helps. (laughs)
[00:35:14.250]So we said, okay, we're going to try it.
[00:35:16.880]But we're going to actually monitor
[00:35:18.420]how much time are they spending
[00:35:19.530]on this behavior before and after.
[00:35:21.770]And we switched to a low-starch,
[00:35:24.590]low-fruit, biscuit-free diet for our gorillas,
[00:35:29.250]and the incidence of the behavior tripled.
[00:35:32.160]So, (laughs) that may or may not
[00:35:34.230]have been tied to a volume issue,
[00:35:36.380]we thought we did an isocaloric switch,
[00:35:39.400]but maybe we just had not gotten
[00:35:41.100]the volume increased enough.
[00:35:44.090]So we did increase the volume again later,
[00:35:46.810]the behavior was definitely still happening,
[00:35:49.350]and so what happened two summers ago,
[00:35:52.430]another zoo had said,
[00:35:53.870]oh if you feed browse every day,
[00:35:55.350]it totally eliminates the behavior,
[00:35:56.740]you never have to worry about it again.
[00:35:58.460]Do you have any information?
[00:35:59.730]No, okay, we'll try it anyway.
[00:36:02.340]So we started feeding browse every day and monitored,
[00:36:07.300]and it seems to have a beneficial effect for our gorilla
[00:36:10.630]but really had no effect for the orangutan.
[00:36:14.610]And so this past summer, we did that again,
[00:36:17.016]just to make sure that it wasn't a fluke the first time,
[00:36:20.570]and we also looked at what the amount of browse,
[00:36:24.170]if there's an effect of the amount of browse offered.
[00:36:26.120]So we had a low browse, and a high browse,
[00:36:29.150]and then we took out a bunch of greens in the diet
[00:36:32.550]and replaced that with browse,
[00:36:34.240]to see is it just increase in the volume of the diet.
[00:36:36.580]Is there something specific about browse
[00:36:39.080]and I have not had time to look at those numbers yet,
[00:36:42.260]but anecdotally I can tell you
[00:36:44.870]that it again seems to have a beneficial effect
[00:36:47.960]for the gorilla and again,
[00:36:48.950]it seems to have basically no effect for the orangutan.
[00:36:53.050]But I cannot tell you that numerically yet.
[00:36:55.760]So that's one of the big examples
[00:36:57.970]where diet can have a huge effect on behavior.
[00:37:01.570]We also had a grad student in the lab
[00:37:04.180]looking at the effect that vitamin E in the diet
[00:37:06.610]would have on cognitive function.
[00:37:08.440]She was using rats as a model species,
[00:37:11.290]looking at performance in a maze.
[00:37:14.740]She would have to present those results for you.
[00:37:18.130]And then we also have looked at the effect
[00:37:20.510]of offering a novel food item on activity levels.
[00:37:23.480]So we've got some donated pig skulls
[00:37:26.190]and we put them in with some of our big cats
[00:37:28.650]and we monitored activity levels before,
[00:37:32.210]while they had access to the pig head,
[00:37:34.260]and then a week later, and interestingly,
[00:37:37.660]activity levels were increased
[00:37:39.680]when they had access to the novel item,
[00:37:41.700]and also afterwards,
[00:37:43.600]so that increase in activity was sustained.
[00:37:47.490]We've also looked at, or starting to look at
[00:37:50.670]the effect that a hyperphagic diet would have
[00:37:53.290]on our sloth bear behavior.
[00:37:55.120]So we have a male sloth bear and a female sloth bear
[00:37:57.860]and we can't put them together right now
[00:37:59.530]because the male sloth bear is kind of a jerk.
[00:38:03.600]So one of the suggestions that was put forth
[00:38:06.100]is they're not, they don't have seasonal diets
[00:38:10.530]in the wild like black bears have a very seasonal diet,
[00:38:13.080]they exhibit hyperphagia in the fall,
[00:38:15.150]they put on a lot of weight,
[00:38:16.380]and then they crash diet because they hibernate.
[00:38:19.640]Sloth bears don't do this,
[00:38:21.300]but maybe because they're not used to the cold,
