Wildlife & Nature

New Zoo Review: Education Plays Important Role

As world’s wildlife wilts under human pressures, zoos and aquariums, whether you agree or not, play large role in keeping biodiversity alive

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Two-thirds of the world’s polar bears could be extinct by 2050 if fossil-fueled global heating keeps melting their Arctic sea-ice habitat. (istock)

Three days after Christmas 1973 the country’s most effective law to protect at-risk species went into effect. By all accounts, it has worked splendidly. In the five decades since the bipartisan Endangered Species Act became law, 99% of species listed on it have avoided extinction, and some have experienced remarkable comebacks.

While one of the nation’s most valuable environmental tools — despite ongoing efforts by special interests to gut it; a House bill filed this year would have eviscerated protections for North Atlantic right whales, northern long-eared bats, gray wolves, and grizzly bears — has had what the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) calls a “stellar success rate,” is it enough to keep pace with the harmful ecosystem impacts being caused by the climate crisis and humanity’s relentless destruction of wildlife habitat?

The obvious answer is no, since the law only applies to 50 states and 16 U.S. territories. The Endangered Species Act (ESA), though, does support the conservation of listed species outside of the United States, and is the law through which U.S. officials enforce the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. CITES is a global agreement between governments to follow rules to monitor, regulate, or ban international trade in species under threat. It is also a key tool in the fight against the illegal wildlife trade.

Some 2,365 animal species are currently listed as endangered or threatened under the ESA, and the climate crisis is an indisputable threat to the continued existence of many. The Center for Biological Diversity has listed 350 species, including sea otters, the Pacific walrus, and polar bears, found in the United States and its territories that are threatened by climate change.

Wood turtles are among the nearly 100 animals Rhode Island could lose, largely due to habitat destruction. (istock)

The ongoing sixth mass extinction is the first to be caused by a single organism: Homo sapiens. The previous five resulted from meteorites, asteroids, and extreme geological processes. This one is being driven primarily by our unsustainable use of land, water, and energy, most notably the burning of fossil fuels.

If we continue to take the natural world for granted, our disrespect is going to lead to the end of megafauna and many other smaller animals in the wild. Those left will be held in captivity.

The northern spring salamander is another animal at risk of disappearing from Rhode Island.

Some biologists have estimated that 35% of animals could become extinct in the wild by 2050 because of global warming. A 2022 WWF report found wildlife populations have fallen by an average of 69% during the past 50 years. Populations of marine vertebrates declined 49% between 1970 and 2012, with some fish species declining by nearly 75%, according to a 2015 report.

Nearly a quarter of the world’s freshwater fish are at risk of extinction because of warming temperatures, overfishing, and pollution, according to an assessment published in December. A fifth of all threatened freshwater species — 3,086 out of 14,898 — are at risk of vanishing, thanks to climate change impacts such as falling water levels, shifting seasons, and seawater moving up rivers.

The United Nations estimates that about 1 million animal (and plant) species are at risk of extinction, more than at any other time in human history.

In Rhode Island, the number of state-listed endangered and threatened animals is approaching 100. Among those the state could lose include the northern diamondback terrapin, the eastern spadefoot toad, the northern spring salamander, the wood turtle, and a few warblers.

Western lowland gorillas are listed as critically endangered. (istock)

The ESA selection criteria for endangered and threatened species — habitat destruction, untempered economic development, disease, and poaching — speaks to a dire situation.

Species don’t exist in isolation; we are all interconnected. A single species interacts with many others in ways that often produce benefits to humans, such as clean air and water and healthy soils for growing food.

When one species goes extinct or its population declines so dramatically that it can’t sustain its ecosystem function, other species are impacted and the way the ecosystem functions and the free benefits it provides are lessened or lost. The potential for other extinctions increases. It’s a vicious cycle.

The WWF notes the species extinction rate is estimated to be between 1,000 and 10,000 times higher than the natural extinction rates — the rate of extinctions that would occur if humans weren’t around.

While extinctions are a normal and expected part of evolution, the WWF says current rates of population declines and extinctions are high enough to threaten vital ecological functions that support human life, such as a stable climate, predictable regional precipitation patterns, and productive farmland and fisheries.

