For the past 124 years, the Milwaukee County Zoo has been a place full of discovery, education and entertainment for Milwaukee and the surrounding area. Today, the zoo stretches across 200 acres and holds more than 3,300 animals. Personally, the zoo has been one of my favorite places to visit with my family. I have many fond memories of us having picnics and walking around looking at animals. The Milwaukee County Zoo has multiple buildings, each for a different species of animals. There is a monkey house, an aviary, an aquatic building, a small mammal’s enclosure, and the list goes on.
There is constantly something going on, whether it is a new animal addition or a renovation to an exhibit. In the fall, they added a new female red panda to the Big Cat house. Dash, the male rad panda, has lived at the Milwaukee County zoo for a few years by himself. Red Pandas are my favorite animals that have ever existed, so I was ecstatic that he was going to be given some company, and maybe they will start a cute little Red Panda family together. However, the Milwaukee County Zoo recently has decided to renovate and expand the elephant exhibit. This sounds wonderful, but they did it in the worst possible way.
For those of you who have not been to the Milwaukee County Zoo, there used to be a beautiful space called the Wolf Woods. It was exactly as it sounds, an enclosed wooded area for the wolves and other creatures that naturally live in the woods. It was right next to a large field with a pond where the moose, ducks, geese and peacocks would hang out and enjoy life. The Milwaukee County Zoo decided to bulldoze the entire Wolf Woods as well as the moose field to build a large building for the elephants. I am so incredibly upset. I love elephants, but to destroy dozens of other animal’s homes and a completely wooded area to build a bigger space for them does not sounds reasonable. There is plenty of undeveloped space on the perimeter of the zoo that they could have expanded into, which they are already doing for a new otter building. They also could have just upgraded the current elephant enclosures, which are not even holding any animals right now.
The point is, who gets priority in this situation? Elephants and wolves are endangered, so both species should be taken care of. It’s hard to place value of one life over another and justify it reasonably. We all live on the same planet and all have a right to be here. It gets more complicated when you dig deeper into it, so I won’t. But, hopefully it’s clear that every action has a consequence. When making large decisions, please think of everything that could be affected and not just yourself.
