Visakhapatnam Animal Rescue Center helped to save a troubled zoo

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:

 

 

Visakhapatnam Animal Rescue Center helped to save a troubled zoo

 

VISAKHAPATNAM--Built to a then-state-of-the-art plan in 1972,

the 625-acre Indira Gandhi Zoological Park in Visakhapatnam is among

the world's most spacious zoos, and is among the few in India with

authentic conservation breeding credentials.

" Captive breeding for species survival " is the mission touted

on page one of the Indira Gandhi Zoological Park brochures. Captive

breeding successes include the December 2007 births of eight dholes,

Asian cousins of the better known African wild dog.

Yet while captive breeding may have enhanced the prestige of

the Indira Gandhi Zoo among fellow zoo professionals, the mission

that really saved the zoo appears to have been opening one of the

first CZA-accredited Animal Rescue Centres for ex-circus animals, in

February 2001.

Current Indira Gandhi Zoo director B. Vijay Kumar added the

Animal Rescue Centre as part of a master plan to rehabilitate the zoo

image, after much of the collection was poached or stolen under his

predecessors during the 1990s.

Replacing the missing animals and restoring the grounds,

Vijay Kumar more than tripled zoo attendance, revenues, and the

operating budget.

More than a quarter of the budget goes into maintaining the Animal

Rescue Centre. Not open to the public, the Animal Rescue Centre has

nonetheless become a source of community pride, attracting at least

as much news coverage as the zoo itself.

Built to hold 30 lions and 30 tigers, the Visakhapatnam

Animal Rescue Centre actually houses 48 lions and 13 tigers at

present, as--to the surprise of the Central Zoo Authority--African

lions turned out to be far more common in Indian circuses than either

tigers or native Asiatic lions.

The paucity of Asiatic lions in circuses who might be

suitable for inclusion in captive breeding protocols has disappointed

zoos nationwide, who had hoped for an influx of new genes from

circus animal collections.

Keeping lions and tigers healthy and happy in a confined

environment is a considerable challenge, even at the best of zoos.

Physically and psychologically rehabilitating ex-performing cats is

more challenging still.

Most of those in Visakhapatnam arrived with chronic physical

problems, as result of poor diets, parasites, lack of adequate

exercise while spending years in small cages, and untreated old

injuries.

Scars on most of the big cats' foreheads are a visible

consequence of repeated electroshocking. Degenerative hip ailments

are a legacy of riding many thousands of miles over bumpy roads in

wagons without good springs--or any springs at all. Some of the cats

are blind.

As much physical care as the big cats typically require,

however, their psychological abnormalities are harder to treat.

The tigers, in general, adapt more rapidly to relative

freedom within spacious enclosures. Many of the lions, even after

years at the Animal Rescue Centre, are still afraid to go outside.

Once coaxed or coerced to go outdoors, they wait fearfully beside

the door until allowed back in.

Inside, some pace within the exact bounds of the circus

wagons they occupied years ago, imagining barriers where none

exist. Several try to hide from humans.

Eight lions and tigers died from various unforeseen

complications during the first 21 months that the Visakhapatnam

Animal Rescue Centre operated, Ramesh Susarla of The Hindu reported

in June 2003. Among them, four tigers were killed by other tigers

after finding various ways to breech cage barriers, despite repeated

barrier modifications and reinforcement. The original design

apparently worked well with ordinary zoo tigers in France, but the

ex-circus tigers proved to be more inventive and aggressive.

With most of the Indian traveling shows now out of business,

Vijay Kumar and staff do not anticipate an ongoing large influx of

more ex-circus animals.

The Visakhapatnam Animal Rescue Centre has, however,

received animals from at least two other zoos that had serious

problems. Most recently, in August 2006, the center took in six

big cats from the Birsa Munda Zoological Park in Ranchi, Jharkand,

after six others died within a month's time from the tick-borne

disease babeosis. Ironically, the Birsa Munda Zoo was itself

planning to build an Animal Rescue Centre.

Two years earlier, in August 2004, the Visakhapatnam Animal

Rescue Centre took in seven tigers from the former Pratap Sinhav

Udyan Zoo in Sangli, Maharashra, derecognized by the Central Zoo

Authority due to bad conditions and poor animal care.

Despite the derecognition, and despite protests led by

PETA/India, the Pratap Sinhav Udyan Zoo continued operating for

another year, still with five lions, until flooded by the August

2005 monsoons.

Wildlife SOS then evacuated the last five Sangli lions to the

Animal Rescue Centre run by the Sri Venkateswara Zoological Park in

Tirupati. [Two photos of the evacuation appeared on page 12 of the

September 2005 edition of ANIMAL PEOPLE.]

The Sri Venkateswara Zoological Park built the Tirupati

Animal Rescue Centre to more-or-less the same specifications as the

Visakhapatnam Animal Rescue Centre, to accommodate 60 big cats.

After receiving the last of the Pratap Sinhav Udyan Zoo

lions, it was almost full, but nonetheless accepted another 16

lionesses, three lions, and a tiger just two weeks later. Kerala

Forest Department senior veterinary E.K. Easwaran told news media

that the Jumbo Circus of Wayanad, Kerala, had apparently kept the

animals for seven years in a garden on a coffee plantation, hoping

to find a way to again exhibit them. --Merritt Clifton

 

 

 

--

Merritt Clifton

Editor, ANIMAL PEOPLE

P.O. Box 960

Clinton, WA 98236

 

Telephone: 360-579-2505

Fax: 360-579-2575

E-mail: anmlpepl

Web: www.animalpeoplenews.org

 

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