“Serious declines in populations of species are an indicator that the ecosystem is breaking down, warning of a larger systems failure,” according to the WWF. “If we do not course correct, we will continue to lose life-sustaining biodiversity at an alarming rate.”

One possible solution is complicated and controversial: zoos and aquariums.

Lions are popular zoo attractions. In the wild, they are listed as vulnerable. (istock)

Zoos have wild side

Lou Perrotti, director of conservation at Roger Williams Park Zoo, noted “reputable zoos” have been conducting wildlife preservation work for decades.

“We’re gonna put the ‘Tiger Kings’ and all those people on the back shelf, because we can’t control what they do,” said Perrotti, talking about the popular Netflix series starring Joe Exotic and other disgraceful animal handlers. “One role zoos play is educating. We have the ability to educate hundreds of thousands of visitors a year about the species we hold, the threats to those species, the threats to the habitats those species live in, and then working in collaboration with other zoos, other NGOs [non-governmental organizations], state, federal agencies around endangered and threatened animals.”

There are some 10,000 zoos worldwide, according to the Association of Zoos & Aquariums (AZA), an organization “committed to being a global leader in promoting species conservation and animal welfare by leveraging the size, scope, expertise, and public trust of its member institutions.”

Zoos already assist in the implementation of ESA-mandated recovery plans. One ESA approach preserves species in their natural habitat, and the other moves them to zoos that try to replicate nature in confinement.

Perrotti, who has worked at the Providence zoo for 25 years, noted zoos play a pivotal role in ESA recovery plans.

“Those recovery plans are great menus for us to be able to utilize our resources to contribute to whatever the recovery actions are,” he said, “and for zoos that could be everything from an educational campaign right down to breeding programs with direct on-the-ground reintroduction of those species back into the wild to either augment populations or create new populations.”

A 2018 study found that zoos and aquariums were listed as responsible parties for 15% of the recovery plans of ESA-listed species.

Perrotti, for one, continues to work on projects to save several threatened or endangered species, including the American burying beetle, the New England cottontail, the aforementioned eastern spadefoot toad, and the timber rattlesnake. The latter has been extinct in Canada since 2001, is listed as endangered in Massachusetts and six other states, and classified as threatened in Connecticut and four other states.

“We just celebrated 30 years of reintroduction efforts on Nantucket with the American burying beetle,” he said. “We’ve had a breeding program for the federally protected New England cottontail, which is our only native rabbit, since 2010. There are now new populations and augmented populations from Rhode Island to Maine because of those efforts. Of course, the timber rattlesnake … needs a little bit more advocacy, but, you know, that’s where we can be strong and say, ‘Hey, look, all species matter.’ We can’t selectively conserve species based on people’s fears.”

The ivory tusks of elephants are valuable in many parts of the world and on the black market, so they are illegally killed in large numbers every year. (istock)

Organized crime turns up the heat

Global heating, loss of habitat, and environmental degradation aren’t the only human-caused distresses being inflicted upon the natural world. The poaching of game species for their horns and tusks — some 20,000 African elephants are killed annually for their ivory — and smaller animals to be pets contributes to biodiversity loss.

Rhinoceros horns have long been in huge demand in China and Vietnam, where they are used in traditional “medicines.” South Africa is home to most of the world’s rhinos and has been the country hit hardest by criminals, with more than 1,000 rhinos killed each year between 2013 and 2017, according to Save The Rhino.

The pair of white rhinoceros at Southwick’s Zoo. (Frank Carini/ecoRI News)

The country has some 2,000 black rhinos, which are listed as critically endangered, and about 13,000 white rhinos, which are classified as near threatened. There are five rhino species in all, and two — the Javan rhino and the Sumatran rhino — have fewer than 80 individuals left in the wild.

Southwick’s Zoo in Mendon, Mass., has two white rhinos. Betsey Brewer, the zoo’s director, noted the poaching of rhino horns has become big business for organized crime.

A sign posted outside the rhinos’ enclosure. (Frank Carini/ecoRI News)

“They have the money. They have the helicopters. They have the infrared sightings,” she said. “And they just brutally kill them.”

