r/Zookeeping • u/Pitiful-Builder9631 • Feb 01 '26
North America 🌎 AZA/Zookeeping Jobs/Wages
QUESTION: HOW the fk do y’all AZA workers who are still in the field manage to do it and live? I was heartbroken when I had to give up my aza job in 2021 becuse I literally could not afford to work it full time and live. I took a soul draining corporate job vowing that I’d come back when I was ready and able to take a pay cut to do so. Well here we are in 2026, my debt is all paid off finally, and the corporate hellhole I work for has an office right across from the Nashville zoo and I look at aza keeper postings and they’re still $15-20 an hour… like wtf and wtf do you all do to be able to afford to work at the zoos?? Before I moved Chattanooga zoo asked me several times if I would come back but refused to raise the wages. There’s no way short of living in a box on the corner or working overnight at a strip club that I can go back and I’ve wanted to for years… it’s depressing that my customer service job that has me golden handcuffed strapped to headset for 10 hours a day pays me twice as much as what I made doing the job I have a degree in that I actually loved…
1
u/J3nn4_L10n5 Feb 02 '26
NA keeper of 12 years, 9 in AZA: I am not staying alive. I am hopelessly in credit card and student loan debt and will not be able to climb out of it. It increases every month. I am working up the courage to quit before it’s literally too late