Animals in the Economic Downturn

This week, the Random Animal has been shuttling back and forth between a state with no functioning government (Minnesota-The Great Shut Down) and a state with a government some want to recall (Wisconsin-Walker Vs. Unions ).  For "functioning" government, maybe we have to go national. Wait--there's the debt ceiling crisis and politicians being as cooperative as alley cats in heat. Go international? Hmm, Greece, Italy, Ireland.... ?
All right, that was a low blow against alley cats, which like many animals suffer more when human institutions and economies go into a frenzy.  The July 4-10 edition Bloomberg Businessweek Magazine  has an article on the "Collateral Damage" of state budget cuts, complete of a photo of scary, invasive, Giant Carp (no bad jokes, please, about Giant Carp in DC). It lists a number of programs cut or reduced, several which impact animal life. Bedbugs might benefit and have a greater chance to thrive, because of a "50 percent cut in funding for the Integrated Pest Management program, a division of the state-funded Cornell Cooperative Extension research center." Carp may also get an assist upriver. In Minnesota  there's a proposed cut to a dam project meant to keep Asian carp from moving into northern rivers and lakes, where they displace native species. Animal control services have also been cut back in many areas, including one near Tampa. In some cases, this means that there are no sponsored programs for handling stray or feral cats. Individuals, on their own initiatives, might harass or harm the cats; others may put humane effort into trapping them and neutering them. With or without government shutdowns, high foreclosure and high unemployment has meant more dogs, cats, and other pets surrendered to shelters or abandoned. And many humane organizations have seen a drop-off in donations.
You could google gov't programs in your area to see how the economy is affecting wild and domestic species, but the chances are no one is budgeted to update the website. One active site talks of federal coordination of carp-control programs.  IF there is not resolution of the federal budget crisis, it's not just hot-air homo sapiens who will suffer.

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Water for Elephants, Execution, and Sanctuary

Rather behind the many readers who made Sara Gruen's book a bestseller, I finished Water for Elephants. It is an exciting story about a man who ran away to join the circus, twice in a sense, and yes, there is an elephant, along with a very attractive woman, a mystery, and liberty horses. Questing man, alluring girl, suspense, the largest land mammal, and horses--what more could one want?
The book does not attempt to be a literary tour de force, like Franzen's Freedom, or an imaginatively distinctive interpretation of human and animal connections, like Gordon's Lord of Misrule (books previously reviewed on this blog). It is NOT an anti-circus or anti-captivity, though it certainly details cruelties and abuses to circus animals and circus humans. But the novel is lively and well told and grants some animals "agency"--the ability to act on their own will and behalf.
Agency intersects with morality and justice: if you can choose your actions, you can decide to be ethical--or unethical. Evolutionary psychologists and animal behaviorists have been studying how large human abstractions like "moral" and "just" relate to behavior that is not just human. Many primates have a sense of reciprocity and fair play; if Capuchin monkey A sees that he only gets 3 grapes for performing the same task as monkey B who gets 10 (!), monkey number 1 stops trying to even get those 3 grapes. (Frans de Waal writes about primate ethics and empathy.) Does this mean the same laws should be applied to animals as to humans? In notes to her novel, Gruen tells of elephant "executions" that occurred after an elephant had killed a person. In 1916, the elephant Mary was hanged in Tennessee. The hanging seemed motivated not by any clear understanding of justice, but human, or "inhuman," desires for control, publicity, and horrifying spectacle. Gruen also refers to the electrocution of Topsy, who had killed 3 handlers.  It turned into a bizarre science experiment involving Thomas Edison. A Wikipedia entry, "Execution by Elephant," also claims that some rulers had elephants trained to kill and torture humans.
All these events sound absolutely unthinkable now. Nonetheless, humans are often at a loss when a captive animal poses a threat or is killed. A red wolf that escaped his confines at the Minnesota Zoo was quickly killed, considered by staff the safer response that a tranquilizing attempt. When a "killer" whale killed a trainer at Sea World, he--Tilikum--remained alive and after a year returned to performing (without a nearby human). The orca Tilikum is considered responsible for 3 human deaths and his case raises all kinds of questions about predators in captivity, about what is "just" with an animal, and about what is tolerated when an animal is valuable as a breeder and crowd-catcher. Is Tilikum's behavior an aberration and reaction to stress in captivity, as some a spokesperson for Animal Legal Defense Fund suggests?
I have found no account of orcas in the wild killing people, though they certainly kill other marine mammals and cousin whales for food.
Back to elephants, I once heard that increasing numbers of people in the zoo world, proponents of zoos, who coming to believe more and more that certain species should not be in zoos. These included highly social animals adapted to a very different space and range--such as dolphins and elephants. If a facility did want such animals, it should seek to have more than one to alleviate isolation. A lone elephant is, well, lonely.
 A touching example of loneliness ended is the story of the elephant Shirley, who at the age of 52 was "retired" and sent to a sanctuary. Shirley, as her story is narrated in a PBS Nature documentary, brings life to the cliche, an elephant never forgets. Have a handkerchief ready: here is the story of Shirley and Jenny: