What's the worst animal-related smell you've ever experienced at work?
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The Crickets I keep as live food for my lizard reek...
Kakapo
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I think most zoochatters don't work at zoo, only the most lucky ones. So many of them will not experience bad animal smell at their works. However, despite not working in a zoo, I work with animals (with live seafood for markets). One day we bought two giant European lobsters (Homarus gammarus). One of them died. In the next day, I got it out of water. Despite being only one day dead, it smell was really terrible. One can smell it several meters away.
Outside of work, the worst animal smell that I noticed was the one of a pig kept at a small village. It was enclosed in a small place inside a closed building, and probably its excrements and urine was not cleaned for ages. Opening the door of the building was like a kick to the smell sense.
Outside of work, the worst animal smell that I noticed was the one of a pig kept at a small village. It was enclosed in a small place inside a closed building, and probably its excrements and urine was not cleaned for ages. Opening the door of the building was like a kick to the smell sense.
A co-worker's post-Christmas flatulence. The were only two of us in the offices (during the Christmas break) and I think they must have been letting fly repeatedly in their own small office for most of the day perhaps sub-consciously thinking they were on her own -probably reinforced by not having seen me till late in the day when I walked in. It was like walking into an invisible wall of sewerage stench, it quite took my breath away as I awaited my nose getting used to the smell (and "normalising it") whilst trying not to flee.
I've dealt with smelly coworkers. One who didn't wear deodorant and one I have currently who has to dump at the same time every day. You know just to avoid the bathroom that time of day.
Giant anteater diarrhea. In the end, I had to throw away the pants covered with it.
Closely followed by liquefying carcesses (just cleaned a full box this morning) left outdoors, purulent / gangrenous infections and bursting abscesses, especially in the GIT and genital tract, fouling fetuses, anal gland infections, neglected pig farms, working in the slaughterhouse in the summer...
Then skunk spray, maned wolves and bush dog in groups, stressed gorillas, vampire bat colonies, blasts of whales, vomit & feces of various carnivorous / piscivorous species (among others, crows fed on cat food, defecating large pythons/cobras...).
How all of them smelled? They made me envy people like BeakerUK...and significantly decreased my sensitivity to smell. However, humans can smell worse.
Closely followed by liquefying carcesses (just cleaned a full box this morning) left outdoors, purulent / gangrenous infections and bursting abscesses, especially in the GIT and genital tract, fouling fetuses, anal gland infections, neglected pig farms, working in the slaughterhouse in the summer...
Then skunk spray, maned wolves and bush dog in groups, stressed gorillas, vampire bat colonies, blasts of whales, vomit & feces of various carnivorous / piscivorous species (among others, crows fed on cat food, defecating large pythons/cobras...).
How all of them smelled? They made me envy people like BeakerUK...and significantly decreased my sensitivity to smell. However, humans can smell worse.
Dead Lion. Smelled like a dead Lion.
You must have had some interesting jobs. Skunk spray isn't bad from a distance but pretty bad if you're up close. I was with a friend and he hit one with his car and that stench was overpowering. I also agree that humans can smell worse.
Just one (profession).
On an everyday basis. the pigmy hippos are probably hard to beat
I can relate to that!
The worst smell came from a man who regularly came to the library I worked in. There was also a woman who was only slightly less smelly.
Slightly off-thread, as this wasn't at work, the worst human smell I ever witnessed was on a U-Bahn carriage in Berlin. I'm not sure how to describe it -the nearest I can get was a scruffy man, possibly a vagrant, possibly having soiled himself, intermixed with some noxious industrial cleaning product (which itself was foul but didn't mask the other smells) -something for everyone's gag reflex.
I was already seated when the man came in the carriage and as he (thankfully) walked to the far end everyone's heads raised, their faces showing a mixture of trauma, alarm and confusion. Language was not a barrier -our "body language" united us all as we looked at each other to confirm, "yes, it is that bad, but what the hell is it?".
I and a couple of others on the carriage quickly arose and opened windows. Following that it was an endurance test to my stop three along the line. I tried to breath through my mouth, not gag, and work out exactly what the smell(s) was.
Even among the horror there was a little light relief. The next stop, following the smell-monger getting on, a young guy came into the carriage and immediately saw loads of empty seats down the far end of the carriage occupied by (now) only the "star attraction". He seemed quite pleased with this (the smell obviously not having hit him yet) and he quickly moved to choose from all the wonderful seats available -he got around five steps into the "inner contamination zone" before he obviously hit the wall of stench and literally spun 180 degrees on a heel and walked back very quickly, very confused of face. He opened the remaining two unopened windows as he did so. This scene was like something out of a Farrelly Brothers movie.
I was already seated when the man came in the carriage and as he (thankfully) walked to the far end everyone's heads raised, their faces showing a mixture of trauma, alarm and confusion. Language was not a barrier -our "body language" united us all as we looked at each other to confirm, "yes, it is that bad, but what the hell is it?".
I and a couple of others on the carriage quickly arose and opened windows. Following that it was an endurance test to my stop three along the line. I tried to breath through my mouth, not gag, and work out exactly what the smell(s) was.
Even among the horror there was a little light relief. The next stop, following the smell-monger getting on, a young guy came into the carriage and immediately saw loads of empty seats down the far end of the carriage occupied by (now) only the "star attraction". He seemed quite pleased with this (the smell obviously not having hit him yet) and he quickly moved to choose from all the wonderful seats available -he got around five steps into the "inner contamination zone" before he obviously hit the wall of stench and literally spun 180 degrees on a heel and walked back very quickly, very confused of face. He opened the remaining two unopened windows as he did so. This scene was like something out of a Farrelly Brothers movie.
Jaguar poop was my first experience with "God this reeks so bad I can't stand it" (I'm mostly immune to it now), then armadillo/anteater/aardvark poop (anything that eats insectivore diet pretty much)... but really what makes me gag now is macaque poop.
I don't work at a zoo, but I think Emperor Tamarins smell terrible.
A really big colony of gannets on a day without much wind takes some beating. The accumulation of the residues from the digestion of many thousand mackerel really builds up.
Many of the body odours of humans and other mammals are caused by small amounts of esters of medium chain fatty acids from the decomposition of more complex esters in sweat and urine. When I worked with a range of fatty acids in a food research lab nearly 50 years ago, the one I remember most vividly was a pure sample of a octanoic acid: it smelled of the sweatiest sweat imaginable, with the addition of a sharp acid note which caught the back of my throat like vinegar (which contains acetic/ethanoic acid). The animal relationship is that this acid was first extracted from the urine of billy goats, hence its old name of capric acid, the similar compounds known as caproic acid and caprylic acid were also isolated from this notoriously smelly source. Tiny amounts of these chemicals produce the characteristic pungency of goats cheese. After one cautious sniff of the pure chemical, I have always loathed goats cheese.
Many of the body odours of humans and other mammals are caused by small amounts of esters of medium chain fatty acids from the decomposition of more complex esters in sweat and urine. When I worked with a range of fatty acids in a food research lab nearly 50 years ago, the one I remember most vividly was a pure sample of a octanoic acid: it smelled of the sweatiest sweat imaginable, with the addition of a sharp acid note which caught the back of my throat like vinegar (which contains acetic/ethanoic acid). The animal relationship is that this acid was first extracted from the urine of billy goats, hence its old name of capric acid, the similar compounds known as caproic acid and caprylic acid were also isolated from this notoriously smelly source. Tiny amounts of these chemicals produce the characteristic pungency of goats cheese. After one cautious sniff of the pure chemical, I have always loathed goats cheese.
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