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When developing an enrichment program, one of the hardest tasks is creating the amount and variety of enrichment devices. To improve the behavioural welfare of the animal, you need to create a particular choice, change and complexity. In my zoo experience, I see many people struggling to think of new enrichment ideas and create new…
Every wild animal has to make the optimal decision when foraging. The best foraging strategy is the balance between energy cost and energy gain within the limitations of the animal and the surrounding, or in other words, the decision that maximises the currency under the constraints of the environment. The decision on foraging strategy is critical…
Training an animal is one thing but building an actual training program with a specific system is another. There are many details we have to think about to make a program work within a zoological facility. A program doesn’t start with the animals but with the zoo itself. A well organised management team with modern…
Animal enrichment is known as a primary and essential husbandry practice nowadays. It means that enrichment is provided more regularly and is more goal-based then before to stimulate species-specific behaviours and mental activities. To achieve these goals, you have to create a particular choice, change and complexity in the environment for the animals in your…
Technology is utilized in daily life more and more. Technology is almost everywhere. Similarly, zoos are using technology progressively in their institutions as well. You can see it in educational efforts, using auditory and visual signs to educate the visitors. Your tickets for the zoo are now bought online. Zoos often have a mobile app…
Internet of Things (IoT) is making a huge step and is more and more easy to use for everyday cases. It has explosively grown where devices are connected and controlled by the internet. With the come of affordable (actually pretty cheap) mini-computers, like Raspberry Pi and Arduino, the power of computing and digital making has…
We all want the best for the animals in our care. To make the environment more challenging, more complex and more stimulating to perform certain behaviours, we use environmental enrichment to achieve these aims. Sometimes, when you use a particular enrichment item to stimulate a specific response, the enrichment will not immediately be used. Does…
Often animals are hand-fed, without any form of enrichment or effort to obtain their food. I caught myself last time doing the same while feeding the otters. So the next day I used the food, normally chopped fish but this time as a whole, and inserted it in a sandwich feed board. The otters, normally done…
When you walk alongside the animals you take care of, there are always things you see or want to remind yourself for. Some strange behaviour you observe, an enrichment item that just popped up in your head, something you want to repair or want to do. It is not always easy to remember all the…
Environmental enrichment can be defined as “The provision of stimuli which promote the expression of species-appropriate behavioural and mental activities in an understimulating environment”. In an ideal world, all animals in captivity would be provided with environments that were maximally favourable to their (behavioural) welfare. Designs for truly naturalistic-appearing environments combined with responsive environmental designs…
