Elephant Advocates Charge Zoos As Devastating As Poaching For Elephants’ Lifespan
Assail AZA for PR Lies to Hide Premature Death of Zoo Elephants


Orlando —In the wake of the sixth elephant death in less than twelve months, members of In Defense of Animals (IDA) and Animal Rights Foundation of Florida (ARFF) will gather at Disney’s Animal Kingdom, where directors of the American Zoo and Aquarium Association (AZA) are conferencing, to highlight the industry’s egregious track record. The groups are calling on zoo industry spinners to stop misrepresenting the facts about elephant longevity, acknowledge that zoo conditions are prematurely killing elephants, and begin the process of transferring elephants from inadequate zoo enclosures to naturalistic and spacious sanctuaries.


When: Friday, January 21, 2005 at 11:00 a.m.
Where: Disney's Animal Kingdom, at the “Welcome to Walt Disney World” sign

As public controversy escalates over zoos’ inability to provide for elephants’ sensitive social and spatial needs and the body count of captivity-induced premature elephant deaths rises, the AZA has begun to redefine elephant longevity in order to explain away the ongoing early deaths of elephants in zoos. Recently released AZA zoo “lifespan” data is faulty, excluding the high infant mortality in zoos and comparing the average age of death in zoos to that of wild elephant populations devastated by poaching.

“Thee AZA has fudged the numbers but in doing so has demonstrated that zoos are having as devastating an effect on elephants’ average age of death as poaching,” said IDA president and veterinarian Elliot Katz. “In the wild, poaching cuts short elephant lives; in captivity, zoo conditions are also causing elephants to die early. Zoo conditions cause elephants a lifetime of suffering due to debilitating and painful captivity-induced health problems caused by lack of space.” 

As the largest land mammals, elephants are genetically designed for almost constant movement and can walk tens of miles a day over varied terrains, activity which is essential for their joint, foot and digestive health. In zoos, elephants spend their time inactive in cramped enclosures, standing on concrete or hard compacted dirt which leads to extremely painful degenerative joint disorders and recurrent foot infections—exacerbated in cold climates when elephants are forced indoors to even smaller spaces where they stand for extended periods in their own feces and urine. AZA standards allow an elephant to be held in an area of 1,800 square feet—the equivalent of six parking spaces.

Just days after the death of Peaches at Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo this week, the activists will demand that AZA directors support the relocation of that zoo’s surviving elephant, Wankie, to The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee as the first step in a plan to make meaningful changes for elephants in zoos. 

“The zoo industry must stop lying to the public and manipulating scientific data to paint a prettier picture of the sad lives of elephants in zoos.” Katz continued. Zoos must pledge to never capture and import elephants from their native lands and immediately develop a plan to end the practice of keeping elephants in small enclosures that prevent adequate movement and cause them to suffer and die.” 

Please visit savezooelephants.com for more information.