Zookeeper Horror Stories

"So what else have you done stupid in your life?"

- Peter Brazaitis, You Belong In a Zoo!

My boss had been on the road transporting animals for the past few weeks.  It was a side hustle that helped him support his personal zoo, where I was employed as a keeper.  On the morning of his return from a cross-country haul, he parked his truck out back, then tossed me the keys to the attached trailer.  He told me, sleepily, that there were three crates of parrots in the second stall, and that I should bring them inside the reptile house for the night to keep them warm.  Without further comment, he disappeared for the bathroom, the kitchen, and then bed.

Taking the keys, I opened the second stall - without peeking inside first, which admittedly was not the brightest move on my part.  

There weren't parrots inside.

Instead, I found myself locking eyes with a very large and very cantankerous bull sable antelope, jet black and snow white, with a pair of horns each thicker than my wrists at the base.  I spent a millisecond trying to decide whether I should a) slam the door shut and lock it back up, or b) run.  Fortunately, before that millisecond had passed, I had already started on option "a."  Half a second after I latched the door shut, the entire trailer shook as the bull crashed his horns into the side.  

My boss, his fly down, stomped outside and demanded to know what the ruckus was, and why I hadn't gotten those parrots moved in yet.  

The parrots, it turns out, were in the third stall.

I can, thankfully, count on two hands the number of times in my career where I have legitimately been terrified.  Not scared that I was going to get yelled at, possibly fired, or that I was going to embarrass myself and maybe lose a shot at a promotion.   Actually, literally, "So-this-is-how-I'm-going-to-die, or at least be irreparably damaged, scared.   When those moments happen, it's usually because I did something dumb... like take it on faith that my sleep-deprived boss knew the difference between "Stall 2" and "Stall 3."  Other times, it's because someone else did something dumb, and I was just in the way.

Stories like this can make good conversation pieces later in life, make you feel like a veteran who's seen and done a thing or two in their time.  In the moment, they are horrifying.  The memories that I've had so far are ones that I treasure as learning lessons.  As valuable as they've been to my development as a keeper, however, I'm not actively trying to get more of them.