Magic of Zoo Math

Math? Zoo?

Zookeepers are animal attendants employed at zoo. They take care of animals and manage the system of the zoo. Since many people see zookeepers as only trainers or guards of the animals at zoo, they wonder or doubt if math is necessary for zookeepers to harness in their carrier. However, math plays a key role in their work and zookeepers do say how much they have underestimated math before they started to work at zoos.

When does math play a part in zoo?

1. Planing the animal habitat

Since many animals have different types of habitat and many zoos have many different kinds of animals and numbers of animals, it is important for the zookeepers to manage the size of different environments for each type of animals or groups they keep.

For example, there is a math problem from the video...

Q. Find the volume of a pond at the zoo that is shaped roughly like an elliptical of width 20 feet wide by 13 feet long and is about 8 inches deep.

TO SOLVE

Measure lengths of fence lines, etc and convert the measures if necessary.
Get the square footage of area.
Use the formula
1. Formula= π (a)(b)(d)
  1. ★a= shorter radius (minor axis)

★b= longer radius (major axis)

★d= average depth of the pond

Factors that matter:

How big are the animals
How big are the habitat
GEOMETRY!

2. Counting

Many of the times zookeepers have to keep track on the number of animals that they have, but it is always challenging for them to count the numbers with their raw eyes. Then, this is when math comes in part of a role...

Zookeepers sometimes would just count
They would divide the animals in different groups and count the number by groups.

3. Animal Nursery

There are many times when zookeepers have to hand-raise some baby animals and it is very important for the babies to be raised in careful treatments and cares. Therefore, in order to raise the babies healthy, zookeepers have to exploit math to reach this goal.

Here is an example problem from the video...

Q. Suppose a 700 lb zebra needs a worming treatment. The dose is .4 mg/kg and it's a 50 mg/ml solution. How many milliliters of the solution should the zebra get?

Here are some situations when zookeepers use math for animal nurseries

Measuring treatments for the babies
Recording the data such as babies' weight and comparing the data with other zoo animals to see how others raised their animals.
Using all the data for the incubator such as temperature, humidity, and weight
Adjusting diet based on the animal's weight
How much of certain minerals they need to feed

Here's an overview of math in the zoo ☞

Sources:

This page by Julie H. ('18)

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