Another article in the Age, Animal rights and wrongs - In Depth - theage.com.au This raises some interesting questions and has quotes from the usual animal rights people, Wirth, Singer, Hancocks etc. Certainly what they have raised is valid and needs to be answered or addressed but all three are coming from an anti zoo perspective.
There is no defending such atrocious actions. No defence whatsoever. Keeping elephants in captivity is such a monstrous outrage in the first place, due to the numerous leg and foot ailments that they suffer over the years, that to stab one with any type of object is totally unjustified. The ankus and various other metal "weapons" should be banned from every zoo in the world. If that happens in my lifetime then I'll move to Antarctica... And Rigo the gorilla in solitary confinement for 16 years blackens Melbourne Zoo's eye. What a joke of a situation that has become...and supporters of the zoo say that they have the best interests of the animals at heart? What a disgrace.
I think Rigo was recently integrated with a troop... IMO, Elephants can be kept in captivity but it requires a huge commitment... I do agree that all implements such as the one used here should be banned, maybe as a requirement of accreditation...
I was the a bit more then a week ago and all the gorillas were off display except for the young ones because of introductions to Rigo
Ankus' should definately NOT be banned, you try controlling something like an elephant without one. in Australia you will find all Ankus' are probe (blunt) ended and it is illegal to have sharp ended ankus. I have seen the ankus Melbourne zoo use and they are a whole lot better than the ones I've seen in thailand and Sri Lanka. Elephants can be hard to handle and it takes a lot of time and commitment from keepers. I am not going to comment on the vailidty of these accusations but I will say that the actions of one should not affect the reputation of the rest. I am prepared to be criticised for this but in some cases force is necessary when dealing with elephants (i do not agree with stabbing them) to use a bit of force. How many of you have smacked a dog for biting or hurting you or anything like that. We do not know the circumstances as to what led up to the supposed stabbing so we should bve careful with what we say
I didn't know this... But are YOU sure..? He'd have to be pretty strong guy to stab an elephant with a blunted one... With all the dog smacking and human biting you do, I'm starting to think you may have a violence problem..! No we shouldn't... This why they have escapes built into Elephant enclosures... You may also want to look up the meaning of forum (a hint: it involves the words "open discussion")...
I am very sure they are blunt ended, I believe the report states an ankus wasn't used to stab the elephant anyway. The ankus are made here in Australia and were actually made specifically for Melbourne Zoo. Your telling me you've never smacked a dog for snarling or snapping at you? I will admit that I've been responsible for smacking the odd dog for misbehaving, this is nothing but natural dominance though. The same thing goes with elephants, in group situations animal need to know their place. I had one elephant that had to remain chained up when I was arund as she would always have a go at me, this was because I was nervous when I first met her and didn't show the confidence and dominance necessary in that particular environment. Sure we can discuss and a discussion is from both sides . . . just providing something to discuss
There is a whole, very large thread about the integration of Rigo into the troop. There was no excuse for having him on his one for such a long time but it is not a current situation. Was the elephant actually stabbed? Or was it jabbed? There is a difference. Stabbing implies that the skin was pierced with the implement. Did that happen? The elephant situation is not ideal at Taronga/Melbourne zoos but they certainly are NOT being mistreated by the keepers. The article made a huge thing about the zoo needing to be commercial. Well that's the reality of the situation. If yjhe newspaper or it's readers don't like that then they need to take it up with the Victorian Govt. Then there is the furphy that money used to pay for the elephants would have been better off used to conserve habitat. Certainly no one can dispute that but the thing is - that money would not have been available for that. It was raised for this particular purpose. With regards to the tapir having its eyeslids sewn shut. We know that the Malayan Tapirs in Australia have suffered terribly in terms of eyes. That's why the zoos stopped breeding them. Was this particular treatment warrented? I have no idea - I'm not the vet who would have been consulted on this issue.
