If you work at a zoo and/or know someone who does please answer my question ASAP! I really would like to look at working at a zoo when I graduate high school. I love animals, ESPECIALLY the exotic ones. ^ _ ^ I would like to be one of the people who gets to spend alot of time with them and possibly be a trainer. So please recommend a job for me and/or how to get there. Do I even need to go to college or do I only need to train at the zoo? Please help! Thanks!
I did a week of prac at a zoo a few months ago. Everyone working there had gotten in through a different way, and they all said they were very lucky to have gotten the job. Most of them had been studying animal science or something related to animals at tafe or uni, but I don't know how related that was to them getting the job. The way it worked at this zoo (Monarto open range zoo in Adelaide, Australia) was that everyone started working in the natives section, working with wallabies, etc, then after however many months, when someone else moved up, they could start working with ungulates (giraffes, zebras, etc), and then rhinos, then carnivores (lions, cheetah, etc), until they found the section they liked the best, to stay in. But everyone started working with natives (the boring animals, lol).
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I would say - your best chances would be to get as much related experience as possible. Remember that a zoo keeper's job is basically to feed and clean up after (awesome) animals every day, so anything related to that (even if it's dogs at a dog shelter) would be helpful, but of course apply and apply for work experience at zoos and wildlife parks. Every single person I talked to said they were incredibly lucky to have had a job come available and for them to be accepted, so just work to make sure you have the best looking resume for whenever a job becomes available, with the best and most related possible experience and education you can think of. I think the key point is that experience is more important than education, almost all the keepers I met hadn't been to uni.
Good luck!:)
