Trainer Academy|by trainers for trainers!

Since I was young, I have always dreamed of becoming a marine mammal trainer and in 1988 began by volunteering at a pinniped facility in Milwaukee, WI, which provided shows and interactive programs to the zoo going public. I was fortunate to be hired and began training seals and sea lions just two years later in 1990 and soon became the Senior Trainer. Because the sea lion facility was based in a zoo, the opportunity arose to consult in other areas of the zoo that had training needs and I was able to teach keepers to train a variety of other zoo species operant conditioning techniques to allow simple shifting to complex behaviors in order to cooperate in their own medical care. I quickly became passionate with the ability to teach keepers how to provide the best possible care for their animals which includes shifting animals on/off exhibit or from one enclosure to another as well as to perform medical behaviors from body part presents to advanced behaviors such as blood draws and hand injections.

Protected Contact Training

This was a challenge initially as the training with bonobos, gorillas, orangutans, giraffes and elephant is protected contact and is very different from training a sea lion where they are able to physically interact with you. Protected contact was new to me and it means there was a barrier between you and the animals. It is very exciting to see how the same training techniques can be applied to so many different species and how the training at times needs to be modified depending on the species and of course the institutions’ goals. After 10 years in Milwaukee working with an extremely diverse group of animals and trainers/keepers, I decided it was time to venture out on my own and I started my own training consultation company.
I started my first contract with Como Zoo in St. Paul, MN with the primary purpose of developing their seal/sea lion training and educational programs. Just as in Milwaukee, once the keepers from different departments noticed the positive changes that were made with the pinniped collection they wanted to start training their animals. Soon a zoo wide program was initiated and ultimately developed over several years to include the great apes (orangutans & gorillas), hoof stock (zebra, giraffe, kudu), big cats (cougars, snow leopards, tigers, lions) as well as sloths, porcupines, foxes, wolves, snakes, polar bears and tortoises. I have found the key for a successful program is to develop a trusting relationship with all the keepers I work with. The keepers know their animals best and since I only make site visits, it is imperative the keepers relay they correct information back to me. I then began working with Blank Park Zoo in Des Moines, IA to develop their seal/sea lion educational program as well as a big cat training program.

Paw present snow leopard

After several years of training, the lions perform in educational demonstrations for the public to not only show how we can perform voluntary husbandry behaviors but also to highlight their natural behaviors to show a conservation message. The zoo noted the many benefits that the training provided and the program expanded to the whole zoo collection to include gibbons, otters, hoof stock, red pandas and a red tail hawk. I have also had the great opportunity to provide training seminars and training program evaluations for various zoos throughout the mid west.

I never thought when I was young that I truly would be training all these species of animals…dreams can come true if you work hard and are open to what comes across your path in life. This part of my life I did not expect and I am so grateful to be able to get involved and that is conservation work. My partner Dr. Mike Briggs and I started our own not-for-profit organization to perform carnivore research in Africa. I received a veterinary technician’s certification and license in 2004 and we began field work in Africa where Mike had been doing this work for years. Our organization, the African Predator Conservation Research Organization (APCRO) www.apcro.org, goal is to preserve the various carnivores found on the continent of Africa (lions, hyena, wild dogs, leopards, cheetah and jackals). We are a veterinary based organization looking primarily at disease transmission in novel species, emergence of new disease and the genetic and nutritional factors that may be influencing this problem. Doing conservation work to help preserve carnivores along with working with zoos to provide the best care for the animals allows for very complete feeling of self fulfillment, gratefulness, and humbleness to have the pleasure of fulfilling your personal and spiritual goals while spending your life struggling along with others who have the same passion for the best life of both captive and wild animals.

African Predator Conservation Research Organization (APCRO) www.apcro.org

When Shelley asked me to write a blog, I was a bit hesitant because I have never “blogged” before….so bear with me if my comments aren’t presented in the typical fashion. For those of you that don’t know me, I was the Manatee Care and Training Coordinator at Mote Marine Laboratory & Aquarium for a decade (or so…) before working with Sea Life Park for a couple of years, and then was fortunate to land in my current Vice President of Conservation position with the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA). As you can probably guess, two of my life passions include manatees and conservation…with that in mind…I thought I would focus my first blog on a topic that we as trainers usually first focus on with our animals – husbandry, or medical, training.

Voluntary lateral blood sampling

As you likely know, medical examination procedures with numerous species of non-domesticated animals in our care typically require some amount of physical or chemical restraint. An alternative to this is the implementation of an animal husbandry training program that uses standard operant conditioning with positive reinforcement techniques. The convenience of having animals voluntarily participate in routine medical procedures reduces their level of stress, increases health assessment opportunities, improves their level of care, furthers collection of baseline biological data, facilitates physiological research, and provides a dynamic form of environmental enrichment.
Medical procedures with untrained manatees require that the animal be dry-docked and restrained by numerous personnel. Husbandry training facilitates medical procedures typically carried out with restrained manatees, such as blood sampling, weight, dorsal ultrasound, body length, and girth measurements. Utilizing trained voluntary behaviors with manatees, allows these medical procedures to be conducted with increased frequency while reducing the number of handlers and amount of time needed per examination.
In addition, procedures difficult to obtain and rarely conducted with manatees when they are restrained, such as respirometry, ventral ultrasound, urine sampling, and core temperature measurements can become routine and incorporated into valuable physiological research investigations. Samples and measurements collected on a routine basis can be analyzed and the results can be used to augment our knowledge of the manatee’s physiology. Some of the studies conducted have provided important information about what factors affect manatee creatinine (stress) levels, how they thermoregulate, what hormonal fluctuations they cycle through, and how their respiratory characteristics contribute to red tide impacts. This information has direct conservation applications for both the in situ and ex situ manatee populations….and is made possible by basic husbandry training…how awesome is that!?

voluntary body length measurement

voluntary eye exam

Debi was responsible for initiating the 1st USFWS permitted Manatee Training Program in the U.S. and was the Manatee Care and Training Coordinator at Mote Marine Laboratory and Aquarium for over nine years. She has an extensive background in conservation research training, with a particular focus on manatee sensory biology, behavior, animal training and husbandry, but also has cetacean stranding and sea turtle training and care experience.

She was also the Director of Research and Education at Sea Life Park in Hawaii, has served as Secretary on the International Marine Animal Trainers Association’s (IMATA) Board of Directors, and is currently their Research and Conservation Committee Chair.

Currently, she is the Vice President for Animal Conservation with the Association for Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) and is responsible for overseeing AZA’s core animal programs, facilitating the work of AZA’s members in cooperative population and collections management, and the advancement of AZA’s conservation and science initiatives.

She earned her Ph.D. in psychology (cognitive and neuroscience) from the University of South Florida.