Group wants answers in death of Petal the elephant 

What is the Philadelphia Zoo hiding?  Read articles about the request for investigation into Petal's death here:

Philadelphia Inquirer

Daily News

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 The NEW YORK TIMES weighs in on the Philly Zoo elephants - click here and Friends of Philly Zoo Elephants' efforts are acknowledged:

 A group calling itself Friends of Philly Zoo Elephants had started a campaign to persuade the zoo to send its elephants to a sanctuary, claiming that the zoo was making them stand on hard surfaces, not letting them roam enough and allowing them to fight.

When the lone Asian elephant, Dulary, now 42, got into a fight with one of the three African elephants last year and the zoo put her in isolation, the group demanded to see her. When it was rebuffed, its members picketed and handed out pamphlets denouncing what it called the mistreatment of elephants in Philadelphia and at other zoos.

The first national story on the Philly Zoo elephant controversy was in the Washington Post, December 2005 - read the story here.

http://www.dailyamerican.com/articles/2007/11/01/news/news109.txt

Local Paper covers Elephant Story

Phila. lawyer opposes elephants’ move By VICKI ROCK Daily American Staff Writer Friday, November 2, 2007 12:00 AM EDT

A member of the Friends of Philly Zoo Elephants is opposed to those elephants being moved to the Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium’s International Conservation Center near Fairhope.

The first three African elephants to be brought to Somerset County will be the three females from the Philadelphia Zoo — Pedal, 53, and Kallie and Bette, both 24. The Philadelphia Zoo is closing its elephant exhibit. The zoo’s Asian elephant, Dulary, was sent to the Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee.
Marianne Bessey, a lawyer who lives in Philadelphia, said Pedal, Kallie and Bette could be sent to the Performing Animal Welfare Society sanctuary in California.

“The Performing Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) sanctuary in California has offered to take Kallie, Bette and Petal free of charge,” she said. “This sanctuary would give the elephants free access to more than 75 acres, and does not use an ankus (bullhook) to dominate the elephants. In addition, the elephants would not be subject to breeding attempts, which in many cases in captivity has resulted in harm or even death to the mother, particularly for elephants bred for the first time at age 25 or over — like Kallie and Bette. And the largest U.S. zoo elephant exhibit is less than eight acres, woefully inadequate for the world’s largest land mammal, who roam up to 30 miles a day in their native habitat.”

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Dulary's move to The Elephant Sanctuary in TIME Magazine!!!!

 
Download a PDF copy here !

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Philly Zoo Unequipped to Handle Elephants

Wallace McKelvey                       Issue date: 11/14/06

After receiving a bath from her keeper, Dulary proceeds to shower herself with dirt gathered from the cold ground.

She paces around the courtyard before making her way to the stone boundary. Eyes drooping, she rests her trunk on top of the barricade, breathing the air beyond her half-acre enclosure.

Dulary, the lone Asian elephant at the Philadelphia Zoo, will leave the park for the first time since childhood next spring.

Ginette Meluso, communications manager for the zoo, said Dulary will be taken to an elephant sanctuary in Tennessee and three other African elephants will be transported to the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore.

"Eleven other zoos have closed their elephant exhibits," Meluso said. "The vast majority are due to financial reasons."

The zoo had planned a major expansion of the elephant habitat before the economy took a downturn, she said. Donations financed a new big cat exhibit and a children's zoo, but fundraising for the proposed elephant savannah had returned $1 million of the necessary $21 million for construction to begin.

Meluso said a press release announcing the departure of the zoo's elephants was released on Oct. 5 and produced mixed reaction.

"We've received about 200 phone calls and e-mails - a moderate response compared to the media attention," Meluso said.

Marianne Bessey, founder of the Friends for Philly Zoo Elephants, helped organize a petition last year for the release of the four animals to the elephant sanctuary. Bessey said the petition was signed by 7,000 supporters and may have influenced the zoo's decision.