[00:38:24.780]they are still trying to pack on some pounds
[00:38:27.300]before we go into winter.
[00:38:28.980]So if we increased their diet and allowed them
[00:38:32.160]to put on a lot of weight going into winter,
[00:38:34.700]will that have an effect on the incidence
[00:38:36.870]of aggressive or stereotypic behaviors in that animal?
[00:38:40.000]And that is ongoing,
[00:38:40.950]so I also can't tell you what the results of that are,
[00:38:44.708]but it's good to actually monitor these things
[00:38:48.760]because again, some other zoos have tried this
[00:38:50.700]and they've said yeah it worked,
[00:38:52.040]but also we still don't house
[00:38:53.260]our sloth bears together anymore
[00:38:54.660]because they don't get along.
[00:38:57.330]So it's hard to tell if that does work, great,
[00:39:01.240]and we can establish that it does,
[00:39:03.190]but if it doesn't, we need to know that
[00:39:05.310]we need to work on trying something else.
[00:39:08.310]Some other recent projects,
[00:39:09.550]we had a high school student actually,
[00:39:12.380]kind of coordinating efforts
[00:39:13.760]looking at how to supplement vitamin D in sea turtles.
[00:39:18.850]So our vets had been taking regular blood draws
[00:39:22.510]on these animals because they had established
[00:39:25.310]a serum vitamin D level of zero,
[00:39:28.890]which was a concern,
[00:39:30.530]so we started an oral supplement,
[00:39:32.730]it did seem to increase that a little bit,
[00:39:35.220]and then the Zoo Academy,
[00:39:36.750]that we have a high school program at the zoo,
[00:39:39.390]her project was looking at whether access to a UV light
[00:39:44.020]would also increase that above and beyond
[00:39:46.330]what the oral supplement was able to do.
[00:39:48.440]We also do a lot of palatability studies
[00:39:50.420]because as I said,
[00:39:51.253]you can formulate the perfect diet
[00:39:52.690]but if the animals won't eat it,
[00:39:54.200]it's not worth it.
[00:39:55.490]One of the things with our browse program,
[00:39:57.210]since we live in Nebraska
[00:39:58.570]and we do not have regular access to browse in the winter,
[00:40:02.580]we're working on preservation methods.
[00:40:04.550]So we freeze some,
[00:40:05.820]but we are limited by our freezer space,
[00:40:08.420]so we're working a lot on browse silage,
[00:40:11.930]which is interesting and challenging
[00:40:13.670]and very time-consuming,
[00:40:15.340]so we want to make sure that before we dedicate
[00:40:17.170]a lot of time and resources to that,
[00:40:19.650]that the animals are actually going to eat it.
[00:40:22.260]So that's where palatability studies come in.
[00:40:24.950]Just literally comparing will they won't they,
[00:40:27.210]or do they eat that better or worse than the frozen browse.
[00:40:31.610]Another project, oop, ooh, that's fun.
[00:40:37.160]There we go.
[00:40:38.360]So another thing that we've been working on,
[00:40:40.570]one of our Zoo Academy students last year
[00:40:43.290]had the pleasure of sorting through
[00:40:45.770]all of the rabbit remains after cheetahs had eaten them.
[00:40:49.680]So we want to feed more whole prey to our animals
[00:40:53.000]because there is a formulated ground meat product
[00:40:57.130]that will meet all of their nutrient requirements
[00:40:59.200]but as we mentioned,
[00:41:00.610]behavioral needs are different,
[00:41:02.820]so we want to feed more whole prey
[00:41:04.800]so that the animals are spending more time
[00:41:07.070]exhibiting those natural feeding behaviors,
[00:41:09.120]manipulating their food, tearing at it.
[00:41:11.760]There's also some thought
[00:41:12.900]that the non-digestible portions of whole prey,
[00:41:15.414]we are calling animal fiber.
[00:41:18.405]It is not chemically a fiber
[00:41:20.500]but the non-digestible portions
[00:41:22.670]behave sort of like fiber in a carnivore's digestive tract.
[00:41:26.410]There's a little bit of fermentation that happens.
