This adventure is making me deal with my thoughts on animals in captivity and I don't like it. I don't like it one bit. It's not fun.
Hence the combined post. I couldn't talk about one adventure without feeling like I needed to explain the other, but I wasn't ready to get into it. I'm still not, so bear with me (no pun intended).
I live near a rescue zoo. I'm even a member! I have never had any doubt or concern that those animals weren't being taken care of. How do I know this? I don't know. I just do. Gut feeling, I guess.
So when I went to the Capital of Texas Zoo, I was surprised by my gut feeling. It wasn't good. The website looked pretty pro so I was not prepared for how... not pro everything else was. The half-assed office (shed with one window, exposed insulation on the inside, not painted, full of animal cages (complete with animals), no lights and hot) and the too-quiet guy working there (he was nice enough, really - I don't want to judge people for not being extroverts, but it was more than that). I thought OK, bad taste in decorating and a bad choice of employee, but whatever. Then it was the handwritten, but large and emphatic declaration that you may not take pictures except for your own personal use... which includes NOT posting them on-line. Hmmm. "Why? What are you hiding?" was my first thought, as it would be anyone's. Then I felt bad, as I'm wont to do, everybody has copyright issue stuff and blah, blah, blah. Who knows if he got screwed out of royalties or something, I don't know. OK, but still a little weird. The guy said I could talk to the owner when he gets back and get permission to post them. He even found me outside to say he spoke to him and that if I'd leave my info and email him, he'd give me permission. Fair enough. So I'm finally off to see the animals. The enclosures seem really small... and cagey (versus the more recent trend of more natural looking spaces). The land the zoo sits on seemed to be a fair amount of acreage so it made me wonder why the cages had to be so small (not ridiculously or dangerously small... some just seemed too small for the natural movements of that particular animal). Only about half had a description of what you were looking at and those were just printed from a computer (how hard could it be to do them all?). The bathroom was in like a mobile home type building - I didn't use it. And the new "snack bar" is just a stand with coolers and boxes and a handwritten menu of chips and soda. And no one is even there. That's when I realize that the front office guy is also walking around feeding the animals. And then I see him doing work on "the new monkey enclosure". One guy. Working the whole zoo. (I asked him where they get the animals. He said they are 3/4 rescues and the others are bought or traded from other facilities.) On the way to the lion and white tiger side, I passed another mobile home thing, but this one had piles and piles of stuff like animal crates and scrap wood and tools and what not. Honest to God, if it was in your neighborhood, you'd call the cops. But in answer to the biggest question - the animals looked healthy to the naked eye. They even boast being second to only the San Diego zoo in successful reproduction of a fossa. That is an accomplishment. No one looked sick; they looked hot and bored, but not sick.
So why do I keep having to talk myself into being OK with this place? On the surface, it looks dreadful, but we all know you shouldn't judge a book by it's cover. I hate people judging me, I try not to judge other people. I didn't even meet the owner. Maybe it's all a matter of bad taste more than bad ethics. You just never know. So my brain starts trying to understand the situation. It is very possible that this guy truly loves what he's doing and wants to give the animals a safe place to live and the kids a great educational experience. I can only imagine how expensive it is to house all those animals and feed them and pay the vet bills and make improvements. I get that.
Which leads me to Natural Bridge Wildlife Ranch. After the zoo experience, I was positively dreading this. I was scared of what I'd see. Well, I'll be damned if I didn't love it. They have a full color guide with an audio tour so you can identify all the animals and learn something about them. The animals are just out in the open, hanging out. They come up to you if they want, they don't if they don't. There were lots of babies. They looked healthy. They looked... normal? Can you say that? I really enjoyed it and would do it again. How do I know they are OK? I don't. Just a gut feeling. This was more in-line with my experience at the Austin Nature Science Center. Those animals and enclosures didn't bother me either.
But all in all, how can I be OK with any of it? In a perfect world, there wouldn't be an issue because we wouldn't need to have zoos to save animals from extinction or under population or because we are destroying their homes. We'd have other ways to learn about animals in their natural habitats. But the world is not perfect. And there are going to places that do a good job with the situation. If you start researching, there is propaganda for either side of the "zoo" argument and honestly... I can't decide which side I'm on. I've decided I'm undecided.
Mainly because I can't pinpoint my problem. Or their problem, for that matter. Is it all OK when I can't see the "mess"? Is it all OK when the dirty underbelly is safely hidden in storage facilities or prettied up with fancy fake habitats? Is there even a dirty underbelly? I don't know. Or is it not OK to keep wild animals at all? They certainly are not living a normal life (although not running from predators or eking out a food supply is a plus. See! There I go! Propaganda!) Maybe it all just boils down to money. It changes everything. All I know is what I saw and what I felt. My head gets all spinny when I think about it. I'm really not here to debate the issue. I just wanted you to know my experience and that I'm not sure how to deal with it.
P.S. The owner never replied to my email so I did not post the pictures of the animals I took at Capital of Texas. And that's all they are - just pictures. No expose stuff, because I'm still unsure of what the deal is. (I did read some yelp reviews and all of them were good... except for one. One lady said all the same things I did. Is it only us?!)
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