Joey Ratliff and his son Joselito. Joey's wife Cindy works with sea lions at the Audubon Institute. It looks like Joey is getting ready to to a Larry Allen Dean
Marco Peters SPLASH set up at the Mississippi State Fair
Courtesy of Joey
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Marco Peter's SPLASH
Posted by
Wade G. Burck
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9 comments:
The first time I saw Marco's set-up was at the STL Sport Show a few years ago. He had Emil Popescu's patagonian females. His show is great, funny and accurate facts. He was doing photos with the girls. People walk up, some try to pet the sea lions, etc. -- scared the hell out of me. My wife Kathy just stayed in amazement to see if someone would get bit. Never happened. A credit to good animals and good care by Marco.
Jim,
A sea lion not biting someone/something in that situation, may not be so much of a credit to anything as much as it may be simple shit house luck. LOL
Wade
The photo of my son and I is one of those photo ops they sell. They gave us a couple for free. Real nice folks, let us see the backside of the trailer, kitchen and how it all breaks down.
I thought maybe these were seals at NO Zoo. I didn't look at the picture really close to see it was the Squalus show. It appears to me, and I know zero about critters in the water, that the animal behind Mr. Ratliff is snarling at the one on the other side of his son. Do they snarl or growl or show aggression? I just read how they don't care about innocent bystanders getting hurt in the wild. It seems up to 2/3 of a groups pups can be killed during mating season, being run over by males aggressively trying to get to a female. Is a bite from one of these pretty bad? I assume they carry some kind of bad fish bacteria in their teeth.
Casey,
I think like any animal without a voice box and a spoken language, they snarl and growl as a means of communicating. See what happens when you don't address it to the expert. Any goof can offer insight.LOL
The worst animal injury I have ever seen was sustained on the calf of the leg of the head sea lion trainer at Marineland named Carl when he got between a bull sea lion and 3 females. The infection is supposedly devastating. It was a "marine fungus" infection that Ika the White Tiger sustained on his toe, which necessitated the eventual amputation of the leg.
Funniest thing I have ever seen is a sea lion assistant trainer standing between a door with a sheet of plywood trying to keep the bull sea lion from leaving the ring and heading back to the holding pens when one of the females in back barked. It was like trying to nail jelly to a tree. His head would disconnect at about his chest, and his and open mouth would start "whipping" left and right as he was on a dead run. Looked like an out of control McCullough chain saw, and left a pretty clear message of what his intentions were. He learned to slam the bottom corner of the "plywood block" and go right under. His name was Taz, short for Tasmanian.Affectionately, of course.
Wade
Casey, the one behind me is Alicia and she yawned right as the picture was taken. We liked it because she did look like she was yelling at us. The other animal is Minnie, these are Marco's original two Patagonians. This unit now has two Californias also, so they do a two part show, first with the "big girls" then with the "ego trippers".
SO what looked to me like "I am gonna come down there and chew off your face" is actually just a yawn. I think I will be staying off the beaches and outta the ocean,,,lol
Casey,
We have to also assume when they are done yawning, that they will carry you to safety, ala Montecore and Shaman.
Wade
Take it easy fellows. Remember, I'm the yutz standing next to her.
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