She said the organization was founded in 2005 after she, along with other activists, grew increasingly concerned for the welfare of the Philadelphia elephants.

Bessey said many group members witnessed the problems at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago, where three elephants died over the course eight months.

"I vowed it wouldn't happen to the Philadelphia elephants without a fight," she said.

Zoos cannot accommodate the elephants, Bessey said. As the world's largest land mammals, elephants require space to roam and familial herds to support them psychologically.

<continued> click here to read entire article

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Philadelphia Daily News Podcast: "Our 70th podcast looks at the decision by the Philadelphia Zoo last week to close their elephant exhibit, sending one elephant to a sanctuary and three to another zoo. We talk to Dr. Andrew Baker of the Zoo as well as to Marianne Bessey, an activist with Friends of Philly Zoo Elephants."

 Click Here to Download Podcast

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John Grogan | Pack them off, but never forget

By John Grogan

Inquirer Columnist

Vikram Dewan leads the way down a sun-dappled path at the Philadelphia Zoo, where he recently took over as president and chief executive officer.

He is eager to point out the many exciting innovations and improvements for the nation's oldest zoo.

The renovated big-cats exhibit reopened in May with more cats, more up-close viewing opportunities, and a whiz-bang interactive learning station for kids.

Plans are advancing for a bigger and better children's petting zoo, slated to open in 2009, replacing the antiquated one that has been in place for nearly half a century.

A $6 million makeover of the birdhouse is on the drawing board.

Dewan, a compact man who sports wire-rimmed glasses and a beatific smile, wants to trumpet the zoo's bright future. He leads me through gaggles of happy youngsters and moms with strollers.

But before we have walked 50 paces, the one topic Dewan would just as soon not talk about is literally staring us in the face.

Up ahead are three of the zoo's four elephants, standing close together in their small, dusty enclosure, looking lugubriously out over the crowds.

The elephants are magnificent creatures, and on this day, as on most, they draw some of the biggest crowds.

An undeniable sadness

Yet there is something undeniably sad about them, these intelligent and complicated mammals hardwired to roam freely across the vast savannahs of Africa penned into a mere one-third of an acre.

It's a little like squeezing four humans into a phone booth and saying, "Have a happy life."

Because the three African elephants don't get along with the sole Asian elephant in the tight confines, they are kept segregated.

The zoo has had elephants since it opened in 1874, but their captivity in such tight quarters has become a source of mounting protests and bad PR in recent years.

Dewan arrived in July to inherit a raging controversy: Was it possible to keep such social, free-roaming creatures in the tight confines of an urban zoo totaling just 42 acres?

In the end, Dewan and the zoo's board answered no.

By deciding earlier this month to donate the animals to larger facilities, they basically agreed with protesters that the animals deserve better. "It's absolutely the right answer for where we are today," Dewan says. "Always the welfare of the animals came first."

The zoo was unable to raise the $22 million needed to expand the elephant quarters, and even if it had, the biggest space available would have been a couple of acres - still woefully insufficient.

"We're bounded on all sides," he says. "At best it would have been a temporary solution - three to five years - and a very expensive one."

Starting over

And so in the spring, the three African elephants - Petal, Kallie and Bette - will take a road trip down Interstate 95 to six-acre digs at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore. And the lone Asian elephant, Dulary, will be alone no more, enjoying life among her own kind on an open 2,700-acre sanctuary in Tennessee.

It's the right thing to do.

Every zoo lover no doubt will miss the sagacious elephants so central to the experience. And the financially struggling zoo's gate numbers could suffer without their drawing power.

But keeping them would have come at too great a cost - not so much financial as moral.

Zoos exist not only to amuse and entertain, but to teach and instill understanding of, and respect for, other species and their habitats. The whole concept is slightly incongruous. Can we really expect to imbue children with respect for other species by pulling the animals from their native habitats and imprisoning them behind bars?

Yet it is the elephants that are most emblematic of this disconnect.

