Funds should go to conservation, not cages

Ever since I first learned about Google Alerts, I’ve been receiving dozens of links to articles about zoos on an almost daily basis. Over the past few years I’ve gotten in the habit of printing out articles about new zoo exhibits and the refurbishment of old zoo exhibits, especially if they indicate their cost.

I expect that anyone reading those articles in isolation say to themselves, “Wow, that’s a lot of money” and leave it at that. I suppose it’s a natural reaction since a great many new zoo exhibits range in price from hundreds of thousands to tens of millions of dollars, certainly a lot of money to most of us. But most people don’t think about the fact that zoos all over North America and around the world are engaged in the same kinds of expensive projects as their local or regional zoos are. And when you start to add up the costs, it’s mind blowing.

Here’s just a small sample of what I’ve come across in the past week or so. The National Zoo recently opened a new elephant exhibit that cost a whopping $56 million. The Oregon Zoo plans to exceed that with their own $58 million elephant exhibit. Meanwhile the Houston Zoo will open a $28 million gorilla exhibit in 2015, while this summer the Dakota Zoo will open a small primate exhibit that, by comparison, is dirt cheap at only $750,000. As I sat down to write this blog, another one came in. The Indianapolis Zoo is planning a $30 million orangutan exhibit. Those few projects come in at a staggering $172.75 million and that’s just the tip of the proverbial “new exhibit” iceberg.

About three years ago I added up all the zoo capital projects that were featured in articles in a 1 month period. I’m sure I didn’t see them all, but what I did see added up to $1.213 billion dollars. They’d house at most a few hundred individuals representing a motley assortment of species. All in the name of conservation.

Most of the zoo promotional material that’s used to rationalize these obscenely expensive exhibits feature vague claims about how important they are to public education, conservation and how they’ll produce a positive conservation outcome that will benefit animals and their wild habitats. Of course, most of that commentary is unsubstantiated, meaningless and self-serving. The reality is that most zoos talk the talk, but when it comes down to putting their money where their mouth is, they don’t do much to help. Instead, they construct monuments to waste and pat themselves on the back for doing it.

There are thousands of conservation projects around the world that are starving for funds. They’re aimed at preserving habitat, conducting anti-poaching patrols, mitigating human-wildlife conflict, fighting the wild animal parts trade and addressing a plethora of other concerns. Pick a handful of these projects at random, look at their cost and at what they can accomplish and it becomes abundantly clear why they should be funded and not the new zoo exhibits.

Rob Laidlaw
Zoocheck Inc.

Time to put aside differences and get elephants moved as smoothly and safely as possible

On October 25, 2011, City of Toronto Council voted 31 to 4 in favour of retiring the Toronto Zoo’s three surviving elephants, Iringa, Toka and Thika, to the PAWS sanctuary in California.

The Toronto Zoo had originally proposed sending the elephants to an American Zoo and Aquarium Association (AZA) accredited facility. Council decided the more appropriate and compassionate choice for the elephants was the PAWS sanctuary.

The move to PAWS has been endorsed by many of the world’s leading elephant experts, including Dr. Joyce Poole, Dr. Cynthia Moss, Winnie Kiiru and Dr. Keith Lindsay, to name just a few. In addition, animal experts, like Dr. Jane Goodall, animal welfare and wildlife protection organizations and many others endorse the move.

On November 24th, the Toronto Zoo Board of Management affirmed City Council’s decision and set a target date of April 30, 2012 for the elephants to be moved. This time frame allows for a working relationship to be established between the Toronto Zoo and PAWS staff, permits to be obtained, training to be conducted and winter to pass (since the elephants will most likely be moved by truck).

A number of people, such as some Toronto Zoo staff (including several elephant keepers), argued that the decision by City Council, and even by the zoo’s own Board of Management, was ill-informed and inappropriate. Some Toronto Zoo elephant keepers also said all potential recipient facilites should be evaluated and compared to find out which one was best and that the keepers should be the ones to make the decision about where the elephants would go.

In my view, the decision by Toronto City Council and by the Toronto Zoo Board of Management was reasonable, informed and appropriate. Here’s why.

