If Aspinall is really committed to improving the welfare of his elephants, he would build a new, big barn with sand floor for them instead of flying them to Africa to an uncertain future. The night housing in Howletts needs an upgrade urgently, but the paddocks are very spacious and if the night housing is improved, the elephants would have a good and safe life there. Kenya already has enough elephants and needs money to protect the ones they already have, not more elephants…
Howletts Wild Animal Park Howletts Wild Animal Park News 2021
- Thread starter GorillaBoy
- Start date
I would not be surprised that KWS nor the Ministry of the Environment had both not previously been consulted. Imagine a full on Southern African capture team working with the JAF foundation in Kenya ..., that is something of a major misjudgement I would think given locally available resources and expertise.Tut tut tut....now that's an interesting development...
Reintroduction of the world's largest land mammal without consent of the sovereign nation where it is to take place.
I try to keep an open mind but it all sounds a bit Mickey mouse to me at the moment.
Further, if you consider that the Daphne Sheldrick Foundation works to rehabilitate wild orphaned elephants over years when mothers have been passed away or been killed illegally or in accidental circumstances, it close on takes years to get them back into the wild. This is with the expert guidance and assistance from the ranger forces on the ground, KWS trained staff in veterinary care, capture teams and protected area management cohorte.
The question remains: Why waste precious conservation Kenya Shillings on getting captive-born and old elephants "back into the wild"? Please note: they are non indigenous as I believe the source populations for Howlett's captive African elephant population has been off Tanzanian and Southern African stock / origins, so the captive savannahs are admixed. This more or less fails some reintroduction guidelines and criteria on its own.
This conundrum becomes all the more relevant if you consider that there is no real need to support African elephant populations within Kenya. For your information: the MIKE program and the PIKE trends over the last few years have been downward both in Eastern and Southern Africa (where poaching and illegal killings in Central and Western Africa have intensified and at times been out of control), which just goes to show that there is no urgent conservation need to have DA/JAF Howletts elephants back to Kenya.
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One suspects that *this* partial climbdown from the originally-suggested plans.....
...is very much because of the pushback against said plans coming from Kenya as noted here....
But then, are we surprised?
...is very much because of the pushback against said plans coming from Kenya as noted here....
But then, are we surprised?
I do wish they had made that point more prominent in their feature article. Along with that the notion of reintroduction in this case is seriously flawed and should not receive the international stamp of approval from IUCN's African Elephant and Reintroduction Specialist Group nor conservation funding from third parties.
Finalemente: I have my doubts that John Aspinall would have taken all that financial and painstaking physical and husbandry management effort in building up large breeding groups of endangered species to ensure more prosperous and successful breeding of them under captive conditions only to have his heir let slip and fold his zoo operations.
Onychorhynchus coronatus
Well-Known Member
Totally agree.
What I don't understand is why they would go to the media with their plans and put on a show when they haven't even been granted permission to proceed by the Kenyan government.
It seems like their media team is jumping ahead of itself and prioritizing tabloid coverage over prudent planning and organising the logistics of this all.
One might say this is a major m.o.c.k.-up.
Might also put the entire effort not just regionally suspect but the Eastern African media implosion may alert and trigger the above mentioned IUCN Specialist Groups into an official non committal / ill advised conservation action recommendation.
Might also put the entire effort not just regionally suspect but the Eastern African media implosion may alert and trigger the above mentioned IUCN Specialist Groups into an official non committal / ill advised conservation action recommendation.
Onychorhynchus coronatus
Well-Known Member
One suspects that *this* partial climbdown from the originally-suggested plans.....
...is very much because of the pushback against said plans coming from Kenya as noted here....
But then, are we surprised?
God...
It's such a cringe worthy move though.
It's like something a political spin doctor would say and makes you wonder just who is at the helm of their head of communications....
Oh wait......
