Discovering The Mature Lifestyle
A long and eventuallyy successful search forr birth parents ... Page 4
Health & Wellness
January 15, 2015
January Issue
Burnsville couple stays active through zoo volunteering BY SUE WEBBER CONTRIBUTING WRITER
S
hirley Ahlquist of Burnsville spent 40 years working in a hospital laboratory and decided that when she retired she wanted to do something totally different. “We’d been Minnesota Zoo members for a few years,” Shirley said. “Any time I had questions about an exhibit or an animal, I could find a volunteer and they always knew what I wanted to know.” After talking to a volunteer one day while visiting the zoo, Shirley said, “I decided that’s what I wanted to do.” Her husband, Mark, a retired commercial real estate landlord who had been working with a Habitat for Humanity crew, decided he want to be a zoo volunteer, too. Since 2001, the couple each has amassed more than 4,000 hours of service at the Minnesota Zoo, 13000 Zoo Blvd., Apple Valley. “We’re Wednesday people at the zoo,” Shirley said. “We interact with visitors. They move us every half an hour. Often we have bench talks.” With boxes and boxes and boxes of artifacts, including bones and feathers, the two often can be found sitting on a trail or in a booth, talking to visitors. Their volunteer work required four allday Saturday sessions of training and quizzes. “For each area of study there’s a fact sheet and you take a quiz,” Shirley said. There’s a separate page for every animal at the zoo. “We still review the fact sheet
Mark Ahlquist of Burnsville shares information about one of the aquatic exhibits, during one of his volunteer shifts at the Minnesota Zoo. (Photo by Tad Johnson - Sun ThisWeek Newspapers) every time,” Mark said. The zoo isn’t just a summertime destination. Many school and day-care groups take field trips there during the fall and winter. “If I see a keeper talking or a training session going on, I listen, or I listen to the
other volunteers,” Shirley said. “There’s always something to learn.” One of the volunteers’ jobs is to help find lost children, Shirley said. “It’s better if we’ve got the child and we’re looking for mom,” she said. “Moms are frantic when they can’t find their kids. When it’s really
crowded, it’s easy to get separated.” Each time a volunteer reaches 1,000 hours, he or she is rewarded by being allowed to choose to do something behind the scenes, Shirley said. “One of the best things I did was feed the grizzly bears carrots or celery,” Shirley said. “I had a bear keeper on each side of me.” The zoo is open all year round. “It’s a good thing to come in the winter because it’s not so crowded,” Shirley said. “It’s fun to walk outside on the trails when the coldweather animals seem to be bored.” Training classes were in process at the Minnesota Zoo at the end of 1977, so 200 volunteers were trained and ready to go on May 22, 1978, when the zoo opened its doors, according to Kelly Lessard, public relations manager at the zoo. In 2014, 1,116 volunteers donated 113,857 hours at the zoo, she said. “We have volunteers throughout the metro area and some who live in North Dakota, Wisconsin, and up North in Baxter and Nevis, to name a few,” Lessard said. “Volunteers can work as many hours a week/month as fit in their schedule. We have a volunteer from Burnsville who is here four days a week.” People volunteer at the Minnesota Zoo for many different reasons, according to the zoo’s website. Common responses when asked why they volunteer include: • love of animals and/or plants • concerned about environmental issues and want to do my part to help aniZOO - TO PAGE 3