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110 6 Environmental Enrichment: Opportunities for Learning

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Figure 6.4 Giraffes at Belo Horizonte Zoo, Brazil. One male associated an electric shock with receipt of succulent
leaves. Note the hotwire fence just above the wooden fence. Source: Fundação de Parques Municipais e Zoobotânica.

and a number of studies have already shown during these learning periods can result in
that obesity is on the rise in captive animals captive animals not recognising their prey
(Morfeld et al. 2014). species if they were released back to the wild.
Food beyond being a primary reinforce- For example, captive cheetah that had been
ment is a source of many sensory stimuli fed cow meat upon reintroduction in Africa
such as visual, olfactory, and tactile which we tried to hunt inappropriate species such as
have already considered. It is also a source of giraffe and rhinoceroses (Young 1997).
gustatory enrichment. From the colour,
smell, feel, and taste of food animals can
learn about the relative nutritional value of 6.8 Discussion
different food items to them (Rowe and
Skelhorn 2005; Werner et al. 2008; Passos During the process of environmental enrich-
et al. 2014). A redder fruit might indicate a ment animals are learning all the time about
sweeter and more energy rich food item to a the new stimuli in their environment and any
primate species, for example. However, if contingencies created by these stimuli. If
zoos or laboratories preprocess food items by these learning opportunities are carefully
peeling fruit and chopping it up, many of managed they add value to the use of environ-
these contingencies may be difficult for ani- mental enrichment and in the zoo environ-
mals to learn (Sandri et al. 2017). ment this can be through facilitating the four
In general, we have only discussed associa- objectives of the modern zoo in terms of con-
tive and non‐associative learning and not servation, research, education, and leisure.
mentioned processes such as imprinting and Much of the benefits of environmental
sensitive periods. Many species learn what to enrichment come from animals learning about
eat during a sensitive period (a learning win- their environment, which makes their environ-
dow) and imprint on that type of food ment more interesting. In some cases such as
(Burghardt and Hess 1966; Burghardt 1969). the use of nutritional environmental enrich-
Failure to provide appropriate food items ment, food is the primary reinforcement which