California Sea Lions
The Memphis Zoo is home to one male, Skimmer, and two female, Helen and Chloe, California Sea Lions. The sea lions and their keepers participate in training sessions at lest twice a day, every day. The public has the opportunity to watch educational training presentations and learn how we take care of our favorite pinnipeds. During these presentations we demonstrate fascinating features and characteristics of sea lions as well as explain how and why operant conditioning is so helpful in their every day care.
We start the presentation by teaching the public about some of the natural behaviors of sea lions. For instance, the sea lions will "porpoise" around the pool as we explain that they use this skill to increase their swimming speed to escape for predators such as sharks and killer whales. The sea lions will also demonstrate how they go about thermoregulation. They do this by swimming with one or more flippers out into the air in order to release or absorb heat from blood vessels close to the surface of the flippers.
The sea lions also show off their agility and flexibility that other pinnipeds (seals and walruses) don't have. They can walk on land using all four flippers, bend their neck so that their nose touches their back, balance their entire body weight on just the front flippers, and jump to a target 9 feet above the surface of the water. Chloe sea lion even shows the public how important conservation is to the survival of all marine life by picking up plastic bottles out of the water and placing them in a recycling bin.
The most important reason we use operant conditioning with sea lions is for husbandry. We train them to present flippers, roll over onto their backs, turn around in a circle, and lie down flat in front of us so we can do thorough physical exams without using any restraint methods. The sea lions will also open their mouths so we can check their teeth and gums. Helen sea lion allows for her teeth to be brushed with a toothbrush and poultry flavored toothpaste (she would probably prefer fish flavored, but we haven't found any). The sea lions will also step up onto a scale to get weighed every day.
And last but not least we work on desensitizong them to being stuck with a needle and syringe for blood collection. This in particular takes time and patience. While the sea lion is lying down in front of us, we pinch the animal in the area we would like to get blood from. Once the animal is completely comfortable with this we move to a blunted needle, to a tuberculin syringe, and eventually work our way to a 20 gauge needle. There are several areas that can be desensitzed for blood collection, inculding the caudal gluteal vein on the dorsal side about half an inch from the spine, the back flipper, and the area between the tail and flipper. The biggest challenge has been actually finding a vein to collect from. It is hard to see a vein on a sea lion due to all the blubber they have.However we have collected a few times from Helen in the area between the tail and hind flipper.
All of these behaviors wouldn't be possible unless they had positive consequences for the sea lions. They respond best to a reward of delicious herring, capelin or smelt. However sometimes just a pat on the neck will do. Because of all the time and effort that goes into the sea lion operant conditioning program, the sea lions have developed a special relationship of trust with their trainers. And it is this trust that serves as a reinforcer and motivator for the trainers!
Special thanks to Vicky Brown for writing the above text.
Special thanks also to the sea lion trainers including Vicky Brown, Kathy Fay, Gail Karr, Morgan Powers, and Tammy Smith. Thanks also to the "idea man" Louie Bell as well as the sea lion narrators Kate Friedman and Kim Bailey.