APPLE VALLEY, Minn. — The time is 7:30 a.m. at the Minnesota Zoo, and it opens at 9.
Zookeeper Maggie Estby is knocking out a number of tasks, like preparing breakfast for a family of endangered tigers. And forget Frosted Flakes! These guys eat horse meat with added vitamins and nutrients.
Toronto Zoo researchers developed the diet, and it allows snacks.
"I'm just gonna put some gloves on first," Estby said. "This is chunk muscle meat. We use this as kind of like treat meat … This is something the cats usually really enjoy."
Now Estby leads the way to a behind-the-scenes den, where everyone must mask up to help protect the tigers from COVID, she says.
"So if you guys wanna just make sure the bar door is closed behind you," she said.
And there they all are, including two special cubs. Brother and sister Andre and Amalia were born at the Zoo back in May as part of an international species survival plan.
They're getting big.
"We're getting to the point where we do have to separate the cubs when we're feeding them," Estby said.
But filial piety: Estby feeds their parents and older siblings first.
"This is dad, Luca, down here," she said. "Hi buddy. Good morning."
Whether wild or zoo, tiger fathers don't have anything to do with their cubs after breeding is over. So, the twins stay close to their mom, Dari. After all, they're still nursing. Plus, Dari's a pro. This is her third and likely last liter.
Dari's backstory stands on its own, but in short: Dari's mother neglected her and the Minnesota Zoo intervened to keep the lineage alive. Curator Diana Weinhardt has known Dari since she was born.
"Well, it took a little bit of work, but she's got a great team," Weinhardt said. "We all went to garage sales and just got a bunch of toys for her when she was a cub, and now her cubs are - we have sturdier equipment now, but these cubs are, they're tough!"
Meal time is loud.
"They're getting very, very, vocal," Estby said between roars.
But no one's upset. The cubs are just finding their voice, she said.
"She's chuffing at me when I do that, which is a friendly greeting," said Dr. Annie Revis while joining Estby on the other side of the den at around 8 a.m. for a mock medical check.
Revis is the Minnesota Zoo's director of animal health.
"This has been my dream job," Revis said. "I've wanted to be a vet and really a zoo vet since I was 3 years old."
In the mock medical check, the cubs take turns lining up and laying down between two wooden boards.
"Lay down," Revis said. "There you go, good."
They're rewarded with treats, just like a house pet. By the way, Andre weighs about the size of a large dog, 50 pounds. Amalia, 45 -- and growing.
"Especially going into winter here, we want them to kind of keep that cub chub on," Estby said. "It's easy to tell them apart from a distance by their tails."
Dr. Reevis is now lightly pinching their furry butts - and not just cuz they're cute. It's so they can get used to human touch and the feel of an injection.
"All of our tigers get very similar vaccines that your domestic cat would get, so rabies vaccines, the feline viral diseases and the kind of unique one is they also get vaccinated for canine distemper, which is, you know, thought of as a dog problem but our big cats are also susceptible to it," Revis said.
The cubs were vaccinated shortly after birth and are caught up on shots now. They're not taking any meds either.
"So, unless there's a problem, we don't check on them," Revis explained.
But for this demo, Dr. Reevis shines a flashlight to check their golden-brown eyes.
Now it's 8:30 a.m. and Estby must prepare the public tiger den. She carries outside what looks like three silicone bunt cake pans and places them spaciously apart on the ground.
"This is a bloodsicle," Estby said. "This is the blood leftover from where we get their meat … Mix it with a little bit of water, freeze it, and it becomes an awesome treat for these guys."
Next, she sprays perfume on a large pumpkin and other enrichment items on the ground like antlers and tree logs.
"It's just perfume," Estby said with a chuckle. "Yep, this is actual body spray for humans and they love it."
Now, she's checking the entire perimeter for any openings in the fence. This is a very important step.
"I mean, we're putting tigers out there, which is very dangerous, and overnight you never know what happened," Estby said. "You know, trees fall. Storms happen. It gets windy."
She also checks around for new scratch marks. Zookeepers want to protect the trees from big cat claws, so sometimes they wrap them to discourage the tigers from climbing up too far.
Guess what also travels far: tiger pee! So Estby wipes down the windows every morning to ensure visitors have a clear view of the glass.
And already, she can see some guests. That's because people with Minnesota Zoo Memberships are allowed onto the grounds early.
In fact, the Minnesota Zoo reports every day since September, when the striped siblings made their public debut, zoo members have been showing up in time to catch the moment Dari and her cubs enter the den for the day.
"They're so very cute," one zoogoer said.
"I just want to cuddle 'em," another responded.
The cubs always stay out until only Dari decides it's time to go back to the private sleeping quarters, which on this day turns out to be 1:45 p.m. Tigers are mostly nocturnal, you know.
The Minnesota Zoo is currently open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily, including weekends.