The animals who more suffer in captivity

There are some animals that are very difficult to keep in captivity, and because of that many zoos don't end up meeting the needs of these animals. Some of that animals are:

. Cetaceans: probably the animais that more suffer in captivity.
Besides, in most of the cases, they're kept in ridiculousky small tanks, they're often used in shows, or attraction of the "dive with the dolphins".

. Polar bears: one of the last animals I would try to keep in captivity (in a warm place). Though they look good, they often aren't. They are animals that need a lot of space, both on land and water, and it is difficult to keep them in a place like that with the proper ambient temperature.
NOTE: those funny dances that they usually do (repetitive movements) are stress.

. Elephants: in this case isn't so serious, many elephants are kept in large safaris. But many elephant exhibits that I see, though large, seem to be small for elephants.

Giant pandas are the most expensive animals in captivity in the world to stay alive. But they will remain the most expensive place being in terms of stay happy?

(If you have more ideas of animals suffering in captivity, share!)

 

I'd say chickens. Kept in truly horrible conditions. And domestic dogs: too often unstimulated and overweight. I think most captive elephants, pandas, polar bears and even cetaceans have it pretty good in comparison......

 

Giant pandas are well adeptable to captivity, it's just they are very expensive to loan from China.

Some other animals that are hard captives would be:

Uakaris, woolly monkeys, Sumatran rhinos, platypus, pangolins, I will say many species of small cats (like Asian golden cat, black-footed cat, jaguarundi, ..), brown hyena, palm civets, tree kangaroos, sifakas/indri, tarsiers/galagos, bontebok antelope, topi antelope, gerenuks,

quetzals, shoebills, jabiru, general Asian arboreal hornbills (difficult to breed in captivity), harpy eagles, many birds of paradise, shining (eg. Maroon) parrots, oh pitas! yes,

sea turtles, sea snakes (elapid snakes), gharials,

most sharks.

All from different/unknown reasons. I would suspect for small cats because of high sensitivity to stress and possibly inappropriate diet (high on iron or cholesterol, low on taurine, low on fermentatable fibers (hairs or plant)).
Asian arboreal hornbills - need more spatious enclosures.
Brown hyena - why? I don't know.
Most sharks - need more space with not-confusing magnetics/mechanical waves like ultrasounds

Maybe here can be added also black rhinoceroses (because in the past they most probably were fed mostly innapropriate diet - full of iron, like grass/alfalfa and their hay.), and the captive population I think it's not healthy/viable as it should be (rhinos with lower content of iron in their internal organs and bigger reproductive success)

 

I know. But it wasn't what I asked. It is obvious that these animals will suffer, as they are often in contact with humans, and if I may also mention cockroaches, ants and rats. What I mean is about animals who suffer because they are difficult to keep.

 

Most cockroaches, ants and rats actually don’t have it too bad-unless they run in conflict with pest control...

 

Large sharks tend to fare pretty poorly in captivity. I guess one or two places are doing okay with whale sharks, but for the most part big sharks don't really last long. I wonder why that is? If the issue is tank size, I wonder how big a tank would have to be to keep an adult great white alive for an acceptable lifespan...

 

Sharks are other good example. The only great white shark held captive with success was a young shark in Monterey Bay Aquarium main tank, which was released into the wild after 3 months. Japanese aquariums without any structure tried to keep goblin sharks and frilled sharks in captivity in. Obviously, they're not resisted.

 

Worst I know is domestic crested duck. It is bred to have a hole in the head, really.
http://www.backyardchickens.com/t/707110/the-truth-behind-crested-ducks

Second worst are probably some breeds of dogs. They are essentially like wild wolves, want to run, chase things and bite. Not if one is bred in a shape of a sausage with short legs, or being smaller than a cat, or having underbite jaws or fur covering eyes.

Some breeds of pigeons and cats should not be born, either.

 

Wrong Question,Felipe. ALL Animals in captivity suffer, if domestic animals, pets, our beloved meat-deliverers from the animal-factories,circus animals, and, of course not to forget, ALL animals in Zoos. You already said it-they live and SUFFER in Captivity-do you know what than meaans-they lost their FREEDOM, just for show, to live behind glass, fences and in small cages, only because we humans can see them for our pleasure. Can this be good ? No.

