Working with the animals Q What jobs did you do before working at a zoo?
I went straight from school to work at London Zoo. This was my first job. I worked at London Zoo for about six years and then went and worked at a bird park called Bird World as the head keeper and head of handrearing the rare birds. It was a very cool job and I hand reared a lot of penguins while I was there. Then I worked with marine animals and was the curator at the Gweek marine animal rescue centre in Cornwall, in the United Kingdom. When I moved to New Zealand, I got a job at Hamilton Zoo. I stopped being a zookeeper eventually, as it was really hard raising three children and being a zookeeper. It is not a parttime job. I hope to go back to working in animal conservation in the future.
Q Why did you choose the job?
I was mad about animals. I wanted to be a vet, but didn’t finish school. Many years later, I managed to get a place in vet school in Scotland, but couldn’t raise the money to pay the fees as I had already done a degree by this time. As a child, I lived in London and the zoo was very close to where I lived so I went there a lot. My poor mum. I came home with all sorts of weird and wonderful animals that I was given to look after, including two pythons, a red kneed tarantula, an iguana and a kestrel; along with the dog I adopted.
Q How did you get into it and when?
I used to volunteer at London Zoo on the weekends from about age 15. After a while I spent more time at the zoo than at school. My teacher spotted me working there one day when I was supposed to be at school, so I ended up leaving school and working as a volunteer. My first volunteer job was looking after the baby chimps. I had to play with them: dream come true. My first paid job was in the zoo veterinary hospital for six months helping out while someone was on maternity leave. From there I applied for jobs as a zookeeper. I didn’t have any qualifications, so it was quite hard. Sometimes I would end up training a person who had been given the job I applied for but didn’t get. Often they were straight from university and had no idea what the job would be like or how hard it would be. In the end, perseverance and hard work paid off.
Q What qualifications and training do you need?
At least a certificate in zoo animal management and some practical experience. I studied zoo animal management while at London Zoo. They had their own training programme. I didn’t have a degree when I started out, but took three years off at age 28 and went to university to study environmental sciences and did animal behaviour as part of it. I graduated with a firstclass honours degree which was a huge thing for me as I didn’t finish school (I had to complete a university entrance course to get in). These days, ideally you need a degree in zoology or similar, or to do animal care with vocational training.
Q What personal skills do you need?
You need to be caring, organised, practical, calm and a team player. Zookeepers need to be really practical and hard working. They need to be able to really care for the animals and be able to communicate clearly with visitors as public talks are often part of the job.
Q Any physical requirements?
You need to be fit and strong and happy to work in all kinds of weather. Working at Hamilton Zoo, I remember days when it rained so much that even heavy duty waterproofs didn’t stop you from being soaked to the skin.
Q What do you do on a daily basis?
Pick up a lot of poo. Prepare feed for the animals.
Q What is the most challenging aspect?
When I started in the zoo industry there weren’t a lot of women, so we all had to prove that we could do all the physical work. These days there are lots of women zookeepers.
Q What is the most interesting assignment you have had?
I went to Cephalonia to monitor turtles nesting and hatching on the beaches; I took a sea lion from England to France (I drove her there in a truck and stayed in France while she settled into her new zoo); I went to
America to do an internship in the marine animal rescue centre in
San Francisco; I trained a young sea lion; I took cheetahs for exercise runs getting them to run behind a four wheeler (they were so fast they used to jump up on to the four wheeler); and I handreared an eagle and he lived at my house until he was big enough to live at the zoo.
Q What changes have there been in the industry?
There are lots more female zookeepers in all areas.
Q What are the highs of the job?
Hanging out with the animals, driving around on a tractor as the sun comes up, chucking out hay and having penguins sit on my lap.
Q What are the lows of the job?
There is just so much poo to pick up (ask any zookeeper about the poo), working in all kinds of weather and animals being moved to other zoos (it’s really hard not to get attached), and for me, juggling being a fulltime zookeeper and managing family life once I had children as both are very demanding.
Q Where will you be in 10 years?
Hopefully, working in animal conservation.