She pointed to a photo of a rhino hanging outside the animals’ enclosure and said that horn is worth $250,000.

When we aren’t killing rhinos for their horns — which are made of keratin, the same protein that forms our hair and nails — and make-believe medicine, the illegal pet trade is a contributing factor in the global decline of some freshwater turtles and tortoises.

Of the 360 known turtle and tortoise species, 52% are threatened. Poaching is a significant threat, here and globally, as is habitat destruction.

Perrotti and AZA-accredited Rogers Williams Park Zoo have long been working on efforts to protect at-risk local species, including the eastern box and wood turtles.

“The illegal wildlife trade is huge, and turtles are a big part of that,” Perrotti said. “Right now we’re seeing thousands of turtles annually confiscated at airports, leaving the United States to go into the Asian and European markets. And one of the big issues for TSA agents or U.S. Fish and Wildlife agents is when they seize these animals, they don’t know what to do with them. They don’t have the capacity to hold them, or the bandwidth to take care of them, the veterinary support that it takes to disease test, treat, and triage sick animals. We’re on the forefront of that. They go from airport to us.”

Once they are brought to Rogers Williams Park Zoo, he said, the animals are checked for disease and genetic testing is done, and once they are cleared, “the goal is from confiscation to conservation.”

“We’d like to see them released, so we try to open that pathway depending on the species, where it was confiscated, what we know about it,” Perrotti said. “We try to get things back into the wild. If not, we try to place them in zoological institutions where breeding programs can be established, where the offspring of those animals would have a conservation value. And you know, worst case, if they can’t be released and they can’t be bred, then they’ll be ambassadors for their kind and become education animals to tell that sad story.”

All five of the world’s rhinoceros species are threatened, as this sign at Southwick’s Zoo explains. (Frank Carini/ecoRI News)

Zoos and aquariums and their supporters see these animal-keeping institutions as providing a bridge between conservation and loss.

Boston’s New England Aquarium, for instance, runs a conservation program focused on African penguins. The population of this species, also known as the Cape penguin and confined to southern African waters, has declined 95% since pre-industrial times and the species is listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Their survival is threatened by the depletion of food from overfishing, climate change, and pollution. The New England Aquarium recently joined the AZA’s Saving Animals From Extinction (SAFE) African penguin program, an international effort to protect and restore wild African penguin populations. The AZA-accredited aquarium also participates in the African Penguin Species Survival Plan, which supports field conservation efforts and a breeding program to help promote a future for this endangered species.

In the early 20th century, it was estimated that there were some several million breeding pairs; today, fewer than 11,000 breeding pairs remain, according to a story published in The Guardian last summer. By 2035, if current trends hold, scientists say there will not be enough breeding pairs for the species to continue to survive in the wild.

The New England Aquarium is home to some 50 penguins, African and southern rockhoppers. Aquarium educators are often present to provide information about penguins and efforts to protect them in the wild.

Southern rockhopper penguins, with a population of about 2.5 million, are considered vulnerable by the IUCN, as their numbers are declining throughout most of their range.

“We’re not just an aquarium, we’re a research institution, we’re a conservation organization,” said Letise LaFeir, chief of conservation and stewardship at the New England Aquarium. “Our work spans across what we do.”

African penguins are listed as endangered. (istock)

The marine biologist noted the aquarium has survival plans for certain species in its care.

“So for example, African penguins, what that means is that as we take care of these animals we’re thinking about how what we learn applies to supporting this species in the wild,” said LaFeir during an online interview with ecoRI News in late June. “We now have had penguins that have lived three times longer than they live in the wild. Well, what have we learned? And how do we apply that?”

To help apply that knowledge, the aquarium partners with institutions to share information that supports threatened populations in the wild.

Sara Van Wormer, director of education for the AZA-accredited Buttonwood Park Zoo in New Bedford, Mass., said the “vitally important role of zoos and aquariums worldwide is to actively assist the protection and perpetuation of endangered and at-risk species by participating in Species Survival Plans.”

This AZA program outlines mating choices to maintain genetically viable populations, “with the larger end goal of introducing such animals back into the wild,” Van Wormer said.

