Two Sides to the Same Story

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A couple of days ago, a friend of mine asked me how exotic wild animal sanctuaries were "created" in the US.  I did not have a definitive answer at that time, so I decided to do some research, with some help, of course!

I would like to thank my sister (she sent me the last video on this posting) and two friends whom sent me law references, pictures, videos, and articles found in this posting.

So what exactly is a wild animal sanctuary?

Well, let's see.  According to WikiAnswers, a sanctuary is "an area specially designated where it is illegal to interfere in anyway with the natural life there. Hunting, shooting and fishing would be prohibited. A sanctuary is a place where killing or capturing of any animal is prohibited except under orders of the authorities concerned. They provide protection and optimum living conditions to wild animals."

However, an amendment to the Lacey Act Amendments (Public Law 108-191-Dec, 19, 2003), (2) (C), defines an accredited sanctuary as:

(i) a corporation that is exempt from taxation under section 501(a) of the Internal Revenue Code 1986 and described in sections 501(c)(3) and 170(b)(1)(A)(vi) of such Code;

(ii) does not commercially trade in animals listed in section 2(g), including offspring, parts, and byproducts of such animals;

(iii) does not propagate animals listed in section 2(g); and

(iv) does not allow direct contact between the public and animals.

The definition of "sanctuary" seems to vary between different non-profit corporations.  There are a few core beliefs, such as no buying exotics from breeders (fur farms) or selling of its animals (to private owners) and of course they only take in animals that simply have no other place to go.  

Some people espouse that a good sanctuary has a no "hands-on" provision when it comes to exotic wild animals (you can look but you can't touch). 

Others believe that the animals should not be exploited in any way (no putting Tigger's picture on a mug to sell or give paid tours of the animals' habitats/enclosures). 

And then there are those that believe the animals should live as wild as possible, no human interaction what-so-ever (that means no face or butt animal paintings).

So if you want to know what a non-profit organization's definition of a sanctuary is, you will have to take a peek at the non-profit's mission statement.

So, let's take a look one at one of the oldest sanctuaries operating in the US, The Wild Animal Sanctuary (WAS) and see how it got started.  According to the WAS website, the founder, Pat Craig, in 1980, created the Rocky Mountain Wildlife Conservation Center, DBA The Wild Animal Sanctuary on his family farm outside Boulder Colorado.

After two physical relocations, the WAS moved to its present location near Keenseburg, Colorado and today it is open to visitors, year round.

But the sanctuary was not always open to the public.  In 1996, the facility was not open for public tours, but it was open for wildlife photographers and film crews. 

An NPR article dated April 14, 1996, titled “NOT ALL WILDLIFE DOCUMENTARIES ARE FILMED IN THE WILD,” provided a running interview narrative between Pat Craig and Mark Roberts. In this article, Pat Craig discussed with the interviewer how photographers and film makers stage certain wild animal scenes so as to “imitate life in the wild.”

Pat Craig apparently allowed photographers and film makers to use his animals to stage “fake” wild animal scenes “so long as his animals had fun.” It wasn’t until one of the filmmakers wanted to take his pet jaguar, Freckles, to Arizona and film him attacking a coatamondi, when Pat Craig raised an objection as to how his cat was to be used in the film.

The article stated Pat Craig eventually discontinued the use of his animals by photographers and filmmakers when he “witnessed privately-owned mountain lions attack tame deer.” 

You can read the NPR article below:

NPR-Craig

Here's a touching picture of Pat Craig and his "pet" jaguar, Freckles:





(click to read article)

Pat Craig was not the only one to have a close and personal relationship with exotic "pets" as a pet owner and breeder, Tammy Thies from Wild Cat Sanctuary also enjoyed the companionship of exotic cats in her home.



Jasper




According to the St. Thomas Winter 2000 Magazine, Tammy Quest Thies started her sanctuary, The Society for Wild Cat Education, on her personal property.   And like most sanctuary founders,  Tammy's house was located on the sanctuary grounds and when Tammy retired for the evening she was joined by a serval, caracal and on occasion, a lynx.  Tammy was quoted as saying "I pretty much sleep around them."  Obviously, Tammy and her small exotic cats had a pet/owner relationship.

