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 Lion |
I recently decided to visit the Milwaukee County Zoo when I found out that they had a Family Free Day. Having lived in Wisconsin for 12 years, I had never visited the zoo, because I'm opposed to keeping animals in captivity. When I entered the zoo, I tried to do it with an open mind, which was not easy. I was hoping though, to find at least a much better situation than the one I remembered from my last visit to a zoo, when I was a teenager. What I found however, was absolutely shocking and heart breaking. The very first animal I came across was a lion. It was not easy seeing this impressive animal kept in a small enclosure behind glass, with his natural habitat painted on the wall. One thing that I noticed almost right away was that most of the felines were doing a lot of pacing, which I know is a sign of stress. |
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After the felines, I went outside and found the enclosures of
the elephants, rhinoceroses and hippopotamuses. It's a sight I won't soon
forget. They are confined to the most depressing looking enclosures. And
since we were in the middle of the winter, they spent most if not all of the
day in there. I only saw the elephants outside for about half an hour. It was no surprise to me to see them expressing many behaviors showing that they were bored and under stress. The elephants were doing a lot of head bobbing and repetitive movements and the rhinoceroses were pacing in their enclosures. I noticed that the people walking by didn't spend much time with these animals, simply because there wasn't too much to see. It was clear that the elephants, rhinoceroses and hippopotamuses were basically in a waiting room until spring. |
 Rhinoceros |
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Elephant at the Milwaukee County Zoo - 2008 |
I contacted the Milwaukee County Zoo and asked them about
this particular situation with the elephants, rhinoceroses and
hippopotamuses, but got no reply from them. It surprised me when I found out
that the Milwaukee County Zoo is considered one of the best in the United
States. To the left you see one of the small clips I took of the elephants. On this clip you see an elephant repeatedly lifting up an object and throwing it down. She was doing this for an incredibly long time. I would walk away from the elephants, come back an hour later and found her still doing it. You can find a larger version of this clip and other clips and pictures I took during my visit in my picture library. |
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The rest of the zoo wasn't much better. The zoo truly is not much more than a collection of bored, lonely and depressed animals. What makes life so difficult for zoo animals is that they hardly have any privacy, lack mental stimulation and physical exercise. Even though you might think that zoo animals would get used to a life in captivity, they really don't. Even animals that are bred in zoos still retain their natural instincts after many generations of captive breeding. Elephants for instance, naturally live in large herds or family groups. In zoos they are often kept alone or - like at the Milwaukee County Zoo - in pairs. Animals like polar bears are used to hunting; this habit is replaced by the zoo with regular feedings. Most animals kept in zoos would naturally roam for tens of miles a day. |
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 Bonobo |
I also visited the Bonobo exhibit. Bonobos (also known as
Pygmy Chimpanzees) are our closest living relatives and very intelligent
animals. At the Milwaukee County Zoo they are given a small playing area
with some climbers. Human children would get bored there after a few hours.
These animals have to spend years in this place. Some zoos actually give anti-depressants or tranquillizers to control the behavior problems of some of their animals. |
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Another problem with zoos are all those cute little zoo babies people love to look at. In most cases they are bred purposely to attract visitors. And because zoos have only limited space, they are faced with a "surplus" of unwanted adult animals. Some of the "surplus" animals become food for their fellow zoo habitants or are sold to smaller zoos or to laboratories for experiments. It is not uncommon for zoo babies to be rejected by their mothers. In some situations zoos keepers will step in and take care of the rejected babies, in other situations they choose to simply leave the babies to die. Zoo keepers also choose to remove babies sometimes, even when their mothers have not rejected them. They do this to make the babies "better exhibit animals" (safer to work with and more at ease around people). |
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 Hippopotamuses |
Zoos claim to help with conservation. Hardly any zoo however, registers their animals on an international species database and most zoo animals are not endangered at all. Even though there are thousands of endangered species, zoos have only been able to return about 12 species to the wild with some level of success. Most zoo animals released in the wild don't survive. This is because zoos don't provide the right environment for a successful captive breeding project. The animals would need to live in habitats resembling their natural ones, especially in terms of climate and fauna. The animals would also need to be raised with minimal human contact and in populations large enough to provide a natural social balance and a suitable gene pool. | |
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Most people love taking their children to a zoo, since they see it as the only way to show them amazing animals like elephants or tigers. It is true that most people won't get the opportunity to see most of the zoo animals in the wild. It is better though to make do with books, videos, television or the internet. By taking them to the zoo, they are not taught much about the natural way these animals live. Instead, they are shown a collection of sad and exploited animals and are given a very bad example about how we should treat the fellow occupants of our Earth. Children learn a lot more by exploring the wildlife around us. That way they can learn about animals in their natural habitat. Just compare the picture of the hippopotamuses in nature to the right with the one I took at the zoo above. |
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Zoos are nothing more than collections of sad, exploited animals. For more information, please check out:
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