If the Philadelphia Zoo really wants to teach visitors about the elephant's wild majesty and special place in the animal kingdom, here's an idea:

Build an exhibit explaining the long history of these amazing animals in captivity and why the nation's first zoo will no longer be a party to it.

http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061008/OPINION11/610080306/1112/OPINION

http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/news/local/15602012.htm

http://www.chestnuthilllocal.com/issues/2006.07.06/letters.html

Zoo is no friend

In the June 29, 2006 article about a visit to the Philadelphia Zoo [“Zoo critic can bear-ly contain his sadness”], Jimmy Pack noted most of the animals appeared “either doped up, dead tired or too depressed to give anyone any attention.” Mr. Pack’s experience echoes my own and that of many others who have observed the zoo’s elephants eating hay mixed with their own feces, jammed together under the barn’s overhanging roof — the only shade provided inside the barren exhibit, and displaying stereotypic behavior such as neurotically weaving back and forth. In the wild, or at sanctuaries where they have free access to acres of space, elephants roam for miles — foraging, exploring, and socializing with other elephants.

Then there is Dulary — the Asian elephant attacked last summer by one of the African elephants, a tragic consequence of the Zoo’s failure to provide adequate space for four of the world’s largest land mammals. Dulary has been living in solitary confinement for over ten months, briefly released from her steel cage inside the 1,800 square foot cement barn when the Africans are inside. Female elephants are extremely social animals who live their entire lives with their families in the wild. Dulary suffered alone through the winter, dropping nearly a thousand pounds in a few months. Now Dulary will suffer alone through the sweltering heat of summer, spending 20 hours a day in a barn cooled only by a few fans - no air conditioning and little ventilation.

In response to concerns about the elephants, Zoo officials have denied that Dulary is isolated; after all, says the Zoo, she can “hear, smell and see the other elephants.” Reassuring news for all the human prisoners in solitary confinement — they aren’t really isolated because after all, they can smell the other prisoners! As for Petal, Kallie, and Bette, the three African elephants, Zoo officials glibly claim they are in “good health” and “happy.” These claims are contradicted by eye-witness reports of the elephants displaying foot problems and the Zoo’s refusal to provide access to the elephants’ medical records despite repeated requests from the public.

The Philadelphia Zoo has no excuses for its failure to provide adequate living conditions for these four majestic elephants. The Elephant Sanctuary (“TES”), a 2,700- acre natural habitat refuge for elephants in Tennessee, offered last fall to take Dulary at no charge to the Zoo, including free transport. TES will be able to accommodate additional African elephants in the coming months, providing the other three Philly Zoo elephants with a permanent home. That for over 10 months the Zoo has continued to refuse to send Dulary to TES and instead has forced her to languish alone in a cement barn for more than 20 hours per day is nothing less than gross negligence.

Marianne Bessey
Member, Friends of Philly Zoo Elephants
Lansdowne

 

http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/news/opinion/14053954.htm

Councilman Kenney's March 9, 2006 Letter to the Philadelphia Daily News

THE PHILADELPHIA Zoo has long been one of our most valued treasures. Home to more than 1,500 animals, many rare and endangered in the wild, the zoo prides itself on conservation and education.

Recently, however, issues concerning the well-being of the zoo's four elephants have surfaced. One is in respect to the amount of space dedicated to the elephants. The other is the incident of the 41-year-old female Asian elephant named Dulary being kept separate from the other elephants since August after an injury to her eye during an altercation with one of the zoo's African elephants.

Both of these concerns are validated by the American Zoo and Aquarium Association's accreditation guide. The AZA insists that zoos should make every effort to maintain elephants in social groupings. The guide also says that Asian and African elephants should not be integrated into the same herd due for health and behavioral reasons.

I have also learned about elephant sanctuaries, in particular the Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee. I am impressed by the sanctuary's climate, space and specialized care.

