We would like to welcome Riley Hill who recently joined our amazing team at the Saginaw Children’s Zoo, in early September, as the new Animal Nutrition Lead. Riley comes to Michigan from Illinois, as she moved here from her previous home late this past summer.

We are thrilled to have her on the team and would like to welcome her to the Zoo and celebrate National Vet Tech week we thought we would introduce her to you.

Q & A With Riley 

Q: What are your favorite hobbies and interests?
A: I love reading, watching crime documentaries, and baking.

Q: Where did you go to school?
A: I went to school at University Wisconsin Platteville and got a Bachelor of Science in Biology emphasis in zoology. Throughout my time in school, I completed internships that gave me experience in both animal keeping and animal nutrition, including leadership responsibilities.

Q: What was it like moving to Michigan and starting a job in a new state?
A: It was definitely a big change, but I was also excited to start a new chapter in my life and experience something new!

Q: What made you want to work in Animal Nutrition and with Animals in general?
A: Nutrition plays such an important role in an animal’s health and well-being, so being able to help prepare their diets every day is very rewarding to me. I love knowing that I get to play a part in keeping the animals healthy and thriving.

Q: Favorite part about your job?
A: My favorite part of the job is the team that I get to work with. Everyone has been so welcoming and nice, and it really made the transition so easy.

Q: Most difficult part of your job?
A: Time management, it is important that we are here every day to make the diets for the animals while making sure we have time in our day to do our other responsibilities like going shopping, inventories, restocking, cleaning and more.

Q: Favorite part about Michigan so far?
A: My favorite part of being in Michigan so far is having a change of scenery and getting to know the area, especially now with the fall coming and seeing all the colors come out.

Q: Process of putting together diets and quality of food you look for?
A: We start by preparing the diets for the animals that receive produce. We look for fresh, high-quality produce and follow the rule that we wouldn’t feed the animals anything that we wouldn’t consider good enough to eat ourselves. At the end of the day, we prepare the fish and meat diets. We check the fish for freezer burn and inspect the meat and whole prey to make sure everything is safe and acceptable to feed to the animals.

Q: Do you have a favorite animal species to make diets for?
A: My favorite animal species diet to make would have to be the Capuchin.

Q: Animal with the toughest diet to prep?
A: The toughest diet to prep would have to be our barred owl, Hoot.

Please join us in welcoming Riley, not only to the Saginaw Children’s Zoo, but to Michigan and the Great Lakes Bay Community!