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Some good points made here:
https://www.kent.ac.uk/news/environ...O-m2QBjJXKSoCQXGiDy9d0ih4RZJbkifuDPYUzO-Kv9yA
https://www.kent.ac.uk/news/environ...O-m2QBjJXKSoCQXGiDy9d0ih4RZJbkifuDPYUzO-Kv9yA
Which is why I have felt so strongly about this whole affair and been arguing time and time on this thread that this is a rewilding exercise for all the wrong reasons while not underpinning the local conservation narrative nor relevance to elephant conservation in situ and at the same time using as a source population mostly totally unadapted towards any rewilding exercise (even rewilding orphaned wildborn elephants by the DSF itself can take years to come to any positive outcome ...).
Reintroduction of endangered species can be a game changer in local conservation initiatives as being the focal point for conserving the wider landscape and ensure protection of a representative ecosystem, habitat and more biodiverse animal-plant communities. Here those purposes are not served at all. Further, while admitting reintroduction exercises by definition are projects of trial and error working to a successful modus operandi for putting in a sufficiently viable and robust reproducing and sustainable population somewhere. This takes one to have a long term vision for project execution and final outcomes and benefits local and beyond the local. Those benefits do not exist here ... full stop. No community nor conservation in situ in Kenya is served by this heavily personalised and PR/marketing driven transfer of a captive elephant breeding group in situ. I would even go so far as to say no country in Africa is absolutely desperately waiting for this project to come to fruition.
While I have been very diplomatic up till now, now is probably the best moment for me to acknowledge my personal conviction that the more we discuss the matter here online the more it becomes an ill advised project, a total fallacy along with potentially being a legal minefield for animal welfare concerns and potential criminal negligence on the part of the initiators / promoters of this project. I do hope all this hullabaloo over DA's publicised plans will lead to a dead in the water project. And I will not say that lightly or just remark off the cuff, let that be clear (I am a science dedicated individual with an informed opinion that cannot remain silent in the face of all the evidence stalked against the JAF project under consideration).
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Well said. It has a strong whiff of the 'white saviour' complex, in assuming that they can do better or know more than the KWS.
I suspect this is a genetic condition which affects the whole family. The late John Aspinall always knew better than everybody else about everything.
At this point, I have not even brought on the black / white issue, but yes .... I have all along felt that it could be construed as a post colonial and elitist whim sitting uneasy in the face of Kenya's rich and diverse ethnic communities where the race factor remains relevant till this day and also going forward.
Onychorhynchus coronatus
Well-Known Member
I thought you actually articulated it far better than the article of the academic mentioned but then again you have been a conservation practitioner so it's to be expected.
I agree all the work that John did to create a breeding herd just to see a lot of his work over many years dismantled also goes with the other species there
But the only reason he created 'breeding herds' was with the ultimate aim of reintroductions wasn't it? Never just to be seen as 'zoo' animals. It has worked for a handful of species but for many others I've never been certain what the ultimate aim was.I agree all the work that John did to create a breeding herd just to see a lot of his work over many years dismantled also goes with the other species there
I always believed the Aspinall philosophy was to breed and release animals into the wild too. But (and this is where Damian has adapted it I feel) not to release all of them, to grow the colonies to such an extent they could still stay in Kent as the insurance policy they represented but to also fulfill a purpose to replenish wild populations.
Onychorhynchus coronatus
Well-Known Member
From what I've read he was in favour of reintroductions and I believe that he authorized some during his lifetime.
However his view of the future of biodiversity was an apocalyptic one and coloured by a misanthropy that was disturbing and deeply enmeshed with very extreme right political beliefs (not a belief system that is compatible with Conservation).
He was no Gerald Durrell that's for sure and for all the great things apparently achieved at the Aspinall parks that fact is very hard to ignore.
I get the impression from the articles I've read that his vision of the parks was almost of a lifeboat / sanctuary for megafauna that he believed would face imminent extinction in this century.