As these elephant issues have attracted public attention, the zoo has positioned itself as the victim by being extremely defensive and by mischaracterizing a passionate person's pleas as threats.

It is time for the zoo to recognize that elephant care standards have changed. Wouldn't it be great to give the elephants a retirement party for all of their years serving our city and region? The party could also be a fund-raiser for the zoo, accompanied by penny-drives and corporate donations.

The zoo can transfer the elephants to the Elephant Sanctuary free of charge and maintain AZA accreditation. I'm sure the zoo and sanctuary could even create a partnership to include communication on the elephants' health and well-being.

It would also be great to include an exhibit where Philadelphia Zoo visitors could watch the elephants in the sanctuary on a live telecast.

James F. Kenney
Philadelphia City Councilman

 

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/13970310.htm

John Grogan | Zoo hysteria high as elephant's eye - February 27, 2006

By John Grogan (author of Marley and Me)

Inquirer Columnist

It might be easy to write off as a nutty extremist Marianne Bessey, the animal-rights activist who has been banned from the Philadelphia Zoo.

Easy, that is, until you look into the eyes of the giant, majestic beasts she so zealously - some might say hysterically - champions.

Until you look into the eyes of a captive elephant.

There is something there. Something more than docile existence. There is intelligence, fierce intelligence. No question about it. Even the zoo's own Web site notes the animal's innate smarts. Is it my imagination, or is there also sadness in those eyes?

Sadness and longing?

Bessey thinks there is, and she has become obsessed with helping the zoo's four elephants find freedom - or at least a relative facsimile of it - at a 2,700-acre pachyderm sanctuary in Tennessee.

She has become a major burr under the saddle of the zoo's administration, regularly visiting the elephants in their tight quarters at the zoo, videotaping them, freely sharing her opinion that elephants deserve better than a quarter-acre exercise yard where visitors stand and gawk at them.

"They're so intelligent and just so amazing," she said by phone Friday.

'A little depressed'

Bessey, a lawyer, became smitten with elephants as a child. "But when I saw them in circuses or zoos, I always felt there's something wrong here," she said. "They always seemed a little off or depressed."

In 1996, she traveled to Zimbabwe to watch wild elephants in their native habitat and was stunned by how differently they behaved and interacted from confined animals.

And those smart, deep eyes, she insists, had different expressions. Not sad at all.

She calls zoo elephants mere "shadows" of wild elephants.

Last year she began badgering zoo officials to release the four elephants to the sanctuary where they could live closer to how nature intended. So far, the idea has gone nowhere.

She's particularly frustrated over the fate of Dulary, a 42-year-old female with an injury that has kept her inside a concrete barn since August.

"It's like putting your child in a closet for the rest of their life," she said.

As her frustration grew, she posted a message earlier this month on an online chat room known as the Elephant Connection. In it, she wished that Philadelphia Zoo Director Alexander L. "Pete" Hoskins might experience what it would be like to be "kept in a concrete closet for six months to hasten [his] demise."

"My frustration just boiled over," she said.

What she didn't know was that zoo officials were monitoring the chat room (your donor dollars at work), and they filed a police complaint against her, apparently on the theory that her comments were not-quite-but-almost-sort-of a little like a death threat.

A threat, but to what?

Now, we can't have death-threatening eco-terrorists at a family attraction, right? And so the activist was banned from zoo property.

Remind me again who's acting with extreme hysteria?

Let's get real here. The threat the zoo is trying to contain is not to its director's life but to its well-coiffed public-relations image. Zoos are friendly, family places where all the animals are happy all the time. There is no room for loudmouths questioning whether the elephants might be better off running free.

I like zoos. I like the Philadelphia Zoo in particular, so much so that I have an annual membership. I like taking my kids there. But I have to say, when I reach the elephant enclosure, I see it, too. Those eyes.

Most of the other animals seem content in their enclosures. But the elephants always leave me feeling just a little... sad. If they could talk, you know what they would say. And it would not be how splendid life is standing in a rectangle of dust so people can take their photographs.

