Try an ‘animals au naturel’ program!

It began last spring with elephants, and now includes penguins and sea lions too. The animals do all sorts of endearing, memorable things, like paint on canvas so visitors can take home a memento to hang. Or, they might twirl in water like aquatic dancers, or cuddle in visitors’ arms.

“These are not skills and talents they use in the wild,” understated an “educator” at the place where these things happen -- the Indianapolis Zoo. (The story, “Taking an animalistic view of art,” first appeared in the Washington Post, then in a Trenton Times travel section.)

You read it right. It’s all part of the zoo’s plan to get people interested in and caring about their captive animals – whatever it takes to do so – so those people can then be fed sugar- coated information about what the animals are really like and why they should live.

Cause wild animals to do something they would not ordinarily do . . . so that they can continue to live . . . at such neat places as zoos, where they can keep doing unnatural things? Do I have it straight?

It seems comparable to a circus rep saying, “Let the tigers leap through rings of fire to prove their species is worth saving.” But in both zoo and circus, the animals made to do unnatural or demeaning things are captives – removed from some or all such basics as family, habitat, climate, their real lives and behaviors.

“It’s great enrichment for the animals,” said that same zoo “educator.” As if, deep down, every elephant or penguin aspires to paint; every sea lion, to dance.

Come on, Indianapolis Zoo. You could quit the convoluted reasoning by simply freeing the animals. And don’t worry: they’d know just what to do.
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"Solitary, cold confinement"

Earlier this month, newspapers reported cruel treatment of elephants in zoos. What else is new?

Maggie, formerly of the Alaska zoo and now in a California sanctuary, is the “poster pachyderm” for elephants who were finally freed, thanks to months or more of public protest. But as the latest survey makes clear, there are plenty of other elephants still in captivity (i.e., zoos) – that is, unnatural and unhealthy conditions.

“In Defense of Animals” (IDA), the zoo watchdog organization, reports that “scores of elephants are warehoused throughout the long winter months in miserable confinement, many of them hidden from the public.” Small concrete cages, which keep them from getting the movement they need, contribute to mental and physical problems, and premature deaths.

Usually native to semi-arid savannas and tropical and subtropical forests, elephants typically travel in groups over miles and miles of their home ranges each day. Instead, elephants in American and Canadian zoos stand for hours on cold, hard concrete floors. Is there any wonder they contract food diseases and arthritis, and engage in aberrant behavior?

Included in the survey IDA conducted were zoos in such UN-savanna-like places as Illinois, Rhode Island, Ohio, Quebec, Massachusetts, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Colorado, New York.

This issue really comes down to zoos: what they exist to do and how they do it. Is keeping an elephant in solitary, cold confinement teaching visitors anything accurate about how elephants normally live? Of course not.
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Good news, please!

A reader’s comment reacting to a recent post here exclaimed at how welcome the good news (about two former service dogs) was. This also happened a few months ago, when a reader wrote some good animal news – about the resurgence of wild turkeys in the area.

It’s true: most of the posts here are in fact warnings or bad news. In part, I think, that reflects what’s actually happening to animals. I only wish it were like most news in the media -- dealing with the exceptions, not the rules. But I don’t think so.

Even so . . . here’s my invitation to any readers with good news about animals: please tell me about it! Then, if at all possible, I’ll post it.

We’d all like to think life is better for animals than it so often seems. But then, all it takes to suggest the real way of the world is a thought about factory farming or the fur industry or zoos and circuses or even the people who leave dogs tied up outside 24/7. . . or those who think the way to celebrate a holiday is to eat an animal.

Calling all good news!
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Earned royalty

“There she is” . . . the Pachy Princess, chosen from among all the contestants in the “Ms. TUSKany Pageant.” The elephant (yes, the elephant) with the most votes (as in donations) will be crowned Ms. TUSKany on Oct. 17 at the 2009 Elephant Grape Stomp.

Humans who attend the event will “sip regional wines, savor Tuscan cuisine and share a squishy moment with the elephants” (a.k.a. “pachyderms” or thick-skinned animals).

If this seems stranger and stranger, that’s because it’s all about an elaborate fund-raiser for PAWS, the Performing Animal Welfare Society, in California. Among the residents at one of its three sanctuaries are nine elephants, including Maggie, formerly of the Anchorage, Alaska zoo.

You read it right: an elephant – whose habitat is tropical – lived for years in Alaska, in a cage with a concrete floor, and for much of the time without elephant companionship, until animal activists raised such a wide and loud ruckus that Anchorage reluctantly let her go. Underwritten by a humane and moneyed friend of animals, Maggie was flown to California, where she has settled right in, as reported in reports and videos from PAWS.

The vote-donations from here for “Pachy Princess” won’t go to Annie, Ruby, Gypsy, Lulu, Mara, Rebecca, Wanda or Nicholas (in the running for Mr. TUSKany) – however worthy they all are. Maggie’s the sentimental favorite. In becoming a “rescued elephant” and escaping Alaska, she beat the odds. (As Maggie’s freedom fighters said at the end of each note, “Warm rumbles” or “Trumpets!” )

Besides an introduction to PAWS and news of Maggie, more details on the Ms. TUSKany pageant can be found at the organization website: pawsweb.org .

Vote early and often!
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