I want to ultimately find out if zoos need to change to serve animals and
humans better or if they should be consigned to history if you peel it all
back and you look at say London Zoo in 1828
and all the others hoops throughout the nineteenth century they all had big
animals showy animals colorful animals mainly from Africa or from Asia typical
zoo today is got exactly the same collections they have not moved on from
there opened in 1928 Detroit Zoo kept the same animals most other zoos did
including elephants a star attraction this place is taking a long hard look at
the scientific evidence to determine what animals it should keep and what it
shouldn't this used to be the indoor enclosure for Detroit's two Asian
elephants now notice there is more room for people as goodness then there is for
elephants I didn't want it so smart about it but well how come there's more
room for the because zoos in the beginning we're thinking a little bit
more about people than they were about animals many captive elephants have
major problems with their feet because they're not walking enough and they're
not walking in the right material it turned out captive born female Asian
elephants the majority of the zoo population were living 19 years on
average we looked to the nearest thing which was timber camps in Burma we found
that they were living to their Beck 40 so and at least double what we were
seeing in zoos it really raised a massive red flag that something is not
right I think this generation of elephants have suffered and you can see
that in the scientific data we can see it it's it's a shame shame on us but the
next thing is what we're going to do about it and the next generation needs
to be protected and we learn from the past
here this is stereotypic behavior abnormal
and repetitive with no obvious purpose professor Mason investigated why animals
display this behavior the species most at risk was the polar bear which has the
largest home range of all land mammals sometimes over 250,000 square kilometers
she challenged zoos to fundamentally improve the way they keep wide-ranging
carnivores or phase them out that really put the cat amongst the pigeons at over
1.6 acres this enclosure is more than eight times the size of the old one this
enclosure cost around 16 million dollars to design and build at that kind of
price trying to meet the welfare needs of animals like polar bears forces zoos
to make hard choices you can't do every animal you can't have a postage stamp
collection and expect to be able to have all the animals thrive if the wild is
beautiful and like it was when I went first to Africa that's where all chimp
should be and quite honestly when you go to a really good zoo which has a big
outside enclosure then you think well I Cleve I was a chimp I probably rather be
here than out in all these dangerous situations in the world zoos are saying
that saving animals is their fundamental role around 400 pandas have been bred in
captivity this project is succeeding in breeding animals but struggling to build
a self-sustaining population in the wild just five have been released and only
three survived all things considered a huge amount of money has been spent on
the captive breeding program for pandas and considering so few although precious
individuals have been reintroduced it has it been worth it is it is it worth
it
ah I mean we've learned a lot and and should we continue them right now I'm
feeling no there are a lot of people today who say
that zoos should shut down what do you think I think those arguments of zoos
being part of the problem and using animals and having massive welfare
issues and not educating the public and not doing conservation was was true in
the 40s 50s 60s and shame on us probably in the 70s and early 80s as well but
genuinely the last 10 or 15 years the world's changed and a lot of zoos have
woken up to that and a lot of zoos are run now by people like me who
passionately understand this understand the arguments and we're trying to make a
difference