Lessons from America: the proper zoo policy

[airiefairie.livejournal.com]

We have probably all heard by now about the controversial decisions at the Copenhagen zoo to put down a giraffe and feed it to the lions in front of the visiting children, and to subsequently put down a few lion cubs because they were planning to introduce a new adult male lion to the zoo, and they were concerned that he would have killed the cubs anyway. People were naturally appalled. There were lots of discussions about animal rights, the treatment of animals in the zoos, etc. Even some satire.

Now there is a new story that I am sure is about to cause all hell breaking loose once more,

Bern zoo faces flak over second bear cub death

...And there is of course a pre-story to that:

Bern zoo under fire after bear eats baby cub

Another act of inhumane treatment of animals, I am sure many would argue. And they would be right, to a point. However, if we are to look at the problem a bit closer, we may begin to realise that there is more to those two stories than just that. Indeed, it seems the problem runs much deeper than most of the audience is probably suspecting. Because one or two cases like these could be possibly interpreted as incidental acts of cruelty and poor judgment/management - but when there is a wide-spread tendency, there must be a systematic flaw in the, well, system. And as it turns out, there really is:

How many healthy animals do zoos put down?

Apart from the side point that is being made in the article, namely that, while this problem tends to affect animals of almost all species, but only the "large and charismatic" ones tend to make the headlines, there is also the central part of the problem:

""We do it when it's necessary," [Copenhagen Zoo's Scientific Director] says. "If I should take an average over 10 years - it could be probably something like 20, 30 [per year]."

"That figure includes some smaller animals, not just the big "charismatic megafauna" that have the potential to make headline news. At the larger end of the scale, Copenhagen Zoo has put down leopards, tigers, lions, bears, antelopes and hippos in recent years, as well as the young giraffe, Marius."

And this is obviously not just in Denmark. The various breeding programmes around Europe include such necessary actions like the so called "management euthanisation", and not just of ill animals. The overall number is really staggering: 3-5 thousand annually. But why? What is causing this? Is it rampant mismanagement? Or something else?

Well, turns out the European zoo association (EAZA) has adopted a "breed and cull" policy, at least for a number of species, which often results in huge surpluses of animals that cannot be possibly accommodated by the international zoo system, no matter how much the exchange of animals is intensified between zoos.

In the meantime, most American zoos extensively use the practice of contraception to prevent such a surplus, and have thus been able to control their populations for the most part. The conclusion is inescapable: the two zoo systems (Europe and America) have adopted two very different approaches to population management, and the most reasonable way to decrease the probability of healthy animals being killed due to overpopulation or under controversial pretexts like in these recent cases, is to adopt the American approach. Otherwise the problem will not only stay, it will be getting more serious with time.

There is probably at least one positive effect from this recent stream of unpleasant news coming from around the European zoos. It is that these cases may have finally triggered a debate about the proper treatment of animals in an artificial environment that the European public should have probably had a very long time ago.

Comments

[allhatnocattle.livejournal.com]

Hmm, you point out the strange dual nature of the American Zoo. On the one hand conservationist (to the extent of the preservationist) role that zoos play. With zoo keepers not only caring for the animals, but better learning about the animals. If not for zoos some species of tigers (for example) would all be extinct.

On the other hand zoos rarely release captive breeds back into the wilds. In fact they American zoos limit their breeding to numbers that zoos can accommodate. And most zebra (for example) are not penning the endangered breeds in zoos, but more commonly keeping the more common (cost effective?) plains/savannah zebra in direct contrast to mission statements.

It is pretty obvious that the stated priority of zoos to hold conservation as priority #1 is great optics. However this goal can't be achieved without cash flow. Cash flow comes only through having animals on exhibition. The daily spectacle visitors expect is what generates ticket sales, donations and all other forms of revenue.

Fact is most conservation that works is pretty straight forward obvious. Stop encroaching human development into wild lands and the wildlife will take care of itself. We don't need zoos to tell us that.

Last year I saw 8 rhinos in Nepal. 2 were baby rhinos. A few years ago the Nepali government closed all tourist resorts within Chitwan Park as well as the roads and all other manmade facilities (except for ranger stations which are got to by canoe or elephant). When tourists (like myself) do visit the park now they don`t actually enter the park but remain in a buffer zone perimeter surrounding the park. The park is reserved for the wildlife; rhinos, tigers, slothbears, monkeys, deer, marshmugger crocodiles, etc. This conservation effort has resulted in one single rhino poaching in 3 years!!! (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140312-nepal-chitwan-national-park-wildlife-poaching-world/) The census numbers of both rhinos and tigers are up quite dramatically.

No matter how ambitious zoos may want to be, they do not replicate even a fraction of this success. No matter how large and "natural" zoo enclosures try to be these enclosures are un-natural. Animals know they are captive. Even if lions are fed crazy sized slabs of prime rib every day they have to sense they are missing out on what makes them lions. The thrill of the hunt, the kill, the feast on (possibly unsanitary) gazelles is their raison d'etre.

Zoos may publicize that their priority is conservation, their efforts scientific, and for the most part that's true. One school of scientific zoology has learned when to vaccinate the animals, and when to breed, and when to feed them hormones and when to separate them, and how to keep them stimulated, and which ones are candidates to be released back into the wilds, etc. And all this is pretty awesome. And nearly all of this is done on public exhibition, on display in captivity. And it's all very scientific for the spectacle of it.

But this European school of scientific zoology, specifically Copenhagen, has re-analyzed their way of doing things. Is the role of a zookeeper really to sedate polar bears so they'll calm the fuck down? Is zoo conservation really about castrating ibex's so they'll stop attacking each other? I thought the scientific maxim was about learning and educating. Science is kind of meaningless if they don't teach what they've learned. And what do they teach the willing public? "This is a kangaroo. He comes from Australia. We have to have to feed them hormones otherwise they breed worse then rabbits." which is all well and good but isn't very deep. Maybe it satisfies the public who any looking at the kangaroo only because it's en route to the Zoo's McDonald's/roller coaster/candy floss vendor. But for anyone who is interested in more then a passive way... "This is a giraffe, the tallest living terrestrial animal and the largest ruminant. It is an ungulate mammal that chews it's cud like camels and cows. Giraffes have two horn-like structures called ossicones, which are formed from ossified cartilage, covered in skin and fused to the skull at the parietal bones. Would you like to see these up close?"