It makes do diffrenceeif dolphin, elephant,polar bear, rabbit, lion, tiger, ape, monkey, zebra,anteleope, wombat, kangaroo-they all are animals with FEELINGS,and now they have to live and suffer in captivity,also millions of pets-dogs,cats,guinea pigs, rabbit, hamsters, budgies in tiny flats in giant cities-poor creatures is the only thing I can say about that-but what worse-animals have to suffer so we can EAT them !!!!! Don't forget that...I think, this is much more worse than all zoos of the world together.

 

Don't forget many of these species do not do well in captivity
because of the very low number of founders for their current population.
I would not be surprised if many of those species will do well when new
founders are brought in the current captive situation.
Think of the shoebills imported to Belgium, and many species of stick
insects: newly collected populations do very well in contrast to
populations of the same species brought into captivity earlier.

Also, when cared for properly, many rare and 'difficult' species are not
so hard to keep at all. Money is often a problem for many not so popular
species: zoos do not want to invest in some species, but do for others.
That is why elephants and polar bears are doing better in zoos than some
marsupials for example, or birds with expensive diets.
Zoos do not want to invest money in expensive food for aardwolves,
but they seem to do for gigant anteaters.

 

Yes I don't forget that. But still, if some species will not prove as good captive in the first attempts, then the interest to keep that species decrease significantly, and hence we have low number of founders. If let say that shoebills thrived well in captivity, then more and more birds would be added from wild population. Of corse this is not case with every species that I have mentioned.

 

And you came here at the Zoo Chat to criticize zoos? I know often captive makes animals suffer at the hands of the wrong people, but it also help. And that's what inspires us to build zoos, zoos where animals are satisfactorily healthy and happy.

 

And even the great whites at MBA were all young sharks, I'm not sure if they ever held a fully grown adult.

 

I feel bad for dogs that are bred in such a way that they can't do a lot of physical activity. Like, they want to run and play but they have such warped bodies or severe breathing problems that they get exhausted after a few minutes. I got pretty angry after reading a Cracked article about dog breeding, the breeder they interviewed acknowledged the severe health problems of her breed and she talked about how horrible it was... But continued to breed the dog as it was anyway, because she "loves the dogs". Bull! People like that don't care about the dogs as individuals. They only care about dogs as the breed. Otherwise it wouldn't be a huge deal to bring in some other breed to breed out some of the nastier health problems.

 

Nobody has ever kept a quetzal in captivity.

 

I can think of four species that have been off the top of my head, including currently.

 

No you are not right, on Zootierliste are listed at least 30 european zoos that had kept several Quetzal species in the past, and now there are still 2 zoos in Europe (Walsrode and Parco Faunistico in Italy) who keep Golden-headed quetzal.

 

Good question for soemone who has started a thread named"The animals who more suffer in captivity"in a Zoo forum....Do you know any zoo with really happy elephants,dolphins, aps or polar bears ? But how can you be happy, if your your freedom was taken away and you have to spend the rest or even your whole life in CAPTIVITY ?

 

And to live free and happy in the wilderness (eg. in Africa), until poachers/wars kill them, and finaly wipe them from the face of the Earth, and at the same time, we should not have insurance populations in zoos? Is that what you realy want?

 

And by the way, nowadays, almost all zoo animals are captive born, and they don't know for life in wilderness, how such life is (and hence we don't have animals deprived from freedom ), and are used to captive conditions, and can be very happy. I think captive apes are happy (those kept in appropriate conditions), but I can't say that all captive elephants feels happy, though.

African elephants tends to be more happy than Asian, and those who live in bigger enclosures, with grass, not barren environment (just sand, rocks, and pool), are more happy (As I see them on YouTube videos, pictures; this don't mean that this is true, but it's my view). Just look at their facial expression, longevity, reasons for death, and birth rates, you can easily realise. Asian elephant calfs are more prone to die from EEHV infection than African ones.