Thursday, December 6, 2007 Section E
A KING AT DUSK
A WEAKNESS FOR BLONDS
TOFU FOR TIGERS
DISAPPEARING
QUEEN
DRAGONS IN THE SUN
SOLD FOR $25
PREGNANT MALES
DESIRE
HIS MOTHER’S FATE
IT’S ALL HAPPENING
AT THE ZOO
CHAPTER
3
The queen of the zoo enters
from the back, through
a hidden corridor that
leads to the waiting eyes
of her public. Enshalla
has been lounging in her
private quarters, where she
passes her nights and the
idle hours of her mornings
preening and flying into
rages at her minders,
where she toys with any
males misguided enough
to believe they can possess
her, chuffing at them and
then dismissing them with
a snarl. Now she is ready for a walk. A door slides
open and she appears, cloaked in a calm both beautiful
and terrifying. She moves through dappled shadows
and into the sun, every step a promise, every breath a
warning. She pads across ground littered with bones and
stained with blood, past the large picture window where
admirers stand with mouths agape, so close they can see
the emerald of her eyes and watch the shoulder muscles
shift beneath her stripes. “Here kitty-kitty-kitty!” one
calls out. Enshalla does not acknowledge the comment.
Instead she raises her great head and sniffs, testing the
air to see if her attendants have left her a token of their
devotion. They love to please her. Knowing that tigers
revel in different scents, they venture into the exhibit in
the early morning, when Enshalla is still locked away in
her den, and spray the area with dashes of cinnamon,
peppermint, even perfume. Her favorite is Obsession.
Above her, on the boardwalk that overlooks the
exhibit, more people are staring. Once, a man asked
one of the keepers why they insisted on serving meat
to the tigers. Wouldn’t a vegetarian diet be better?
The keeper explained that tigers are carnivores with
deeply bred instincts for hunting prey. The man was
not satisfied. “Couldn’t you give them tofu shaped
to look like their prey?” Enshalla remains hostile to
Eric, the latest Sumatran male the zoo wants to pair with
her. The staff has not yet dared put them together. They
rotate the two tigers into the exhibit at different times;
in the night house, they keep them in separate dens.
The keepers hope Enshalla will soften toward Eric
and allow him near when she cycles into estrus. But
the risk is great. Tigers tend to be solitary animals,
defensive of their territory; both in the wild and in
zoos, their encounters sometimes end in death.
In 1994, when Enshalla was 3, her father killed
her mother in this same exhibit, crushing her
windpipe in an attack that caught the keepers
off-guard. . Story continues on page 3E
IMPERFECT
LOVE
LIFE. DEATH. THE PARADOX OF FREEDOM.
A N I N E - PA R T S E R I E S B Y T I M E S S TA F F W R I T E R T H O M A S F R E N C H
St. Petersburg Times | Thursday, December 6, 2007 |
3E
■ PHOTOS BY
ST E FA N I E B OYA R ,
T I M E S STA F F
On the cover:
Herman, the
alpha chimp, has seen the
best and worst of Lowry Park’s
history. When he arrived in
1971, many of his current
keepers hadn’t even been
born.
SUNDAY
DEC. 2
THE NEW
WORLD
MONDAY
DEC. 3
ORPHANS
TODAY
DEC. 6
IMPERFECT
LOVE
FRIDAY
DEC. 7
WILD
SUNDAY
DEC. 9
SEX-POWERSTATUS
MONDAY
DEC. 10
THE HUMAN
EXHIBIT
THURSDAY
DEC. 13
THE CITY &
THE FOREST
FRIDAY
DEC. 14
CODE
ONE
SUNDAY
DEC. 16
DUSK
CATCHING UP?
Go to tampabay.com
for the story so far and
an in-depth multimedia
presentation about Lowry Park,
wildlife conservation and the
role of zoos.
NEWSPAPER IN EDUCATION
tampabay.com/nie/zoo has
a host of learning resources
for classrooms and families.
Ellie, left, has spent almost her entire life in American zoos. The younger Matjeka has just arrived from the African savannah. Almost immediately, they form a bond.
. continued from 1E
In August 2003, just after the Swazi elephants
arrived, Enshalla celebrated her 12th birthday —
fairly old for a tiger. If she’s going to have a litter,
it has to be soon.
Her keepers understand the necessity of adding to the world’s dwindling supply of Sumatran
tigers. Still, they can’t help admiring her invincibility. One keeper, a modern woman with modern
ideas, takes great satisfaction in Enshalla’s refusal
to automatically concede to the male imperative. It makes this keeper happy that many of the
female animals she works with are dominant.
“All our girls are like that here,” she says,
smiling proudly.