Other major zoos have released their pachyderms to large sanctuaries where they now roam free.

Visit the zoo, look into those deep, knowing eyes. Then ask yourself: Isn't it time Philadelphia did the same?

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Another vision for the Philly Zoo

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/opinion/local2/region/12637691.htm

Letters | An expanded vision for our zoo: Virtual reality


In Julie Stoiber's article on the future of the Philadelphia Zoo's elephants, zoo president Alexander Hoskins rationalized the confinement of these animals by comparing their situation to a city-vs.-country debate among humans - "Are you happier on your 100-acre estate or in your Center City condo, with access to arts and culture?" ("Zoo elephants may have to leave town," Aug. 28).

This remark underscores the real problem for the zoo and its large animal inhabitants: a lack of progressive vision about how the zoo as an institution should be designed and experienced for animals and humans alike.

Why not strive to be America's first zoo again? We could be the first to promote a new exhibit that captures these majestic animals in their natural habitat and social organization through technology and virtual reality along the lines of Disney's wildly successful amusement, Soarin' Over California, which stirs the senses and leaves a positive lasting impression. We could be the first to bring the public to the species through technology and innovation, instead of playing catch-up to captivity mandates. Revenue generated
could be applied toward conservation and research partnerships in Africa and Asia, and could distinguish the Philadelphia Zoo as a pioneer in a bold, new model of zoo design.

A recent visit to the zoo left me as depressed as the elephants appear to be. Is moving to a bigger "condo" going to change that condition?

John Kiernan
Phoenixville

 

Philadelphia Zoo Demonstrations in the News - 

"Elephant turf at zoo sparking a fight"

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/12707692.htm

"Roaming Charge"

http://citypaper.net/articles/2005-08-25/cityspace2.shtml

Responses to "Roaming Charge"

http://citypaper.net/articles/2005-09-01/mailbag.shtml

http://citypaper.net/articles/2005-09-08/mailbag.shtml

**** Posted on Tue, Sep. 13, 2005 *****

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/opinion/local2/region/12628978.htm     The real remedy for zoo elephants is to set them free By Elliot Katz The growing debate over zoos' ability to adequately provide for elephants - including those in Philadelphia - demonstrates wide public concern about current conditions. Every year, zoos spend millions of dollars trying to treat elephants suffering the ill effects of zoo confinement. Inadequate zoo conditions such as hard, compacted dirt and concrete and a lack of space lead to a host of ailments for elephants, including digestive troubles, reproductive problems, degenerative joint disease, lameness, and chronic foot infections. Evidence that such maladies do not befall elephants in the wild has led growing numbers of experts to conclude that zoo life itself is killing them. How else can one explain that elephants in zoos live just half their natural 70-year life expectancy? Elephant-foot expert Michael Schmidt, a former zoo veterinarian who specialized in the care of elephants for more than 25 years, says in his book Jumbo Ghosts: "Zoo-genic foot disease remains the number one source of pain, suffering and premature death for zoo elephants." In response to new space requirements from the American Zoo and Aquarium Association, the Philadelphia Zoo is planning to build a $22 million, 2.5-acre elephant exhibit. While it is a significant increase to the current outdoor space of a quarter-acre, it is simply not enough for elephants, who, in the wild, can walk 30 miles or more a day with their families. Elephants, the world's largest land mammals, need space to maintain good physical and psychological health. Daphne Sheldrick, a veterinarian and leading authority on African elephants, has said that "100 miles is a mere stroll for these animals." Another expert, Joyce Poole, who has studied wild elephants in Kenya's Amboseli National Park, concurs: "As a scientist who has studied elephant behavior and communication among free-living individuals for 30 years, I am stunned that the American Zoo and Aquarium Association is not able to perceive the empirical evidence that elephants need much more space than what is currently allotted to them." Poole notes that the ailments that plague elephants in zoos are simply unheard of in the wild creatures she has studied for three decades. But there is a solution. Last year, after the captivity-related deaths of two elephants, the San Francisco Zoo sent its two remaining elephants to a sanctuary. San Francisco then became the first American city to mandate minimal standards for elephants, requiring at least 15 acres for any future exhibits. Next, the Detroit Zoo, recognizing its inability to provide for elephants' physical and psychological needs, became the first U.S. zoological institution to close its elephant exhibit solely on ethical grounds. The elephants were sent to a sanctuary, where they have access to more than 100 acres of soft soil and varied terrains, conditions that no zoo can match. If Philadelphia residents want their elephants to have good lives, they should advocate for the elephants to be sent to one of two U.S. sanctuaries that provide up to 1,400 acres of naturalistic habitat. There, the elephants can roam, and heal from the damage caused by life in the zoo. Dr. Elliot M. Katz is a veterinarian and founder of In Defense of Animals (www.idausa.org), an international animal-rescue and advocacy organization based in Mill Valley

