Week 76: No News is Good News

A slow week really. A nice change of pace. Nothing died, we all just sailed through our classes and there was no major drama. Rehearsals continue and I feel like we make very little progress as time goes on and spring spec is ever closer... But, staff thinks we are doing ok with the schedule.
I'll take this slow week to address the fact that new animals should begin flooding into our facility in the next month or two. It really irks me that staff has waited so long to actively seek these animals out. I understand that we don't generally pay for our animals, they are all donated or loaned to us. Most of the 20+ deaths that my class have seen have been due purely to age. This was something the staff could have easily seen coming and started planning for and seeking these animals out months ago. Now, the rest of my class is annoyed because even if these animals come here before we graduate, they have to quarantine for a month and at this point, if we are assigned as trainers, it will only be for about a month, and they likely won't appear in spring spec. All the talk of new animals is basically a moot point for us since we know we'll have little to nothing to do with them. It is unfortunate that my experience at various facilities that deal with animals have shown me this is often the case. Things only happen when the problem has come to crisis level and something HAS to be done. Hopefully I can eventually get a job at a place with copious amounts of money that can keep ahead of all these games. (Pics: Marine Mammal Center--Sea lions, sea lion brains, and baleen)