…you sleep. Henry does it better than most.Read more
It’s the Little Things
Our Jersey steer, Max, is a picky eater. Unlike most bovine, which will eat anything you hand them, Max really only eats his hay and steer chow (breakfast cereal for cattle). Keepers Kent and Jill and I have been working extra hard since last summer to sneak extra pieces of training foods into his giant mouth, just to get him to try something new. For training reasons, it’s a good idea for Max to learn to eat foods that are moreRead more
Sheep Update
Since the arrival of our 4 alpacas, we’ve had many people inquire about our sheep. A member of our farrier‘s family (the man who comes out to trim Lightning’s hooves) was very excited to provide the retirement home for our old ladies. They now live about an hour from Durham on a few acres of grass with a roomy stall they can access at any time. Their only jobs are to mow the lawn and to look pretty. Our farrier,Read more
Trimming Duck’s Wings
Have you ever wandered into the farmyard and asked yourself, “Why doesn’t the duck simply fly away?” There are three answers: He does, sometimes. As you can see here in an older post. He seasonally has wing feathers trimmed to help keep him down on the ground. At nearly 11 pounds, he’s a little bit too chubby to really get off the ground. In the early spring and fall, Ducky molts (loses) his old feathers and grows a niceRead more
Concurrent Accession
“Accession” is a word the zoological world uses to mean, “adding to.” It’s the term applied to newly acquired individuals to a museum/zoo/aquarium’s collection. We don’t have a large turnover in our collection at the museum. Every year we lose some animals due to old age, health problems, or transfers to other institutions and we gain a couple, but our collection stays at about the same number. Because we don’t take in new animals very often, I found it interestingRead more