Philadelphia Inquirer editorial on the Philly Zoo's proposed expansion of elephant exhibit

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/editorial/11643826.htm

Posted on Sat, May. 14, 2005

Editorial | A Crowded Elephant House, Move the herd

Today's zoos have to evolve not only for their survival as amusement attractions but also to protect the animals.

Animals no longer live in cages; they wander through re-created habitats. Keepers scatter food and offer playthings to stimulate animals' intellect. Conservation and education efforts aim to help people link the captive to the wild.

Scientists get smarter daily about exhibiting and preserving wild species. Yet these better ideas sometimes require hard choices, especially for historical, urban zoos with limited space and finances, as at the Philadelphia Zoo.

Now, but even more so in the future, not every zoo will have the resources to display every species. Properly caring for creatures may mean saying good-bye to beloved friends. Philadelphia should start by sending its elephants to zoos that can provide them a better home.

By midsummer, zoos accredited by the American Zoo & Aquarium Association must submit plans to breed elephants and improve their habitats, most of which don't meet the association's 2001 guidelines. AZA president William R. Foster expects half of the 80 members with elephants to spend millions in the next five years to upgrade habitats. Others will close their exhibits.

Philadelphia wants to build a new savanna, but it would not be a wise investment - for people or pachyderms.

Undoubtedly, the zoo would design a state-of-the-art elephant facility, superior to the current home. But even the improved yard proposes to crowd up to seven elephants on 2.5 acres, the most space the hemmed-in, 42-acre park could dedicate to this species. That's not enough for the world's largest land mammal, which roams 30 miles a day in the wild.

Philadelphia put a replacement for its 1940s-era elephant house in the 1997-98 master plan, but the zoo hasn't raised the $22 million cost. Other needs were more pressing. First came "Big Cat Falls," a $20 million update of the even older carnivore house, which opens next year. Also in line is renovation of the architecturally distinctive bird house, a $14 million project. The zoo also must raise about $5 million yearly in private funds to supplement its operating budget.

America's first zoo is caught up in a national debate over the future of elephants in captivity. In 2004, four zoo elephants died in San Francisco and Chicago of health problems that animal welfare advocates say were exacerbated by captivity. Also last year, the Detroit zoo voluntarily ended its elephant exhibit because of space and climate constraints.

Calls to remove elephants from all zoos are overwrought. They're charismatic ambassadors that educate children about the plight of their wild cousins. But "elephants aren't necessary to communicate a conservation message," Foster said.

Some zoos, especially those with Serengeti exhibits nearly as large as the entire Philadelphia zoo, should keep their elephants. Philadelphia should invest its scarce land and money resources elsewhere.

