Most behaviors that you see keepers demonstrate at the zoo or aquarium are natural behaviors that the animals do in the wild. When the animals do them, the keepers give them a treat and pair it with a gesture or a word, so that they associate them, and eventually the word or gesture is enough to elicit the behavior because the animal knows that there’s a reward. But here’s the thing: most of those behaviors are encouraged because they help veterinarians and keepers do health checks.
Yeah, its cute when they nose boop the stick, but also keepers need to check their vision and depth perception and mobility. Sea lions are so cute when they wave! But vets and keepers need to check under those flippers to make sure that they’re healthy and that they don’t have any restrictions on their motion or cuts on their skin. Why do they ask animals to jump? Again, to make sure that they’re healthy, and also because its fun and animals LOVE to move around and jump and have fun, its mentally stimulating.
This is the most important thing I will ever reblog and anyone who is still ignorant enough to think zoos are awful can fuck off my blog. Zoos are necessary. If you think otherwise please unfollow me because I don’t want you here.
This is super important for people to see. I have worked at a zoo and I can not tell you how many times I’ve had to defend the zoo for the good they do. People need to learn that zoos are actually helping save endangered species.
Remember: Sea World is not a zoo and doesn’t really care about animals unless they can make a profit. Fuck Sea World.
Alternatively, Busch Gardens does care for their animals.
This 100% was me at the zoo. Don’t touch Melon, he’s mean. Okay, but I have to touch Bob to make him get his stupid emu head out of my shirt, so what if I also touch Melon until he likes it?
Sephiroth is angery because he has one wing and sometimes attacks people? I want to pet him also. Also he won’t get off the rock I have to clean anyway, surely a little pets on the good side will be fine.
Martha and Stewart are assholes that tag-team while the pond is filling? I bet I could CUDDLE THEM.
The female deer will excitedly nuzzle you in the stomach for feeding them. This is fine, because they don’t have antlers. The male deer is locked up while we’re putting out food because he will gouge you to death with his little nubby asymmetrical horns, because he thinks the females are doing it.
The entire monkey enclosure will eat your fingers for a single fruit loop. They also have the smallest arms and can reach through holes they’ve made in the tarp on the gate to their enclosure. Do not hold hands with the monkeys. (2nd gen old man monkey will also pee on the keepers that don’t give him fruit loops. He is a jerk.)
The rehabilitated bear that still sits like she’s on a couch because she did that when she was living in a crack house? Yes, she looks chill. Yes, she looks The Softest. No, do not pet her back through the fence. No, do not go into the corridor and try to offer treats for pets.
Big Mac does not know he will break your ribs, but YOU know he will break your ribs. Do not enter Big Mac’s enclosure no matter how much he chuffs and displays his belly and rubs on the cage and looks sad. Yes, he genuinely wants pets. Yes, Pinkie is deliberately getting pets where he can see it as a sign of dominance even though she’s a housecat and he could eat her in approximately one bite.
The turtle is mean. Period. He is an old man and he does not like you. He does not like the parrot getting fries and he does not like that he is in a kiddie pool to warm up because his enclosure lost power, and he does not like you behind him preparing food for the owls and raptors. Petting him will not help this. He will rock back and forth and mean mug you forever because he is a grumpy old man.
All of the rabbits need more handling on principle. They don’t know you and they are very distressed that you’re taking their poop away. They can learn, a little, kind of. The guinea pig is insane and will not learn. Do not pet the guinea pig.
this post is gathering some highly blessed zoo stories i love it! thank you
as biologist, can confirm
brain: that frog is very small me: well spotted, brain brain: put smol frog in mouth me: no!
brain: that lynx…looks so fluffy… me: it does brain: we should pet it. me: it’s awake and angry so no.
brain: baaaaby bunny. me: yup. brain: baby bunny goes in pocket me: nooo it doesn’t.
I stopped buying Lush products a while ago, largely because of this issue (I didn’t want to give money to charities that use fear-mongering, hand-wringing anthropomorphism to actively fight biodiversity), and their treatment of the Little Fireface Project only solidified this. Now Lush has sponsored a conference whose end goal is essentially dead elephants, whether they want to admit that or not.
I’m sure they wouldn’t admit it, but their goals- no captive breeding, no zoo care- are hugely problematic from a conservation standpoint because- let’s face it- there’s no way to ensure elephant survival in the wild at this moment in time. Not when there’s such a global demand for ivory, and not when their habitats are so valuable to developers, timber companies, and mining companies.
This of course brings up a really salient ethical issue- if elephants can’t survive long-term in the wild, should we be “ark” breeding them, trying to preserve them in captivity for future generations? Unfortunately, that’s not the question these groups ask. Their “solution” is to just take the elephants from “bad” captivity (zoos) and put them in “good” captivity (sanctuaries).
However, these sanctuaries aren’t actually all that safe for elephants.
They’re not the African savannah minus people, where the elephants can just run free. There’s still barns. There’s still fences. There’s still tuberculosis- zoos can have that too, but zoos have better vet care and actually train the animals to participate in their own healthcare- which means that vet checks are less stressful. Sanctuaries, even the ones that do some vet training, still can’t really disinfect their grounds, and they can’t get rid of that TB bacteria- which can stick around for absolute ages. There’s still risks, and I don’t think these free the elephants people actually realize that. It’s like with cetaceans- the answer isn’t “free ‘em all,” nor is it “captivity is the ONLY SOLUTION.” Animal conservation, especially for species like elephants that have a pretty good wild population, is all about middle roads. There’s got to be a middle ground, and animal rights totally misses that. They’re so obsessed with the idea of “freedom” that they don’t actually stop to think about what freedom really means for these animals. Humans are the most successful invasive species anywhere in the world, and we’re not just going to go away because a bunch of animal rights activists think it’d be good. Even if they do successfully get elephants out of zoos, what good will that do? It won’t stop poaching, it’ll just make good science more difficult to do.
