Animals should not spend their unabridged lives in captivity simply to fulfil our desire to see them. Here are our superlative ten facts about zoos that y'all demand to know...

one. Zoos are miserable places for animals

This dead wallaby was left to rot by staff at Tweddle Farm Zoo for ii weeks and
the zoo refused to carry out a post-mortem to found why the animal died

In 2010, a Freedom for Animals undercover investigator filmed ill animals left untreated and expressionless animals to rot on floors atTweddle Farm Zoo. Freedom for Animalshad to take rabbits to a vet to have infections treated and after our expose local constabulary confiscated a monkey who had been kept lone and given block and other junk nutrient to swallow.

Think safari parks are better than 'traditional' zoos? Woburn Safari Park was keeping its lions locked into minor enclosures for 18 hours a solar day . A government zoo inspection report in 2010 said: "The animals were very crowded and there was no provision for individual feeding or sleeping areas. There was no visible environmental enrichment. Some of the lions exhibited skin wounds and multiple scars of diverse age, some fresh, some healed."

In late 2012, another safari park was shamed as West Midland Safari Park was exposed for providing white lion cubs to a notorious circus animal trainer , who sent them to a traveling circus in Nippon. The Lions remain in the circus today.

A government-funded study of elephants in U.k. zoos institute "at that place was a welfare concern for every elephant in the UK." 75% of elephants were overweight and merely xvi% could walk ordinarily, the balance having various degrees of lameness. Less than 20% were totally free of foot problems[1].

ii. Zoos can't provide sufficient infinite

Zoos cannot provide the amount of space animals have in the wild. This is especially the example for those species who roam larger distances in their natural habitat. Tigers and lions have around eighteen,000 times less infinite in zoos than they would in the wild. Polar bears have i 1000000 times less space[2].

three. Animals suffer in zoos

A authorities-funded written report of elephants in United kingdom zoos found that 54% of the elephants showed stereotypies (behavioural  bug) during the daytime. 1 elephant observed during day and nighttime stereotyped for 61% of a 24-60 minutes menstruum[3].

Lions in zoos spend 48% of their time pacing, a recognised sign of behavioural problems[4].

iv. Animals die prematurely in zoos

African elephants in the wild alive more than than three times as long as those kept in zoos. Even Asian elephants working in timber camps live longer than those built-in in zoos[5].

xl% of king of beasts cubs die before one month of age. In the wild, only 30% of cubs are thought to dice earlier they are six months old and at to the lowest degree a 3rd of those deaths are due to factors which are absent in zoos, similar predation[half dozen].

5. Surplus an imals are killed

A Liberty for Animalsstudy establish that at to the lowest degree 7,500 animals – and maybe as many as 200,000 – in European zoos are 'surplus' at any one time.

Animals are regularly 'culled' in UK zoos. In 2006 the whole pack of wolves at Highland Wild animals Park were killed later on the social structure of the pack had broken down. In 2005 two wolf cubs and an adult female person were shot dead at Dartmoor Wildlife Park. The vet reported: "Selective cull due to overcrowding and fighting in the pack" and "Further cull of cubs needed". In 2001 a DEFRA zoo inspection of Dartmoor Wild animals Park in Oct 2001 found that "several significant dead animals" were stored in a food freezer "for taxidermy in the time to come".

The European Association of Zoos and Aquaria (EAZA) said in 2007 that member zoos were being actively encouraged to kill unwanted animals, including tigers, if other zoos did non want them and if they were hybrids. It said that such animals take up space and keeper fourth dimension[7].

In 2010, zoo trade bodies rallied to the defence of a German zoo which was prosecuted for breaching brute welfare laws after it killed 3 tiger cubs because they were non pure-blooded (hybrid)[8].

In 2011, an exposé of Knowsley Safari Park led by Freedom for Animalsfollowing data provided past a whistleblower showed the safari park to be in contravention of legislation on disposal of carcasses also as raising queries over handling of firearms. A former employee of the safari park alleged: "culling was being used as a ways of traininginstead of being carried out in the kindest and most humane mode."

In early 2014, there was global outrage when Copenhagen Zoo killed a salubrious young giraffe chosenMarius. The effect triggered a worldwide argue on culling in zoos and it was admitted by zoo spokespeople that thousands of healthy animals are deliberately killed in European zoos lone each year.

6. United kingdom zoos are continued to animal circuses

These lions were sent as cubs from West Midland Safari Park to a circus trainer

Liberty for Animalsexposed a UK zoo in 2009 that was a member of the merchandise body BIAZA (which supposedly upholds the highest standards) as having abreeding connection with a controversial fauna circus. Noah'due south Ark Zoo Farm had been convenance camels from the Great British Circus for several years and in 2009 obtained three tigers from the circus.

A female tiger at the zoo had three stillborn cubs and another who died at 3 weeks one-time. The mother also died.

The same zoo was found to doing business withanother circus animal trainerin 2013. This was the aforementioned trainer who had been sold panthera leo cubs pastWest Midland Safari Parkand sent them to a traveling circus in Japan.

vii. Animals are trained to perform tricks

Many zoos train animals to perform tricks every bit if they were in a circus. Performing sea lions, birds and elephants can exist seen at many Great britain zoos.

Some grooming of elephants has been done using electric goads. Liberty for Animals infiltrated a training session held at Blackpool Zoo in 1998 and filmed elephants existence trained to lift their feet and head, hold sticks in their mouths and jabbed with elephant hooks in the shoulder and head.

In 2010 it was revealed that an elephant at Woburn Safari Park had previously been trained using an electrical goad [ix].