August 2005 Philadelphia Inquirer article on proposed expansion of elephant exhibit

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/states/pennsylvania/counties/philadelphia_county/philadelphia/12497255.htm

 Review of the Philly Zoo

http://www.aapn.org/zoopage3.html

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
America's First Zoo - but, unfortunately,  far from being its best. A depressing zoo. I would have expected so much better in such a wealthy city. It is neatly packaged and presented with lots of lip service to conservation but there is little concern apparent for the welfare of the inhabitants. Nothing strikingly bad and certainly better than the vast majority of Asian zoos but definitely disappointing.  Visited in April 1998.

Stu Bykofsky | Dulary not forgotten, soon to be gone

September 25, 2006

A DECISION about a new home for Dulary, the 42-year-old Asian elephant quarantined for more than a year, should be made no later than "the end of October," Philadelphia Zoo President Vikram Dewan told me Friday.

The decision will reveal where she will be going, but not precisely when.

The zoo has known for more than a year, since a tussle with another elephant, that Dulary would have to be relocated. After almost a lifetime in Philadelphia, she will go to another zoo or a sanctuary with proper facilities.

The "when" is not known because of the tricky logistics surrounding the move, Dewan said.

The decision process has moved as slowly as a foraging elephant. In the end, Dulary will go where it is best for her, said Dewan, who's been running the zoo only since July 6, replacing long-time mahout Pete Hoskins.

Still an open question is the fate of the three African elephants: Petal, 50, Kallie, 23, and Bette, 22.

Although the elder Dulary and Petal had lived together peacefully for four decades, the addition of two younger Africans changed the dynamic, said senior vice president Andy Baker. After an August 2005 rumble between Dulary and Bette that left Dulary with a damaged right eye, the three Africans and the Asian have been kept apart.

All during that time, Marianne Bessey, who heads Friends of Philly Zoo Elephants, has been trumpeting, protesting and leafleting for change. Bessey's mantra is "Let the elephants go."

Two problems: One, elephants are great for the gate, said Baker, because no other animal can quite match them. They are "singular." People want to see them up close and personal.

Two, they need a proper home and the three Africans would have to be moved as the family unit they have become. Not many places can accept three elephants. "It's taken longer than I thought," said Baker.

He said that in April.

The zoo already has shelved plans to expand its elephant exhibit, saying it was too costly, but I guess it's feeling the heat that comes from bad PR. A relentless advocate, Bessey has beat the drums relentlessly in behalf of the great mammals she so dearly loves and respects.

Bessey welcomed the zoo's coming announcement, said it was "long overdue," but added she hoped Dulary would be going to a sanctuary. "If she's going to another zoo, it would be more of the same."

Public opinion slowly is swinging her way. Eight U.S. zoos, including San Francisco and Detroit, have packed their pachyderms off to larger quarters. The Bronx Zoo will not replace its elephants after they die.

After taking over as president, Dewan launched a charm offensive, calling in media and others for get-acquainted sessions. Last week, he even met with Bessey, who had been banned from the zoo.

That's smart leadership, but chat fests aren't action.

Now that a deadline for the announcement has been made, the zoo must expedite the actual move. Deciding where to move Dulary was a portrait of foot-dragging. The zoo must move cheetah-fast to get the old girl to her new home.

 Sooner or later, zoos will lose the Great Debate on Elephants. The pachyderms will be retired, first from zoos, eventually from circuses.

The Philadelphia Zoo - as America's first zoo - should lead in developing creative new ways of "displaying" elephants (using computers, DVDs, webcams, whatever). It's the right thing to do for the elephants - and it is inevitable.

Awesome elephants belong in better place than a freezing zoo

The elephants at the Philadelphia Zoo have fascinated kids and former kids around here for generations. Many of us remember staring in awe at the magnificent animals, waiting for them to lift their trunks and trumpet. They were our wide-eyed introduction to the wonders of wildlife.

But times and attitudes change.

The Philadelphia Zoo announced last week that it is closing the exhibit. Its four elephants will be shipped elsewhere by spring. The zoo was unable to raise the $22 million to expand their habitat.

