Animal cruelty and neglect is an ever present problem in many different areas of the world. Zoos are an example of a topic that many individuals claim to unfairly treat animals, and argue that the government should ban them. Although there are a variety of zoos around the world that manifest this problem, the United Kingdom is a place where this topic is specifically debated and where low zoo animal welfare acts as an ongoing issue. Studies prove that the health and happiness of Britain zoo animals is not as high as it should be.
However, many individuals claim that Britain has plenty of laws and regulations that monitor the oos and their actions. Although it is true that Britain has certain laws and rules on zoos, such as the Zoo Licensing Act of 1981, they are typically not enforced strictly enough to succeed in their purpose of keeping the animals healthy. After extensive studies, professors and biologists were able to conclude, through consistent data results, that formal inspections of Britain zoos do not guarantee that zoos meet minimum animal welfare standards.
Therefore, the argument that regulations of zoos are successful in keeping the animals healthy has gaps and issues that individuals need to address. In rder to solve the problem of low health of Britain zoo animals, regulation and laws need to be more strongly enforced. In addition to this, zoo owners should require staff workers to monitor visitors at every exhibit when the zoos are open to the public.
In necessitating these rules zoos Vanessa Jakse: Missing header. Vanessa Jakse: Good title. Vanessa Jakse: Make sure this is all the way up. ill eventually increase visitor and animal interactions, food and environmental quality, and opportunity for wild-like behavior. These qualities of treatment will all lead to an improvement of overall health of captive animals in Britain zoos and can onvince individuals that the government should allow these zoos to remain. Overall, the physical and mental health of Britain zoo animals is not high enough and the government must enforce an increase in regulation of laws and rules on minimum welfare standards in order to solve this issue and maintain zoos and their benefits.
Introduction The maltreatment of animals is an issue that has been historically present for a very long time and still occurs in many forms today. Animal cruelty traces back to the twelfth century after a war erupted as a result of the Romans’ invasion of Britain. The British fought this war with the elp of their dogs. After the war, pleased with their endurance and fighting performance, Britain began exporting the dogs for pit bull fights against larger wild game.
It was in 1835, after the government made this fighting illegal, that dog on dog combat began. Unfortunately, this blood sport then began spreading to other countries and brought forth other forms of animal brutality such a cockfighting and the abuse of factory farm animals (Animal 1). In addition to the brutality and abuse, neglect and prevention of natural behavior are other forms of animal cruelty. Zoos are an example of an area that can possess these forms of nhumane actions towards animals.
Studies find that Britain zoos often neglect the health of their animals through a lack of supervision of visitors, insufficient enclosures, and a refusal to provide opportunities for natural behavior. Starting in the 11th century, William the Conqueror, and later in the 16th century, Queen Elizabeth I, organized menageries as a form of entertainment. Later, throughout the seventeen and eighteen hundreds, formal zoos began to pop up in cities. During these times, due to lack of space and materials, zoo owners placed the animals behind bars in dirty, metal cages.
Some of he animals were even drug around to be acts in circuses, such as George Wombwell’s menagerie that that toured Britain fairs and carried fifteen wagons of animals and a brass band (The 1). The health and wellness of these naturally wild animals was not considered or worried about. It was not like today in which zoos give the animals enclosures to resemble their true habitat. As the years continued, certain individuals started to become concerned for the animals and the debate over the humaneness of zoos began.
As the problem continued to grow, the Zoo Licensing act of 1981 was finally put in order in the United Kingdom as nsure that zoos provided their way to animals with a suitable environment. As Britain passed more laws like the Zo0 Licensing Act of 1981, the overall environment of zoos began to transform. However, the improvement of enclosures and technology is not enough to overcome the reigning issue of the overwhelming amount of health complications within zoo animals. “While conditions have improved from the years of bars and cages, detractors take issue with other items” (Kristin 1).
Although zoos have been drastically improved since that of the first zoos in the 1700s, there are still an astounding umber of attributes that are detrimental to the captive animals’ health, and the lack of regulation allows them to continue. The general topic of discussion among scholars is that the health of zoo animals in Britain needs specific attention as a way to counter the increasing push for the banning of zoos. Most scholars tend to specifically address the causes of low health of zoo animals.
The most common causes addressed are visitor interactions, types of enclosures, and a lack of opportunities for wild behavior. There are scholars such as G. R. Hosey and Gareth Davey who both feel that zoo visitors have a strong impact on animals’ health. Davey argues that visitors inflict high stress on the animals, but that the measure of the stress depends on a multiplicity of variables including type of animal, person and the surrounding environment (Hosey). Davey, in contrast, argues that visitors can have both negative and positive effects all depending on the actions of the visitors themselves (Davey).
Both of these researchers display strong arguments on the fact that visitors have negative effects on the zoo animal’s’ health; however, Hosey argues that there are a variety of variables that play a part in the effect while Davey expresses that it is all a result of visitors’ ecisions and actions. Along with these proposals, scholar Paul Koene argues that the low health measurement of Britain zoo animals is over exaggerated, and that a lack of opportunity for zoo animals to act wild in their small enclosures has no effect on the health of zoo animals whatsoever.
Koene describes how animals adapt to the area in which they grow up in. An animal living in a zoo will most likely never encounter an experience in which wild behavior is necessary. Therefore, if a zoo raises an animal and it loses wild adaptations it will not matter (Koene). Koene’s argument differs with that of Hosey and Davey n that Koene focuses on whether or not animal enclosures and lack of opportunity for wild behavior has an effect on zoo animal health rather than focusing on the effects of zoo visitors.
Although the scholars discuss specific possible causes of the poor health of animals in zoos and how detrimental they are to the animals, they do not address how Britain can avoid or solve these causes. Scholars G. R. Hosey and Gareth Davey seem to overlook how the effect of zo0 visitors could turn positive as well as what zoos can use to stop the negative interactions between visitors and the animals. They do not cover the importance of governmental regulation on Britain zoos in order to make certain that they are meeting the minimum animal welfare standards.
However, Paul Koene addresses how the prevention of the opportunity to act naturally has no effect on zoo animal health without considering animals that were not raised in the zoo but placed there further into adulthood. Each of these arguments contains gaps that lack information and other views of the issue. Scholars Chris Draper, William Browne, and Stephen Harris fill these gaps in their own research as they display their argument on the unsuccessfulness of formal nspections in Britain zoos in regulating whether or not they meet welfare requirements.
The research of these men not only covers all examined causes of low zoo animal health, but also narrows in on the originator of the issue: the lack of solid and strongly enforced rules and regulations. As successfully expressed in the research of these intellectuals, the laws and rules regarding Britain zoo animal welfare standards need to be better enforced and supervised as it is the lack of regulation that allows all causes of a decrease in animal health to occur. The lack of regulation and supervision of Britain zoos leads to neglect and unfair treatment of zoo animals.
Over time, the physical qualities of British zoos have improved, yet there is still a multiplicity of problems that add to the poor health of captive animals. Many scholars discuss these causes yet fail to address how Britain can put them to an end. In order to improve the overall health of animals in British zoos, the government must enforce stronger rules, laws, and regulations and increase supervision in order to ensure that all zoos are at least meeting minimum animal welfare requirements
