In what is shaping up to be a difficult day for animals in the news,
two stories highlight problems faced by the animal kingdom.
In one, a recent study has shown that elephants live longer in the
wild than they do in zoos. Living conditions inside zoos is one
reason officials at the Detroit Zoo in Royal Oak sent popular
attractions Winky and Wanda, one of whom has since died, to
California to live in a sanctuary. (Winky died this spring at age 56;
reports indicated he
I've seen recent broadcast reports describing other efforts to help
elephants in zoos, including a push in L.A. to build a sanctuary in
its zoo or else giving up the elephants. The last report I saw showed
numerous zoos having given up on housing elephants in conditions that
are detrimental to their health, as elephants need more space to thrive.
So this report highlights what people have been thinking for a while.
Meanwhile, the Bush administration is scaling back protections of
endangered species (animals and plants). These changes include
eliminating some studies conducted before projects start and
prohibiting evaluations of what impact a project could have on global
warming and then on specific species, The Associated Press reported.
Of course, this is standard. Obama vows to reverse them when in office.
Same thing happened when Clinton left office. For instance, he
toughened rules for working in forests, something Bush undid when he
was in office.
It's a game of back and forth, but out of that, real change does
come... eventually.