That's where I believe the difference lies between the visions of father and son with John believing in the role of his zoo as a centre of ex-situ Conservation and Damian... well you know his views already...
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A quick check on Damian's Twitter reveals something interesting - he follows Born Free, Freedom for Animals and multiple animal rights/anti-zoo groups.
This means either Damian's deliberately drank the animal rights Kool-Aid or is pretending he did. Either way, with the inquiry looking into his charity for misappropriation of funds, I think his days are numbered.
Also, the Howletts rewilding programme actually validates the captive breeding of elephants, not refutes it - one of the principal arguments against elephants in captivity is that captive-bred elephants will never be reintroduced into the wild and/or such an endeavour is doomed to failure.
Except... didn't Howletts do that - and provide a framework for others in the future?
This means either Damian's deliberately drank the animal rights Kool-Aid or is pretending he did. Either way, with the inquiry looking into his charity for misappropriation of funds, I think his days are numbered.
Also, the Howletts rewilding programme actually validates the captive breeding of elephants, not refutes it - one of the principal arguments against elephants in captivity is that captive-bred elephants will never be reintroduced into the wild and/or such an endeavour is doomed to failure.
Except... didn't Howletts do that - and provide a framework for others in the future?
I think his twitter account has been inactive since about 2018 - not that that invalidates your point though.
The more I think and read about this, the more I see current developments as business decisions rather than animal welfare ones. I'm not as well versed in some of the intracacies regarding re-wilding as others that have commented. But with this whole Elephant story.. whilst the public lap up the idea of animals going back to the wild (from the article posted above this seems to not really be the case anyway, nor are they needed there), the organisation also quietly rids itself of a huge operating cost. Why not seek to rehome them elsewhere? I imagine there are a number of European zoos that would take them on. But then the PR result would be markedly different. I also find it weird that an individual so apparently against the idea of zoos is also creating boutique, expensive 'experiences' at one of his sites.
The more I think and read about this, the more I see current developments as business decisions rather than animal welfare ones. I'm not as well versed in some of the intracacies regarding re-wilding as others that have commented. But with this whole Elephant story.. whilst the public lap up the idea of animals going back to the wild (from the article posted above this seems to not really be the case anyway, nor are they needed there), the organisation also quietly rids itself of a huge operating cost. Why not seek to rehome them elsewhere? I imagine there are a number of European zoos that would take them on. But then the PR result would be markedly different. I also find it weird that an individual so apparently against the idea of zoos is also creating boutique, expensive 'experiences' at one of his sites.
Onychorhynchus coronatus
Well-Known Member
The narrative that he was conveying when he came on this site and started the thread seemed to suggest that he had once believed in his father's approach / philosophy regarding ex-situ Conservation in the parks but had lost faith.
He seemed to be framing that narrative of loss of faith as a conclusion that dawned on him over time when he began to look at and question the Conservation output of zoos and contradictions in practice.
He initially kept mentioning things such as inbreeding depression within zoo animal species populations and hybridisation and disease.
But despite many of us asking for examples of this ( I was particularly interested in hearing of examples of evidence of hybridisation for example because of my work) he just wasn't prepared to provide any concrete evidence or to entertain the possibility that zoo captivity can in many circumstances be a provisional strategy to help avoid those kind of problems occuring in the first place.
Again there are grains of truth in his argument that zoos are not doing enough for conservation and that some species are better conserved in-situ and that we should critically examine zoos roles and functions (which isn't to say ban them as he suggests) and personally I just don't think we can avoid the need to critically examine these wider issues or afford the consequences of not having done so.
However there just didn't appear to be any room for nuance or compromise within his argument or that he had considered the case of smaller taxa (it seems that he was mainly centering the argument around megafauna).
I would tend to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that my own impression is that Damian genuinely was once a believer in zoos but that for whatever reason he lost faith and in the process gained a new faith (or was influenced by someone with these ideas) in animal rights which has a stark / austere black and white world view and no shades of grey.
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