from my perspective, i don'tknow who to point the finiger at but i do know this.... rigo - no excuse. pathetic management on the zoo's behalf and his life was probably compromised simply for the desire to maintain a larger group for display. the fact that he was aloone was one form of neglect (that was unnecessary and avoidable) the other was the fact that he was not given access to better surrounds. this all points to display taking priority over animal welfare in my eyes and the zoo deservs as good as they get. seals - its a fact that the zoo will be maintaining them in that atrociously small pool for a reasonbly extended period of time. do you think its big enough? i don't. tapir - when melbourne acquired this animal it was well known that the species was prone to eye troubles from sunlight. yet i for one saw the animal on display for some time in full sun. eventually a pathetic attempt (small shade clothed area) was made to keep her poy of the sun. i beieve it to be a case of the zoo attempting (poorly perhaps) to treat the problem but never prevent it in the first place. i saw that tapir in a innapropriate enclosure for some time. elephants - what happened? who knows. but i will say this. many years ago i wrote on this forum about a senior keeper i saw behaving very aggressively to mek kapah. hhooking an ankus behind her ear and forving her to her knees and shouting very loudly and aggressively. this was on a quiet weekday and was all part of her "enrichment" excercise program. had she struck out at this keeper i would not have been surprised for the behaviour was aggressive and uncalled for. the elephant was not being given a response time between being "asked" to do something and "forced" with the bull hook. i have never forgotten it and i was astonished the keeper had the nerve to do behave in such a way in front of at least one or two visitors. lastly, the sources for this article were in fact fellow melbourne zoo keepers who were disgusted with their collegues actions. keep that in mind. and jarkari - i am so glad you will never own an elephant
Patrick - great post. Jay - I can`t see a difference if Dokkoon was "stabbed" or "jabbed". She was clearly in distress and terrified because of the keeper`s outbreak of anger if the newspaper report is correct, and there is no, absolutely no excuse for that. If the Melbourne elephant handlers can`t handle their elephants without such actions, they should change to protected contact (like many zoos in europe have done in the last years). Jakari - if you need to smack a dog to keep up dominance you are making something wrong and you should make the efford to learn about dog`s body language and how to become a "pack leader" without using physical violence.
Jarkari: what the hell? A publicly-funded institution like the Melbourne Zoo should not be cramming a small herd of elephants into three tiny enclosures in the first place. To beat one of those elephants with some type of blunt or sharp weapon is completely and utterly unacceptable. It is possible to allow elephants to do things at their own speed, and if a particular elephant is not responding...then the keeper simply waits longer. Your speech about hitting dogs is a ridiculous comparison, and next you will be talking about having kids and smacking them around. Your argument is weak, and it appears that you refuse to say anything bad about Melbourne Zoo. Jay: I do realize that there is a long thread all about Rigo and his solitary confinement, because I contributed to it a number of times. Just because Melbourne Zoo is finally getting off of its ass and doing something about it after 16 years doesn't mean that we can all forget that it ever happened. Disgraceful zoo etiquette by the management. And who cares if the elephant in question was stabbed or jabbed? Does it really matter? Why nitpick about something inconsequential, when the greater question that should be asked is why was the elephant being hit in the first place? Every single one of us here at ZooBeat loves zoos and seeing captive wildlife, and that is essentially why we are on this site. But for folks to be so blind in their love for locked-up animals that they refuse to criticize any zoo activity exemplifies plain old stupidity. The best zoos in the world deserve criticism, especially when it comes to caring for elephants. 1- The Oregon Zoo is praised for its elephant breeding program, but it has 6 elephants on 2 acres and 5 out of 6 have serious foot ailments. 2- Taronga, Melbourne and San Diego all have elephant enclosures that are much too small. 3- I am always reading about the great and wonderful Chester Zoo, but how can such a supposedly progressive zoo cram 10 elephants into the space that one should have?
There is a difference between stabbed and jabbed. Of course neither is acceptable but in the battle to win peoples hearts on the matter ( and this is what it is), stabbed is a far more perjogative word to use. It's a matter of semantics. Stabbed implies physical harm, the causing of a wound, especially as there were twelve stabs. Jabbing does not imply a physical wound, rather like being poked at by someone. Not pleasant but it doesn't actually wound you. When people read that article, and when I did, I saw the word stab and IMMEDIATLY thought that the implement must have penetrated her skin into her flesh. Only after a brief time did I wonder if that is what happened. Many people won't question it. If the word had been jabbed people would have shrugged it off. That is why it is important.