[00:41:29.640]So we want to feed more of that
[00:41:31.110]but it is not a homogenous feed source.
[00:41:33.380]So if we say the nutrient content
[00:41:35.700]of a whole rabbit carcass is this,
[00:41:37.780]so we fed that to the cheetah
[00:41:39.280]and that's what they're getting,
[00:41:40.750]that may not actually be accurate
[00:41:42.110]because they're not necessarily eating the whole thing.
[00:41:44.140]So this person got to sift through those remains,
[00:41:48.330]blenderize a lot of bunnies,
[00:41:51.680]and so we're trying to get a better handle
[00:41:53.700]on what is the actual nutrient intake from whole prey?
[00:41:56.810]What portions are they eating?
[00:41:58.480]What portions are they not eating?
[00:41:59.950]What is the nutrient intake
[00:42:00.930]for what they're actually eating?
[00:42:03.120]And then this year we have some other students
[00:42:05.220]who are expanding that to looking
[00:42:06.920]at different prey sources and different predators
[00:42:11.000]to sort of narrow that down a bit more too.
[00:42:14.510]Another thing that our grad student
[00:42:16.790]had worked on in the past couple of years
[00:42:18.450]is looking at the diet effect
[00:42:21.090]on biomarkers of oxidative stress,
[00:42:23.370]so she was looking at oh in a variety of species
[00:42:27.780]that vitamin E with rats was part of it.
[00:42:30.510]She was also looking at oxidative stress
[00:42:32.440]and how that was tied to cognitive function.
[00:42:34.740]There was also a joint project
[00:42:36.270]that we did with our reproductive physiology department
[00:42:39.500]looking at how fatty acids and minerals in the diet
[00:42:44.140]might affect biomarkers of oxidative stress
[00:42:46.830]as well as sperm morphology in snow leopards.
[00:42:51.220]We are struggling to get them to reproduce in captivity,
[00:42:53.610]so is there an effect that the diet is having on that.
[00:43:00.480]And then some upcoming projects.
[00:43:02.460]We're going to be looking at alternate fiber sources,
[00:43:04.930]where they're more insoluble or soluble,
[00:43:07.300]or blended fibers are better in certain species of cats.
[00:43:12.840]There's a really interesting project,
[00:43:15.040]small-clawed otters in zoos are prone
[00:43:18.320]to developing calcium oxalate stones.
[00:43:21.700]No one can really pin down why,
[00:43:23.110]we can't really pin down
[00:43:24.060]if that's common in wild animals as well
[00:43:26.080]or if that's here,
[00:43:27.550]so we were going to be trying to measure Oxalobacter,
[00:43:31.197]the bacteria that digests those oxalate stones
[00:43:34.380]in the feces of small-clawed otters,
[00:43:37.544]if it's present, if it's not,
[00:43:38.470]if there's maybe a way to add it as a probiotic.
[00:43:44.150]But that's been on the docket for several years
[00:43:46.477]and we just haven't quite gotten it done.
[00:43:48.330]And then we've recently noticed
[00:43:51.120]that it seems like some of our raw meat diets
[00:43:53.342]may be deficient in vitamin A.
[00:43:56.840]We've seen a couple clinical cases
[00:43:58.940]in zoos across the country but not a lot.
[00:44:03.340]So we want to look at how storage or freezing
[00:44:07.360]or freeze-thaw cycles might affect
[00:44:08.970]the vitamin A content in that
[00:44:11.630]and see if we are indeed
[00:44:14.330]seeing deficiencies in the meat in all zoos,
[00:44:17.220]if it's just how some zoos are storing things,
[00:44:20.036]or maybe it's just lab error.
[00:44:22.700]We've gotten some really inconsistent results
[00:44:25.110]from certain labs where one lab will test high,
[00:44:28.060]one lab will test low.
[00:44:30.520]Yeah, and then we have so many different species
[00:44:32.947]and so many different potential projects.
[00:44:34.830]Anyone who's interested in anything,
[00:44:36.410]I'm certain could find a project
[00:44:38.590]that interests them at the zoo.
[00:44:40.910]So that was my long and rambling summary.
