Part 1 - The Enrichment for the Sun Bears

Text by Ng Wai Pak
 
While we are waiting for the new bear house construction to be finished, the bears still have to keep in cages. Thus, to reduce the stress and boring level of our bears, enrichments are very important for them. Enrichment can be done in many ways which include physical construction, introducing new elements, foods, toys, arrangement of the facilities and cleanliness.  
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At the moment, our bear house has three exercise enclosures. Each of them was facilitated with various enrichments which includes heavy and hard wood logs, rock pool, water tank, dried leaves and decay wood with termites, to create a place that is as close as their natural habitat. All the bears will take turn to be released into the exercise enclosure in daily basis.

Sun bears like to bite and destroy. Branches, twigs and decay woods are their natural toys.

Our bears like to roll on the dried leaves as it makes them feels like rolling on the forest floor.

To ensure our bears are fully utilizing all the enrichments and learn or revise the basic skills such as forage, digging, destroying and climbing, foods is always the best incentives. Normally, we cut fruits into various sizes and hide them in different places in the exercise enclosures. We have to think creative and try to not put the food in the same place for the same bear. Bears are smart and they really do remember where to search for their favorite banana and papaya.

Foods were hidden in different places to encourage our bears to exercise and foraging.

The bears have to forage in the rock pool, and this keeps them active.

Sun bears can be quite arboreal. Enrichment should encourage them to climb.

In the next article, I will still talk about the enrichments that we do in BSBCC. Hope to get your feed back and comments. Thank you.