The Copenhagen Giraffe

I think seeing a baby in a herd as an individual money spinner is the wrong way of looking at it. A herd is a herd is a herd, and by definition it contains babies. Without babies it is just a group of sterile females, with a frustrated male overseeing them.

I think all predators have a pecking order, eating wise [including different species eating the same kill]. Did anyone see that fascinating programme about vultures the other week?

They were called African Painted Hunting Dogs, with capitals. Their fur is blotched with brown black and yellow, more like a paint-rag than a painting.

I wouldn't like to argue with them over a carcase.

They're very high on the endangered list, aren't they?

I wouldn't like to argue with a lot of (human) males over a bit of steak! Seems to bring out the caveman in them.

Tegan Put it into this IUCN Red List search box at discover.iucnredlist.org/

I tried to copy the link to the exact page, but it kept putting that blasted 20% into it (it does that as a substitute for a space, which is not allowed in links)

Elegran, thanks for the information from your zoo day.
it's off the giraffe topic, but have others read about the fact so many elephants are being killed for their tusks. Kenya was one of the main areas, and it seems the ivory is sold for Chinese medicine etc.
If this type of poaching increases, and why wouldn't it, is it possible elephants will become endangered?
I seem to remember there are also concerns about orangutans being at risk.
Given the strife and poverty in so much of Africa, I begin to feel that much as I prefer to see animals in their natural homes, we probably need zoos to continue their work.

Iam64 In the Red List, the African Elephant is down as vulnerable (one stage less than endangered) Red~list details of ~African Elephant

I think everyone prefers to see animals in the natural homes. Zoos are insurance policies - and sources of research and education.

Iam64 Red List entry for Orang Utan - Critically Endangered

You can't be against a giraffe being used as meat and forget all those hundreds of millions of pigs, cows and chickens ( and horses) who share this same destiny. You don't hear of any Tesco or Sainsbury's customers getting upset when choosing their joint of beef or their pork sausages.

That is how life on earth works and if our ancestors hadn't started saving our carcases, then our ancestors would have been eaten as well.

The Red List categories are:-

Least concern
Near threatened
Vulnerable
Endangered
Critically endangered
Extinct in the Wild
Extinct

The List is not all that easy to negotiate, as there are so many species on it. To search for a particular species, it works best to do a Google search of the name of what you are looking for, plus "Red List". That will give you a link to the relevant page within www.iucnredlist.org

Thank you, margaretX, for espousing reality. Young giraffe is natural food for lions when they can get it. In the wild they have to kill it themselves of course. Their killing method isn't usually quite so humane as a bolt to the brain, though that isn't their fault of course. I'm sure they do their best to be efficient.

I like your analogy. Certainly no-one who eats lamb (cute young animal) should be making objections to lions eating young giraffe. The ethics, as I and iam64 have already argued, are the same.

What would you like to hear about next, Thatbags ? The "activities" we were set as part of the day's agenda (open, not hidden) ?

The "activities" will do just fine, thank you, elegran. What were you asked to do?

OK Bags We were given several "dilemmas" and put into groups to discuss what we would do in response to each of them. This, by the way, was a run-through of what secondary school classes are put through when they come for a conservation lesson - first a short talk (in our case, on the giraffe/lion news) then a tour of some of the exhibits, then the "activities) The object of the activities is to get people to think about the situations.

I won't go into details of all of the "dilemmas" (except the last one, it would be interesting to hear opinions on that) but they were on -

1) What new animal should be added next to the zoo collection (cheetah, giraffe, or jerboa) with details given about their lifestyle, category of endangeredness, cost of housing, visitor attractiveness etc.

2)What new subject should be added to the regular public talks

3) Where should a beaver trial be situated (this was prepared before the start of the one that is nearly finished) with geographical, human population and farming, water quality, costs, etc.

4) Which of six female tigers would be the best mate for a given male, with details of genetic similarities, health, age, personality, reproductive history if any.

5) How would we plan "corridors" to link 30 areas containing various sizes of populations of pandas into 12 areas, given maps and details of vegetation, population density, contours and so on of each.

