They’re Just Absolutely Nuts About the Zoo

At 9:30 a.m., five days a week, Jerry Murrey can be found at the San Diego Zoo sitting at a picnic table, drinking a cup of coffee and shooting the breeze with the elephant trainers.

They bat around some good zoo gossip, or discuss a problem they’re having with an animal. When the break is over and the keepers go back to work, Jerry stays and finishes his coffee.

Jerry is not an employee. He is a zoo regular, a self-proclaimed “zoo nut.”

Murrey and about a dozen other zoo patrons who visit the park practically every day, rain or shine, holiday or no holiday, are known as zoo nuts and have become virtually institutions at the park.

Most of these regulars are retired and the zoo is a second home, a place they can go to see their favorite animals and talk to other regulars or employees they have come to know over the years.

According to Marsha Beegle, a park security officer who knows most of the zoo nuts by name, there are other people who are crazy about the zoo, local photographers and some of the zoo’s administration included. But they are not really zoo nuts, she said.

“I’ve always liked the zoo ever since I was little,” said the 52-year-old Murrey. “I come in the morning and have my coffee, then usually wander around and talk to the help and talk to the animals.”

Murrey has been coming regularly for 10 years.

According to park employee Roger Flores, most of the regulars have whittled their tastes down to one species of animal and spend most of their time in that area of the park. Some have even earned nicknames like the “tiger lady” or the “gorilla man.”

Elephants are Murrey’s turf. He knows the park’s seven elephants by name and has followed one of them, Debbie, since she started out in the children’s zoo about seven years ago.

“They seem to have more personality than any other animal, they act different and all have their own ways of doing things,” Murrey said, as he pointed each of them out.

His straw hat is covered with buttons and pictures of animals in zoos across the country that he has “adopted,” meaning he helps pays for their feed. He even had the honor of naming one of the animals, a water dragon lizard up in the Los Angeles Zoo. The lizard is named Sam.

Murrey first being addicted during his early childhood visits to the Milwaukee County Zoo. Labels can sometimes be nasty but Murrey is quite proud of his zoo nuttiness. His car is adorned with a personalized ZOO NUT license plate, he passes out Zoo Nut business cards, and to top it off, he is listed in the San Diego phone book as Jerry Zoonut, right below the Zoological Society of San Diego.

Not even the heart attack Murrey suffered last month can keep him from his visits.

“As soon as I was able to get around on my own, I went to the zoo,” he said, but he added that he’s taking it easier and has stopped climbing the park’s hilly trails.

Because he has donated such a large amount of money to the zoo, over $10,000, he is a lifetime member. But the San Diego Zoo just isn’t enough; he also carries an annual pass to the Los Angeles Zoo and visits other zoos across the country whenever he has a chance.

According to zoo spokesman Jeff Juett, the number of regular visitors has dropped slightly since the zoo’s main restaurant was closed for remodeling earlier this year. People used to come in and have breakfast when the park opened at 9 a.m., he said, but now, until the facility reopens around Easter, they are forced to eat elsewhere.

The cost for a yearly pass to the park, which is the mainstay among the regulars, varies from about $40 to $11 for senior citizens. Some, like Murrey, have contributed enough money to be given lifetime passes.

Animals aren’t the only reason that many come to the zoo. Rosa Payne and many others do their daily walking at the park. Rosa has been at it for almost four years. “It’s a nice place to come and walk, for the exercise and the scenery. And it’s safe,” she said.

Suzi Leigh has visited the zoo almost every day for the past three years. At first she covered the entire park, but that was before she fell in love with the primates, she said. Leigh has become so familiar with them that now she reads to them and shows them pictures out of her Zoo Books magazine, which she and her husband, Charles, help support.

“They’re our closest relatives,” said Leigh, reflecting on why the monkeys and large apes are so special to her. “I’ve just fallen in love with them, they’re so endearing to me.”

Leigh claims that most of her animal friends know her on sight. According to primate keeper Rick Schiller, she’s probably right.

“Sure, monkeys can recognize people,” Schiller said as he cut up a nice vegetable and fruit entree for one of the monkeys. “After a while, they begin to recognize and figure out who the regulars are.”

Schiller added that he and most other keepers like having regular visitors like Leigh keeping an eye on things. Quite often they notice things that a keeper might miss, he said, whether it be problems with an animal or a tourist attempting to tease them.

“They help us. Since we don’t have time to patrol outside the cages, they catch things that we don’t normally have time to catch,” he said.

“I look forward to seeing them when they come because they are people who appreciate and respect the animals,” Schiller said. “It’s nice having someone around for the love of the zoo and animals, not just some of the more showy parts of the park.”

Because the regulars are often familiar with some of the individual animals, they are able to tell if the animal is not feeling well or isn’t acting normal.

Norman Smith, 68, dons a bright red cap and carries a set of binoculars. He had been watching one antelope carefully for the past few weeks and noticed that the animal was acting a bit out of the ordinary, so he asked a keeper. The keeper found that the animal was in heat.

Smith also has come to know one of the brown bears. “Chester is very sensitive to people. He doesn’t like it when people stare at him. It gets him edgy,” Smith said.

Although he enjoys being around animals, Smith has no pets in his small apartment because that would be cruel and unfair, he said. Instead, he begins his day at the zoo, where he can see almost any animal on earth. It has been part of his daily routine for the past four years.

“It’s a wonderful place to come and start your day and say ‘Hi’ to the animals,” he said.

Some of the zoo nuts know the place as well or better than many of its employees. Murrey knows the zoo’s history and environs so well that he takes it upon himself to answer questions from curious tourists and can give directions to get to almost any animal in the park.

Murrey recalled one of the more memorable zoo events of the past decade--Brooke Shields’ internship in the summer of 1983.

Shields received citywide attention while taking part in a school project that allowed her to spend a month at the zoo as a student intern. She worked as a regular keeper, taking care of the animals and cleaning cages.

One morning she had coffee with Murrey and some of the keepers. After talking to her he said he couldn’t understand why she was receiving so much attention.

“She was a very nice lady and very well mannered,” Murrey remembered, “She tried to work as hard as possible.” But, he says, she was always being bothered by people trying to take a picture or have her sign an autograph.

“I really shouldn’t say anything,” he said, chuckling, “because I can remember taking a picture of her, too.”

Murrey isn’t the only one who has a memory for zoo trivia. Frank Bernoski can remember getting into the zoo for free when he worked as a bus driver back in 1943.

“I can remember when it cost 25 to get in here. Now it costs $6,” said Bernoski, 73, who has been a mainstay at the zoo almost every day for the past 11 years.

In fact, Frank is a favorite among zoo employees and if he doesn’t show up at his usual 10:45 a.m., someone calls his home to see if he is all right. Some of the employees around the park even carry his heart pills with them in case he has any problems.

Frank credits his wife for getting him into the zoo habit. She loved the outdoors and had a particular fondness for Balboa Park. After she died, he just kept coming. In her memory, he continues to buy two passes to their favorite place every year.