And I think AZA has been really taking a hard, hard look at where elephants fit into the collection. Now, also little sidebar on that is we know that it’s been difficult working with the philosophy of the people that maintain elephants through the years. This argument of no contact… Read More
What’s your opinion about that?… Read More
Well, I certainly agree with a couple of points that I think have been made through the years. Not every zoo needs an elephant. You don’t have to have an elephant to tell the elephant story. And if you’re gonna have elephants, certainly by what we know today and the… Read More
I think that’s a big philosophical question. Now, I know that it’s probably a balancing act and there are some institutions that might try to say, “Okay, we’ve got an operating budget but 10% of our operating budget, we’re going to identify for in situ conservation activities and that’s what… Read More
Do they want you spending that kind of money helping something that isn’t going to show any benefit at home or would they rather see you fix up something at home that has benefit to the institution and to the people who care about the place?… Read More
And I think you’d have to dissect the activity and decide how does your community feel about it?… Read More
How do the people that own the institution feel?… Read More
When you talk about spending money, there are zoos that spend 10, 20, 30 million, more maybe on animal exhibits for gorillas or flaming, whatever it is, should these monies be spent more for helping those animals in nature, as opposed to the incredible amounts of money that zoos now… Read More
Certainly a big philosophical question. Read More
I think you also have to be very cautious because when you send money off to a foreign zoo or something like that, you’ve got to make sure that it’s going to be spent for that which it was meant for. I am aware of monies that have been given… Read More
First of all, I don’t think we… We probably have a little bit of a moral obligation. I don’t know that it’s so much a responsibility and I think it totally depends upon an institution. I think it depends on whether an institution’s got the funds to participate in that… Read More
Why aren’t you spending that money at home?… Read More
Do we have a responsibility to that and can we help them?… Read More
What’s your opinion about US zoos and aquariums?… Read More
Can they do things to help upgrade developing countries with their zoos, especially where zoos are not the profession but a job filled by people just looking to have work?… Read More
So, you can take those for what they’re worth. Sometimes we had good ones. Sometimes we had bad ones. We quit doing them because we weren’t sure that we were really getting valid information. Read More
Well, that’s like, duh, we should be doing that. And we learned their cultures. We learned when they would come to visit the zoo and we made things special for them. They would always come on Sunday afternoon after church, after they’ve had their lunch and the families would come… Read More
And we tried to make corrections. We got on the Hispanic radio stations. We got on the Hispanic newspaper and we concentrated. And so, zip code surveys, big help to us and exit surveys. Now, exit surveys, you can take ’em for what they want. If you’ve had a great… Read More
I think it’s done probably on fairly regularly today because there’s a lot more marketing people involved with the zoo business today. But those zip codes were very helpful to me, particularly in discussions. “Well, we don’t have that many people visiting the Oklahoma City Zoo.” “Oh, excuse me. Let… Read More
Now, zip code surveys evolved because when people first started taking zip code surveys, they thought okay, where are these people coming from that are visiting your zoo?… Read More