In the weeks that ensue after the dimetrodon mission, several keepers do their rounds while also reflecting on their work at the park.
- Action Mom: Baylene the brachiosaurus matriarch has just enough energy left in her to personally discipline whippersnappers and would-be usurpers in her herd despite her old age, and has a fully grown adult son named Adin.
- A Day in the Limelight: This chapter serves as such for ornithischian keeper Cass Cheng, her mammal carnivore keeper sister Tina, hoofstock keeper Horace Northup, and sauropod keeper Mohinder Chandra. Also serves as a fairly minor one of these for Kyle at the very end.
- Authority in Name Only: Gertie and Sua, the elderly alpha females of the apatosaurus and brontosaurus herds (respectively) largely leave all the heavy lifting to their respective younger and stronger enforcers.
- Beary Friendly: The arctotherium are shown to get along fairly well over the course of their appearance in this chapter, with the two cubs in particular even shown playfully wrestling with each other.
- Boring, but Practical: Horace's justification for the use of exercise balls as enrichment items for the glyptodonts and similar animals. As he himself knows from experience, what this method of enrichment lacks in creativity is more than made up for in achieving desired results.
- Deliberate Values Dissonance: The current troubled dynamic between Cass and Tina Cheng is explained in this chapter to be partially a result of their parents having raised them (but particularly Tina) to view such sibling dynamics to be perfectly acceptable as a result of as much largely being the case in their ancestral home of Vietnam.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Spiny the juvenile dimetrodon briefly appears, getting bullied away from the lake by Rommel. This sets the tone for his later appearances.
- Foil: Baylene the brachiosaurus is shown to be this to apatosaurus and brontosaurus contemporaries Gertie and Sua. All three of them are elderly matriarchs of their respective species' herds. However, while Gertie and Sua largely just hang back and leave all the heavy lifting to much younger and stronger enforcers, Baylene herself still has just enough energy in her despite her old age to be able to personally discipline whippersnappers in her herd; usually with a dizzying slap against them with her tail.
- Gentle Giant Sauropod: All the Morrison formation sauropods behave fairly nicely and don't cause too much trouble. But that doesn't prevent some of them from using serious force when needed.
- Interspecies Friendship: Horace is shown to have developed one of these with Dermot the doedicurus. Cass is similarly shown to have developed one of these with Einstein the pachycephalosaurus.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Cass always includes an apple amongst her lunch every day. Unfortunately, this leads to Einstein the pachycephalosaurus constantly trying to steal them from her after one incident of him managing to get a bite of one causes him to start considering the fruit his personal favorite snack as well.
- Troll: Einstein the pachycephalosaurus proves to be this towards his primary keeper Cass by virtue of both attempting to constantly steal her apples and leading her on chases whenever he successfully gets ahold of them.