As pleasing as Enshalla’s independence may be,
it poses another threat to her future. Feminism is
a human invention, just like morality and ethics
and the vegan principles espoused by the man
who wanted to feed the tigers tofu. Nature is
indifferent to all of the hopes embedded in these
ideas. It unfolds outside our notions of progress,
justice, right and wrong.
The queen glides along the edge of the small
pond at the front of her exhibit. In the water, her
reflection moves with her.
A shimmer of orange and black, disappearing.
NOT
far away, the king crouches on his
throne. Every morning, he claims
this spot on a shelf of rocks beside the waterfall
and surveys his domain. The rocks are replicas,
made to look like a weathered canyon wall. The
waterfall is an illusion, too, a stream pouring
from a PVC pipe. But the king is real.
His chin hairs have gone gray. He gets winded
more easily than he used to. Still, he seems to miss
nothing. If one of his subjects is lonely, he offers
comfort. If there is a dispute, he is usually ready
to step in. Often, he keeps to himself. He lies down
on the rock shelf, studies his fingers, stares into
space. He did not ask for these responsibilities. This
existence was thrust upon him long ago.
Several lifetimes ago, to be precise. On another
continent, in another century.
“See the big monkey?” a mother says to her child.
At the sound of her voice and the sight of her
blond hair, Herman quickly stands. Suddenly he is
alert and energized. He blows kisses at the woman.
He rocks and sways, puffs up his chest, bristles the
thick black hair on his shoulders and back, all to
make himself look strong and powerful.
The mom laughs. Clearly the big monkey likes her.
“Isn’t he funny?” she says, and her child nods.
They’re so trusting, the moms with their
golden hair and their tank tops and their tanned
shoulders, shining in the sun. They almost never
catch on to what’s really happening. It’s probably
for the best. No one goes to the zoo expecting to
be propositioned by a chimp. But sometimes, if
the moms stand there long enough, watching
Herman strut, a hint of recognition plays across
their faces. Possibly they have known other males
who have acted this way. In a bar, maybe, or in
the last hazy hours of a party.
Herman’s mixed-up libido is not his fault. It’s
just something that got turned around inside
him a long time ago. Also, for the record, he is not
a monkey. Chimpanzees are apes.
Watching Herman at his perch, it’s tempting to
wonder how much of the past he carries inside
him. He probably does not recall his first life, in
the wild. He was only an infant when a hunter in
the West African bush took him from his mother
in 1966, killing her for meat.
Ed Schultz, an American working in Liberia at
the time, found the baby chimp on sale inside an
orange crate and bought him for $25. Ed named
the chimp Herman and took him home to his wife
Elizabeth and their kids Roger and Sandy. They
gave Herman milk from a bottle — actually, the
bottle Sandy used when she was pretending to
feed her doll — and taught him to wear a diaper
and to eat his fruit at the dinner table. The family
adored and pampered him, not having any idea all
the ways their love would change him.
Soon they returned to the United States, first to
Ohio, taking Herman with them. One winter day,
they dressed him in a knitted cap and booties and
carried him outside to see the snow, drifting across
their lawn. Is that moment still imprinted inside
him? Does he still feel the cold?
By 1971, the Schultzes had moved to Tampa.
Realizing that Herman was growing too big
and potentially dangerous, they donated him to
Lowry Park. Herman might recall the day the
family escorted him to his new home. On the way
in, he scaled a light pole. After a childhood in the
trees, it was the last time he would have a chance
to climb anything that tall.
Maybe other moments from that day come
back to Herman. The family, climbing into his
cage with him to say goodbye. The children crying. The parents heartbroken. Herman, no doubt
more confused than ever as the cage door was
locked shut and he began his third life.
He stayed in the old zoo for the next 16 years. It
was awful. Tens of thousands of people filed past,
often too close for the animals’ safety. News clips
from over the decades tell a harrowing story: Razor
blades tossed into dilapidated cages, arrows shot into
the compounds. The place was deadly. Sea lions
collapsed from copper poisoning after eating
pennies that had been tossed into their tank. A
tiger died after someone gave it amphetamines
and barbiturates.
Inside his cage, Herman learned to perform, to
clap and blow kisses and smoke cigarettes. Whatever
it took to win over the strangers who came to see
him. Somehow, he survived long enough to see
the old Lowry Park torn down. His home inside
the new zoo — the exhibit with the artificial
rocks and waterfall — was hardly a substitute
for the life he might have led in Africa. But it
was a considerable improvement over the cage,
allowing enough room not just for Herman but
for a small group of other chimps.
Waves of primate keepers have worked with
Herman since the new zoo opened in 1988, and as
they have all come and gone, the king has stayed.
Many of the keepers with him now weren’t born
when he arrived at Lowry Park.
Herman, they will tell you, leads a pretty good
life these days, enjoying the privileges of his position, napping in the sun, charming pretty women.
