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Baby giraffe killed at Copenahagen Zoo

66 replies

ReallyTired · 09/02/2014 23:14

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2555079/Danish-zoo-kills-young-giraffe-deemed-surplus-feeds-lions.html

It seems odd that the zoo made the decision to kill Marius when other zoos were prepared to take him. I realise that 200kg of meat is valuable and that killing a cow is no less cruel than killing a giraffe. Lions and tigers have eat meat. Surely beef is cheaper than giraffe meat.

What I find crazy is that the zoo probably could have sold him for more than the cost of 200kg of meat.

OP posts:
WidowWadman · 10/02/2014 06:57

Why should children not see that carnivores eat meat, pumpkinsweetie? People get so detached from where food comes from.

noitsachicken · 10/02/2014 08:37

Zoo's cull animals, fact. The only reason people are so upset is because its a 'cute' giraffe. Are people just as concerned with all the rodents that get culled in zoos?

Giraffe are bred in zoos to maintain captive populations, no zoo bred Giraffe is ever likely to be released in to the wild.
Terminating the pregnancy or euthanasia at birth would have prevented the mother experiencing birth and rearing the baby, and the rest of the herd from experiencing a young calf. Breeding promotes natural behaviour in captivity.
Zoos that are part of breeding programmes will have entered into agreements to prevent them selling animals and ensuring they abide by recommendations for where the animals are transferred.

I agree with feeding the Giraffe to the other animals, but perhaps butchering it in front of the guests was a step to far!

I promise you all that any zoo you have visited will have euthanaised animals as a population control method.

MomentForLife · 10/02/2014 09:25

Oh my. I'm sure children understand that lions eat giraffe without seeing one being hacked into chunks.

I understand the logic behind using the body but zoos all have this pretence that they're saving and protecting animals. Doesn't look good to make the animal so publicly dispensable.

Original poster
ReallyTired · 10/02/2014 09:44

"Zoos that are part of breeding programmes will have entered into agreements to prevent them selling animals and ensuring they abide by recommendations for where the animals are transferred."

Prehaps that agreement needs to be reviewed as there were people prepared to offer a lot of money for Marius. Why is selling a giraffe any worse than selling a horse or cattle?

I think that this giraffe was killed as a pubicity stunt. Animals that are bred for meat are not normally given names.

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pumpkinsweetie · 10/02/2014 09:51

widow I'm sure this isn't what you would expect your children to see on a typical trip to the zoo!

Yes children should be taught where meat comes from, but live slaughter goes way beyond that!
Just like adults need to know what murder means, would you really have to witness it to understand what it entails?

ProfYaffle · 10/02/2014 10:01

I understand he had to be taken out of the breeding population but could they not castrate him then send him to a zoo who was prepared to take him?

Floralnomad · 10/02/2014 10:17

noitsachicken if we are going to go as far as saying we need to let them breed as that's what they do in nature then let's go the whole hog ,do away with the enclosures and let the prey animals all take their chances with the lions and tigers etc ,that's what they have to do in the wild so let's give them the 'experience' . I personally think that this whole situation has not been helped by the Zoo directors attitude and the public butchering was him making a point to the protesters.

LucyLasticBand · 10/02/2014 10:21

put him out to graze?

but he would still need feeding.

i dont really know why people are making a fuss tbh. he went on to have a purposeful ending.

juule · 10/02/2014 11:18

"To butcher it publicly seems sadistic and I find it all very odd."

I feel the same way. Very odd.

LRDtheFeministDragon · 10/02/2014 11:23

I think it was a bit grim to do the dissection where children could see (and I wonder why parents would take their children to see that?!).

But if they reckon he couldn't be bred from, I don't see how moving him to another zoo would help, and I think it's a pretty cruel life for an animal to be neutered. Even with dogs that've been bred by humans for millenia, there can be health issues to do with neutering - so mightn't it be that it's not a safe option?

I assume they dissected him for a reason, ie., to find out more about giraffes, so I can't get too steamed up about that either.

Original poster
ReallyTired · 10/02/2014 11:28

There are issues with castration, but millions of human males under go a vascetomy without castration every year without problems. Prehaps there are issues with how many male girafffes can be in a herd.

