Zoos aren't answer to protect wildlife

Conservation efforts for animal species all over the world continue to increase. Those efforts include restoring and maintaining habitats, establishing and enhancing ecosystem services such as creating protected free roam areas, creating anti-hunting/poaching laws that have severe punishments if violated, and protecting species from extinction. In Africa especially, where tourism infrastructure is relatively new, incentives for conservation increase as cash flow from said tourists continues to pour in.

Brien Comerford's letter "Lions safer in zoos than in the wild" implies an unethical and potentially dangerous agenda: removing lions from their natural habitat and placing them into zoos. If a sick or injured animal is not well enough to return to the wild after medical treatment, or if they were born in captivity, then yes they would need to stay. However, taking perfectly healthy lions from their natural habitat would be expensive, and stressful for the animals.

Confining them to a pen would be an enormous step down from the free savannas of Africa, and could pose a threat to the pride's dynamic. While a zoo, like Brookfield Zoo, indeed takes great care of their resident animals, it doesn't hold a candle to the wild.

Taking them would also pose a severe threat to local ecosystems, and would result in an influx of animals that lions hunt, such as herbivorous animals, resulting in a decline of local flora and therefore a decreased food supply for said animals.

Death and decline of these animal populations would leave less food for their predators as well, leading to an extensive decline of several species. The proper solution would be to support wild conservation and fight habitat loss, and to crack down on the illegal pet trade and hunting, and the trade of these animals' body parts as good luck charms or medicine.

Danielle De La Rosa

Des Plaines