First of all, THANKS everyone for joining our crowd! It’s so great to see everyone participating and helping curate our primate exhibit. I’ve even received one response from a Mr H. Hewitt in our comments box here at the zoo so we’re both “virtual” and “real”!
By a very slim margin, the votes show Goeldi’s monkeys (callimico) and titi’s for our primate species and, by a wide margin, agouti on the ground.
Goeldi's monkeys beat out emperor tamarins for our callitrichid species in the exhibit!
I am excited about all of these species. The Houston zoo has only housed Goeldi’s monkeys once before, back when the Natural Encounters building was the old small mammal house.
Goeldi’s monkeys have been kept with many other species, including titi monkeys, so this should be a good combination. Titi’s generally prefer to stay higher up in a space and are much more passive. Because these two species prefer different areas and have varying activity levels, they should be able to coexist without coming into conflict for resources in the exhibit.
I contacted the SSP’s for Goeldi’s and titis this week. Follow this link if you didn’t catch the blog about managing species across zoos and what an SSP is: http://houstonzooblogs.org/zoo/2012/01/first-ever-crowd-curated-exhibit/
Sometimes things happen very quickly with SSPs, and sometimes things can move extremely slowly. We got very lucky with Goeldi’s monkeys. The species coordinator was in the process of finalizing the master plan for this year and we can obtain a breeding pair immediately! The male is slated to come from Philadelphia, and the female from Saint Luis. This is doubly lucky as sometimes you have to agree to hold non-breeding animals until a breeding pair becomes available. That can sometimes take years!
I haven’t managed to connect with the species coordinator for the titis yet, nor have I had a chance to follow up on leads for agoutis, so I will keep you posted as things progress for those species.
The next step is to obtain what we call a “specimen report” on each animal. A specimen report is a compilation of all the daily keeper notes as well as medical records on an individual animal. These reports are reviewed by our animal care and veterinary staff to make sure there aren’t any “red flags” or long term issues that we need to be aware of. If the report looks good, I then submit an “Animal Transfer Proposal” (ATP) detailing the animal’s individual identifying number, where it’s coming from, the contact person at the zoo where the animal is coming from, shipping costs and an approximate shipping date. This form needs to be signed by the Vice President of Animal Operations, our veterinary staff, our Registrar (who maintains detailed records for every individual housed here at the zoo!) and our Director. If everyone agrees, our veterinarians determine when there will be space in our quarantine facility and then contact the veterinarians at the other zoo to requests pre-shipment tests for our animal. Once all of that clears I can finally book a flight and get our new little monkeys!
Iknowall of you that voted for Goeldi’s are as excited as we are and if you voted for emperor tamarins, I hope you aren’t too dissapointed and that you will be just as charmed with these unique monkeys!
Stay tuned for your chance to help us prepare the exhibit for our new arrivals!