“This work, however, must be done in harmony with work in the field, creating protected spaces in which these animals can return and thrive,” she said. “In some cases, zoos can participate in these efforts directly, while in others, such as the Buttonwood Park Zoo’s, we raise funds and awareness for organizations in the home countries of our animal species.”

As for trying to replicate nature in confinement to protect dwindling populations, the Bristol Zoo Project, in North Bristol, United Kingdom, and owned and operated by the Bristol Zoological Society, is building a new habitat for some of the world’s most threatened species.

The wildlife conservation park’s new Central African Forest enclosure will be home to several critically endangered species, including western lowland gorillas, cherry-crowned mangabeys, and slender-snouted crocodiles.

A June 28 BBC story reported the enclosure has been designed to evoke a sense of the dense forest and landscape of Equatorial Guinea, some 3,800 miles away and where the Bristol Zoological Society runs one of its largest conservation projects.

Hundreds of millions of people worldwide visit zoos and aquariums annually. (istock)

Captive audience

Admittedly, though, most people view zoos and aquariums as entertainment — somewhere to bring bored kids, for example — rather than refuges or stopovers for animals. But that perspective has been slowly changing. Whereas zoos and aquariums were originally about entertainment, followed by some education, many of today’s institutions are about education and conservation. Entertainment is lower on the list of priorities.

This paradigm shift over decades in how some zoos operate, however, hasn’t stopped critics from noting zoos can struggle to maintain genetically diverse populations and that some captive-bred animals lose their defining behavioral and/or physical characteristics, which drastically reduces the likelihood of their future release into the wild.

These concerns and others — limited space, mistreatment, most animals don’t appreciate being gawked at and/or touched, and, the obvious, confinement — have prompted some conservationists to advocate instead for more investment in the protection and restoration of natural habitats.

To address one of those concerns — inbreeding — Brewer said zoos share animals and DNA information to keep healthy and genetically diverse populations. She noted her zoo’s two female cheetahs are on loan to another zoo for breeding purposes.

AZA, a Maryland-based nonprofit, accredits 250 zoos and aquariums in 13 countries. The United States is home to 213 of these facilities, in 46 states and the District of Columbia. (Southwick’s is accredited by the Zoological Association of America.)

Endangered species at local zoos chart
Some of the animals listed as vulnerable, threatened, or endangered by the IUCN that are on display at the local zoos and aquariums ecoRI News spoke with for this story. The facilities have some of the same species so they are only listed once. (Joanna Detz/ecoRI News)

Of the some 8,600 species housed in AZA facilities, about 800 are categorized as endangered or vulnerable by the IUCN — the global conservation organization established in 1964 that is widely known as the Red List.

AZA zoos and aquariums have reported investing $50 million annually in more than 200 species listed as threatened or endangered. The nonprofit, in 2015, launched SAFE, an initiative that operates individualized conservation programs for 40 species, including African penguins.

SAFE has directed funding to increase cheetah and African lion populations, to expand anti-poaching efforts in Uganda, and to protect turtle nesting sites in Costa Rica.

Last year, according to the initiative’s 2023 report, AZA members “continued a multi-year trend of investing more than $200 million in activities directly benefiting animals and habitats in the wild,” and SAFE added seven new programs to benefit African elephants, Mexican wolves, North American bison, ocelots, Perdido Key beach mice, the sunflower sea star, and North American freshwater mussels.

“Freshwater mussels are such highly endangered and unknown animals that we depend on partners for successful recovery and conservation,” Megan Bradley, a mussel biologist with the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, is quoted in last year’s report. “Our relationship with AZA facilities has tangibly moved forward restoration of endangered species, and we appreciate the opportunity to support and collaborate with facilities sharing these interesting species with the public.”

The public, in fact, is an integral part of wildlife conservation efforts, whether they realize it or not. Some 200 million people worldwide, including about 180 million in the United States, visit AZA-accredited zoos annually.

A Rhode Island-based nonprofit taps into all those zoo and aquarium customers, plus the public’s noted trust in its local zoos and aquariums, to help make conservation a significant part of the visitor experience.