We have the technology to run a reponsible breeding programme. Why can we not breed giraffes like cattle, controlling the sex and which animals provide sperm. What is the breeding programme for? Are actually looking to increase the number of giraffes in the wild?

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LRDtheFeministDragon · 10/02/2014 11:35

Yeah, but, um, it's a giraffe. Not a human male. So maybe it's not the same, eh?

LRDtheFeministDragon · 10/02/2014 11:36

Sorry, that came out ruder than I meant it ... I mean, do we actually know these are options the zoo couldn't be bothered with? Or are we just hoping they did something barbaric for the sake of it?

noitsachicken · 10/02/2014 12:18

Floral - most zoos would love to feed live prey, but its illegal to use live vertebrates for food (in the UK). Zoos in China do though.

Castration would be expensive and large animals like Giraffe are hard to anesthetise safely.

Also there are sooo many Giraffe in captivity, and not all would be part of managed breeding programmes. It would be impossible to treat them like a herd of cattle!

It is common practice to allow animals to.breed, to maintain genetic lines, keep a population healthy and allow natural behaviour. Euthanasing young males at natural dispersal age is common in many species, especially primates. Most zoos choose not to tell you about it!

JugglingFromHereToThere · 10/02/2014 12:26

I think they could have been more sensitive about upsetting people including children. It seems an odd thing to do to me.

WidowWadman · 10/02/2014 16:00

The zoo's own FAQ is worth reading

TheScience · 10/02/2014 16:06

I don't really see the problem with killing him so long as it was done humanely. Killing a captive, inbred giraffe isn't going to impact on whether they are endangered in the wild.

I also think the public dissection was a pretty good idea, and interesting from an educational point of view. None of the children watching seemed traumatised and surely it's up to their parents, not the zoo, to "protect" them from it if they feel necessary?

LucyLasticBand · 10/02/2014 16:13

exactly, the children where there because their parents took them. there are TV programmes on dissecting animals. to see it live may well be fascinating.

TheDoctrineOfSnatch · 10/02/2014 16:14

Yy TheScience - an autopsy is interesting and zoo goers had the choice of attending or not.

noitsachicken · 10/02/2014 17:24

Yes I agree nothing wrong with the public dissection if people choose to watch.
Just from a PR point of view they already knew the story was causing controvacy why add to that!

winkywinkola · 10/02/2014 17:26

I don't know about the public dissection. It seemed really rather gruesome and unnecessary to be done in public. Educational? I'm not convinced of that either. It just seemed a bit of a spectacle. Perhaps I'm wrong.

Morloth · 11/02/2014 03:54

Shrug lions eat meat, they had an extra giraffe and lions to feed.

Two birds, one stone.

I would let my kids/take them to watch it being butchered/dissected. It would be very interesting.

We eat meat in my family, there is no point being squeamish.

The kids loved Inside Nature's Giants when it was on, fascinating.

Desura · 11/02/2014 14:51

Would you mind elaborating on how this is educational/interesting? The only equipment they had was a bolt gun and the instrument they used to cut him to pieces.

What long-lost knowledge was gained here, exactly? Giraffes have blood and internal organs? Glad we cleared that one up.

If he was so worthless they should have taken the £415,000 someone offered to not kill him, and shipped him off to one of the two wildlife parks that offered to pay for him to be transferred.

Savages.

RiojaHaze · 11/02/2014 14:57

Re Longleat, it might be worth reading their official statement about why they did what they did before getting angry about it.

The male lion had been attacked by the female beyond repair, and the female and her cubs had neurological conditions that made them aggressive.

Original poster
ReallyTired · 11/02/2014 15:59

I don't think that you can compare longleat killing 6 lions with the killing of the giraffe. The animals killed at Longleat were not healthy.

I have no objection to enuthanising animals for health reasons like happened at longleat. I could even accept enuthanising a health animal if there is no home for it. However any animal deserves some dignity in death. Killing and dissecting a giraffe in public is not giving it dignity.

Even the animal that was killed for tonight's suppoer in an abbotoir did not suffer the indigity of being gawped at in its last minutes.

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