Zoos often do more harm than good, creating unnatural environments that look realistic enough to make any potential return to the wild all but impossible. Unfortunately using real animals for these purposes involves tremendous cruelty. The idea of conserving animals that are at risk of going extinct is a great one; the problem is that not most zoos live up to it. However, when the animals being culled arent in demand, they might find themselves facing death. Kept in barren cages rarely larger than 20 by 20 feet, bears in roadside zoos spend their days pacing, sleeping abnormally long periods of time, and bobbing their head all indications of extreme psychological distress. The Dark Truth behind Bear Bile Uses: Hidden Costs of Traditional Medicine, The Untold Story of Factory-farmed Cows the Consequences for Animal and Human Health, Are Giraffes Endangered? For example, if the number of lions is drastically reduced in an area, their prey will thrive. Dimming Lights: Are Fireflies Endangered? They are used to collect exotic pets from owners who are looking to get rid of them. The monotonous, confined life of animals in captivity is a mere shadow of what life was like for them in the wild. Why Are Puppy Mills Bad: The Numerous Reasons Why They Must Be Stopped And How You, yes you, Can Help! We have good models of captive wild animal protection laws outside of this country as well. Some animals are quite intelligent so keeping them in captivity should never be an option. This can lead to an appreciation of animals, which in return will see them being treated much better. Sadly, most of these associations end up protecting the interests of their members, and not the animals they should be protecting. The law, adopted by Congress in 1966, protects so-called warm-blooded animals who are bred for commercial sale, used in research, transported commercially or publicly exhibited, like in a zoo or circus. Thousands of animals are captured and put in zoos and aquariums for tourist attractions every year. Today, nearly every country in the world is a member of CITES. However, in a zoo, the boundaries between the wild and captivity are rearranged. Mr. Hagenbecks model was widely influential. A fine day out with the family might itself be justification enough for the existence of zoos if the zoo animals are all happy to be there. By designing these enclosures so that many animals could be seen at once, without any bars or walls in the visitors lines of sight, he created an immersive panorama, in which the fact of captivity was supplanted by the illusion of being in nature. Most people arent always comfortable seeing animals that are kept in zoos. The A.Z.A.s policies allow for the euthanasia of animals, but the president of the association, Dan Ashe, told me, its very rarely employed by his member institutions. Many zoos use Prozac and other psychoactive drugs on at least some of their animals to deal with the mental effects of captivity. When theres a surplus, you can just have a plant sale. Thats undeniable. His justification was philosophical. "An even smaller proportion are part of captive breeding programmes and, of those, a tiny fraction have been released back into the wild. In some environments, we believe it's best not to keep certain wild animals at all, as their needs simply can't be met. What if they sent all the animals that need really large areas or lots of freedom and socialization to refuges? [WATCH], Armored Dinosaur Magnificently Preserved After Face, Skin, Spikes Survived Fossilization. The process of training an animal is a long and brutal one. More than 6,000 comments made by the visitors were recorded, nearly half of which were purely descriptive statements that asserted a fact about the exhibit or the animal. The researchers wrote, In all the statements collected, no one volunteered information that would lead us to believe that they had an intention to advocate for protection of the animal or an intention to change their own behavior.. See Related: Best Books on Endangered Species. The U.S. became a signatory to CITES in 1975. In April, ethical tour operator Responsible Travel after consultation with wildlife charity Born Free Foundation axed trips that include zoo visits. Instead, they will hire generalists with a degree of knowledge specificity and run with that. Learn More. The A.Z.A. Wild dolphins swim up to 40 miles day with the other members of their pod, while captive dolphins are forced to swim in tiny pools with unfamiliar dolphins day after day. Children leave most zoos with a misconception about how animals behave in the wild and what it takes to truly care for endangered animals. PETA says: "People who care about protecting endangered species should donate to organisations that safeguard them in their natural habitats if a species' native environment has been destroyed, there's nowhere left for the animals to go. Its protections are minimal as well. An animals worth is only equal to the attraction it offers to visitors. Why Animals Should Not be Kept in Zoos These animals oftentimes live in inhumane conditions, and pose a serious threat to public safety. Its said that Texas has the worlds second-largest tiger population, due to private citizens propensity for keeping these big cats as pets. 2. Animal Legal Defense Fund v. Claws N Paws, Looking for case and legal resources? For example, a lion might have a hard time adjusting to hunting for its meals when it has spent years being fed and lazing around. For example, smaller and faster animals with a lot of predators in the wild tend to thrive in zoos. Today's zoos are extremely important to saving wild animals and their habitats. But, for every story that casts zoos in a bad light from Vince the rhino's poaching at Paris' Thoiry Zoo in March; Cincinnati Zoo shooting endangered gorilla, Harambe, last year after a child fell into his enclosure; or Copenhagen Zoo killing and publicly dissecting Marius, a two-year-old giraffe in 2014 there are heart-warming tales too. However, the truth is that no enclosure can come close to matching the vastness of an animals natural environment. Animals in zoos can sense this, and over time their confinement can lead to worrying behavioral changes. