Zoocheck Canada director's India visit

[Guest guest]

Dear all,

Zoocheck Canada director Rob Laidlaw visited New Delhi this

week. It was nice to renew acquaintances and visit Delhi Zoo together where

we shared notes. Rob shares my concern on the plight of Shankar, the lone

African Elephant. Shankar was mingling with an Asian Elephant when we saw

him before a keeper drove him inside the kraal and chained him and he

started swaying the way captive elephants do. We had an opportunity to look

at the Chimpanzees very closely inside their dens and observed them being

fed. The Chimpanzee enclosure in Delhi Zoo is by far the very best Great Ape

enclosure I have seen anywhere : it is more than 2 acres in area, has a

grass substrate with natural trees and the terrain is undulating and as long

as the animals are held captive, there is little to criticise about this

facility.

 

Rob is gathering material for several books on wildlife and dogs and also

visited the WWF office to interact with staff on several issues of common

interest. He is also promoting the film called 'The Tiger Next Door' that

highlights the plight of captive tigers in North America. One interview of

Rob attached alongwith a link to his paper on reintroduction of captive

animals to the wild that is of major scientific interest. Here :

 

http://www.zoocheck.com/articlepdfs/Reintroduction%20of%20Captive-bred%20Animals\

..pdf

 

 

I hope he will continue his involvement with Indian zoo animals for a long

time to come. Several Indians are helping him with elephant captivity issues

in Canada. He is an extremely well read person and it is always a pleasure

to talk to him.

 

Best wishes,

 

 

Interview with Rob Laidlaw, Director of Zoocheck

Thursday, 18 September 2008 GreenMuze Staff

 

 

Polar bears in an Indonesian zoo. Photo: Rob Laidlaw

 

With a hot new book geared towards helping young readers learn more about

zoos – Wild Animals in Captivity – we caught up with Zoocheck founder and

Executive Director Rob Laidlaw to ask a few questions about zoos, what life

in captivity means for the animals and where do wild animals fit in with the

environmental movement.

How did you get involved with captive animal welfare?

 

I have been extremely interested in nature since my early childhood. I

remember reading everything I possibly could about animals, conservation and

the environment and watching every television documentary about wildlife. At

a very early age, I realized that when animal interests came up against

human interests, the animals nearly always lost out, even when human

interests were trivial. That seemed wrong to me, so I decided to do whatever

I could to ensure that animals were given fair treatment.

 

While there is certainly a great deal of discussion about wildlife, and

particularly endangered species, the welfare of individual wild animals is

still an idea that is struggling for legitimacy in environmental discourse.

—Rob Laidlaw

 

How long have you worked with Zoocheck?

 

I started Zoocheck in 1984 after visiting a small roadside zoo in rural

Ontario. I was shocked at the animal housing and husbandry conditions I

encountered, such as ramshackle homemade cages and filthy conditions, so I

began to investigate what laws there were to protect captive wild animals. I

soon found out that wild animal keeping was essentially unregulated and that

no one really knew very much about the plight of captive wild animals. I

decided it was an issue that someone needed to take on, so I did and that

eventually resulted in the creation of Zoocheck.

 

Rob Laidlaw, Director of Zoocheck

 

What does Zoocheck do?

 

Zoocheck Canada is a wildlife protection charity established to promote and

protect the interests and well-being of wild animals. Its goals are achieved

through research and investigation, public education and awareness programs,

legislative campaigns, capacity building initiatives and litigation. While

most of our work over the years has involved captive wild animals in Canada,

we have also been involved in a number of international initiatives, as well

as campaigns to protect wildlife in the wild.

 

Where do animals – captive or wild – fit into the current climate of

environmental discourse?

 

While there is certainly a great deal of discussion about wildlife, and

particularly endangered species, the welfare of individual wild animals is

still an idea that is struggling for legitimacy in environmental discourse.

I’m sure that will change with time. I think many people are starting to

view the welfare of the individual living components of our environment as

worthy of consideration, so I have little doubt that welfare concepts will

become increasingly prominent in future environmental discussion.

 

Why do captive animals need a voice?

 

Captive animals need a voice because a majority of people today believe that

zoos and other captive wildlife display facilities are benign or even

beneficial and that they have the best interests of the animals in mind. Of

course, after nearly three decades examining zoos, I believe nothing could

be further from the truth. In fact, I know most zoos still incarcerate

animals in conditions that fail to satisfy their biological and behavioural

needs; they continue to remove significant numbers of animals from the wild;

they produce an annual predictable surplus of common animals with nowhere to

go; and they make only a negligible contribution to the conservation of wild

animals in their natural habitats. Since animals are unable to defend

themselves, I think it is incumbent upon those of us who care to ask

questions and to challenge animal use wherever and whenever it occurs.

 

While zoo visitors love to see baby animals, many of them end up being

shunted to substandard zoos, sold to animal dealers, dumped into the pet

trade or sent off to even less desirable circumstances once their appeal has

subsided.

—Rob Laidlaw

 

Are all zoos created equally?

 

No, there are a variety of zoos and zoo-type facilities and they range in

quality. The best captive facilities are the ones who place the needs of the

animals as their highest priority. The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee in

one such facility. As a refuge for abused and discarded elephants from zoos

and circuses, they recognize the need to provide elephants with space,

complexity and a rich social environment. By providing hundreds of acres of

field and forest for their elephants to roam, the sanctuary allows elephants

to behave like elephants. While it still not the wild, the facility is

larger and more complex than any zoo I have encountered anywhere in the

world. It puts to shame the bland, meager spaces provided to elephants in

typical zoo environments.