It is a story that is being repeated across the country. As more was learned about these great creatures, it became clear quarters were too small and the indoor cement floors of northern zoos can lead to foot infections that can kill elephants.

Philadelphia's three African elephants -- 50-year-old Petal, and the 20-somethings, Kallie and Bette -- are going to Maryland Zoo in Baltimore. Dulary, 42 and the lone Asian elephant, will go to a sanctuary in Tennessee.

Whether elephants should be in zoos at all is a controversy. But just about everyone agrees that the confined spaces of old zoos and freezing temperatures in northern states are bad for elephants. Their survival is crucial.

Habitat loss and poaching have been deadly in the wild. Africa's elephants have dropped from 1.3 million in 1971 to somewhere between 300,000 to 500,000 today, according to the American Institute of Biological Sciences. The number of Asian elephants in the wild is put at less than 50,000.

It will be sad to see Petal, Kallie, Bette and Dulary go. But the survival of the animals is more important than our amusement.

 *********

http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/news/local/15714048.htm

Stu Bykofsky | 'Bittersweet' elephant tale with a twist

Philadelphia Zoo president Vikram Dewan used the word to express how he feels about sending the zoo's four elephants to new homes, a move that will be made sometime next spring.

The word expresses how Friends of Philly Zoo Elephants leader Marianne Bessey feels about the fate of Petal, 50; Kallie, 23, and Bette, 22, who will go to quarters that are being expanded to six acres at Baltimore's Maryland Zoo. "They are relocating the problem, not removing it," she says.

For Dulary, the fourth elephant, the resolution is all sweet, not bitter at all. The 42-year-old Asian elephant will be moved to the 11-year-old, 2,700-acre Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tenn., home to 19 elephants - 16 Asians and three Africans. The Asians and Africans live in separate herds.

Elephant Sanctuary Executive Director Carol Buckley is awaiting Dulary with open arms and predicts Dulary will be well-received by her peers.

"Dulary will be introduced into a group of eight Asian elephants. This group is a very established group and they have a history of being quite receptive to newcomers," says Buckley.

Back in Philadelphia, there will be no layoffs and Dewan says the zoo's three elephant keepers most likely will "stay with us and and will continue to provide care and affection for other animals. Right now they are focused on the next six or seven months and making sure they do the best possible job for the elephants."

When Philly's pachyderms depart, it will be the first time America's First Zoo will be without elephants since it opened in 1874. In explaining the elephants' departure, the zoo has emphasized a lack of money to upgrade the elephants' habitat. The improvements would have included physical expansion, which strikes me as a tacit admission the mammals could use more space. Philadelphia joins 11 cities that have closed or plan to close elephant exhibits.

The zoo says it meets space standards set by the American Zoo & Aquarium Association, but elephant advocates, and zoo officials, admit no organization has ever scientifically determined how much (or how little) space elephants need.

No human can say with certainty what elephants want or need, but we can agree more space = happier life, and the ½ acre in Philly for four elephants is like squeezing a size-10 foot into a size-8 shoe.

I know some people think you can't have a zoo without elephants. Many people used to think you can't have a circus without elephants, but Cirque du Soleil proved otherwise.

Elephants are crowd-pleasers and their loss might hurt the gate at the zoo. Their announced departure could be marketed like Barbra Streisand's Last Tour, or Cher's.

"We think it's really important to be able to provide an opportunity for our members and our guests and our extended zoo family to be able to have the opportunity to say goodbye in the proper way," says Dewan.

But just like Barbra and Cher, "farewell" may not mean what it says.

Dewan surprises me when he says someday down the road, "As we look at re-doing the back end of the zoo, and how we would go about that, we will certainly consider how and in what way the elephants could be re-introduced."

Bessey sadly shakes her head. "It is a shame that Mr. Dewan has learned nothing about the devastating impact of keeping elephants in zoos, or he would realize the entire 42-acre Philly Zoo doesn't have the space or the climate to meet the needs of elephants."

The elephants' tale may not yet be ended.