During the day he plays chase with the keepers, tearing after them along the back fence as
they run along on the other side. In the evenings,
he sticks his long black leathery feet through the
mesh in his night house so his keepers can treat
him to another pedicure.
Still, the staff wonders how much longer he can
hold on. How many more years before his heart gives
out, or another male topples him from his throne?
There are only two other males in the group.
One is even older than Herman and is so low in
position that the females bully him. The other is
an adolescent male named Alex who worships
Herman so much that he imitates him, puffing
himself up and rocking back and forth and acting
like he is the alpha.
But inside any chimp group, even a small and
stable one like Herman’s, power is always fluid.
Alliances shift. Secret deals are made. A new
male could be transferred into the group; Alex,
growing fast, might look at Herman one day and
.
Story continues on page 4E
Enshalla’s keepers love to please her, spraying her exhibit with peppermint and cinnamon and her favorite perfume, Obsession. Here, in front of the tiger pool, she waits for a snack of horse ribs.
4E
| Thursday, December 6, 2007 | St. Petersburg Times
Herman’s dominance over the chimps is unquestioned, for now. But already the adolescent male, Alex, left, show signs of wanting to become the next alpha. The keepers wonder how long Herman can hold on.
. continued from 3E
The family
decide it’s time for a change.
It’s hard to imagine what Herman would do then.
If he were no longer the king, who would he be?
After 32 years in this place, he has become a
gray eminence. An old man at dusk, hanging on.
adored
THE
calendar says summer has ended.
Officially it is the fall of 2003. And
yet by noon, Lowry Park feels like a kiln.
The Komodo dragons aren’t complaining.
They bask in the sun, motionless except for the
flickering of their tongues. In a shallow and
shaded pool, the stingrays fly through the water
in slow-motion circles.
Hours pass when nothing seems to happen,
when it seems like every species must be dozing. Then everything happens at once. The animals are licking newborn babies clean, battling
for power, courting another sexual conquest,
plotting a rival’s downfall — giving themselves
over to desire, greed, rage, ambition, even something that could be called love. Suddenly the
world opens, offering a glimpse into its logic and
design, its random joys and casual cruelties.
That October, Virginia Edmonds and the other
manatee keepers are still working around the
clock to save Loo, the abandoned calf found in
the Caloosahatchee River. He’s been having trouble adjusting to the formula.
One Friday evening, Virginia is feeding Loo
with the bottle when the manatee calf begins to
shake. He seems to be seizing.
David Murphy, the zoo’s vet, is called. A small
oxygen mask is placed on Loo’s face. It’s no good.
A few minutes later, Loo dies in Virginia’s arms.
The moment is painful. But after 11 years at
Lowry Park, Virginia has learned to accept that
some animals will die, no matter how much care
their keepers give them.
“The manatees, some of them just don’t make
it. We have a lot of death, no matter what we do.”
THE
keepers in the herps and aquatics
department are smiling. One of their
male sea horses just gave birth to a new brood.
A male, yes. The way it works with sea horses,
the female deposits the eggs into a pouch on the
male’s stomach. He fertilizes the eggs, then holds
them in the pouch for two weeks. “Pregnant
males,” they’re called. When the babies are big
enough, the male pushes them into the water.
“They’re good at birthing,” says one of the
herps keepers.
Now, as the babies swim near their parents,
they look like specks. There are more than 100
of them in this brood, not unusual for sea horses.
Soon most are likely to be dead. Sea horse babies
have high mortality rates, sometimes 90 percent
or more.
The deaths do not weigh heavily on the herps
staff. They accept that this is the way of things.
And they know that soon enough a pregnant
male will be hatching another huge brood.
Biologists break it down into two categories
of species. Some, known as K-selected species —
usually mammals, like tigers, chimps, humans
— produce only one or a few offspring and then
concentrate on rearing and protecting that handful of their young. If one of the babies dies, the
loss goes deep.
In herps, the calculus of life and death is
figured differently. Most of the time, the staff
works with what are called r-selected species
— fish, turtles, frogs, spiders and other species that reproduce in greater number, with
a much higher mortality rate and the parents
devoting virtually no energy to the rearing of
those young.
Emotion is largely removed from the equation.
Unfairness abounds, at least by human standards. Some species of frogs, the herps keepers
say, will lay a clutch of eggs, wait for the clutch to
hatch, then lay infertile eggs for the tadpoles to
eat for their meals.
Mention to the keepers how wrong that seems,
how grossly unfair, and they try not to laugh at
your naivete.
and pampered him,
not having
any idea
all the ways
Ed Schultz holds a young Herman in the Ohio snow.
IN
the herps department, where the
animals are cold-blooded and the
keepers like them that way, sentimentality dies
quickly. In other sections of Lowry Park, the
keepers — like the species they work with —
tend to be more warm and fuzzy. They talk to
their animals, praise them, indulge them. They
establish a relationship.
