(April 30, 2015 at 12:16 pm)AFTT47 Wrote: There are more privately owned tigers in the US than there are wild tigers. That just blows my mind.
I saw a pair of tigers being fed at a zoo once. Holy fucking shit, Batman! They were fed what essentially looked like a giant hot dog. It was horse meat. Saying they ate the food would not begin to do it justice. It was more like they annihilated it. When the food was being loaded into a part of their enclosure they were cut off from, they were roaring so loud I could feel my bones vibrating. When the door to the female's side of the feeding area was released, She shot in there, leaped into the air and spun around in a 360 degree spin. She landed on her feet with the 7lb. horse hot dog in her mouth, having deftly snatched it off the elevated platform where it had been placed. The feeder said she weighed 450 pounds. Four hundred fifty pounds of muscle, claws and teeth with effortless speed and the grace of a ballerina.
I have a hard time understanding how a person's survival instinct doesn't kick in and rebel at the thought of having an animal like this as a pet. You can pet and snuggle one like a big kitty but catch it at the wrong time... So a zebra? People do much worse.
I am not against zoos, if you think about it, once an animal is domesticated to that point, putting them back out in the wild for many species is a death sentence. I would say if they have a big enough enclosure and activities to keep them mentally healthy, that is better than putting them in the wild where humans might kill them for sport or out of self defense.
I saw a story on a guy who raised a family silverbacks only to put them in the wild, went back to that same spot where he released them, found 6 of them dead, murdered by rivals. How stupid was that? Some species will not adapt back into the wild if you raise them at birth.
Someone has to take care of these dangerous animals and sure, they better know what they are doing too, but no, don't ask me to pet a tiger or snare an alligator or play with an adult chimp. Glad there are zoologists and biologists who care to study those things, but no thank you. I have problem enough with morons in my neighborhood letting their dogs wonder around off a leash.