[00:44:44.000]Does anyone have any questions?
[00:44:50.397]I have a couple questions.
[00:44:51.555]Sure.
[00:44:52.388]When you run these trials
[00:44:53.790]and do this work,
[00:44:56.090]are there avenues for you to publish the results,
[00:44:59.440]present them?
[00:45:00.273]Tell us a little bit about the professional side of that.
[00:45:02.430]Yeah, so there are conferences that are specific to zoos.
[00:45:08.187]We can also to animal sciences conference to present
[00:45:12.960]results of research there.
[00:45:16.070]I mean, we've published in journals
[00:45:17.380]just like anyone else.
[00:45:20.280]So there are a lot of different avenues for that.
[00:45:23.170]The NAG, like I said, has a conference every other year
[00:45:27.420]where we can present research.
[00:45:29.720]The Comparative Nutrition Society
[00:45:31.900]is in the off years of NAG,
[00:45:34.681]so those are primarily the things that I go to.
[00:45:38.730]But there are also AZA conferences,
[00:45:41.697]and since we deal with so many different species
[00:45:44.720]like any of the domestic research that's happening
[00:45:48.600]in domestic or even human species
[00:45:51.567]those would be too.
[00:45:55.640]I noticed there's a lot
[00:45:56.550]of students here.
[00:45:57.620]Can you talk a little bit about how you set up
[00:45:59.630]research programs with university staff and students?
[00:46:04.100]Sure, so we accept a lot of interns
[00:46:07.310]in the nutrition department
[00:46:08.410]and really all across the zoo.
[00:46:11.210]Reproductive physiology and genetics
[00:46:12.890]also takes some interns
[00:46:14.840]as well as all the animal departments.
[00:46:17.497]I think even our education department has internships.
[00:46:21.270]So an internship is a good place to start.
[00:46:24.860]We've also done some collaborative research projects
[00:46:28.087]and that really just involves reaching out,
[00:46:31.590]thinking what you're interested in.
[00:46:33.320]Depending on the project, a lot of what we do
[00:46:36.230]is research that does not manipulate or change
[00:46:40.090]the diet in any way.
[00:46:42.130]If there is going to be manipulation of the diet
[00:46:45.100]or the conditions for the animals
[00:46:46.470]or if we need to take, say, blood samples,
[00:46:49.769]we have an IACUC board that approves
[00:46:52.780]any research that happens so there's some oversight
[00:46:55.700]from both veterinarians and people in the community.
[00:47:00.757]But yeah, absolutely we can walk
[00:47:02.500]people though the IACUC process.
[00:47:08.730]Yeah?
[00:47:09.563]What does the SSP coordinator
[00:47:10.950]role entail?
[00:47:12.998]Like how are you elected or like...
[00:47:15.310]Sure, so for me, it was saying hey,
[00:47:18.180]there's not currently a nutrition advisor
[00:47:20.100]for the serval SSP,
[00:47:21.550]hey, NAG, I would like to be the nutrition advisor
[00:47:24.253]for the serval SSP.
[00:47:25.910]Here are my qualifications.
[00:47:27.270]This is why I can do this.
[00:47:29.110]And they said, okay great.
[00:47:30.560]And then the felid TAG put out a statement
[00:47:35.060]to everyone that said okay,
[00:47:36.680]we actually have a nutrition advisor now,
[00:47:38.370]ask her if you have questions.
[00:47:40.414]And there were a whole bunch of questions up front
[00:47:42.080]and then none since then.
[00:47:44.260]So honestly it involves, for that particular thing,
[00:47:48.860]relatively little for me.
[00:47:50.620]Now nutrition advisors to the TAGs,
[00:47:53.000]that's a lot more involved role.
[00:47:55.600]Certain SSPs I think are more active than others.
[00:47:59.160]So it varies a lot.
[00:48:01.950]Some of the TAG nutrition advisors would be involved
[00:48:04.560]in helping publish the nutrition chapters
[00:48:06.510]for those animal care manuals.
[00:48:13.370]Yeah?
[00:48:14.203]So I suspect the AZA is very important
