How to Report Animal Cruelty in Zoos

I recently visited Kharkov in eastern Ukraine and whilst there I made a trip to the zoo located in the city centre.

Unfortunately the living conditions of the bears was (in my opinion) very poor. Think concrete hell hole. On my arrival back in the United Kingdom, I decided to make some noise and get attention to the plight of these poor creatures via a blog post about Kharkov Zoo. So far I have made some interesting discoveries about the web - it is full of people who are more than happy to spread the word about animal cruelty!

Whether you see such cruelty in your own country or whilst on holiday it's always a good idea to go public, perhaps by creating a blog post, an article (like this page) or by contacting your local newspaper. Journalists are always on the lookout for new material.

Aside from reporting animal cruelty to the local authorities you could also try contacting an independent animal rights pressure group, they will have more contacts and readership which can give your concern some real exposure.

I would recommend this website - www.bornfree.org.uk as a good start. You can find plenty more by doing searches.

Blogs

People love to write and share information, by doing a Google blog search you can easily find dozens and dozens of people who are actively looking for content to fill their animal rights blog. Make contact and share you info.

Take photos and videos

It is all very well telling others about what you witnessed but to get real attention you need to take photos and preferably video footage of what you saw.

What you see in the video above is three bears in a concrete box, paint peeling off the walls and to the left of the cell the floor is covered in a green gunge. The locals also saw fit to throw food including whole loaves of bread and sweets (inc wrapper) at the bears. This was one of several bear enclosures and typical about everything that is wrong in our society.

Lets be honest here, zoos are not natural. They are a place for humans to satisfy some weird curiosity. With today's technology and the ability to watch these animals (often live) on T.V whilst they are still in their natural enviroment,one has to ask: Are zoos still needed?

The answer is of course no. Animal rehabilitation centres yes, but zoos, created for the sole purpose of displaying creatures in an alien environment - no.

There are many animal conservancy centres and rehabilitation centres around where one can get up close to animals in a much more natural environment, so visiting a Frankenstein zoo should be a practice concealed to the historical dustbin.

Unless of course your sole intention of visiting said zoo is to heap shame on the owner.