• What zoo made headlines for purposely killing its own healthy animals?
How did the Surabaya Zoo earn the name “The Zoo of Death?”
Here are 10 of the most controversial zoos and animal attractions on Earth.
10 –Ocean Park • This aquarium in Hong Kong is a sort of
magnet for animal rights activists, particularly relating to its dolphins.
• There is an ongoing campaign to convince the park to release its captive bottlenose
dolphins to the wild, but park officials insist the dolphins are well cared-for, and only
perform in shows out of their own free will.
• Of course, there is also a video from Ocean Park that appears to be of an attempted
dolphin suicide by slamming itself against the walls of its tank.
• Park officials also claim that’s just a habit of that particular dolphin, and it
doesn’t actually hurt itself.
9 –Khan Younis Zoo • Gaza is a difficult place to run a zoo.
Or anything, for that matter.
• The constant fighting, military occupation, and explosions going on everywhere make it
difficult to keep people fed, much less animals.
• Even when things are peaceful, the zoo is minimally staffed, but when fighting breaks
out, the staff is unable to get to the zoo to care for the animals.
• And that means dozens of animals are left in enclosures to die of starvation and thirst
for weeks on end.
• This has happened twice at the Khan Younis Zoo, where animals are left for so long, they
actually begin to decompose because staff can get back to them.
8 –Toronto Zoo • There isn’t anything particularly controversial
about the way this zoo is run.
The Toronto Zoo has been open since 1974, and they’re fully accredited and legitimate.
• But in 2009, they hit an unusual set of circumstances –three elephants died in a
span of four years.
• One of those elephants was Tara, the longest-tenured elephant at the zoo, who died at the age of
41 for reasons that were not really known.
She had not shown any signs of being sick until one morning she just couldn’t get
up.
• African elephants can live to be as old as 70, but the average lifespan for elephants
in captivity is around 40-45 years old.
7 –Le Mat Snake Village • This tourist attraction in Thailand is
a zoo… in the same way the lobster tank at your local seafood restaurant is a zoo.
• You don’t really go to the Le Mat Snake Village to see the snakes.
You go there to eat them.
• You go there, pick out your snake, and then the prep begins.
They kill the snake by stabbing it through the head and drain its blood into a glass
for you to drink.
• Then they pull out the still-beating heart and put it into a small shot of vodka – also
for you to drink.
• After that, they grill the meat, and use the fat to make fried rice.
6 –Wilhelma Zoo • In 2014, Anton the polar bear died suddenly
in Stuttgart, Germany.
The reason why wasn’t immediately apparent… zoo officials just noticed him starting to
vomit up pieces of fabric.
• It turns out Anton had gotten into a jacket dropped into the enclosure by one of the guests
at the zoo.
• There was probably food inside it, and so Anton just swallowed the jacket whole,
causing fatalintestinal damage.
• The same zoo has also seen a hippo die from choking on a tennis ball, and an elephant
die from swallowing a teddy bear.
5 –Tiger Temple • One of the premier tourist destinations
in Thailand – other than the snake village – is billed as a “sanctuary” for wild
animals, including a number of endangered species.
• Problem is… the so-called “Tiger Temple” wasn’t actually supposed to have those animals.
• Many of them found their way there through the black market and underground dealings,
and many of the tigers in their care ended up slaughtered for their furs.
• A 2-year investigation linked the Tiger Temple to an illegal animal trafficking ring.
4 –Surabaya Zoo • This zoo in Indonesia is better known
as the “Zoo of Death.”
• Between July and September of 2013, 40 animals died at the zoo.
Those include a giraffe with 20 kilograms of plastic in its stomach, and a tiger whose
stomach rotted from eating meat laced with formaldehyde.
• A few months after that, an African Lion was found dead in its cage, after it got its
head stuck between some metal cables and hung itself.
• Authorities wanted to examine the lion’s body, but it mysteriously disappeared before
they were able to.
3 –Calgary Zoo • A collection of seven Humboldt penguins
dying in 2016 was only the latest in a series of mysterious animal deaths.
Here are just a few that occurred in the span of about 10 years.
• 200 fish died from water quality problems.
• A spider monkey died of frostbite.
Another was crushed by a hydraulic door.
• A possum was stepped on and killed by a zookeeper’s foot.
• A capybara was also killed by a hydraulic door.
• A hippo, several mule deer, a baby elephant, a wild goat, four gorillas, and 41 stingrays
are also on the list of the Calgary Zoo’s obituaries, all since about 2005.
2 -SeaWorld • The most famous aquarium in the United
States has never really been free of controversy.
• In 2010, orca trainer Dawn Brancheau suffered a grisly death in the jaws of one of her own
orcas.
• They’re not well-publicized, but injuries to both orcas and trainers are not uncommon
at SeaWorld.
• But the latest 2010 death led to a number of investigations and articles on the matter.
And at least one study has found that the life of captivity may actually be driving
Shamu insane.
• Because orcas and dolphins are intelligent to the point of near-sentience, they’re
subject to the same mental issues from isolation and captivity as humans.
1 –Copenhagen Zoo • Several of the zoos on this list let animals
die from neglect, poor conditions, or unusual circumstances.
• The Copenhagen Zoo is probably the only one that kills its own animals on purpose.
• In February of 2014, they shot and killed a perfectly healthy giraffe, simply because
they were trying to prevent inbreeding.
• Just a month later, they killed four healthy lions… to make room for another lion.
• The explanation is that the new lion – a young male – would have ended up fighting
the other lions for supremacy and one of them would have ended up killed anyway…
so they just cut out the middle man.