“Everybody loves the animals and they’re paying good money to get through the gates,” said Bill Mott, the longtime executive director of The Ocean Project. “Many of today’s zoo and aquarium visitors, especially the younger generations, want to know how these animals are being protected in the wild. They’re all doing conservation work now. That wasn’t necessarily the case when The Ocean Project was founded.”

Mott wasn’t implying the nonprofit he helped found was the sole reason for this newfound focus on conservation. He was talking about the changes he has witnessed (and also helped bring about) during the past three decades.

The Providence resident has spent the past 27 years working with zoos and aquariums on conservation efforts, by building networks and coalitions to promote more collaborative and strategic initiatives. From its five founding partner North American organizations in 1997, The Ocean Project now has 2,000-plus partner organizations in 150 countries.

“Our primary mission was to help make zoos and aquariums stronger leaders for conservation. It’s about getting people, zoo officials, and the public to be advocates for the wild world,” Mott said. “We need animals, and it’s not great that they are held in captivity, but exposure to them is important. It raises awareness about and passion for wild populations.”

Among the changes zoos and aquariums have made during the past few decades, according to Mott, is hiring frontline educators and interpreters to connect the paying public with the animals they are seeing and the wilds they are from.

“Without these educators, you’re just wandering around looking at awesome animals … as we know most people don’t read the signs,” Mott, a communications professional, said. “Educators ask visitors questions. They engage with them about what they can do to help protect wildlife habitat. The public becomes more invested in conservation, and educates themselves on their own.”

Jenny Theuman, the animal care manager at Roger Williams Park Zoo, shared a similar point of view. When people visit zoos or aquariums, she said, they are having experiences and making memories that “helps reconnect them with nature and reestablish the value that our environment has in our everyday lives.”

A May 1 AZA online posting titled “Empowering Youth as Conservation Policy Advocates” notes that “Aquariums and zoos seeking to get youth excited about conservation policy can start with training to increase confidence and give them the tools to act.”

“Government policy is essential to respond effectively to climate change and threats to biodiversity,” according to the authors’ lead. “Public policies complement individual action, influencing other actors and enabling large-scale change. But to pass policies that advance conservation, environmental justice, and more, decision-makers must hear many voices.”

Southwick’s Brewer noted zoos and aquariums give people, especially children, an up-close look at what the natural world has to offer. A visit can breed curiosity, she said.

“I think we’re much more removed from nature now,” said Brewer, noting society’s addiction to social media and video games. “We’re more about protecting it as something separate from us, when we’re all sharing this planet together.”

Van Wormer, of Buttonwood Park Zoo, told ecoRI News education is the key when it comes to conservation efforts.

“In every conservation situation, but most importantly in times of elevated and accelerated crisis such as we face with global climate change, it is important that we take action in several different ways to maximize our impact,” she wrote in an email that answered eight questions. “Here in New Bedford, most of the work that we are able to do has a more conceptual feel to it; for example, by educating the public about the causes and effects of climate change, we are able to raise awareness of those causes and to teach our guests both what they might be doing that contributes to those negative outcomes and to offer easy and accessible ways for them to make a positive difference.”

She noted those positive actions can include switching to a reusable water bottle, carpooling to work, planting a tree, and/or writing to a government official.

This great green macaw is a former pet that can’t fly and is now under the care of Southwick’s Zoo staff. The threatened rainforests of South America are being cut down at an alarming rate to make way for agriculture, putting macaws at risk of extinction. (Frank Carini/ecoRI News)

Conservation is key

Not many species, endangered or otherwise, however, thrive in captivity. Elephants, orcas, dolphins, belugas, polar bears, tigers, and primates are often the most stressed. In fact, the most popular animals on display are routinely the ones who are the unhappiest. Animals that pace back and forth, wearing a path around the perimeter of their enclosures, are likely showing signs of high anxiety.

The New England Aquarium no longer keeps whales and dolphins because of the stress inflicted upon them, according to LaFeir.

Many captive dolphins — there are some 3,000 held in enclosures that are 200,000 times smaller than the marine mammal’s natural range, according to World Animal Protection — are regularly treated with ulcer medications or antidepressants to alleviate the frustration of captivity.

