How the Oklahoma City Zoo feeds 1,400 Animal Souls

Words by Breena Kerr / Photos by Hannah Hudson

At the Oklahoma City Zoo on a cold spring morning, all of the animals are either munching or waiting to munch. In the ape area, a lone orangutan — a member of Earth’s largest known fruitarian species — grabs an unspecified pome from the ground, takes a couple of bites, and then tosses the rest behind him with disinterest. According to nearby signs, this epicurean disinterest is normal for orangutans and seeds many of the fruit trees in Southeast Asia. Then there are the flamingos, with their heads down to the water, beaks moving eagerly in search of the krill, algae, or brine shrimp they would eat in the wild (beta-carotene-rich foods that are responsible for their pink hue). The red river hogs in the African section are snuffling through some hay and leaves and chomping away on the choicest of the roughage. And there is the red panda, who has recently lost interest in most local bamboo varietals, but might chomp on a culm if her keepers have harvested it from her favorite spot on the zoo grounds.

Other animals are waiting to eat: the Amazonian python, who might be two to four weeks away from her next frozen rabbit (they don’t do well if fed too often); the lions, lazing the day away on their hill enclosure while cow femurs with their names on them chill in the freezer; and the hooded pitta bird, whose cuteness and palm-of-your-hand size belie the fact that she’s eagerly awaiting her serving of raw horse meat, egg, and parrot feed.

Yet the food these animals await does more than just stave off hunger. Not to anthropomorphize too much (a risk here) but, as with humans, eating is a raison d’etre. In the wild, animals spend a solid chunk of their waking hours foraging and hunting. And in the process they exercise, socialize, problem-solve, sharpen their strategic skills, and stave off boredom. And for that reason, it’s vitally important that their food at the zoo — which is prepared by humans instead of by nature and chance — also gives them some of those things.

The Oklahoma City Zoo’s commissary staff is small but mighty, with only three full-time employees and a supplemental staff of eight volunteers. It’s headed by Taylor Novak, the resident nutrition manager. Taylor, who has a Ph.D. in biological sciences, is one of only a handful of zoo nutritionists working at zoos and aquariums in the country. Her presence, and that of others like her, is a sign of more enlightened times on the zoological culinary scene.

“Animal nutrition is really only a 40- or 50-year-old field … a lot of things traditionally were very laissez-faire,” Taylor explains. “The mentality used to be, ‘I’m the animal expert and I’m going to feed it what I think is best — and maybe even feed it what I want to eat. So if I’m going to sneak my gorilla an Oreo now and again, that’s totally okay.’”

Today, there are no slipped Oreos, added sugars or fake food dyes, and as a result, animals who live in zoos are getting less heart disease or diabetes than they used to.

Feeding the menagerie of 1,400 animal souls takes a confluence of planning, technological tools, and dedication. There are few days off — Taylor worked on Christmas day last year. “My family said, ‘Why can’t you come for Christmas?’ I told them, ‘I came for Thanksgiving; the animals still got to eat.’” Holiday or no, the ocelots and okapis still get hungry.

Every day, the commissary staff has a computer program that brings up recipes for the approximately 200 meals they must prepare, many of which vary throughout the week to keep things interesting.

On an early spring day, for instance, the group of three “bachelor” gorillas were getting enough stalks of kale to feed a small, health-conscious army, along with a chunky sort of salad consisting of ears of corn, quartered cabbage heads, red onions, cantaloupe, carrots, bell peppers, and cauliflower — all of it filling several gallon-size plastic tubs. Luckily, the gorillas, along with many of the animals, eat in groups, so meals can be made “family style.” By contrast, some of the other animals’ recipes for the day are relatively straightforward. On the day I visited, the meal for the African hunting dogs was minimalist: “Rabbit, Large” the recipe read, “three each.” Whole, raw rabbits, along with whole mice or young chicks, might seem a bit off-putting from the human standpoint, but snout-to-tail eating prevents waste and is part of a complete diet. The bones, nails, hair, and the like provide critical nutrition and fiber for the carnivores.

And it’s not just what the animals eat, but how. “Animals spend 90 percent of their time in the wild sleeping, eating, hunting, and foraging. So if you’re just giving food to them, you’re taking a lot of their natural behaviors away,” Taylor says. “We’ve come up with ways to mimic that, because we want to keep them engaged and keep their minds working.” Commissary staff and caretakers work together to create “enrichment” experiences, which vary from animal to animal. “With certain birds, if you think about how they’re getting fruit or a nut off a tree, they have to get all the way out to the edge of a branch and then they have to reach out with their beak, and then they have to twist and pull,” she says. To mimic those actions, zoo employees have created toys that they load with food, allowing the bird to get its treats the same way it would in the wild.

Taylor said that her team gets regular gifts from local organizations. Many of the tree limbs and chewable leaves in the animal enclosures — referred to as “browse” — are donated by Oklahoma Gas & Electric after workers trim trees near power lines. And a handful of local farmers and hunters regularly donate cow and deer carcasses. Putting these large animal carcasses in the carnivore enclosures not only helps keep them happy but can bring out natural behaviors that rarely happen in captivity.

“One time we had a cow head, plus some other bits, that we gave to the lions. And it was the first time I’d seen them doing things like mounting and batting at it and tearing it and jumping, using all these athletic skills that we know are important for them to do,” she says. “And then, at the same time, down by the watering hole I noticed two of the female lions playing — basically bickering over a piece of meat and then reconciling. It was a kind of conflict resolution I’d never seen them do before, which was really cool.”

Fighting and reconciling over food — it’s relatable, no matter your place on the vast diagram of animal species. And living to eat, it seems, isn’t just for the gluttons among us. It extends to the whole animal kingdom, even if we’re still working out some of the kinks.