Blackpool Zoo proudly publicised its training of a baby sea lion for shows in mid 2013 [ten]. This is in spite of the fact that the United kingdom Government has agreed to ban like shows in circuses on the basis that: "we should feel dut y-bound to recognise that wild animals have intrinsic value, and respect their inherent wildness and its implications for their treatment".

viii. Animals are still taken from the wild

In 2003 the United kingdom of great britain and northern ireland authorities gave permission for the capture of 146 penguins from a British territory in the South Atlantic (Tristan da Cunha). Those who survived the seven-day boat journey from Tristan to a wild animals dealer in Due south Africa were sold to zoos in Asia [xi].

In 2010, Zimbabwe planned to capture two of every mammal species found in Hwange National Park and transport them to North Korean zoos. This included rhinos, lions, cheetahs, zebras and giraffes also as ii xviii-month-old elephants. The plan was merely stopped later international pressure past a coalition of organisations including Freedom for Animals.

70% of elephants in European zoos were taken from the wild [12].

A Freedom for Animals study found that 79% of all animals in Britain aquariums were caught in the wild. Sea Life aquariumsadmitted to taking animals from the wild as recently equally 2013, but refused to provide data on how many of the animals held past them were wild-caught.

9. Zoos don't serve conservation

Zoos merits to breed animals for eventual release to the wild but breeding programmes are primarily to ensure a captive population, non for reintroduction.

Lions are popular in zoos, merely the vast majority "are 'generic' animals of hybrid or unknown subspecific status, and therefore of little or no value in conservation terms [xiii].

Keeping an intelligent, complex and social animal like a chimp in a United kingdom zoo
does nothing to protect his relatives threatened in the wild

Zoo director David Hancocks said: "At that place is a normally held misconception that zoos are not just saving wild animals from extinction but as well reintroducing them to their wild habitats. The confusion stems from many sources, all of them zoo-based… In reality, nigh zoos accept had no contact of whatever kind with any reintroduction program."[14]

Convict convenance is considered by some conservation scientists to be a diversion from the reasons for a species' turn down, giving "a fake impression that a species is safe and so that destruction of habitat and wild populations can proceed"[15].

Zoos spend millions on keeping animals confined, while natural habitats are destroyed and animals killed equally at that place is bereft funding for protection. When London Zoo spent £5.three one thousand thousand on a new gorilla enclosure, the master consultant to the United nations Great Ape Survival Project said he was uneasy at the mismatch betwixt lavish spending at zoos and the scarcity of resources available for conserving threatened species in the wild.

"5 million pounds for three gorillas when national parks are seeing that number killed every twenty-four hour period for want of some Country Rovers and trained men and anti-poaching patrols. Information technology must be very frustrating for the warden of a national park to encounter".

Measures to protect giant pandas' habitat also supports hundreds of species of mammals, at least 200 birds, dozens of reptiles and over half of the plants known to be in Communist china [xvi].

In 2013, Freedom for Animals revealed that the UK'south largest aquarium operator, Sea Life, could traceless than iii pence per visitor to in situ conservation projects.

10. Zoos fail education

A Liberty for Animals study of UK aquariums establish that 41% of the animals on display had no signs identifying their species – the most basic of information.

A US report institute no compelling evidence for the merits that zoos and aquariums promote attitude change, instruction, or interest in conservation in visitors. The written report authors urged zoos to finish citing a zoo-funded written report which claimed an educational benefit from visits "as this conclusion is unwarranted and potentially misleading to consumers."[17]

In 2010, a Government-commissionedwritten reportestablish that "Concerns remain, however, with regard to the lack of available bear witness about the effectiveness" of conservation and education projects in zoos.

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[i]M Harris et al. The welfare, housing and husbandry of elephants in UK zoos. University of Bristol, 2008

[2]Broad roaming animals fare worst in zoo enclosures. Guardian, two.10.03

[3]One thousand Harris et al. The welfare, housing and husbandry of elephants in UK zoos. Academy of Bristol, 2008

[four]M Bricklayer & R Clubb. Guest Editorial, International Zoo News, Vol 51, No one (2004))

[v]R Clubb et al. Compromised survivorship in zoo elephants. Science, Vol 322, 12.12.08

[half dozen]Thou Mason & R Clubb. Guest Editorial. International Zoo News, Vol 51, No 1 (2004))

[7]Zoos kill healthy tigers for the pare trade. Sunday Times, 22.vii.07l

[viii]Code of Ethics & Creature Welfare. World Association of Zoos and Aquariums, June 2010

[ix]Woburn admits it gave bull elephant electric shocks. Dominicus Times, 27.6.10

[10]http://www.lep.co.uk/news/local/blackpool-zoo-due south-infant-sealion-follows-in-her-mother-s-footsteps-ane-5750458

[eleven]Taken by force. BBC Wildlife, February 2004

[12]R Clubb and Grand Bricklayer. 'A Review of the Welfare of Zoo Elephants in Europe', RSPCA, 2002

[thirteen]Nicholas Gould, Editorial, International Zoo News, Vol 49, No 5 (2002)).

[xiv]Quoted in 'Who Cares for Planet Globe?' B Hashemite kingdom of jordan, 2001

[xv]Snyder et al. Limitations of Convict Breeding in Endangered Species Recovery. Conservation Biology, Pages 338-348. Volume 10, No. 2, Apr 1996

[16]Panda mating frenzy hits zoo. BBC News, 4 May 2007 )

[17]L Morino et al. Do Zoos and Aquariums Promote Mental attitude Change in Visitors? A Critical Evaluation of the American Zoo and Aquarium Written report. Guild and Animals 18 (2010) 126-138