But animal rights people don’t actually care about science. They might think they care about individual animals, but they’re totally missing the point at a species/ecosystem level. Closing zoos will do absolutely nothing positive for wild animals- if anything, it’ll just make things worse. But that’s what these groups want- they still think zoos are animal jails and are willfully ignorant about the actual science of animal conservation. It’s not just about warm fuzzy feelings and the souls of animals- it’s about making logical, rational decisions to protect genetic diversity in these animal populations. Putting all those “poor abused zoo animals” in sanctuaries is not how this is done, and if you refuse to understand that despite the piles and piles of evidence, if you’re fundamentally anti-science, if you really think that feels are more important than reals… well, you’re part of the problem, then, aren’t you. It’s 2018. We’re wreaking havoc on our environment and our ecosystems, and without the careful application of scientific processes and knowledge, we are going to lose these things. We are going to lose the rainforests, we are going to lose millions of species- but hey, at least poor Dumbo got to live out his final years suffering from tuberculosis while somebody who thinks elephants actually talk to them dictated his care.
“But what, at the end of these three, informative, tear filled, days, did we all come away with?
Did we put together a white board filled with bullet points and action steps on how to free every last one of the elephants around the world that are rotting away before our very eyes?
Nope, not even close.
But what we did achieve is something, in my view, even more important.
We listened to the elephants.”
We listened to the elephants. This is not science. This is not conservation. This is homeopathy at best. It’s not how you “save” elephants. How you save them is through careful captive breeding, making actual efforts to preserve wild elephant habitat with a minimum of human interference, studying their reproduction, diseases, biology, and other things that can impact reproductive success, and work with local communities doing boots-on-the-ground work to help develop sustainable infrastructure and jobs so that elephant ivory is less appealing to the communities that coexist with elephants. Taking elephants out of zoos and putting them in sanctuaries is not at all how to preserve a species.
Elephants are not people. They have extremely different needs, and to assume that a bunch of people who “heard the call of the elephants” but have… no actual scientific, medical, biological, or relevant zoological experience can somehow know how to conserve them better than people who actually study them is fucking ridiculous.
Which is why I’m still not gonna support Lush.
I’ve been saying for ages LUSH is anti-zoo and does not support actual conservation, but instead animal rights initiatives.
LUSH gave 5000 dollars (as the highest tier sponsor!) to a conference where PETA and Zoocheck and the Non-Human Rights project were major panelists.
And now they’re running a charity pot for Free the Oregon Zoo Elephants – the group that is, as described on the charity pot label, “working to end captivity, breeding, and importation of elephants at zoos and beyond.” Well, thanks, LUSH, for actually putting your stance in writing for the world to see.
This is the kind of thing I tell people when they go off on me being anti-captivity towards marine amusement parks. Zoos and “amusement” parks are totally different things.
Zoos help animals by having breeding programs like those mentioned above, marine parks harm animals by treating them like circus animals and forcing them to do tricks under incredibly stressful conditions and breeding for profit not for saving the species.
Good zoos do not keep their animals in “tiny spaces” with no enrichment. I’m not pro-roadside zoo. I’m pro-accredited zoo. Zoos are incredibly important for conservation and education.
There should be way more pictures of modern zoos so i just add some more
Seriously zoos do so much important conservation work as well I hate when people shit all over zoos as if the animals are locked up and not looked after
The SF Zoo has two sea lions. Now, if you know SF, you know that sea lions are a Thing. They’re all over Pier 39 and various other beaches in N California. In fact, the zoo is near the ocean, so there are sea lions not 200 yards from the zoo entrance. So having sea lions in the zoo seems sort of superfluous.
Except the sea lions are blind. One was found as an adult after suffering a gun shot wound to the face that destroyed his eyes. The other was found as an adolescent, weak and starving because it had been blinded and unable to hunt. So they were rescued and introduced and the zoo built them a nice pool where they can swim and sunbathe and people toss them fish. It’s not the biggest exhibit, or the fanciest. But it’s a home for them, where they’re safe and well fed. Sea lions aren’t the most romantic of animals, but they’re a part of SF culture and a lot of us have a soft spot for the loud, bulbous things. And because of zoos, these two get to live long, happy lives.
Whenever anyone complains about zoos, I think about Silent Knight and Henry.
I think it’s St. Louis zoo that is saving big cats in Africa. Scientists couldn’t figure out what was killing off the local lion population. They were dying off from Canine Distemper. The local unvaccinated dogs of the towns would spread the disease to other animals or have it themselves. When the lions ate the infected animals they would catch it as well. You know what that Zoo is doing to stop this disease? They are going over to those towns and vaccinating the dogs for free. The community loves it and people from other villages comes for miles to get their dogs vaccinated as well.
They also do work with camel populations because the local human population use the camels for food sources the zoos help monitor the camels health.
Another zoo, I want to say it’s the Oregon zoo but don’t quote me on that, is helping female inmates. The zoo works with the female prisons by encouraging the inmates to assist in the breeding and raising of endangered species of butterflies. They plant the specific plants that the butterflies and catapillars need, raise them, and release them. These inmates get noted in any scientific journals that get published. They are giving these inmates a sense of accomplishment and validation.
Zoos not only save species but bring together and assist communities in an effort to save the environment. Zoos, good zoos, are essential to the future and I will fight anyone who tries to say otherwise.
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