Ueno Zoo in Cherry Blossom Time

Last week I visited Tokyo's Ueno Zoo. It was a warm sunny day, the cherry blossoms were out in full force and throngs of people filled every corner of the zoo grounds.

Ueno Zoo is one of Japan's premier facilities and is comparable to almost any major North American zoo. Its wide pathways, tall trees, well-tended gardens, refreshment outlets around every corner and multitude of shady rest areas make Ueno Zoo a wonderful place for visitors. And that's the problem.

Like so many other zoos throughout the world, the Ueno Zoo is a people place. One would think that with a large collection of animals from the four corners of the globe the zoo would be a place for animals, but it's not. It's a place for people.

Unlike the wonderful facilities for visitors, the animal enclosures were small, bland and most of the animals were just sitting or lying around. Those that were active were often engaged in stereotypic pacing or some other abnormal behaviour.

It was obvious the zoo had made some attempt to spruce up some of the cages by adding bark chip substrates, furnishings and objects to manipulate, and I expect those things made the staff feel better, but they didn't seem to do much for the animals. The space and complexity the animals need just wasn't there.

Like most other zoos in the world, visitors noisily filed past one exhibit after another, registering one animal in their mind before moving on to the next. If the animals were inactive, many visitors didn't even stop, they just glanced toward the animals as they walked by.

As I moved through the zoo I tried to imagine what the animals felt with so many hundreds of eyes watching their every move. At a bear cage, the visitor pathway wound around the top of the exhibit allowing people to surround the animals. And there were multiple glass viewing stations at ground level as well. There was no where for the bears to get away from public view. Many other animals had it the same and some had it worse.

Studies show that many animals, ranging from lizards to gorillas, can be very stressed by being watched. That seems obvious to me. But it doesn't seem obvious to the people who build the cages and care for the animals.

Zoos have a totem pole of priorities that place the needs of visitors first, staff second and animals third. That totem pole should be flipped on its head so the needs of the animals come first, the staff second and the public third. Zoos claim they are devoted to animal wellbeing but the reality says otherwise. There needs to be a new zoo paradigm.

As I exited Ueno Zoo I couldn't help but think that a zoo is no place for animals.

Rob Laidlaw
Zoocheck Canada

How Indpendent will Calgary's Independent Review Actually Be?

After a wake of high profile animal deaths and incidents stretching back several years, the Calgary Zoo has finally announced an independent external review of their facility. While this is something Zoocheck and other animal welfare groups have called for, one has to wonder how independent the independent review will be.

In a videotaped statement on the zoo’s website CEO Clement Lanthier said he would be contacting both the Canadian Association of Zoos and Aquariums (CAZA) and the US-based Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) this week to ask them to put together a team of expert reviewers to examine the Calgary Zoo’s practices and procedures. On the surface, this may sound like a reasonable course of action. After all, the two organizations are the accrediting bodies for their member institutions in both countries.

Here’s the problem. The Calgary Zoo is already accredited by both organizations. That the means the zoo has already met or exceeded their accreditation standards which they say are among the toughest anywhere. If they’re already accredited by both organizations and the animal deaths and incidents continue, why go back to those same organizations for another review. Wouldn’t it make more sense to look elsewhere for new expertise?

My faith in the pending independent external review is also undermined by the comments of CAZA national director Bill Peters. In a December 12th Globe and Mail article Mr. Peters said, take out break here….“Yes, there has been a series of unfortunate incidents and they've been looked at and reports have been done in the various occurrences, but is there a pattern? No, I don't think there's a pattern there.”

Given the number of animal deaths and incidents, I find it remarkable that anyone would think there wasn’t a pattern. It seems to me that because they all occurred at the same facility within a fairly compressed timeframe that alone establishes a pattern.

In my view, the deaths of four gorillas in rapid succession is a pattern. Or the presumably preventable deaths of stingrays because of improper oxygen levels, a markhor hanging itself on a rope and the capybara crushed to death in a hydraulic door. If they don’t represent a pattern, I don’t know what does.

Details of the independent expert review are pending. The people involved and the terms of reference are not known. At this point there is one thing I do know. To maintain even a smidgen of credibility the review team must draw extensively from other disciplines, including the animal welfare field. It can’t just be zoo managers reviewing zoo managers.

A few years ago, the National Zoo in Washington D.C. was subject to a review after a string of animal deaths and other missteps were reported in the media. That review involved multiple agencies and individuals, including experts from outside the zoo world.

Will the review be a serious examination or just a public relations exercise? I guess time will tell.

Rob Laidlaw
Executive Director
Zoocheck Canada