Sunday, May 13, 2007

From Robert Perry #1

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Posted by Buckles at 5/13/2007 05:38:00 AM

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Some Very Uggly photos heh -
Whisshueew - - -

Maby ; there trick photography ?
( kinda like the moose one )

Hummm -

13 May, 2007 08:20
Anonymous said...

Its quite obvious that animals in their so-called wild state, or natural envirment have always and constantly lived in an atmosphere of "Fear' and "Want". Fear of preditors and want for food. Man as preditors have certainly added to their anguish. Man also lived in that same enviroment until his superior powers of perception enabled him to become civilized so that he could escape fear and want. So man has endeavored to give animals adegree of civilized behavior by bringing as many as possible in some for of captivity for their well being. I believe that is commendable and this new wave of animal actvists are only encouraging a return to that horrible past. Certainly there will always be animals in this wild state as there will be wars and genocide in civilization, but we have advanced from the "dark ages". and we can continue to care for animals as we have always done. We in the circus have done more for animal care and well being than all of these so-called holier than thou and misguided legislators. Do we blow our own horn? Certainly not because we are only doing what is right and in our simple way are hard to understand what the fuss is all about. That others are sticking up for us is commendable and embarrasing.

13 May, 2007 09:45
Mike Naughton said...

Very well stated Mr. John Herriott!

13 May, 2007 11:34
klsdad said...

An open letter to Mr. Herriott:

Well said... but.. I don't agree with several of your statements and open them to discussion.

I do not believe that elephants and cats have "always and constantly lived in an atmosphere of "Fear" and "Want". I believe elephants lived quite comfortable lives before MAN appeared. They had few predators.. and a lot of food. Cats pretty much the same situation.

And what did MAN do... bring them out (or use them in) their environment to make money from them, either to use them as slave labor and/or
make money exhibiting them. I do not have a problem with that when it is done with utmost care for the animals.

(I vividly remember my Aunt and Uncle telling me at a young age of their visit to Krueger National Park.. where THEY slept in "cages".. and the animals roamed free. They still do.. I believe!!)

And your statement "So man has endeavored to give animals a degree of civilized behavior
by bringing as many as possible in some form of
captivity for their well being" is horse-s..t! (oops. don't take that personally!). Didn't they? bring them out to make money.. either zoos..or individuals.. or organizations.

Now.. as the bows (and arrows)are readied..

Hey.. I'm on YOUR side!!
I'm trying to understand..

I've always wanted an elephant.. and perhaps a circus! I'm 72 now.. so those dreams are on a back-back burner. I attend every
circus performance which comes close to New York City, sometimes a couple or more times. I can't even
comprehend how much you and other animal handlers have loved and cared for your animals.

I was the only person responding to 50 or so protestors when Ringling played Bridgeport, CT for the first time in 40 years, a few years back.. asking why they weren't instead helping stop the killing of elephants in Africa (they didn't know there were two main species when I asked them).. I also asked the lady with the sign and photo "Elephants cry" if she had ever seen an elephant cry..and she said "no". I warned them not to pick-up a banner or cause until they know what they're talking about.

As you may have read.. here in New York City they're proposing banning all wild and exotic animals from entering the city!!!!

What I'm doing is trying to understand your
comments.. so I can stand beside you as we all attempt to keep the display of "wild/exotic" within the law!

Most respectively,

klsdad

13 May, 2007 13:30
Mike Naughton said...

Hey KLSDAD...

Then what happened to the Wooly Mammoths and the Saber Tooth Tigers?

I, for one, am happy that humans are on top of the food chain, otherwise we'd be swinging with the orang-utans.

13 May, 2007 14:12
Mike Naughton said...

Also, the City of New York just spent $20 million of taxpayer money to create a new reptile house.

13 May, 2007 14:13
Anonymous said...

To Kisdad; I certainly enjoyed your comments, but still stand on my comments. As human civilization progressed man obviously became aware of plant and animal life and made use of it. I am quite aware that man domesticated animals and had compounds of a crude sort and also areeas of aprimitive form of agriculture and of course would become aware of preditors that could cause undo hardship for animal and man and endeavored to do something about it. For hundreds of years animals have been domesticated and used long before that first elephant landed in our shores and in fact it was purchased in its native land and not "captured in the wild. In our country there were no zoos, so the menagerie entrapenours exhibited these strange animals and when zoos came into being they did indeed send people [profit making enterprise] to find and bring back these exotic species and man also sought vegetation hertofore unknown. Having animals in captivity gave man the means to disect and study them for thier and our well being. It continues to this day and there also is some sort of financial profit connected to all of it since time immortal. I am pleased that the people referred to in the Krueger National Forest ewere protected for their own safety and believe that was one of the very beginnings of civilization. I am not an educated scholar and wish I could state my case in a more sophisticated manner. I can't believe that before man all animals lived in such a hunkey Dorey state of existance. Maybe they are part of or adjoining their animal heaven adjacent to the "old showman's heaven". Thanks for your comments and would sure expect a reply. Glad you enjoy the circuses and thanks to ythat sea captain prfiteer that kind of started it all.

14 May, 2007 09:50
Anonymous said...

from Jim Stockley........
These pictures were (almost certainly) taken in Zimbabwe in the early 1980s - culling teams armed with R1/7.62mm automatic weapons putting down surplus elephants, in family groups. These guys could flatten a whole family group in under a minute. Once dead, the meat bone, ivory, skins and every part of the elephant was used, nothing left to waste other than the entrails.

Unfortunately Southern Africa is about to resume culling elephant again. South Africa hasn't culled since AR got a moratorium introduced in 1995 - some experts estimate that we have 5000 - 7000 elephants too many in Kruger. Next door in Botswana they are much worse off, some put the number that need to be shot at 20,000 (twenty thousand elephants to shoot). If they don't shoot some elephants soon, they are going to turn the areas they over-populate into deserts - then everything dies. In the Chobe they say that elephants already have to walk 25km daily between water and food.

That's what happens when you successfully protect a species like elephant that can reproduce at 7% per annum - like compound interest, the number doubles every 8 years!

What irony that we are shooting viable young elephants at a time when North America is spending a fortune tryin to breed them in captivity.

14 May, 2007 10:59

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