Here is the St. Thomas Winter 2000 Magazine article on Tammy Quist Thies' early years.

Tammy

Photo insert from St. Thomas Winter 2000 Magazine article

Much like Pat Craig, Tammy Thies enjoyed working and handling "demonstration" cats such as snow leopards, tigers and lions in her early years.

But one day she worked on a photo shoot featuring a Bengal tiger and a black leopard, and that was all it took. She was smitten. — St. Thomas Winter 2000 Magazine

It appears to me that well-known sanctuary directors like having a close and personal relationships with their animals, very much like relationships private exotic pet owners share with their animals.

Even well-known movie star,  Tippi Hedren, President of Roar Foundation (dba Shambala Preserve), started her own sanctuary with pet exotic animals she either acquired or bred at her residence. 



Images from the 1970s home actress Tippi Hedren and daughter Melanie Griffith
shared with a lion named Neil



Melanie Griffith And Her ‘Pet’ Lion

Tippi and her lion Neil

She even produced a movie back in the day called "Roar" that depicts her own lions, which I understand will be re-released this year.  Click here to read more about this movie.

Here is a short video of an incident that took place between Melanie Griffith and a lion.

I would be remiss if I didn't include Carol Baskins, director of Big Cat Rescue, formerly known as Wildlife on Easy Street in the mix.  Like all the folks mentioned above, Baskins kept exotic animals as pets.  It has been said that Baskins not only bought exotics, but she also bred and sold them to strangers.  Like the WAO's directors, Baskin used animals as a way to make money. And like the WAO directors, when the winds of change came about, BCR suddenly changed its operating style, name, and rewrote her pets' "histories."  

I remember watching this video back in late 1990s (I think I just started volunteering with the WAO at the time) and was amazed that there was a place that allowed folks to sleep with cougars.  Knowing that cougars literally come to life at night, I couldn't imagine anyone sleeping with such large cats!  Anyway, here's the video that I saw so many years ago.  

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My research into the WAO led me to the BCR and so after reviewing many records on-line, I came to came to the conclusion that the WAO and BCR are very similar indeed.

So what makes sanctuaries different than private owners?

What else?  Money.

You see, private owners are not charitable non-profit corporations and therefore cannot solicit charitable contributions from the general public in order to maintain their animals. Private owners must have the resources to provide for their exotic animals.

Many sanctuaries, from what I have been able to gather, were established, for the most part,  by at-one-time private exotic animal owners who choose to turn their "pet" ownership into a non-profit business.

Some sanctuary founders’ not only have a history of private pet ownership, but also have a history of breeding their exotic wild animals so the offspring could be sold to other breeders or private owners.

Otis

For years, the founder of Big Cat Rescue initially bred her animals for profit and like Tammy Thies, obtained some of her animals from fur farms.  Carol Baskins was quoted as saying "We were pet owners--we were the pet trade."

Private pet owners typically choose young animals (12 – 16 weeks) because they were much cuter and easier to handle than a full grown animal. Tammy Thies was one such owner who obtained a four month old Siberian Lynx named Otis from a Canadian fur farm, along with his sister, Lindsey.  And Carol Baskins purchased 56 bobcat kittens from a fur farm for her own cat breeding program in the early 1990s.  

Often, private owners and sanctuaries would buy animals from fur farms with the misguided belief that they "saved" the animals from a life of breeding or worse sold for their fur.  Justifying these "purchased animals" only perpetuated the very problem private owners and sanctuaries say they were against in the first place; for you see, if you buy animals from a fur farm, you are only encouraging fur farm owners to expand their business, so as to accommodate a growing customer base.

Even Jack Hanna owned lions and other animals at his home:

Click article to read

Sadly, Mr. Hanna put a new twist to the private lion ownership incident when interviewed by Larry King in 2004:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0401/06/lkl.00.html

Back in 1973 -- I don't really announce this very often -- we had a tragic accident happen with a 3-year-old boy in Knoxville, where I had an animal farm where I had animals for zoos around the country I took care of for them. And this African lion -- a little boy crossed a fence or two -- took the boy's arm off at the shoulder. And I had to go get the arm, and it wasn't able to be put back on the young man.

Later in the interview:

KING: He says that by having his children live with crocodiles in the back yard, he's being a good father by teaching them about crocs at an early age.

