@phillipdodd

Today, Melonie spent the morning doing volunteer training at Bear Hollow Zoo here in Athens, GA for Animal Care. She had such a great time! Maybe I’ll be able to convince her to write a ‘guest post’ for me to describe the experience. She took a lot of pictures from her phone that would be great to include. Anyway, they have this program where, after training for a long time, you can become a docent of a particular animal and go around showing the animal off and teaching folks about them. What a cool thing that would be! I have very fond memories of being places like Sea World and absolutely loving the animal shows where I got to learn about the animals.

It is wonderful especially to teach kids about animals. The other week Melonie and I went to her grandparents house for a family birthday gathering and we brought our sugar glider Lucy along with us to see everyone. I was surprised by how fascinating the little creature was to her kid brothers and sisters! They were asking me all kinds of questions about sugar gliders. What they ate, when they slept, where they live in the wild, why they do the things they do… they considered sugar glider facts to be pretty important stuff!

I was the same way when I was younger. I watched every single animal show on television that I could find, and I always sought out the animal books every time my mom or grandmother took me to the library or bookstore. I have great memories of learning about birds and using a field guide to identify the various birds that were native to my backyard. I sat there at the window in my house’s sunroom with a little journal and watch for birds. Every time I saw one, I would write down what it was, where I saw it, and what time it was. Now that I think about it, I’m not sure why I did that or what my goal was. How envious I am now of my former self — to be able to do something without rhyme or reason and with no goal in sight! Nowadays every action I take seems to have some kind of direction or purpose. Not a bad quality most of the time, but it makes having fun difficult!

Anyway, I digress. Learning about the docent thing that they have going on at the Bear Hollow Park and Zoo in addition to my already resident passion for animals and the recent volunteering with AAHS and PAWS of Athens has gotten be pretty excited about helping animals out in the various ways that I am able to. One of the ways that I know I can help is through writing and teaching. However, I don’t really know how to get started doing something like that. I would love to put some kind of blog out there about animals and write all kinds of stuff about them. The intent of the blog would be to teach folks things that they did not already know about animals.

The question that I am immediately faced with is this: Why?  Or rather, What’s the point? Why spend time writing about animals, teaching about animals, or taking the time to learn about animals? Surely there are far more important things that a person could be doing with there time. Furthermore, why spend time helping animals when there are so many humans that need help?

These questions have been tugging at my heart for quite some time now and have largely held me in a state of confusion. On one hand, I had this immense desire to help animals and teach folks about them, but on the other hand, I had this bundle of questions that I did not know the answer to. How could I, or anyone else for that matter, justify spending so much time and resources on creatures whose lives are often ended for enjoyment by a large percentage of the population? Most people, I’m sure, would take care of an animal in need if directly presented with the opportunity, but as a whole, animals in need are not typically in the forefront of the issues the average American thinks about on a daily basis.

Today, however, I have found answers to these questions. They are pretty simple and not very heavy in the philosophy side, but I find them to be quite sufficient. As for why help animals as opposed to spending time, effort, and resources elsewhere, I believe the answer is because animals are resources and vital to our way of life. Everyone who has a pet, large or small, knows how quickly and profoundly that the pet becomes a significant part of your life. Animals oftentimes provide for us things that humans are either unable or unwilling to provide — love, affection, support, kindness, loyalty, care, play, etc.. Upon a closer look at my life, it is easy to see that I simply would not have become the person that I am today without the various pets that have been in my life. From dogs right down to tiny hamsters, every pet that I’ve had has caused me to learn and grow as a person. In addition to that, having pets have helped me to cope with some of my life’s greatest trials.

As for the second question, why bother to learn about animals, I have found an answer in the amount of lesson that we have to learn from animals. The thing that instantly pops into my head is from the Bible in Proverbs 6:6: “Go the the ant, thou sluggard! Consider its ways and be wise.” Since the beginning of time, mankind has been learning from animals and mimicking their ways to improve their lives. I’m reminded of what I know of the important role animals played in the Native American’s lives back in the days of America’s discovery. They went as far as to attribute spiritual powers to them, making totems of various animals to imbue themselves with the qualities of that animal. Bears for power, Hawks for vigilance, Turtles for patience, and so forth. Humankind has long used animals as a source of inspiration for creativity and innovation as well. Many inventions would not exist if not for the study of animals. Self-cooling buildings have been designed based on studying the termites’ mound designs. By studying the way conch shells are created, stronger, more durable materials have been able to be created. If you do some internet searches, it’s easy to find quite a few fun things that came from animals that you didn’t know about.

In conclusion, I feel that there are many benefits to helping animals out and learning about them. I’m not even mentioning the effect that they have on our ecosystem. There’s a lot to be said about animals, and a lot more to be learned from them.

As for you, I’m interested to know about how animals have impacted your life. Did your pets, both past and present, have as large as an impact on your life as mine did? Do you feel that you’ve ever benefitted from having learned certain things about animals? Let me know! I’d be quite curious to hear your thoughts.

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  • Tags [Athens Area Humane Society, bear hollow zoo, volunteer]
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