Fur, Feathers & Scales - Silkie Chickens

Some of you may know I have my own little flock of chickens in my backyard, but I also work with chickens at my zoo job!  We have two silkie chickens--one hen and one rooster.  Their names are Diana and Red, and they are hilarious!  Red crows all the time, and always lets Diana eat first and steal his food.  If we leave the back door open, they willingly stroll inside looking for someone to toss them a handful of mealworms.


Silkie chickens get their names from their soft, fluffy feathers and  are much smaller than most other chickens.
They have dark skin and even dark grey muscles and bones (so I've read.).  Weird, right?

Chickens are so much fun to watch because they have such goofy movements. I mean, just look at this guy:

Even weirder is that they have more toes than other kinds of chickens. These guys have five per foot!. 
 

I didn't photograph Diana much, but I did get this gem...

And here's a behind-the-scenes peek at our set-up.  It's pretty entertaining to have chickens pecking around your classroom!

If you enjoyed this, be sure to check out my other Fur, Feathers & Scales posts!

6 Awesome Animals

I'm revisiting six of my favorite Fur, Feathers & Scales posts this morning.  Aren't these guys adorable?!

Click below to learn more about each animal!

Chinchilla

Bearded Dragon

Guinea Pig

Hedgehog

Screech Owl

Box Turtle

Happy Monday!

Fur, Feathers & Scales - African Pancake Tortoise

 

Have you ever heard of a pancake tortoise?  I'm convinced they might be the cutest creature with scales.  These are not reptiles that I work with directly, like this lizard or this turtle, but my friend and coworker, Craig Hunter, does work with them.  Craig is our zoo's knowledgeable reptile and amphibian keeper.  He is also a talented photographer who shot all of these photos for us! 
 
Our zoo has four African pancake tortoises (not currently on exhibit), and they are the neatest things.  If you've ever held a tortoise or turtle, you know that they have hard, solid shells.  Pancake tortoises actually have flexible shells.  It's such a strange sensation to hold these tortoises and be able to feel them breathe--I was amazed!  Their shells are not solid, but have small openings between the underlying bony plates, allowing them to flatten slightly as they squeeze under rocks and into small crevices for protection.  In fact, rather than retreating into their shells, they will quickly run to find shelter to evade danger.

African pancake tortoises are pretty great climbers, and are considered to be the fastest tortoise. Their lighter, more flexible shell likely contributes to their speed.  They are found throughout Kenya and Tanzania and eat only vegetation.   

Because these tortoises are so flat, females usually only produce and lay one egg at a time, every six weeks during mating season.  Because of their low reproductive rate and collection for the pet trade, wild populations of African pancake tortoises are declining.  You can help them out by not ever buying one as a pet.

Aren't they great?!



You can check out more of Craig's photography on facebook, and be sure to follow him on instagram, too (@moriarty1984).

Fur, Feathers & Scales - Greater Hedgehog Tenrec

I realized last week that I've never introduced you guys to this animal!  This is a Greater Hedgehog Tenrec from Madagascar!  This particular one is a female, and her name is Maivana. 

Tenrecs look a lot like hedgehogs, because they are distantly related to them. However, tenrecs are endemic to Madagascar, meaning they're not found anywhere else in the world (in the wild.)  They are nocturnal and have fairly long whiskers to help them navigate dark, forest habitats.

Tenrecs can use their long toes and toenails to climb, and they have a surprisingly strong grasp with their legs and feet.  They are omnivores and eat vegetation and worms, grubs and other invertebrates. 

They are covered in spines that are used for protection.  In my opinion, a tenrec's spines are not quite as sharp as a hedgehog's spines.  Often I compare a tenrec's spines to feeling much like a hairbrush.  They can make chirping noises, and they also huff and hiss whey they're being defensive. 

Maivana was really fun (read: difficult) to photograph.  She was all over the place!  I was using a clay pot to keep the poster board backdrop in place, and she just wanted to climb it.  Check out some of our blooper photos below!

Hilarious!

Fur, Feathers & Scales - Pigeon

I have some new critter friends to share with you!!  At my zoo job, we now have these  pigeons! 

 They're homing pigeons, which means they have the ability to find their way home over very long distances--not that they'll be using that particular skill though now that they live at the zoo.  These types of pigeons can actually be very fast and are sometimes even raced against each other. So neat! 

 

We've named them Orville and Wilbur after the Wright brothers.  Cute, right?  I love the noises they make, and I love their iridescent feathers.

Pigeons are found worldwide, and have a wide lifespan--they live an average of six years in the wild but can live beyond fifteen years in captivity. They eat lots of seeds, and sometimes maybe leaves or even fruit.  They'll also eat small insects and worms.