[00:48:18.433]in communicating analysis to (coughing drowns out speech)
[00:48:22.430]member zoos but what about the other way?
[00:48:24.830]Communicating needs and
[00:48:26.200]questions? Oh, hmm,
[00:48:28.233]that's a great question.
[00:48:29.340]I think a lot of that's,
[00:48:31.971]you mean like needs of individual zoos,
[00:48:34.750]like we need information about--
[00:48:36.980]This species.
[00:48:37.930]Sure.
[00:48:40.000]All of the contact information for the advisors
[00:48:43.660]for the TAG AZA SSPs are published
[00:48:47.050]in a place where zoos have access to it,
[00:48:48.810]so my email address is public
[00:48:50.812]so anyone can find that information
[00:48:53.760]and reach out to me and ask questions.
[00:48:56.140]So I think there's a fair amount of back and forth,
[00:48:59.260]it's just incumbent on those individuals
[00:49:02.930]who choose to reach out and ask for information.
[00:49:05.240]There are also some listservs for keepers,
[00:49:08.129]for curators, for directors,
[00:49:09.728]for research, for veterinarians.
[00:49:13.259]Information is definitely distributed that way as well.
[00:49:21.590]Other questions for Kelley?
[00:49:27.952]Yeah?
[00:49:29.090]You talked a lot
[00:49:29.923]about comparative anatomy,
[00:49:30.910]but what about comparative physiology?
[00:49:34.180]For example, if you looked at the pancreas of an animal
[00:49:36.707]and it was devoid of lactase, for example,
[00:49:40.030]then you would know that it's probably
[00:49:41.560]not going to tolerate
[00:49:42.640]the-- Sure.
[00:49:46.861]I think there's probably been less research done in that.
[00:49:52.012]Especially we can't, very hard to take the tissue samples,
[00:49:58.250]so if you wanted say a biopsy of a liver or pancreas,
[00:50:03.690]we're very hesitant to sedate any of our animals
[00:50:07.390]unless it's absolutely necessary
[00:50:08.880]because there's a lot of risk involved with that.
[00:50:11.420]Even in humans, and we've been doing it in humans
[00:50:13.530]for a really long time.
[00:50:15.260]In some of these exotic species,
[00:50:17.440]dosing is really challenging and some of you may have heard
[00:50:19.880]we actually lost one of our African elephants
[00:50:21.925]because of that.
[00:50:23.550]He was sedated one month, everything went fine.
[00:50:25.700]He was sedated two months later
[00:50:27.320]and didn't wake up.
[00:50:28.730]So anything that would require sedation
[00:50:32.540]is probably research that's just not going to happen.
[00:50:35.290]So some of what we do is really opportunistic.
[00:50:38.110]If an animal has to be euthanized for any reason,
[00:50:41.360]we can collect a lot of tissue samples then.
[00:50:45.290]But (coughing drowns out speech) research
[00:50:47.600]is very hard in zoos.
[00:50:51.080]Yeah, sample size is not great.
[00:50:55.400]Yeah?
[00:50:56.233]Do you ever get to travel
[00:50:58.290]to the exotic places where the animals were originally from?
[00:51:04.033]I don't.
[00:51:05.938]I think if I came up with a project that would take me there
[00:51:08.850]and found a grant that would pay for it, I could,
[00:51:12.780]but most of my time is spent with the day to day
[00:51:16.680]managing the diets for the animals
[00:51:18.250]and I don't honestly have a whole lot of extra time
[00:51:20.772]to do something like that
[00:51:22.710]because our staff is so small,
[00:51:24.750]if I were to just take off for several months
[00:51:27.460]that would be a struggle for everyone.
[00:51:30.516]But I know that there are definitely places that do that.
[00:51:34.860]There are some nutrition researchers in the field.
[00:51:39.240]So it's just a question of funding and time.
[00:51:47.790]Other questions?
[00:51:51.617]If not, let's thank Kelly.
[00:51:53.381](audience applauding)

Kelly Kappen

Description

Searchable Transcript

Comments

Related Channels

Kelly Kappen

Description

Searchable Transcript

Comments icon comment

Related Channels

Comments