Learning How Animals Get Their Sleep On

Friday, June 24, 2011 at 2:24 PM

When ideastream reporter/producer Anne Glausser visited the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo for her recent 90.3 WCPN report, ”Animal Sleep,” observing the animals sleeping in their various habitats helped set the stage for the story. But it was also really quiet. And this was a radio story.

“When you experience something that’s rich visually, the challenge is to recreate that for the listeners,” she explained.

“The coolest sound was the gorilla,” Anne said. “He was sitting in his nest and suddenly popped up and beat his chest. The sound was very hollow. It was if he knew I was having trouble getting some good-quality animal sounds.

“I also liked seeing the zoo curator’s reaction. You could see the awe she had for the animals in her care.”

Learning more about how mammals sleep was a good lead in to what we know - and don’t know - about our own species’ slumber habits for ideastream’s Sleep: A Wake-Up Call, a multiple-media exploration of sleep, and why many of us don’t get enough of it.

“We came up with the idea of doing a story on animal sleep when we were brainstorming ways to talk about the concept of sleep,” she said. “All animals sleep in one way or another. It’s the common thread between us, our pets and wild animals. Sleep is the ubiquitous thing that we share… and don’t know much about.”

And, after visiting the Zoo, whose sleep habits is Anne most envious of?

“The ones that can take mid-afternoon naps - the lions on the hills taking their siestas,” she said.

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Health, Sleep: A Wake-Up Call

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