News news

Taratron · Post by **Taratron** » 28 May 2004, 04:17

As most of you know, I volunteer at the Wildlife World Zoo, and work in the gift shop on weekends. Just getting a job in the gift shop, or selling train tickets, or running the boat, is hard enough. But a keeper's position is nigh impossible to come by. There are usually many people ahead of you, some with degrees, some not, some with experience, and some not.

In short, as of May 25, I will no longer be in the gift shop. I will, however, be in the aquarium five days a week, working with both saltwater and freshwater tanks (a total of 20 or so, hundreds of gallons!), and with the head aquarist at the helm, there is no way for our aquarium to look bad!

We've got eels, a shark, a Lake Tang tank, some reefs, a lungfish, and so on.

Just wanted to share the great news. Monterey Bay in July, SCUBA lessons in June, and now a brand new job where I get PAID to feed the fish. And it's not PetsMart!

Dude, life is freaking good.

fishypoo2 · Post by **fishypoo2** » 28 May 2004, 10:33

I do the same at the New England Aquarium in Boston, MA. It's really cool!

coelacanth · Post by **coelacanth** » 28 May 2004, 12:50

Excellent! It's great to find other people on here paid to look after fish, because then we can be really smug about it and irritate everyone else

(not so great though that there are so many others who work in the industry who DON'T take part in Forums like this).
Hopefully you're going to be slyly increasing the numbers of Catfish on display.....

p.s. Ryan, please give Colin Grist a slap from me next time you see him. I'm sure he owes me a drink.

lucy · Post by **lucy** » 28 May 2004, 15:13

Congratulations taratron thats a dream job!
enjoy

Post by **Barbie** » 28 May 2004, 15:54

*quietly turns green with envy* ;)

Congratulations!

Barbie

dag · Post by **dag** » 28 May 2004, 22:56

congrats !!!!!!!! whats better than doing what you love ? Getting paid to do it !!!! Makes no sense to live any other way . Have fun
dag

Taratron · Post by **Taratron** » 28 May 2004, 22:57

Third day on the job, and now I know why they fired the last guy!

No water changes, just topoffs, no algae scrubs (hence the two hours I spent on the perc clown tank), all the live plants are dead, this disgusting green-Jello algae is everywhere....yeah.

My second day there we had three dead Lake Tang cichlids on display, hence the synos and the giraffe cat freaking out. So it's slow water changes all the way, cutting back on feeding....and who knows? Maybe I can get the synos to spawn.

The silver dollar tank really needs work; all of their fins are gone, due to fin rot, from lack of water changes. The lima shovelnose also lack fins, save for the tail. And don't get me started on why we only have three pirahna left....

But I love it.

It beats all my past jobs -totally- away.

dag · Post by **dag** » 31 May 2004, 23:48

Sounds to me like those fish are lucky you are there . It shocks me when I hear of ANY creatures being kept in poor conditions and I am very happy that you are on the way to making life better for the fish . So let me amend my previous statement to : Its great to do what you love and get paid , but when there is the bonus reward of doing something that helps an animal(s) in distress , well......damn , thats utopia !!!!!!!
enjoy
Dag

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 01 Jun 2004, 02:53

ahh, very lucky! hope things go well for you. Oh man what I could do with other people's money and lots of tank space..... *drool*

sjogren1 · Post by **sjogren1** » 01 Jun 2004, 17:33

Wishing you good fortune, congrats!