Where's Marty? At the Maryland Zoo Kitchen where food for animals is prepared

Hi Everyone!

The "Where's Marty?" "Coolest places we've taken you in 2022" week continued today with a stop at the kitchen of the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore.

Now, I need to pause here and give a shoutout to the National Aquarium in Baltimore.

And here is the reason.

We first visited the Aquarium's kitchen, which gave us the idea to visit the Zoo's commissary.

Where's Marty? Preparing food for the animals at the Maryland Zoo

It is no easy feat feeding the fish, and mammals, at the National Aquarium.

But when we went to the Maryland Zoo, it became obvious the challenges were even bigger.

For instance, some animals can get COVID from food exposed to the virus.

Imagine dealing with that for well over a year.

The point, here, is without the Aquarium hosting us, we never would have thought about going to the Zoo.

We will, at a later date, revisit the gem that is the National Aquarium in Baltimore.

It cost, roughly, $50,000 a day to run the Zoo, and a lot of that is for food.

I asked President and CEO Kirby Fowler when he took the job if he realized how big the "Elephant in the room," (no pun intended), the food issues were.

Where's Marty? Learning what the animals eat at the Maryland Zoo

He said he did not and worked in the kitchen for a week just to get a handle on it.

Roughly 1,500 animals get fed daily and not all at once.

Some eat early, some eat late, some eat more than once a day.

And the nutrition of each serving must be spot on. It is charted, and quite strict.

When you go to the store to buy a bag of carrots, I guaranteed it is not this big or the carrot itself, this large.

All in all, it is fascinating how the Zoo is fed, and if you watch the video I think you will never look at a Zoo animal the same again.

Tomorrow our next stop involves, at times, a lot of broken glass.

See ya then!

Marty B!