preview

Zoos Are Made To Protect Endangered Animals

Decent Essays

Zoos are made to “protect endangered animals” and “provide educational experiences”. Animal acts in circuses are meant to “entertain” and “showcase animals’ talents”. But these have proven to be terrible places for wild or exotic animals, providing poor and unnatural living conditions. The best option to protect and preserve wild animals is by supporting habitat preservation, not captivation and exploitation. There are many different types of zoos, ranging from small, half-abandoned collections of animals to huge, seemingly extravagant homes for these wonderful creatures. Most can agree that small, for-profit zoos aren’t okay. But what about the big, ‘non-profit’ zoos? The ones that are supposedly only meant to help endangered animals? In reality, more than half of zoo animals are not endangered at all, but instead captive to draw crowds (One Green Planet 2015). As for the animals that are endangered, zoos tend to only house the popular species, including animals such as tigers and elephants. Most endangered species are not chosen by zoos because they are not as popular, so they won’t attract as many visitors (One Green Planet 2015). Most zoos also take part in breeding programs. Since there are a lot of restrictions on catching wild or ‘exotic’ animals and it is very expensive to buy them from other sources, zoos choose to breed already owned animals. This causes a lot of issues, such as loss of natural reproduction practices for the animals and even miscarriages due to

Get Access