• August 01, 2023

1. What is the name of your profession (position)? My position is called "Animal Care Worker" (in other words, "keeper" from the English "keeper") of the "Big Predators" sector of the city zoo. 2. What is your job and what are your responsibilities? My daily duties include: taking care of the animals (feeding, cleaning and decorating the exposition enclosures), carrying out activities to enrich the environment (i.e. placing new objects in the enclosure or changing the location of old ones (logs, stones), which forces the animal to re-learn "new" territory; the use of special toys, studying which the animal can realize its natural instincts, for example, "hunt" (search, ambush, ruffle "prey" in the teeth, soak it in water, tear it apart) and training (animals must be able to follow the simplest commands, for example, go from the enclosure to the inner cage), keep diaries of animal observations, work with visitors (educational activity). patience, poise, love for animals, attentiveness 4. Describe your working day.The working day starts at 8 am. First of all, my partner and I (working alone is prohibited by safety regulations) make a round of all the animals in the sector. With the help of an external examination, we assess their condition, the presence of each in their cage (it sounds ridiculous, but imagine your horror when it turns out that the tiger has disappeared from the enclosure :-)), and, of course, we talk with them (to maintain human contact -animal). The next 3-4 hours is the cleaning of all cages and enclosures. During this period, animal feed is brought - we check the weight, the availability of all portions, and prepare them for feeding. Feeding takes place during the day according to a specific schedule. From 13 to 14 lunch like office workers After lunch, work is different. We can load land for a new enclosure, clean pools, remove fallen trees, build a fence, and carry out disinfection. If we have free time, we make toys for animals, enrich the environment, and work with visitors. At 18 - cleaning office premises and filling in the diary of observations for the day. It contains data for each animal (health status, behavior, etc.), information about food, treatment (if any), key moments of the working day. Before leaving the shift, all cages are inspected, the presence of animals in them, as well as the integrity of locks and doors, is checked. Work ends at 20, if there are no force majeure circumstances (birth of offspring, death of an animal, arrival of a new animal, etc.). 5. How comfortable are your working conditions (all day outside, or in the office with a cup of coffee)? Almost the whole day on my feet and in the fresh air. I spend a couple of hours a day in a change house (to fill in a diary of observations, for example). Within dAll employees have short breaks (not counting lunch) and you can drink tea and relax. 6. What do you like most about your job? A wonderful feeling arises when the animal begins to recognize you, makes contact. I like to invent and make toys, and then see that the efforts spent on their production pay off with interest and the animal plays with enthusiasm. I like to just observe the behavior of animals (during the game, sleep, bathing, territory development). I like that the presence of overalls allows you to freely behave in any working conditions: hide in the thickets to observe animals, climb a tree to tie a toy, stomp through the puddles of the pool, collecting leaves, and get a lot of pleasure from it. snow, summer rain, how plants bloom. I like to feel at work like on an island that lives by its own rules and is far from the city that begins right behind the fence. Often, while working, I feel such a fullness of life... 7. What do you dislike most about your job? I don't like it when people who work here use the resources of the zoo and animals for personal profit (paying for donkey rides, photographs with birds, selling “unrecorded” animals, saving on food purchases, etc.). Animals are always the worst. I do not like that the main goal of the zoo is to attract more visitors and increase profits, respectively, and the interests of animals are put in last place. For example, for zoo workers, the priority is perfectly “licked” enclosures, and this takes a lot of time (visitors must see cleanliness). Although it would be more important for an animal to maintain normal mental and physical health every day to receive new elements of environmental enrichment. But after all, time is needed to manufacture such elements, to conduct observations of behavior. As a result, if there is enough time, we bring at least some variety to the lives of the wards, if not, lie down and miss yourself in a perfectly cleaned enclosure. Due to the orientation towards visitors, even the adaptation of the animal cannot be calmly carried out, for example, the lynx was just brought from another zoo, the animal is stressed, it does not leave the corner of the cage, refuses to eat, and we need to show that the lynx happily walks in the new enclosure under the eyes crowds of visitors and surrounded by cameras and cameras. I also don’t like the fact that zoo visitors behave like consumers - yelling, scaring animals, knocking on the bars and glass of cages, throwing garbage into enclosures. I understand that it is interesting to see an animal in motion, but imagine how many such people see this same animal in a day and everyone wants to stir it up and force it to move. Most visitors do not come to appreciate the beauty, unusualness of animals, to delve into their way of life, but simply to take pictures against the background of the cage (from the series “I was here”), sometimes without even bothering to read the name of the animal itself. It comes to the ridiculous, for example, the aviaries have a lionmothers are told to children that they see real tigers... 8. If it's not a secret, what is your salary level? The salary is low, as in almost everywhere at state-owned enterprises, a little more than the subsistence level. There is a small allowance for dangerous and harmful work. 9. Describe your team, what kind of people work with you? Employees of two categories work: fans of their work (fortunately, most of them) and those who make their personal business out of this work. Yes, there are also just those who are not taken anywhere else, so they work in the zoo (in fact, such people do not care what to do), but there are relatively few of them. 10. What human qualities do you think are most important in your business? Love to the animals! And love is not because the animal recognizes you, allows you to stroke, etc., but because it gives pleasure to a person to take care, admire, worry about a living being. Balance is also important. Animals feel this perfectly and reflect the mood of the person caring for them. Patience is one of the main qualities. In the animal world, everything happens rather slowly, it takes time for the animal to be convinced that nothing threatens its safety, that a person can be trusted, not be afraid to come close, to enter the cage. You need to be able to win the trust of the animal. And the task is complicated by the fact that it is not identical to communicating with a dog or a cat, which have long been accustomed to humans. Imagine how you will win the trust of a wild animal that walks around in its enclosure, does not want to know you and genetically it does not have trust in people? And if this animal was caught in the wild? 11. Work gives me additional opportunities (everything that work gives you except money, from self-expression and communication with interesting people to the opportunity to visit different countries). My work allows me to: develop such skills as poise, patience, observation (you become more attentive to ordinary life around you), the ability to find an approach to both animals and people; get new information (learn more about nature and animals in it); provides an opportunity to apply creativity in the design and manufacture of toys for animals, as well as to improve the quality and diversity of life of animals in captivity. 12. Do you have the opportunity to evaluate your work on a five-point scale, what grade would you give? Rated "excellent"! In my work, I always try to put myself in the place of an animal, to understand what exactly it needs, what can scare, to understand the reasons for its behavior. Based on this, I try to work in such a way that the animal experiences unnecessary stress as little as possible. 13. Why did you choose this job? I wanted to radically change the working conditions (before I always worked in the office). And also to test myself for strength - I can stand it or not. After all, work in a zoo is also hard physical labor, the need to put up with the ossified system of life of the zoo, with the fact that animals are not always created acceptable living conditions.nia, etc. At first, I was surprised that many people have been working here for 20 or more years and continue to work with enthusiasm! Now I understand them perfectly. You become attached to animals, to nature, to this lifestyle. 14. What are the opportunities for your career development? If I get an education that is close to my work, for example, a veterinarian or ecologist, this will give me the opportunity to take the position of livestock specialist, leading livestock specialist or (with sufficient work experience) head of the sector. Then my job will consist in organizing the work of workers, preparing diets for animals, etc., I will also be able to take part in the scientific work of the zoo. 15. What do you think we did not include in the plan and what else would you like to share with us? I would include a paragraph about what kind of future a person sees for himself in his profession, what else is interesting to him. Perhaps, mastering a new direction, obtaining additional education in a specialty, participating in exhibitions, teaching other people in their profession, etc. 0