 

A gharial in a barren cage. Photo: Rob Laidlaw

 

Other examples of facilities that are head and shoulders above even the

best-known zoos include the Performing Animal Welfare Society ARK 2000

sanctuary, Wisconsin Black Bear Education Center, China Bear Rescue Center

and the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. While none are typical zoos, they

provide a useful, productive model that future captive facilities may want

to emulate.

 

What are the ‘hidden’ sides of zoos?

 

While many of the problems faced by captive wild animals, such as small

spaces and artificial conditions, are obvious to zoo visitors, a whole range

of questionable zoo practices remain relatively unknown. For example, the

practice of segregating animals into small off-exhibit areas during

non-visitor hours is common in zoos around the world. In fact, I encountered

this recently at a zoo in Japan. Lions housed in a very large enclosure were

put into small, kennel-like spaces at 4 pm where they would remain until 9

am the following morning when they would be let out into their display

space. I expect most visitors assume the lions live in their big enclosure

all the time and that if they knew that the lions actually spent 17 hours

each day in their off-exhibit areas, they would be shocked.

Breeding is often portrayed as a positive aspect to zoos, but most breeding

is problematic because surplus animals are typically difficult, if not

impossible, to find homes for. Even many endangered species breeding

programs regularly produce unwanted surplus animals that are hard to place.

While zoo visitors love to see baby animals, many of them end up being

shunted to substandard zoos, sold to animal dealers, dumped into the pet

trade or sent off to even less desirable circumstances once their appeal has

subsided. This is something the average zoo visitor probably doesn’t

realize.

I believe the entire zoo concept needs to be reexamined. It is time for zoos

to evolve into facilities that are more humane, conservation-oriented and

productive.

 

Should we have zoos?

 

I believe the entire zoo concept needs to be reexamined. The outdated,

menagerie-style zoo model, the current format of most zoos today, emerged in

the 19th century and has outlived its usefulness. It is time for zoos to

evolve into facilities that are more humane, conservation-oriented and

productive. If that happens, there may still be some zoos, but they will be

far different from the zoos that most people are familiar with today.

 

What makes a ‘good’ zoo?

 

The best captive facilities are the ones who place the needs of the animals

as their highest priority. They recognize that all animals need space,

complexity, stimulation and an ability to exercise control over their own

lives. They recognize that their facilities need to be self-sustaining, but

they do not focus on commercial objectives, such as perpetually trying to

raise visitor numbers or generate revenue, actions that often occur at the

expense of the animals.

Some of the best captive facilities are small and focused, devoting their

efforts and resources on particular species, becoming specialists in

particular functions, such as animal rescue, or driving legitimate field

conservation initiatives. Unfortunately, those kinds of facilities are the

exception, rather than the rule.

 

A silverback living in a concrete world. Photo: Rob Laidlaw

 

 

Is it possible for animals to have a decent life in a zoo?

 

Given what I have personally encountered in zoos around the world, I believe

that most times the answer is no. I say this because most of the zoos I’ve

visited keep animals in completely artificial conditions that are thousands,

or in some cases, millions of times smaller than the spaces they would

inhabit in the wild. Their ability to act naturally by expressing normal

movements and behaviours is severely restricted or eliminated. Having said

that, I believe there are certain circumstances in which it is acceptable or

beneficial to keep at least some animals in captivity, such as in

sanctuaries and retirement centers, rescue centers, specialist facilities,

conservation breeding centers and, perhaps, in a small number of

“progressive” zoos.

 

Why did you write Wild Animals in Captivity?

 

For a very long time, I have read zoo marketing materials, the majority of

them aimed at children that provide a sanitized and inaccurate view of zoos

and what they do. I have also been contacted regularly by both children and

parents who are concerned about the keeping of wildlife in captivity, and,

in many cases, about school visits to zoos. I felt it was time for someone

to formulate a children-oriented response to counter the propaganda

disseminated by the zoo industry.

 

Any more books in the works?

 

I am currently working on a children’s book about wild animals in

entertainment. It will cover wild animals in circuses, film and television,

beach primates in Spain, dancing bears in eastern Europe and Asia, Temple

elephants and snake charming in India, alligator wrestling in the United

States and the exploitation of animals in educational programs. I don’t

believe most of these topics have been discussed in a children’s book

before, even though they tend to be aimed at the entertainment of children.

I also have an adult book about zoos in the works and essays for two photo

books about human-animal relationships.

 

Closing remarks?

There have certainly been many highs over the years, such as new laws being

passed, changes in policies, zoo closures and animal relocations, to name

just a few. Of course, there have also been many low points as well. The

most satisfying part of this entire process however has been facilitating

the development of new activists. As someone who is completely aware of his

own limitations, as well as the limitations of this relatively new modern

movement to protect animals, I understand the need for more people to get

involved and become active. The movement has progressed tremendously since I

first started and I am very pleased to have played a small role in making

that happen.

 

For more information about Zoocheck visit: http://www.zoocheck.com

 

Read our review of Wild Animals in Captivity by Rob Laidlaw.

http://www.greenmuze.com/animals/wild/395-interview-with-rob-laidlaw-director-of\

-zoocheck.html