The Pros And Cons Of Keeping Animals In Captivity

One con of keeping animals in captivity is how it can be cruel to the animal. Even though the overall treatment of the animals has improved, realistically, it is still cruel to keep animals caged up. Capturing animals is cruel. Animals have rights and routines. By capturing them, this disturbs their way of life and can really affect them. For example, elephants normally travel long distances in the wild, but are unable to do this in captivity. This could also cause psychological effects to the animals by being confined and ruining a wild animal’s natural routine . One of the risks posed by causing this distress to the animals is that it can make the area more dangerous for humans and other animals too. By stopping and interrupting a wild animal’s natural instincts and processes, this can lead to danger for others as the wild
It has been said that many animals suffer from zoochosis. This is a psychological condition which is caused by repetitive behaviour such as vomiting, excessive grooming, coprophagia, eating own feces and self-mutilation. For example, a PLoS ONE study was carried out which suggests that many chimpanzees who are kept in zoos show some very abnormal behaviour which subsequently suggests mental illness. The behaviours mentioned before are usually associated with recognizing some mental illnesses in humans, and aren’t really seen in wild chimpanzees. Nicholas Newton-Fisher, the co-author of the study, says that the abnormal behaviour and mental issues are usually only associated with lab chimps, which is why it was surprising to see the levels of abnormal behaviour that they did in the zoos. Although treatment has been improved, as mentioned before, the cruelty of the enclosures is still an issue. A lot of the animals are still living in small cages and