IDA In Defense of
Animals
April 2018
In captive elephants, the infant mortality rate is a shocking 40%. EEHV, a fatal herpes virus that attacks elephants under the age of ten, is yet another risk that zoos continue to conveniently overlook as they continue to breed by any means. Recklessly experimenting with elephant’s lives is what some zoos call “conservation."
Image from Louisville Zoo
The Louisville Zoo in Kentucky recently announced that Mikki, a
32-year-old African elephant, is pregnant. What the Zoo did not share,
however, is that this pregnancy was forced upon Mikki through repetitive,
clumsy, and very invasive Artificial Insemination (AI) attempts.
Records from the Zoo, which ranked #4 on our Ten Worst Zoos for Elephants
list this year, revealed that in less than a 2-year period between 2014 and
2016, the Zoo made nine artificial insemination attempts and performed three
“practice” sessions on Mikki. This involved Mikki having one front leg
chained, and both of her rear legs tethered with ropes, keeping her
immobilized, and unable to move so that her keepers' attempted penetrations
into her three-foot long reproductive track would prove “successful”.
Since Mikki’s 3-year-old son, Scotty, died of colic in 2010 — a pregnancy
that was also forced upon her through AI — the Louisville Zoo has been
repeatedly attempting to impregnate her again. Baby elephants mean big bucks
for zoos.
Conception through AI has a low rate of success. According to a 2012
Seattle Times report on captivity, “success has been spotty, with
miscarriages and premature and stillborn deaths from artificial-insemination
pregnancies reaching 54 percent”. It is because elephants breed so poorly in
captivity that many zoos resort to these invasive, abusive, artificial
insemination practices to force pregnancies that will only occasionally
produce money-making babies.
There is no real “natural” mating at zoos either. Zoos shuffle bull
elephants around the country like chess pieces with the hope they will mate
with females. This is horribly cruel and exploitive of these males whose
welfare and vital social bonds are disregarded as they are treated as living
“vessels” of sperm.
In captive elephants, the infant mortality rate is a shocking 40%. EEHV, a
fatal herpes virus that attacks elephants under the age of ten, is yet
another risk that zoos continue to conveniently overlook as they continue to
breed by any means. Recklessly experimenting with elephant’s lives is what
some zoos call “conservation.”
AI is yet one more reason why zoo captivity for elephants is such a cruel
and unnatural existence. Don’t support zoos, or fall for their false
conservation claims. Support conservation — and conception — in the wild,
not in captivity. The more people gush over these zoo babies, the more zoos
will continue to use them to manipulate the public, keeping them blind to
the horrible cruelty of AI that is forced on far too many female elephants
in zoos.