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope Captures Dramatic Hour-by-Hour Changes of Dart Mission Slamming on an Asteroid, Can Humanity Deflect Potentially Hazardous Asteroids? As a result, many animals at zoos may die prematurely from stress or illness. For some animals, reintroduction will always be difficult, such as baby elephants, or pet cheetahs, both of which habituate to human care very quickly, says Moore of IFAW. They are just some of the millions of wild animals living in captivity across the United States. Animals have been going extinct for as long as there has been life on earthany weakling or disadvantageous animals get wiped out. The shooting of Harambe the gorilla spawned the most-shared meme of 2016 and caused a hounded Cincinnati Zoo to suspend its social media accounts. What Cause Extinction What Can We Do To Stop It? I have written before about the importance of zoos and the role they have to play in the world for conservation . Zoos, aquariums, water parks, and other facilities can help to maintain the viability of endangered species when humanity does not do a good enough job of protecting the animals in the wild. The worst ones are the malicious keepers who enjoy hurting animals in captivity. Apes are excellent at escaping. Wed like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. The worst climate risks, mapped: In this feature, select a country, and we'll break down the climate hazards it faces. Many zoos and aquariums offer behind-the-scenes tours and informative talks on animal welfare. The state and local laws protecting wild animals in captivity are spreading. Well, scat reveals all sorts of things about individual animals; information the keepers share with the scientific community. That's not a record that justifies tens of millions of wild animals kept in zoos. The polar bears in Winnipeg have disco poo. An example of these associations is the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) which represents over 240 businesses across the globe. Non-native animals are held in conditions that vary greatly from what they are used to living in. After being captives of the pandemic for more than a year, we have begun experiencing the pleasures of simple outings: dining al fresco, shopping with a friend, taking a stroll through the zoo. This is evident in killer whales' most vital body part: their teeth. But this is not the norm. A small exhibit is never going to truly capture the vastness of the open world. The practice of killing surplus animals is kept quiet by zoos, but it happens, especially in Europe. Weve discussed the reasons and can surely all now answer the question of why are zoos bad. Profits are also gained through the selling of animals to other zoos or circuses. Copyright 2023 The Science Times. Now, Alex writes full-time, and when hes not working on an article, hes knee-deep in writing fiction. Slow animals with minimal to zero predators such as elephants have brief life spans in captivity. Carl Hegenbeck, a German exotic animal importer, introduced the modern model of more natural habitats for animals instead of obvious cages at his Animal Park in Hamburg in 1907. And Steve Irwin's Australia Zoo has an on-site Wildlife Hospital to save sick and injured native species. Some zoo animals try to escape. Emma Marris is an environmental writer and the author of the forthcoming book Wild Souls: Freedom and Flourishing in the Non-Human World.. Do not reproduce without permission. They normally find themselves locked in cages, and only released into an artificial habitat when there are visitors at the zoo. Tatiana the tiger, kept in the San Francisco Zoo, snapped one day in 2007 after three teenage boys had been taunting her. She could then climb the wire without being shocked. For example, Charles Harvey and Kurt House argue that subsidies for climate capture technologywill ultimately be a waste. The lack of enough vegetation will then lead to global warming due to less carbon in the atmosphere. Private individuals with the financial means use their money to procure rare or exotic animals from zoos to add to their own private collections. But whether recent events have triggered a profound shift in public consciousness is harder to . In 2020, facilities accredited by the Association of Zoos & Aquariums contributed more than $230 million to conservation efforts. Your email address will not be published. Even if the animals are being fed well, the lack of freedom can cause them to be stressed. In many cases, animals in captivity do not have the space or resources to roam and live as they would in their natural habitat. More tigers live in cages in this country, than exist in all the wild. [WATCH]. Animals are forced to sleep, eat, and defecate in the same small area. In the case of America, our maps, developed with experts, show where extreme heat is causing the most deaths. Animals begin to display erratic behaviors, self-mutilation, and an inability to settle. These standards set a low bar and are widely considered to be sub-par in protecting animals. As a late Gen-Xer-cum-early-Millenial, my childhood was rich with trips to visit zoos. The environment that these animals are kept in isnt natural to them more so the animals that are taken from the wilderness and kept in zoos. Animals are forced to live in artificial habitats that arent anywhere close to their former homes (the wild). The researchers divided the odd behaviors of captive animals into two categories: impulsive/compulsive behaviors, including coprophagy (eating feces), regurgitation, self-biting and mutilation, exaggerated aggressiveness and infanticide, and stereotypies, which are endlessly repeated movements.