Eric Michael Hopper

New addition!

No, not to my house! Last week my department became the proud caregivers for 2 male Grizzly Bears. They are both 27 years old and were part of the same confiscation that Bruiser came from. If you do not know Bruiser's story, email me and I will give it to you. He was an ancient Asiatic Black Bear that lived with us for 10 months until he passed on at the age of 31 or 32 years.

These boys are named Boomer and Bailey (the guy who originally owned them named all the bears names that started with "B".) They are currently living separately but we hope to introduce them so that they can share the exhibit (and we won't have to rotate them on/off exhibit). Here's a picture of the boys:

Boomer:


Bailey:

A tribute to our Troops

Happy Memorial Day...and remember the reason we celebrate it. The reason we celebrate Memorial Day is not for the sales, the bbq's or the 3-day weekends. It is to remember and honor the men and women who have died for this country. I hope you all took a moment today to do that. The following is a video tribute to our troops. I liked it and decided to share. Thank you!!!!!

Happy Birthday Dad!

I love you! I hope you had an fun and relaxing day!

Armand Bayou Nature Center

Beth, Kristin and I decided to visit Armand Bayou Nature Center last week. It was a fun trip, though we didn't see much wildlife. We did see lots of spiders though...and lots and lots of webs. I am actually amazed that this picture turned out. I wasn't sure I'd be able to capture all the webs that were on that tree. :)





Here's a close up of a couple of the spiders we saw. I still need to send them to the Zoo's resident arachnid expert. I really want to know what kind they are.














We also saw a bison and a water snake. Those, and lots of turtles and various lizards, were the extant of the wildlife we saw. Well...I'm not counting the mosquitos that kept trying to eat us. However, there were some nice trails through various habitats - marsh, prairie and forest. We spent several hours there and provided for a nice, enjoyable, distracting day. :)

Brazos Bend State Park

Beth and I went to visit Brazos Bend State Park last week to go looking for 'gators. :) And yes, we did see several 'gators. Most of them were small but we saw a couple of big ones too.

Like this one:

No, we didn't go that close to him...my camera has a pretty good zoom on it. :)

Here's another warning sign we saw. I loved this one!


Most of the alligator we saw were like this one - just hanging out in the water with their eyes and part of their snout sticking out. Just waiting for a tasty treat to come close...


We also saw lots and lots of wildlife. Here are some more pictures. :)

A new artist I've found....

I just bought this guy's cd. I love it!!! If you like country music, check out the songs. If you're interested in buying the cd, go to his myspace page. You can also view his video to "Love At First Sight".

A Tiger Birthday Celebration!!!

We celebrated the tigers birthday last Sunday. They turned 8 years old this year. I've got several pictures that I will be including in this post...I actually took many many many more but pared down the number so that I didn't crash a server somewhere... :)


This is what the exhibit looked like part way through the day. We decorated it with streamers and they had already gotten (and destroyed) some of their gifts.


What else is a tiger supposed to do with a big box?




























Plus, they make great hiding places....











They even got a cake (made out of cardboard with lots of goodies inside it)...























...which they flattened...what else is it there for, right?









They even had some special guests come to their party...

That's right...Tony the Tiger and Toucan Sam made an appearance! :)

















As you can see....Pandu was very fascinated by them...










And what party is complete without a game...That's right...We played Tug-of-War with Pandu. We even had a zoo guest, a young boy, come in to help.
















And the tiger still won...even with all three of us on the other end of the rope... :) (I know you all are shocked, right?)