At one time, certainly in my early days in the zoo, oh, if you had a gorilla it never went anywhere else. You, you know, you had to, you know, there was no sort of no no getting together. That’s obviously changed dramatically over, over the last 30 to 40… Read More
Yeah. Why do you, why do you think that zoos did not implement a major elephant national breeding program?… Read More
I thought they did, at least. I mean there there’ve been efforts over the years to try to coordinate well a number of larger species. And obviously moving elephants is a, is a big issue. But a, I mean a ZA does have a ZA does anyway, have a program… Read More
There are certain species, you mentioned finance, there are certain species that it seems might be good if there was a national program to, to, to do things. Read More
I mean, it’s a huge area, not 2 million, but 2000 square miles practically untouched because of civil war had really, nobody had been in that area, it was just unsafe to go into. But recent surveys show it to be pretty well unchanged over, you know, over a period… Read More
Do you believe there’s still a wild out there or have the majority of wild spaces been turned into managed wild zoos?… Read More
Yeah, that’s a, that’s a good question. There, there is a wild, it has to do mainly with, with just area, you know, acreage, to put it, to put it mildly, where, where there are areas that are largely untouched by humans and are big enough to still be mainly… Read More
Well, it, it is, obviously it does. I’m, I’m not sure that it actually attracts any extra people. It is an addi, it’s an additional fac very family oriented additional facility, which, which provides an added dimension to the day out. And obviously many of the people coming to the… Read More
What was the purpose? A dog presentation?… Read More
So what factors did you take into consideration when you said North Carolina has a dog show?… Read More
And even if you’re doing that, are you quite certain that that animal is comfortable in that situation or, or are there aspects of welfare where, you know, over handling a snake for example, that you know, is not used to being handled by a lot of people for six… Read More
I mean, I’m just just quoting the extreme there, but there are lots of things that have happened in the past. I think today both the zoo world and the audience is much more aware of whether an animal is comfortable or likely to be comfortable or not. So there… Read More
A lot of animals may seem to be comfortable in human presence, but give signs that they’re not, does it, does the show, does the show display behavior which is unnatural for that animal?… Read More
So the question that any animal handler, anybody conducting the show needs to ask is, is this an appropriate behavior to encourage the animal to do, or are we asking it to do something which, which is simply for human entertainment, is not really telling the audience anything valuable about… Read More
But if you are using non-domestic animals, then the whole question is, does what are you actually demonstrating with that animal?… Read More
Does it fit with firstly that animal’s comfort level?… Read More
So how do these animal presentations, we’ll call ’em, have to speak to animal welfare, you mentioned?… Read More
Well, the first thing, I mean, if you’re using, a lot of people now are using domestic animals, which obviously are, are much used to being handled by people. I mean, North Carolina has gone over to actually a very good dog show and is not doing any shows with,… Read More
Yes. Give Example, I would use the example of animal rides, animal shows, but you do feel, why do you feel they need to earn their keep?… Read More
Well, I don’t, I don’t think, I don’t think they need to earn their keep as show pieces. I, I mean, yes, of course there are lots of ways in which one can demonstrate animal behavior, all sorts of aspects of, of animal biology in, in what one might broadly… Read More