I walk at the St. Louis Zoo early in the mornings a couple of days a week. If I get there early enough, I beat both the crowds and the heat. It's an interesting place to visit, too, in the early mornings.

This week I reached the Red Rock region of the zoo just as the keepers were cleaning some of the habitats. In the Antelope Yards, the zoo creates mixed species habitats, typically combining one or two hoofed animals and a couple of different kinds of non-competitive birds. Big birds, too. In a couple of the exhibits, the birds are the largest animal.

When the keepers clean the habitats for some of the smaller animals, they don't remove the animals or the birds. I've never seen more than one keeper at a time cleaning, either. However, in my last walk, as I reached the second of the Speke's Gazelle habitats, I noticed two people cleaning rather than one. A few minutes watching and I discovered why.

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