1. The City Council decision was not made in a vacuum. Councillors had a large amount of material at their disposal, representing all points of view, and many of them conducted their own research.
2. The City of Toronto (and by extension the citizens of Toronto) own the elephants under a governance agreement that has been in place since the zoo was created approximately 35 years ago. Zoo staff do not own the elephants.
3. It was the Toronto Zoo Board of Management who terminated the elephant program in the first place and later affirmed City Council’s decision to send the elephants to PAWS.
4. A significant number of animals are moved into and out of zoos regularly on the recommendation of external committees, zoo managers and curators, and from time to time, other people and/or agencies. Sometimes keepers are involved in those decisions, but many times they are not.
5. The Toronto Zoo elephant discussion has been ongoing for approximately three years. Only after the discussion had run its course, nearly six months had passed since the Board of Management voted to terminate the elephant program and City Council voted to move the elephants to the PAWS sanctuary did keeper staff make a serious effort to have their voices heard publicly and independent of the Toronto Zoo senior management and the Board of Management.
6. Even though the PAWS sanctuary had been promoted for three years by animal welfare groups as the preferred destination point for the elephants, it was unreasonably excluded from the review process established by the Zoo’s board in May 2011, even though no one from the Toronto Zoo had ever visited or contacted the PAWS sanctuary to obtain information about their operation.
7. A review has been done. After the May meeting, Zoocheck compared the AZA elephant management and care standards with conditions at the PAWS sanctuary.
8. The National Elephant Center (NEC), which had been proposed as a possible recipient facility for the Toronto Zoo elephants does not exist and construction of its first phase may not even begin in 2012.
9. A professional poll conducted by RA Malatest and Associates showed that the majority of Torontonians want the Toronto Zoo elephants moved to a sanctuary, instead of a another zoo.

Here are just some of the reasons why I think the PAWS sanctuary is the correct choice for the Toronto Zoo elephants.

• A 323,748 m² (80 acre) African elephant enclosure (647 times larger than the AZA minimum standard of 500 m² adult elephant).
• Natural terrain with hills, pasture for grazing throughout the year, mud wallows, water pools that allow complete submersion and swimming, and other features.
• A 1,858 m² (20,000 ft²) “state of the art” elephant barn with rubberized flooring and heated stalls.
• Other African elephants to socialize with.
• A stable, lifetime home.
• Highly skilled elephant caretakers with a solid track record of successfully caring for old, injured, ill, infirm and retired elephants.
• Humane management and no use of the ankus (bullhook).
• 24 hour monitoring of elephants and staff that live on the grounds (something few zoos have).
• Excellent veterinary care.
• A more elephant friendly climate.
• PAWS is accredited by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries.

The decision to move the elephants has been made. It is now incumbent upon those who truly care about these wonderful animals to do whatever they can to ensure their move to California is as smooth and safe as possible. The elephants deserve no less.

Rob Laidlaw
Zoocheck

Learning from Wisconsin Bears

Just a short while ago I paid a visit to the Wisconsin Black Bear Education Center (WBBEC), a private facility run by Wausau, Wisconsin resident Jeff Traska. I've known Jeff through email and telephone communications for about 7 years. He first contacted me for information about how to keep bears, because he was the custodian of three American black bears and he wanted to make sure he was doing the best he could to provide for their needs.

There are loads of people, organizations and zoos in the US and Canada who keep bears in captivity and I've seen more than my fair share of them. In my experience, it's quite rare to see an impressive bear enclosure, meaning one sufficiently large and complex enough for the bears they confine to actually act like bears. Most enclosures tend to be small, boring, often old-style concrete grottos, where the bears can do little more than sit, lie or sleep their lives away.

Remarkably, even though the biology and behaviour of bears is well known, there are still many horrendously bad bear enclosures, many of them expensive new enclosures in big budget zoos. Some zoos have spent millions of dollars on bear exhibits and have ended up with little more than modified versions of the inadequate exhbiits they had in the past.

The WBBEC was a refreshing change from the norm. Traska tried to figure out what the bears would need and set out to construct an enclosure that would satisfy those needs. The result is one of the largest and most natural bear enclosures in the US. It puts to shame most of the bear exhibits in traditional zoos and shows just how wasteful and deficient they are. Remarkably, the WBBEC enclosure was constructed at a cost of about $100,000.

A visit to the WBBEC raises an obvious question. If a lone individual in rural Wisconsin can build an impressive, spacious enclosure that satisfies a good portion of the bear's needs, then why can't zoos, with their expert staff, committees, architects, and millions of dollars do the same. It's time the zoo industry looked outside the traditional zoo box to see what else is there. They could learn a lot and save vast sums of money in the process. Best of all, it would be good for the bears.

Rob Laidlaw
Zoocheck Canada