That is why Mott believes “conservation efforts must be a priority.” He also noted there are still notorious places worldwide where animals are held in misery, from roadside attractions to unaccredited zoos that “don’t do well for their animals.”

Since 1995, U.S. zoos have turned to antidepressants, tranquilizers, and antipsychotic drugs to alleviate depression and aggression among animals held in captivity, according to a June 2019 perspective published in the Sentient.

“Zoos claim to save wild animals, but wild animals in zoos are reduced to commodities and given inadequate habitats,” the piece’s author, Zoe Rosenberger, wrote. “And on the whole, at an institutional level, zoos paint overly simplistic views of biodiversity and ecosystems by only promoting exotic animals that are well-known, and are often at the apex of their particular food chain.”

She noted many animals in zoos are “charismatic megafauna,” such as lions, elephants, giraffes, and tigers, because they attract visitors.

“Serious conservation efforts begin with humans’ commitment to stop encroaching on and destroying wild animals’ habitats because we are pushing many species to extinction,” according to Rosenberger.

While many animals in zoos are born in captivity, that doesn’t translate to all. Plenty are taken from the wild, often when they are babies and in no danger. Sometimes these wild-takings are done in the name of conservation, or when an animal is seriously ill.

The New England Aquarium’s LaFeir said the institution’s staff and scientists think about the way they collect animals from the wild. Besides following sustainable collection plans, she said the aquarium also raises certain species as a “way to reduce our own footprint.”

A lookdown fish. (istock)

The lookdown fish, a popular attraction at the aquarium, is one of the larval fish species reared on-site.

“We raise them and then we put them in our collections, but we also share them with other aquariums to reduce actual collections in the wild,” LaFeir said. “We also raise our own live foods to feed our animals. Now, granted, not all the foods for all the animals, but we’re increasing those kinds of efforts to reduce our impact.”

Lookdowns are listed as least concern by the IUCN, largely because they aren’t hunted for human consumption because of ciguatera poisoning, a toxin carried by the fish.

She also noted the aquarium’s research arm, the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life, has some 40 researchers and conducts fieldwork to learn about the threats to species such as the North Atlantic right whale, sea turtles, and sharks.

“Based on that research, we inform decision-making, management decisions, and all of it is in light of climate change, human impacts like vessel strikes or entanglements,” LaFeir said. “How do we then address the threats to these animals, what’s impacting their habitats, what’s impacting the biodiversity, and how does that science inform management or policy decisions or development decisions? We also have a policy team, so then we take that and go directly to state legislators or federal legislators or offshore wind developers.”

Her journey into wildlife conservation is exactly the path Mott said many zoos and aquariums now help foster. LaFeir, who is younger than Mott, grew up in Chicago, and visits to the Shedd Aquarium on Lake Michigan were part of her childhood.

By high school, she was committed to becoming a marine biologist. She graduated from Brown University, where she double-majored in aquatic biology, studying salt marshes, and English. She earned a doctoral degree in marine biology from the University of Delaware.

“I was raised in an aquarium,” she said. “It was entertainment, and I loved it. Then, as I got older, I wanted to learn what’s going on in the wild with these animals that are on display.”

Corals are susceptible to subtle temperature changes, a growing concern as the world’s oceans heat up. (istock)

Efforts to repopulate dying coral

Even though coral reefs cover a fraction of the planet, they support a quarter of all marine species, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, making them a critical part of ecosystem health and the ocean economy.

Corals, however, are at high risk of extinction worldwide because of increasing water temperatures and ocean acidification. In fact, coral reefs have been identified as one of the first natural systems that could collapse because of the climate crisis.

Last summer, Florida’s 350-mile-long coral reef system — the largest coral reef ecosystem in the continental United States — experienced the deadliest bleaching event in history, a toll largely caused by record hot coastal waters, the Miami Herald reported in late May.

Now, water temperatures in the Florida Keys are already approaching the coral danger zone — earlier and hotter than last year. It was enough for federal scientists to issue the earliest ever coral bleaching watch, an indicator that the already-struggling South Florida reef tract could face another round of severe heat stress.

In the world’s largest coral reef ecosystem, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, bleaching had affected 90% of the coral assessed in 2022.

