Showing posts with label elephants. Show all posts
Showing posts with label elephants. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

The Cleveland Zoo Elephant Crossing Exhibit Is Spectacular


On May 7 we went to see the elephant crossing exhibit for the first time and were very impressed! It just opened May 5. There are five elephants now and five acres for the exhibit! When we arrived, the trainer was calling the 11-ft. tall male elephant over to cross to the other side so we got to see how the gate worked. It is so cool! It separates the two big sections of the exhibit and the elephants cross through one way and then the people can go across and walk in the same place the elephants did.

There was so much to see we spent an hour just exploring it. I had planned to take pictures for this blog post, but my battery died so went back around 4:00 to get more but they had just brought the elephants inside. In  the video it shows how close the people can be inside and how we can watch the trainers move them along. The mole rats (little mice) and a python is in the elephant building too.


I wanted to go again on Sunday right after I got done teaching my Sunday School class, but Gerard didn’t realize that. I expected him to read my mind but he didn’t. We started on our way after lunch, but since mothers got in free for Mother's Day, it was packed like I thought it would be. In fact, the traffic was all backed up almost to our street! We decided to take Abby to the park instead—see how flexible we are? Turns out it was a good idea because Monday, we heard that the zoo had closed all their parking lots at 1:00 because they were all full!



Friday, May 1, 2009

6 Things I Learned This Week of 2009--Part 17

Help Feed The Hungry

At A Better Woman For God and Family I discovered a similar site to my cat and dog trivia to feed shelter cats and dogs but this one is to help feed people! This is a word game and for every correct answer, 10 grains of rice is donated to the needy. Please visit FreeRice.com to start playing and donating. It's kind of fun, all you do is pick the right definition of words. Just wish they would donate something better than rice. UPDATED 5/4/09: You can choose to do words from different languages or math. I tried German and did better than I expected.

Elephants

I saw a show this week about a place for orphaned elephants and learned the proper way to introduce yourself to an elephant is to blow into their trunk. They cover themselves with dirt for protection from the sun. They are very caring and nurturing animals as this picture I found shows at: Maria Michelle's Furkids and Animal Rescue.

Get Rid of Those Bees

I discovered this way to trap bees on Mature But Not Senile. I hate bees because I got stung once and it hurt so I'm going to give this a try this summer in my yard:
make a yellow jacket trap.

get a 2 liter bottle, cut the top off, where it enlarges - keep it.

then fill it with about 1? of sweet juice, koolaid or pop in the bottom; none of that non cal crap - they want real sugar and only sugar based stuff.

if it’s an aggressive breed they may even like a small bit of pineapple in the bottle to hold their attention while they get stuck before drowning since they can’t fly out. yep.

invert the top and remove the cap, put it back on top of the bottle, with the cap end facing down into the bottle to allow the critters to fly in.

they get drunk on the nectar in the bottom, and drown. simple but effective.

you should change it about every few days or as you accumulate critters.

this works for almost all flying pests.

This was a comment left by BadGalsRadio that was reposted because it was such a good comment. There is more to it so be sure to check out the whole thing at Mature and Senile.

New Christian Blog Discovered

I just discovered a new Christian blog that is outstanding called We Used To Be You. It is well designed, easy to read and navigate, and is extremely interactive. Posts are well thought out, interesting and informative. This is where I first heard about Miss California's Statement that marriage is between a man and woman and all the repurcussions about it. This blog provides guidance to girls and women by sharing their life experiences, providing Godly counsel and sharing the love of Christ. Then answer questions from their readers. I added it to my blogroll and am now a follower. You may want to take a look at this one--it's awesome! Here is the link to the post I wrote about it on my other blog: You Go, Girl!. UPDATED 5/2/09: I was shocked when I got home yesterday and found 23 comments on this post. Quite a debate went on while I was at work which I spent about 3 hours responding. You may want to take a peek and may even have something to add. Little did I realize my innocent post would get so much reaction!

Technology

This is a link to a video called "Did You Know?" that I found very interesting. My cousin emailed it to me and it said Sony played it in their Executive Meeting. I don't how how true these stats are, but some things I found interesting in it were:
1) China will soon become the No. 1 English speaking country in the world.
2) India has more honors kids than America has kids.
3) One in four workers as been with their current employer less than a year; 1 in 2 less than 5 years.
4) One out of eight couples married in the U.S. last year met online.
5) There are over 200 million registered users on MySpace which means if it were a country, it would be the 5th largest in the world!
There are a lot more interesting stats in this video--take a look for yourself.

A Heartwarming Story--Homeless to Chef!

In an email newsletter I received from Covenant House I learned of a heartwarming story about Kimberly, an orphaned girl who was living on the streets and was helped by Covenant House to overcome tragedy, earn her high school diploma, and secure a job as a prep chef. You can read her story at www.support.Covenant House.org. Covenant House rescues kids living on the streets and helps them turn their lives around every day! I am pleased to be a monthly sponsor.


Monday, August 25, 2008

Farewell to Our Elephants!


Yesterday Gerard and I went to the Cleveland Zoo for a farewell party for the elephants. It was fun! After all, how often does a person get to attend a party for an elephant? They are being transferred to the Columbus zoo for three years and are scheduled to return to a brand new HUGE exhibit at the Cleveland Zoo. The new exhibit will be big enough for 8-10 elephants plus other animals will be in with them. We signed a jumbo farewell card for them, kids made elephant ear headbands, a special fruit cake was given to them at 1:30 (which we had to miss because of a previously scheduled for Dr. appointment). It always seems like we usually have no definite plans, but whenever we do, something else comes up at the same time. Why is that? If I could choose to have a super power, it would definitely be to be able to be in two or three places at once!

A party atmosphere permeated the entire zoo. Even the other animals were more lively than usual in spite of the heat! The swamp monkey went for a swim in a big tub, the gorilla tore open a suitcase to get food out of it, the golden bellied monkey kept mooning the crowd from up high on his log near the ceiling. We also got to pet a lot of different furs from a gazelle, a lion, a cheetah, a zebra (felt like a horse), a colibus monkey and the snow leopard which was soft like our cats!

Gerard and Leo posed behind these two "elephants" who were playing music. I felt sorry for them in those heavy costumes on such a hot day, but they did have a fan set up blowing on them.