There are many paths that bring us to horses. Kyle Hetzel has taken one of the more unusual ones. Kyle is a zoo keeper. He has worked with big cats, wolves, marine mammals, giraffes, but these days he is working with domestic animals in the children’s zoo section of a large west coast zoo.

Working with wild animals has taught Kyle the importance of team work and cooperative care. He wants to bring what he has been learning from the wild animals to the handling of domestic animals. In part one Kyle introduces us to the animals who have been his teachers.

There’s Wyatt the wolf pup who developed cataracts and needed eye drops. There’s Maggie the sea lion. At 33 she was the oldest sea lion in a US zoo. She was rescued from a facility where she had had minimal handling. She now needed specialized care to see her comfortably through her geriatric years. And Rosie a giraffe who was injured as a young animal, who very much made her preferences known to the handlers involved in her on-going rehab. And Kie, another sea lion who taught Kyle to listen carefully to the animals in his care.

In this episode Kyle introduces us to his animal teachers and shares some of the important lessons they taught him.