Stopped by the Great Cats, and Guess What They Were Doing?

Giant Anteater Revealed (more or less)

One of my favorite quotes from my mother is, “You’ve seen aardvarks, right? They don’t look as if they come from the same animal.”

The best part of this is that I have no recollection of the context for this line, or whether in fact there was any context for it. (That’s one of the reasons why I so enjoy conversations with my parents.) –But the point is, it’s true: looking at an anteater, aka an aardvark, you get the impression that the leftovers from several different kinds of animals have been hastily assembled into a large mammal that walks on its knuckles and eats insects. It’s great.

The zoo has only recently (re)opened the giant anteater enclosure for viewing—or at least, I think that’s true; it’s tucked away in a corner past the lemurs, and I’ve grown so used to seeing nothing but construction signs over there that it may have been a while before I noticed the sign up saying “GIANT ANTEATER”, with an arrow leading you to them. I was thrilled, even if the first time I saw one of them it was curled up, asleep, and for the longest time wouldn’t even reveal its aristocratic nose to me or to the women who were doing aerobics against the railing of its enclosure (maybe watching all that exercise had tired it out).

[The anteater sticks its nose out.
I'm not completely sure about which parts
of its anatomy are which beyond the head;
maybe all the hanging fur is its tail?]

I’ve gotten to see the anteaters twice now, once in the company of my partner and a visiting friend, and I look forward to spending a lot more time observing them and obsessively taking pictures of them—sometime when I’m not with people who give me gentle hints like, “Are we moving on yet? It’s really hot.”

We did learn an exciting fact about them, thanks to the placard outside their enclosure: apparently anteaters can run at speeds of 30 mph when they want to. I’m not sure when they’d want to—chasing really fast ants, for example?—but we were all quite impressed.

[Is that why this anteater
has a racing stripe?]

And we did see a really interesting zoo sign, posted on the staff-only gate around the side of the exhibit:


First off, I love the line break in “Radio Giant Anteater/ Keeper”; for a moment you really are convinced that anyone entering has to radio the anteaters to let them know. But also, it’s made me wonder just what the anteaters do when they’re startled, and whether there was an incident that both provided the zookeepers with information on the speed of running anteaters and prompted this warning sign.

Flamingo Friday: I’m Ready for My Close-Up

Actually, there are very few avian Norma Desmonds in the flamingo enclosure, so most of them are neither ready to be photographed nor interested in posing. But I take pictures of them anyway, mwahahaha!

What I like best is capturing their yellow eyes, or the details of their beaks (which are quite something—more on those another Friday).

And every now and then I’ll end up with a shot that later gives me pause: there’s something about the manic glint in this flamingo’s eye that makes me a little uneasy—makes me wonder if this bird has something against William Holden, for example.


It’s never film noir with flamingos, though; maybe film rose?

["I am big. It's the pictures
that got small."]

Not That One, the Otter One

In addition to the zoo’s small-clawed otters, there are also (just as of a few weeks ago) a couple of river otters in a little enclosure behind the Small Mammal House, in the cage where the king vulture used to be (it’s been moved to the next cage over). It’s difficult to get pictures of these guys, what with the fencing around their enclosure, and I’m glad the exhibit space is only temporary, since 1. It seems a little small for the otters and 2. In that confined space, so close to visitors, the smell of their food (or them) is quite strong…it’s sort of an oily fish-going-bad smell, and it kind of offsets the animals’ charm.


It’s a different sort of charm than that of the small-clawed otters in any case; these guys are bigger, with deep-set eyes that give them, to my mind, a somewhat cynical expression. Also, they tend to make explosive “pufffffsssshhh” noises as they snort out air—entertaining but also suggestive of disapproval. I’d say they seem like the darkly skeptical older cousins of the sunny, easily distracted small-clawed otters.


Although I know that the small-clawed otters hail from Asia and the river otters are North American, the latter project a pleasant but slightly glowering Tartar-ish sensibility. To me, that is. I wouldn’t be surprised to stop by one day and find them reading some Dostoyevsky or a biography of Attila the Hun.

[Does this otter secretly think
of me as Prince Myshkin?]

This IS My Happy Morning Face

I always knew that prairie dogs were industrious—about burrowing and eating—and of course I knew that they were cute. But I never knew that they were reluctant early risers until I saw their expressions as they munched away at their pellets (or whatever they’re eating) early one morning. It’s remarkably—perhaps even disquietingly—similar to my own expression when I’m eating breakfast…