Article on Japanese zoos

[Guest guest]

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?fd20020310tc.htm

 

TOKYO CONFIDENTIAL

 

Animals' recession woes

 

By MICHAEL HOFFMAN

Yomiuri Weekly (March 17)

 

You think we have it bad. Well, we do, of course --

this is not an easy economy to live with -- but

consider another perspective. You're a seal, not as

young and graceful as you used to be. Or an elephant

whose bulk no longer impresses, or a lion past your

roaring prime.

 

The whole story is in Yomiuri Weekly's headline:

" Animal Restructuring. Laid-off Lions; Demoted

Hippos. " The difference between them and us? We know,

more or less, what's hitting us. They don't.

 

In Shiga Prefecture, there's an establishment called

the Horii Zoo, a kind of retirement home, or

" warehouse, " if you like, for the growing number of

animals rendered superfluous by a steadily diminishing

interest in zoos. " This sea lion is from an aquarium

in Hokkaido, " says zookeeper Yoshitomo Horii as he

shows Yomiuri Weekly's reporter around. " This green

monkey is from Hokuriku. The chimp you see over there

came to us from S. Park in Hokkaido. " Inmates number

in the hundreds, from giraffes, camels and pumas to

small animals and birds.

 

Theirs is no easy retirement. They are crated rather

than housed, their confinement tight enough to bring

warnings from prefectural inspectors. Horii admits the

problem. " I want to get them more space, fast, " he

says. But he doesn't have it, and who else will take

them? Zoos not closing down are cutting back, and have

no room for surplus animals. If Horii didn't

accommodate them, however inadequately, they would

probably have to be put to sleep.

 

A day at the zoo used to be one of the great pleasures

of family life. In 1991, Japan's 167 major zoos and

aquariums entertained 61 million visitors. By 2000,

the number of visitors had shrunk to 42 million. Why?

Fewer kids; easier access to more varied, more graphic

entertainment. Lions no longer thrill, tropical birds

no longer astonish.

 

The Takasakiyama Nature Animal Park in Oita, Kyushu,

used to draw 1.9 million people a year. Now it gets

one-fifth that. Debts and monkeys multiply; gate

receipts dwindle. Hokkaido's Kushiro City Zoo

calculates its revenues cover one-sixth its expenses.

Tokyo's Ueno Zoo saw its annual attendance drop from

7.5 million in 1975 to 3 million in 2000.

 

This is sad for the zookeepers; sadder still for the

uncomprehending beasts ruminating blankly over their

fate at Horii's zoo -- what else do they have to do?

Think of Horii's, Yomiuri Weekly suggests whimsically,

as a re-employment agency, a kind of Hello Work for

applicants eager to please but lacking market value. A

few may have a future as pets. As for the rest, there

is consolation in the fact -- the probable fact --

that their brutish emotional range does not extend to

despair.

 

There is one more wisp of consolation, perhaps even of

hope. When a private railway announced in 1998 the

closure of a zoo it was operating in Kitakyushu,

260,000 locals signed a petition in protest. In

response, the city purchased the facility and turned

it into Itozu Forest Park, set to open in April.

 

The Japan Times: March 10, 2002

© All rights reserved

 

 

 

 

Try FREE Mail - the world's greatest free email!

/