• Question: Are animals healthier living in the wild?

    Asked by 822anmh42 to Carrie, Ellen, Rupert on 16 Mar 2017.
    • Photo: Ellen Williams

      Ellen Williams answered on 16 Mar 2017:


      Not necessarily – the wild can be a tough place for animals – they need to fight off predators (including humans), deal with ever changing conditions (brought about by say climate change, human change) and find food. Especially during dry seasons where food is scarce this can be particularly hard for wild animals.

    • Photo: Rupert Marshall

      Rupert Marshall answered on 16 Mar 2017:


      Animals in zoos can be very healthy or very unhealthy – it depends how good the zoo is at feeding and looking after them. Zoos do give medicine to sick animals though – this doesn’t happen in the wild. In the wild animals can be eaten or left badly injured and left to suffer: it’s just the way nature works. Animals are free in the wild – but not free to live a long life without risk.

    • Photo: Carrie Ijichi

      Carrie Ijichi answered on 17 Mar 2017:


      That’s a really good question and difficult to answer. They’ll have more injuries and higher parasite burdens, they might also be hungrier and thirstier in the wild. However, these are all things they’ve evolved to cope with. The challenges we put on them in captivity are not in their range of normal stresses they’ve evolved to deal with. We also cause some health issues like obesity and diabetes through trying to care too much for them and others like arthritis through poor breeding or using the animal for a tough physical job.

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