In days gone by, the citizens of Europe and North America, whether fashionable or hoi polloi, could taste the far-off tropics by going to the zoo. Professional zoologists liked them too. Now people have the money for exotic holidays, or at least television sets; zoology concentrates on the ways that animals manage their lives in the wild; and animals have rights, or at least an increasing number are thought of as if they do. As a result, some zoos have been slipping towards extinction. For the sake of near-extinct species, the slippage should stop.Zoos are not redundant. People still like them, though not as much as they used to. A good city zoo can attract as many visitors each year as there are people in the city--though some, like London's, do not. Animal-rights campaigners argue that zoos are immoral, that it is wrong to cage creatures which should be free. It is not clear that the animals would always agree; lots of food, no predators, and vets on call make up quite a package. Some zoos do not provide animals with quite such Elysian fields, and their neglect or outright cruelty has tarnished the image of all zoos. Redress, though, is straightforward. Unless misguidedly supported by other means, unpopular zoos will die.SORRY, SHELLS AND SLUGSZoos are well placed to do something that people want done--conserving animals. It is hard work, but it does not make them unattractive drudges. Zoos like those at San Diego and Cincinnati in America, and Chester in Britain, which are good at conservation and good at being seen doing it, are thriving.There is a snag: preservation on the basis of popularity can turn into speciesism, which some regard as the most wicked ism of all. People who will happily shell out to see pandas may not do the same to see, well, shells. But aesthetics may be no worse a criterion than any other for deciding which animals are deserving of charity. After all, beauty often leads on to extinction--ask any species with pretty feathers, or pelts, or tusks. Why not allow it to lead to preservation as well?Discrimination in favour of the big and attractive has other things to recommend it. Most extinct species died out because the place they lived in was destroyed. For the small and unspectacular species--the majority of extinctions--this process is precipitous. Once the trees start falling around them, their fate is sealed. To preserve such species, the answer is to protect their habitat. Big animals, on the other hand, are killed off in slower and less impersonal ways, hunted for food or sport or because they are competing with livestock. For them, captive breeding in zoos may be their last chance to survive.Modern ecological theory reckons that, to survive in the wild, a species cannot afford to drop below 2,000 or 3,000 individuals; otherwise inbreeding, disease or bad weather can easily wipe it out. Mollycoddled in zoos, and with matings carefully arranged to keep their genes fresh and diverse, rare species can be nursed through crises in much smaller numbers. And there is no better way to pay for such care than to charge people to come and see it going on--and in doing so, become more refined in their view of animals. Documentaries can be beautiful. For a proper appreciation of nature, though, there is nothing quite like the smell of elephant dung.
đang được dịch, vui lòng đợi..