Oh and snow leopard. Re Rigo. Your first post on this thread sounded as if this was the first time you had become aware of it and I was just pointing out that it existed and you could read more aboout it there. Sorry.
I believe there is a big difference between "jabbed" and "stabbed"... From a legal point of view there is, about 20 years...
What is the difference between using aggressive force to "manage" the elephants and passive force to "manage" thier reproduction? Elephants in captivity, whether a zoo or traditional "slavery" is abhorent in this day and age. Our "traditional" Thai display validates dominance over the elephants by employing traditional management methods that we would find unacceptable in the study of say, whales. RIGO - Please read his thread, we have long known of Rigo's plight and will continue to demand a family environment for all gorilla's. Elephants are also suffering the cruelty of separation from loved ones for the purpose of "management" and "conservation". I will however, ask the question, isn't the RSPCA a little late on the Rigo issue.
OH ********!!! Dogs live in a heirarchy where that is necessary, I never have problems with my dog because he knows where he stands in my family but I do have young neices come over and that is where problems begin, Being a pig dog you do what is necessary to ensure he knows where he stands and I can gladly say that I would now let my dog play with my four year old niece (albeit supervised). heck this dog shares my bed quite comfortably, not something it would do if I had shown unneccesary aggrevation toward him and that was my point. I don't know what happened in melbourne it may not have been necessary all i was saying was in some cases it is necessary, how many elephants have you worked with in your life Patrick or Yassa. I did not say I agree with some handling methods but you don't know what is and isn't necessary and when you have a bull in musth it comes down to you hitting him with a stick or you being six foot under!!!
I hve never said anything about the zoo and it's elephant enclosures. I would much prefer to see the elephants at an open zoo so I don't know where your comment about me refusing to say anything bad about melbourne zoo has come from, I have never been there. Your point is quite ridiculous, yes I will let an elephant do what it wants, this is no different than letting them develop steroypical behavuours. They will become used to it and then down the track if they don't get their way they will just act out, which is as we have seen recently fatal when it comes to elephants. I have no opinion as to what actually happened at Melbourne zoo and again was stating facts. elephants DO push eachother and bully eachother in their natural heirarchy and a keeper using force is nothing different. I do agree that if he actually stabbed the elephant or didn't give her time to respond then of course that was the wrong thing to do. But don't criticise my opinion on handling animals when many of you haven'y been any more than a few feet with one. It is the same with dogs and the same with humans and in fact any social group in the animal kingdom. I have not said once that I condone unreasonable force, I believe that in some cases though, that force is necessary. wether it be withy people dogs or elephants. granted we have developed much better handling methods in western countries than those I have experienced but to let an elephant repeatedly get away with something is just stupid. Again I do not know the situation at melbourne and do not condone unreasonable force. I am interested to hear what people think that actually have some real experience with animals. If I'm criticised by them then I will gladly rethink my position.
Where do you work to be doing all this "animal handling" Jarkari..? I'd love to know so I could write them and the RSPCA a terse letter... One of my best friends is a dog trainer with seeing eye dog people here in NZ and I met her when she was formerly training dogs for the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry... You stating that physically striking a dog is a legitimate form of control shows that you have no experience in animal handling in particular canine's... Additionally a mate from NZ Customs I was talking to at a party last night told me that a dog handler just got fired for hitting her dog (this wasn't you was it)..? I take offence when say my opinion is irrelevant because I don't have experience handling (wild?) animals (I am not a *****), especially when I believe you are pretending to have yourself...
RSPCA also mentioned Werribee on the news A few years ago a heavily pregnant zebra was filmed by the ABC being dragged along the ground at Werribee after refusing to be loaded into a float. There were two vets and keepers from Melbourne zoo in attendance. Floating a pregnant animal is not recommended and the senior male vet made this clear to the zoo exec in charge (some guy with a huge gut who was seen driving around in a 4 wheel drive giving orders). The vet was totally ignored and of course the zebra went into shock and died. The young female vet did a caesar but the foal was dead also. Melbourne zoo officials did everything they could legally to stop the footage being broadcast but they lost and it was. The story was actually in a series about zoos. I wrote letters of complaint and eventually phoned them and the answer was "they had learnt alot from the experience". They sent me a tourist brochure of the zoos in the mail in response!
