Zachary David talks about his first few days in China-
China so far has definitely taught me that you have to be able to adapt if you are going to survive. From the bus rides to the panda base that can take anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 ½ hours, to trying to communicate effectively with my incredibly limited knowledge of the Chinese language, I am having to adapt all day, every day.
The research itself is no exception. As with all scientific research, some days it goes right, and some days it goes wrong. Today was a great example of that, when we continued our training in stereotypical behavior with an adorable male named Tong Tong. The first stereotypical behavior trial in the morning with Tong Tong was very successful. He was very active, constantly changed behaviors, and displayed a wide variety of stereotypical behaviors. He seemed very interested in his neighbor Mei Xi, and loved to walk near her enclosure, and stare longingly through his window towards her. He even exhibited a new stereotypical behavior that had not been previously witnessed by researchers, which we were able to add to his behavioral ethogram. He was a great bear to train on, as we were exposed to a wide variety of behaviors we had not witnessed in previous bears, such as rolls, tongue flicks, stereotypical pacing, and quasi-stereotypical pacing.
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- Tong Tong trying to get up a tree
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- Munching on some bamboo
However, our second trial in the afternoon was not so successful. When we arrived at his enclosure around 2 PM, he was sleeping. When we left his enclosure around 4 PM, he was still sleeping. For the purposes of our study, sleep is completely removed from the equation, which meant we were unable to gather any useful data for that trial. Oh well, such is the nature of working with animals. We are on their schedule, they aren’t on our schedule. And yet, there is something incredible about being in China, working with pandas, that makes me completely okay and even excited to watch a panda sleep. While adapting and getting used to such a different place can be hard, watching Giant Pandas all day makes it all worth it.
I’m Zachary David. If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment below.
It would seem to me that the fact that Tong Tong was asleep all afternoon was a good thing for Tong Tong who was not displaying stereotypical behavior while he was asleep. It might have been bad for you, but I think it was good for him.
It would be helpful for you to list the stereotypical behaviors you are studying. You and your colleagues allude to them, but do not specify them.
Charlene,
Pandas certainly like their beauty sleep. However, our stereotypic study is ideally performed when the bears are awake. Each bear exhibits their own stereotypic behavior and they can range from pacing to regurgitating. As best as I can remember, I think a single bear had at most- 8 stereotypic behaviors. Other common stereotypes include- Head Toss, Somersault, Cage Climb, Weave & Pirouette.
If you would like to talk more about our study, feel free to email me- nate@pdxwildlife.com
Zachary, Fred Shearer in Corning, Iowa…How is it that you are in China? Sounds like a great opportunity. Where do you learn mandarin? Are Chinese curious about you as an American?
Hey there Fred! Working here is a great opportunity, I’m very thankful to be able to be here! I’ve been working with various animals and doing research since the beginning of my college career, so I think that helped a lot! There’s a blog post about a week back that goes through what I’ve done!
I actually didn’t know any mandarin when I got here, but I’m slowly picking up words and little phrases here and there! Mainly about food. The people here are very curious about us, we are constantly being stared at by everyone. That being said, everyone has been so incredibly nice and helpful to us, we are just an oddity around these parts! Lots of people, particularily younger children, love yelling “Hello!” at us as we walk by every day.
Thanks for the comment, I should be posting many more blog posts over the next couple months and would love to answer any more questions you have!
Zachary David