“What happens to beasts will happen to man. All things are connected. If the great beasts are gone, man would surely die of a great loneliness of his spirit.” - Chief Seattle
Human population has reached 5.5 billion. By 2025, it is estimated that there will be 10 billion humans on our earth. It is unfortunate but true that large mammals have little habitat, and without the help and care of humans, will be unable to survive.
Animal rights groups that say how much happier animals are in the wild are not dealing with reality. Both our elephants would be dead if not for being in the United States. We are very proud of our animals. It is important to us that their needs are fulfilled and their health good. All the behaviors that you see our animals do are behaviors they do on their own. We teach them to repeat those behaviors on voice commands by using food rewards.
The use of cruelty in training is not tolerated. We do not want animals that are nervous, that cower, or that run. Performing should be fun for the animals, playtime. All our animals are in full view of the public each day, all day, we hide nothing. In the winter our elephants visit schools where we show the young students what elephants can do. We also teach them about dwindling populations of large mammals on our planet and the need to now reserve land for habitat. Hopefully through these programs children will learn to appreciate and respect species other than our own.
We do not apologize to anyone for loving and taking care of our animals. We reject fully the concept of total separation of species. Without seeing animals, being around them, respect does not grow.
“In the end, we will conserve only what we love, love only what we understand, understand only what we are taught.”
Our circus excels in care of animals. We excel in allowing young children to see and appreciate animals in our urban culture. If people disagree with us, that can be accepted, but the question is why don’t so called animal rights groups start putting money and time into preserving habitat and teaching population control. Without habitat, large animals are doomed. Our challenge to animal rights groups is to do something pro-active to allow animals to survive rather than simply criticize others. It is easy to be negative and crucify others indiscriminately, but harder to put energy into positive actions that will help perpetuate other species.
It is also interesting to note that both Ringling Brothers and Carson and Barnes Circuses have breeding programs that are successfully helping the population of elephants.
Finally, all we ask is to come to our circus and see our animals yourself - They are beautiful!