This is particularly true in the elephant building. Two months after the night delivery of the
four juveniles from Swaziland, Brian French is
learning to read the new arrivals.
Matjeka, the older of the two wild females, is
having trouble fitting in with the other three.
“She’s a little bit of an outcast,” says Brian.
“She’s buddied up with Ellie now.”
Ellie is the fifth member of the new herd — the
older female that Lowry Park brought in to teach
the four younger elephants how to adjust to zoo
life. As it turns out, the new arrivals might be
able to teach a few things to Ellie.
For years she lived at a smaller zoo in Gulf
Breeze, in the Panhandle, but as the only elephant
there, she never learned the social skills required
to find her way within a herd. Eventually she
their
love
would change him.
joined another group of elephants at the Knoxville Zoo. But she was so awkward socially, other
elephants harassed her, which presumably left her
even more confused about the ways of her species.
Brian and the other keepers hope that Ellie will
overcome her awkwardness to lead Lowry Park’s
fledgling herd. These first weeks, he says, have
gone well. The four newcomers are eating out of
the keepers’ hands. They seem comfortable with
their stalls and are sleeping at night.
Ellie is guiding the four juveniles through the
basics of zoo life, showing them how to stay calm
when the humans touch their trunks or exfoliate
their skin with brushes.
One of the most crucial things she is teaching
the others is how to relax inside the ominously
named Elephant Restraint Device, better known
as an ERD. Located in the elephant building, the
ERD is a giant metal box with bars and moveable
walls. It looks a little like a big cage, but nobody
at the zoo utters that word out loud. Too controversial. Too old school. The zoo prefers to call it
the Hugger.
The way it works: An elephant is led inside the
metal box, and then a keeper pushes a lighted
green button, and the side walls — made of thick
metal bars — close in enough so that the elephant can’t make any big movements. Keeping
the animal relatively still is essential if the staff is
to safely work up close, reaching through openings in the bars to draw blood and urine and perform other procedures.
In a few months the zoo hopes to use the ERD
to help artificially inseminate Ellie. Msholo and
Sdudla are too young and therefore too short to
mount her; they’ll grow soon enough, but the
zoo staff isn’t waiting. Lowry Park is arranging
for two specialists to fly in from Germany. They
have names and distinguished reputations, these
two vets. But at zoos around the world, they are
known as “the Berlin boys.”
It might seem odd, going to such lengths
to make another elephant calf in the United States when southern Africa is overflowing with elephants. But Lowry Park’s recent
experience, importing the four juveniles from
Swaziland, shows just how much more complicated and controversial — not to mention expensive
— that process can be.
The German vets will come to Tampa early
next year to perform the artificial insemination.
In the meantime, Ellie’s keepers can see her confidence growing, especially in the bond she has
established with Matjeka. Every day the two
females walk together in the yards. At night, the
keepers place them in adjoining stalls and allow
them to sleep side by side.
Is it so surprising the two females have been
drawn together? One has been an exile most of her
life. The other arrived here as an outsider, even to
the elephants who flew in on the same plane.
Maybe Ellie and Matjeka recognize something
in each other. A sense of not belonging, perhaps.
Lifelong bonds have been built on less.
BLINK,
and suddenly it is winter.
In the Asia department,
the tiger keepers are noticing a change in Enshalla.
From her den, she still growls at Eric. But on some
mornings, she seems smitten and rubs against the
mesh between them.
Time to put the two of them together. Maybe
they’ll figure it out. Maybe one will kill the other.
Love is never easy.
ABOUT THE SERIES
Over the past four years, St. Petersburg Times staff
writer Thomas French and staff photographer Stefanie Boyar chronicled life inside Tampa’s Lowry
Park Zoo. With the zoo’s permission, they followed
the keepers and the animals, interviewing everyone from the volunteers to the zoo’s CEO.
French and Boyar witnessed most of the events
described in this series, including today’s scenes
among the tigers and the chimps. The sections
describing the elephants’ progress are based on
interviews with Brian French, Steve Lefave and
Lee Ann Rottman and on extensive reporting at
the zoo, following the elephants and their keepers.
Brian French is not related to Thomas French, the
Times reporter.
The account of the staff’s efforts to save the baby
manatee is based on interviews with Virginia
Edmonds and on firsthand reporting afterward as
the keepers worked with other manatees.
Thomas French can be reached at
[email protected] or (727) 893-8486.
COMING FRIDAY
On a rain-drenched river, experts
pursue one of Lowry Park’s most
beloved manatees as he swims
toward freedom. At the zoo, in an
elaborate display of technology, specialists from
Berlin attempt to impregnate a female elephant.
Tampa’s Lowry Park Zoo
Mbali, shown here shortly after she arrived from Africa, is standing in front of the Elephant Restraint
Device — the giant barred box that limits the elephants’ movement while keepers attend to them.