6 )In the Budongo chimp conservation area in Africa there are problems with wire snares, set in the undergrowth by the human inhabitants to catch duiker and other small animals for food, as they have always done. The snares are just the right size for a chimp hand to be caught in them, and one in three chimps has been injured (usually their wrist) by these, sometimes fatally, often losing a hand. Which of these solutions would we use? a) Make the area a national park and keep people out. b) remove the snares. c) educate the humans.

OMG I could never eat lamb! I haven't touched it since my first DGD was born in early March (nearly 8 years ago) and the lambs were gamboling in the fields. I couldn't bear the fact that those pure, beautiful little creatures would be killed within only a few weeks of being born in order to feed someone "spring lamb". The thought disgusts me.

In the absence of natural predators all herds, zoos, collections, etc., have to be culled from time to time. The problems start when the managers of groups to be culled anthropomorphise young animals, give them likeable human names, and market them as cuddly. They either grow up and turn surly (remember Brumas, anyone?) or have to be put down.

Copenhagen Zoo brought this PR disaster on themselves.

Hardly a disaster. Too many people in 'developed' countries are cushioned from the realities of life so they get upset when they see it. I hope Copenhagen Zoo, and others, do more "reality shows" to remind people how life works.

More educative PR is the answer, and more TV documentaries showing just what is involved in releasing captive-bred animals into the wild. You don't just take a truckload of beasts somewhere and open the back doors. That is five minutes in the middle of a long process.

They need to be as well equipped as you can make them to survive in their new environment. Firstly, they need to be healthy, sturdy individuals with no incipient problems, physical or mental, and they need to have as wide a gene pool as possible, to prevent future weaknesses and build a strong population. If they are a re-introduction of a species that no longer exists in that area, they will be the only gene pool in town, and if there are others already there, they must bring variety into the existing population.

They need to know how to live without any support system behind them. Which of the local plants are good to eat, and which are not? Can they catch prey if they are carnivores? They may not even know how to mate! and some species know instinctively how to look after their young, others need to have learnt by watching their parents.

Then they must recognise a predator (including a human one) and avoid it. They won't last long if the sight of a large bird of prey in the sky above leaves them gazing up thinking "How interesting. I wonder what . . ." Curtains for newly released critically endangered animal.

It may take several generations of "training" to prepare a group for repatriation, allowing one generation to learnsome independent behaviour and teach it to their children, who pass it on theirs, and more each generation, until it is ingrained in the group as a whole. That is a lot of investment. Meanwhile you need to keep finding the money to fund their upkeep. and that comes from the visitors who come to see the collection of animals.

You have to plan ahead, to have animals that the public want to come for, not ones that they ought to want to support. That means you also keep meerkats and big cats, when sussliks and portula snails may be the ones most in need of help.

And what does everyone want most to see? Cuddly babies.

Each to their own thatbags I think I see enough of reality (as do far too many young children) and I cannot see any benefit from knowing that, such a beautiful, elegant creature was put down and fed to the lions.

Grumpa certainly a PR disaster.

For no OBVIOUS good reason.

He was born into a NATURALLY managed herd (one adult male and several females) where the breeding is NATURAL. After 18-24 months it is NATURAL for the YOUNG ADULTS to move out of the herd, if they have survived the hazards of growing up surrounded by hungry predators.

If the Copenhagen lions had been housed next door to the giraffes, with small a convenient gap in the fence, then the numbers of offspring would have been reduced NATURALLY but as that was not on, it has to be organised artificially.

If you want animals to live as near to how they would NATURALLY as possible, you have to factor in a few NATURAL hazards too.

If you just want fantasy families, stick to Disney.

I have not yet found the reason for him not going to either of the establishments which offered him a home - perhaps Yorkshire wildlife park were too late with their last-minute offer.

But I have looked at the park on Google maps yorkshire Wildlife Park and the paddocks do not look all that inviting - no trees or other vegetation at all, just a bare field. The pictures may have been taken a while ago, before any planting was done, of course.

Copenhagen Zoo looks a lot more interesting.

The other offer was from a billionaire in Los Angeles who would have kept the animal in his garden.