If you're a bird fan, I highly recommend the book Birdology.  It's has a whole chapter on homing pigeons, and other chapters include cassowaries, chickens, parrots, etc. 

I look forward to working with these birds more and sharing them around my community!

Fur, Feathers & Scales: Netherland Dwarf Rabbit

It's time for another dose of cute.  And what better animal is there to go with my new blog design?

Meet Benjamin!  He is a Netherland Dwarf Rabbit.  He is one of our program animals at my zoo job.  He joined us last year, because his owner developed severe allergies to him and could no longer keep him.  He is about six years old.

Often, many people think that rabbits are lumped in with rodents, but they are in their own group called lagomorphs. One of the differences between rodents and lagomorphs has to do with their teeth.  Most folks know that rodents, like rats and squirrels, have two large front teeth (incisors) on their top and bottom jaws.  Rabbits actually have two pairs of teeth on the top and the bottom.  The second pair sits just behind the first pair of incisors.  Oh, and like rodents, rabbits' teeth do continually grow.

They are herbivores and eat only vegetation.  But rabbits do have a secret.

They eat their own poop.

Rabbits have two types of poop--one is a dry pellet, and the other is a wetter, uh, nugget.  The wetter poo is less digested, so they eat it right away so that it passes through their digestive system again, ensuring maximum nutrient absorption.

The American Rabbit Breeders Association recognizes 48 different breeds of rabbits. The Netherland Dwarf is one of the smallest, weighing up to two and a half pounds.

If you love bunnies, I'm going to leave you with this list of videos for your enjoyment. Maybe your next travel destination?

Fur, Feathers & Scales - Mali Uromastyx

Nope. That wasn't a typo. My fingers were properly placed on my keyboard. In fact, my spell check wants to change uromastyx to burgomaster.  Really? What is that?  Anyway, a uromastyx is a real thing.  And until very recently, I didn't know much about them.  So, we're basically learning together! See how fun this is?

Meet Agatha the Mali uromastyx, which is a lizard sometimes known as a spiny-tailed lizard, and rightly so.

They are found in North Africa and the Middle East. 

Agatha is roughly eight years old, and the average lifespan for one of these guys is about 15 to 20 years.  You might have noticed that she has a slightly misshapen tail.  She used to be housed with a male who bit her tail.  Needless to say, they broke up. 

They average 10 to 18 inches in length (but one species can be much larger) and eat only vegetation. They don't drink much either, because they get nearly all the water they need from the vegetation they consume. 

This mali uromastyx species is sexually dichromatic, meaning the males and females are different colors--the males are more brightly colored than the females.

My favorite thing about Agatha (although her big, fat, spiny tail runs a close second) is the way she excretes salt to normalize the amount of sodium in her body.  You and I excrete salt through sweat and urine.   She has nasal salt glands that secrete clear fluid, which later dries as a fine, white powder. That white stuff on her face is actually salt.

Thanks for learning about this reptile with me! What's your favorite thing about Agatha?

Fur, Feathers & Scales - Screech Owl

I've got another installment of my Fur, Feathers & Scales series for you today.  So far, we've met a hedgehog, a chinchilla, a desert tortoise, a bearded dragon, a guinea pig, a tarantula, a quaker parrot, a skink, a dove, and a couple of rats. Today, I'd like to introduce you to Occhio the Eastern Screech Owl!

Screech owls are found in eastern North America in many different kinds of habitats.  They are very small, standing at 6-7 inches tall.  Their feathers can be one of two different colors, gray like Occhio here, or reddish-brown.

They are predators and catch their food with their feet and talons.  Owls have zygodactyl feet, meaning their toes form the shape of an X, with two in front and two in back.  This is unlike many other birds that have three toes in front and one in back.  Their legs and feet are covered in fine feathers.

Owls have excellent eyesight and hearing.  Because they are nocturnal, owls have huge eyes that enable them to see in the dark. Actually, their eyes are so big  that there's not enough room for muscles to allow eye movement, so their eyes are fixed--they can't move their eyes around.  So, to compensate, they are able to turn their heads 270 degrees (about a 3/4 rotation.)  So cool!

Owls also have really cool ears--they're lopsided!  One ear is higher than the other, which allows the owl to easily pinpoint the location of the sound that it's hearing.  And those tufts on top of this owls head--those are not his ears.  His ears are located not too far from his eyes under all those feathers.

Screech owls get their names from the noise that they make.  Their screech is very eerie. They also have a high-pitched trill that, to me, sounds very much like a Halloween ghost noise.

Occhio (which means "eye" in Italian), is about three years old and is such a fun bird to work with at the zoo.  He definitely steals the show!