HANNA: Larry, there's no doubt about that. I had eight African lions in my -- in this compound for the zoos in Tennessee. I had everything in the world there. I had three daughters. I had one that was a 3-year-old or whatever it was, when I told you about this accident. But whenever they were there, they were taught not to go across the fence. They were taught to look at the animal with respect and dignity, whether it be in the wild or in a zoological park or wherever it might be. And that's kind of where I'm coming from, from this standpoint.

Home, farm, compound...whatever one calls it, Mr. Hanna had his own private collection of exotic animals.  It's amazing how much the attitudes towards private animal ownership changed in the last 30-50 years!

And then of course, there were the founders of the Wild Animal Orphanage, Ron and Carol Asvestas, whom also bred animals for profit until it fell out of "fashion" with the animal crowd.  It was easier to rake in the money from donors, thereby supporting their "pets" until they died and then replaced those animals  with more animals, year after year after year. 

The Argument

What I found interesting is that the very people who owned and even bred animals for profit are now actively supporting legislation to prohibit other people from owning or breeding animals.  In my post, “War Was Declared Against WAR!", you can clearly see the battle lines drawn between sanctuary founders and private owners. You may be thinking that the sanctuary founders whom previously owned exotics are acting like hypocrites today, saying no one should privately own exotic wild animals, even though their sanctuaries were started with their own personal "pets".

I’ve heard the argument that ex-private pet owners operating animal sanctuaries have essentially learned from their checkered “pasts” and are now working in a more “ethical” industry by taking in ex-pets, ex-circus performers, and ex-roadside zoo animals that no one seems to want or need anymore.

Sooo…having heard this argument, am I supposed to believe that in the beginning, exotic wild animal owners were not ethical people until after they opened up their own wild animal sanctuary (normally on their own property, not owned by the sanctuary)?

I’ve heard the argument that owning exotic wild animals is just too dangerous and that only sanctuary personnel have the expertise to work around these dangerous animals.

Hmmm…the only experience I had working around the WAO’s large big cats, bears, wolves, primates, etc., was my personal experiences as a domestic pet owner, and yet I was able to feed the animals, clean their cages, and prepared enrichment items for their enjoyment.

Come to think of it, I don’t think I've ever worked or volunteered with anyone at the WAO who had prior experience caring for cougars, tigers, lions, bears, etc.

Is there even a school for exotic wild animal caretakers? In San Antonio? In Texas? In the US???  I am willing to bet the majority, if not all, of the individuals who owns a sanctuary today, learned how to care for exotics through their own personal experiences.  And that includes their current staff members.

This led me to ask more questions about the wild animal ownership debate—which ultimately led me to this video:

Part I

Part II

What I came away from studying both side of the issues, is both sides (sanctuary and private owners) love their animals. Both sides do not want to be legislated to the point where they can no longer maintain their animals. Both sides want the other side to be legislated by State and/or Federal agencies. And both sides think they have the right to own or possess exotic wild animals. If you are confused about this issue, don’t worry, you are in good company.

Are there great private animal owners and sanctuaries out there?  I would say yes; we just don't hear about them in the news because these owners/sanctuaries are obeying the laws and taking proper care of their animals.  The only time we hear about private animal ownership is when something terrible goes terribly wrong.  Interesting to note, the wrongdoings of sanctuaries are kept very quiet and out of the public's limelight.

Should people own animals as pets, whether in a sanctuary or home environment? Only you can decide.  And just for the record, I am not against wild animal sanctuaries or private ownership.  I just believe there should be more open dialog between both groups for they can learn a lot from each other.  After all, for the most part, they have a lot in common!

All this fighting between the two groups makes me relieved I can still go home to my furry companions, putting my troubles aside for another day.  I think I will give my cats and dogs a big hug tonight and be grateful that as of today, I can still keep domestic pets in my home. For who knows, someday, someone, somewhere, will enact laws restricting dogs and cats to zoos or sanctuaries and make it illegal to own one as a "pet".

On a lighter note, if you think it's hard to tame a tiger, then you obviously do not have a kitty waiting for you at home!  Cat lovers everywhere--rejoice in the "The Mean Kitty Song"  —  Me-ow!

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