To address the decline of coral reef populations, which are suffering from human-caused climate change, the World Coral Conservatory hopes to create a bank of corals in aquariums across Europe that could be used to repopulate wild coral reefs if they succumb to the stress of rapidly warming waters, acidification, and/or pollution.

The Association of Zoos and Aquariums is leading efforts to protect elkhorn coral, a Caribbean species that is listed as threatened. (istock)

The World Coral Conservatory’s effort is among several small-scale coral restoration projects being conducted worldwide.

Through the AZA’s SAFE initiative $1.1 million has been directed to help protect elkhorn coral, an important reef-building species in the Caribbean. The effort seeks to increase the abundance and enhance the genetic diversity of wild coral through direct restoration and repopulation, land-based nurseries, and cryopreserved collections.

At Buttonwood Park Zoo, Van Wormer said the coral exhibit is used to demonstrate the importance of these ecosystems and how the climate crisis is negatively impacting them.

“Climate change not only warms our oceans, but also causes them to become increasingly more acidic as increased levels of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere are absorbed into the water,” she said. “Both temperature and pH level can be devastating to coral populations, and their resulting deaths can have catastrophic consequences for the myriad species who build their lives in and around the reefs.”

Van Wormer noted that by harvesting coral and allowing it to grow in a controlled setting where scientists can gradually expose it to changes in water quality, efforts can be made to assist coral in becoming more tolerant to change.

“When they are ready, the more temperature and acidity-resistant populations of coral can then be replanted in the ocean to reclaim the habitat that climate change is threatening to make uninhabitable,” she wrote. “While we are not able to actively participate in this process in the wild, we are able to promote awareness of what needs to be done, largely in the hopes of informing and inspiring the rising generation of scientists who will inherit responsibility for the climate crisis.”

North American osprey populations became endangered in the 1950s because of the use of the insecticide DDT, which thinned their eggshells and greatly hampered reproduction. DDT and related pesticides were banned in 1972. (Tom Wojick)

What we do now matters

While the sixth mass extinction is doing a number on biodiversity, the local zoo and aquarium professionals ecoRI News recently spoke with for this story expressed optimism.

In fact, Van Wormer found the idea behind one question — Is the ESA and other wildlife protections, both here and abroad, enough to counteract the destruction done/being done by humans? — unproductive.

“It is easy to argue that conservation attempts are a drop in the bucket and that the damage humans have done and continue to do is insurmountable, but this sort of rhetoric is counterproductive and largely inaccurate,” she wrote. “Not only are these conservation efforts incredibly impactful, but undervaluing their impacts threatens to undermine whatever progress they are able to make. The idea that something needs to work 100% or it is not worth trying is the antithesis of our efforts, on both a global scale as well as on an individual basis. To quote Anne-Marie Bonneau, the Zero Waste Chef: ‘We don’t need a handful of people doing zero waste perfectly. We need millions of people doing it imperfectly.’”

The New England Aquarium’s LaFeir echoed the sentiments of Perrotti, who said, “In conservation, the worst thing we can do is nothing.”

“I think the important thing is we have to imagine the future we seek and then work toward it,” she said. “We could just decide things are really bad right now and then let’s see how it plays out. Or we can decide these are changes we can make now to have them play out in 10 years. That’s the key. Whatever we do today matters for tomorrow.”

Note: Yes, the headline, for those of you old enough to remember, is a reference to the New Zoo Revue, a half-hour children’s TV show that ran from 1972-1977. It taught the basic principles of getting along with others, respecting the community and oneself, and doing the right thing.

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  1. climate change, poaching, and ignorance contribute to wildlife decline, zoos can help, but we also have to face the inconvenient truth that human population growth underlies all of this, even if that is unpopular with some religious and ethnic zealots, and economists expecting endless expansion on a finite planet.
    World population was about 4.07 billion in 1975 and has doubled since to 8.13 billion now. Obviously adding over 4 billion additional people in not yet 50 years, each wanting habitat, energy, resources, has had major impacts. We are still adding 70 to 80 million more each year. And addressing this should be relatively easy – it is mainly a matter of freeing and educating and empowering women, ensuring access to birth control if wanted. but….

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