Exploring and Mitigating Visitor Effects on Reptile Welfare

Many people, especially children, may learn best through tactile experiences. As a result, guests who view animals housed behind glass barriers will often interact with the glass in some way. This may include more passive interactions, like silently pressing palms against the glass, or potentially loud disruptive interactions, like tapping, hitting, or kicking the glass. These types of interactions, both silent and loud, may have negative impacts on animal welfare. These concerns are particularly relevant to amphibian and reptile taxa, which are frequently housed in glass-walled habitats and tend to be understudied in comparison to mammalian species. The Detroit Zoological Society aspires to engage in humane education that builds empathy in guests towards the non-human residents of the Zoo. Beginning in 2022, we began designing and testing strategies to decrease guest interactions with glass and increase animal welfare in the Holden Reptile Conservation Center (HRCC). We designed prohibitive signage instructing guests not to touch the glass as well as empathetic signage that explained why glass interactions were potentially harmful to the animals and offered alternative actions to engage with the animals. The empathetic signage featured a photo of the animal with language in the first-person to help build connections between guests and the animals. We conducted observations in 2022 and 2023 during peak visitor season, recording both animal and guest behaviors. While the empathetic signage has been successful at reducing both loud and quiet glass interactions, we haven’t seen corresponding benefits to animal welfare. This suggests we may need to lower glass-interactions further to improve animal welfare. Our ongoing investigations are testing further strategies, such as reader-rails with 3-D printed models and information for tactile engagement.