By JOANNE CAMPBELL
For Rantoul Press
I am shocked and saddened to see that a man named Robert Engesser is traveling the country and setting up a roadside zoo full of exotic cats and cubs in various cities using the name “Jungle Safari.”
Last week they were in our town at Rantoul Plaza.
Unscrupulous breeders of exotic cats like Engesser travel the country displaying tiger cubs at fairs and malls and offering customers — for a fee of about $35 — the opportunity to pet the cubs and have their photos taken.
These breeders often promote their “pay to play with tiger cubs” scheme under the guise of providing consumers with education about big cats. But the truth is they are simply using these innocent young creatures to make money.
Without knowing the facts, seeing children pet cute tiger cubs seems adorable and innocent. But according to Big Cat Rescue, an accredited sanctuary in Florida, in reality these cubs endure a miserable existence while they are on display and then are destined, in most cases, to a life sentence in deplorable conditions or are killed as part of the multi-million-dollar illegal trade in tiger parts.
If asked, these exhibitors usually tell patrons that the cubs will have a wonderful home once they are too big to have contact with the public, either at their facilities or elsewhere.
However, regulations allow any owner in the U.S. to keep a tiger in a concrete-floored, chain-link enclosure not much bigger than a parking space, often with nothing to do but walk in circles or stare out … for the rest of their lives.
Enforcement of the rules that do exist is limited because there are not enough inspectors to adequately monitor the thousands of tigers owned by people licensed to exhibit animals. We treat criminals in prison far better than the way most owners end up treating captive tigers, whose only crime was being bred by a breeder/exhibitor to make money.
People who are unaware of the facts surrounding this important issue innocently support the abuse by patronizing the cub displays. The cubs are adorable, and the exhibitors are skilled at telling their lies. But increasingly, people are becoming aware of the issue and the abuse. As the number of people who object to such displays grows, more and more venues are banning the displays, both for humane reasons and because it is good business not to offend the growing number of customers who do not want to see animals mistreated.
I want our town to be a forward-thinking one and ban these roadside zoos.
Joanne Campbell is a resident of Rantoul.
soutce
For Rantoul Press
I am shocked and saddened to see that a man named Robert Engesser is traveling the country and setting up a roadside zoo full of exotic cats and cubs in various cities using the name “Jungle Safari.”
Last week they were in our town at Rantoul Plaza.
Unscrupulous breeders of exotic cats like Engesser travel the country displaying tiger cubs at fairs and malls and offering customers — for a fee of about $35 — the opportunity to pet the cubs and have their photos taken.
These breeders often promote their “pay to play with tiger cubs” scheme under the guise of providing consumers with education about big cats. But the truth is they are simply using these innocent young creatures to make money.
Without knowing the facts, seeing children pet cute tiger cubs seems adorable and innocent. But according to Big Cat Rescue, an accredited sanctuary in Florida, in reality these cubs endure a miserable existence while they are on display and then are destined, in most cases, to a life sentence in deplorable conditions or are killed as part of the multi-million-dollar illegal trade in tiger parts.
If asked, these exhibitors usually tell patrons that the cubs will have a wonderful home once they are too big to have contact with the public, either at their facilities or elsewhere.
However, regulations allow any owner in the U.S. to keep a tiger in a concrete-floored, chain-link enclosure not much bigger than a parking space, often with nothing to do but walk in circles or stare out … for the rest of their lives.
Enforcement of the rules that do exist is limited because there are not enough inspectors to adequately monitor the thousands of tigers owned by people licensed to exhibit animals. We treat criminals in prison far better than the way most owners end up treating captive tigers, whose only crime was being bred by a breeder/exhibitor to make money.
People who are unaware of the facts surrounding this important issue innocently support the abuse by patronizing the cub displays. The cubs are adorable, and the exhibitors are skilled at telling their lies. But increasingly, people are becoming aware of the issue and the abuse. As the number of people who object to such displays grows, more and more venues are banning the displays, both for humane reasons and because it is good business not to offend the growing number of customers who do not want to see animals mistreated.
I want our town to be a forward-thinking one and ban these roadside zoos.
Joanne Campbell is a resident of Rantoul.
soutce
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