Jen Godfrey

"The use of environmental enrichment in preparing a harbor porpoise for Human Care in Zoological Facility”

Environmental enrichment plays an important role in ensuring proper mental and physical health in animals in zoos and aquariums.  It provides sufficient mental stimuli to effectively reduce stereotyped behaviors and increase an animal's behavioral flexibility.  I studied the application of environmental enrichment in preparing a female harbor porpoise ( Phocoena phocoena ) for a captive environment.  Using a harbor porpoise for this study offers challenges because harbor porpoises are fairly nonsocial cetaceans and because there has been little previous research on their behavior.  This specific animal offered further challenges because of her history as a rehabilitated animal under legal restrictions that limited her exposure to people for two years. The goal of this study was to not only provide the benefits normally associated with environmental enrichment, but to do so in a way that increased her interaction with trainers and prepared her for the unfamiliar stimuli that will be presented to her in an aquarium environment, without the use of food as a positive reinforcement.  For thirty days over the course of two months an assortment of 20 enrichment objects were presented by trainers using one of 7 specific actions, four times per day.  During these sessions, six minutes were spent making baseline observations of her behavior, immediately followed by three minutes of one object and action and three minutes of another object and action. Using 10-second time sampling to quantify the frequency of her behaviors, different behaviors were quantified to gauge her level of interest or avoidance in enrichment.  Her behavior during the study supports the hypothesis.  Her interest remained constant over time and her avoidance behaviors decreased.  Also, a significant increase was observed in her interest and avoidance behaviors during enrichment when compared to baseline behaviors.  Even when exhibiting interest behaviors, she maintained a level of apprehension regarding enrichment throughout the study period, suggesting a further need for enrichment.  Also, while one of her stereotyped behaviors decreased during enrichment, another increased, suggesting a need for a change in the type of enrichment used.