Living It Up: Training Sea Lions

Jackie: "Now I know here you can swim with the dolphins or you can interact with the sea lions, why do you prefer to work with the sea lions?"

Allison: "I just like their personalities, they are kind of like dogs with big flippers, just a lot of fun and very outgoing."

Jackie: "And they are pretty easy to interact with you said, you reward them with the fish."

Allison: "Yeah basically we use operant conditioning techniques, desired behavior is reinforced and unwanted behavior is ignored."

Jackie: "Now how much fish would they eat in a day?"

Allison: "Well they all have their own diet based on age, activity level, pregnancy, even time of year, usually varies from 10 pounds of fish to 40 pounds of fish a day."

Jackie: "Oh look it, it loves its tummy rubbed, how sweet... so they love affection don't they Allison?"

Allison: "They seem to enjoy it."

Allison: "They communicate with each other through vocalizations and postural displays."

Allison: "You are going to ask her to target, like that and then you ask her for behaviors, like speak,"

Jackie: "Target, shark."

Jackie: "Target, smile."

Allison: "What do you think about dolphins classy?"

Jackie: "Classy show me a dolphin."

Jackie: "They are very graceful in the water."

Jackie: "Now I'm going to teach Classy to catch a frisbee."

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Contact: jjohnson@wsvn.com

Theater of the Sea

84721 Overseas

Island Morada, FL 33036

305-664-2431

www.theaterofthesea.com