Danish Zoo Offers to Turn Your Pets Into Fodder For a Tax Donation
A zoo in Denmark has once again disturbed the rest of the world with the way it feeds its meat-eating animals. Aalborg Zoo in North Jutland is asking patrons to donate their pets to the cause.
“If you have an animal that has to leave here for various reasons, feel free to donate it to us,” the zoo offered on Facebook. “The animals are gently euthanized by trained staff and are afterwards used as fodder. That way, nothing goes to waste - and we ensure natural behavior, nutrition and well-being of our predators.”
The post is punctuated with a recycling symbol and heart emojis. It notes that one of its residents in particular – the European lynx (mistranslated as ‘locust’) – “needs whole prey, which is reminiscent of what it would naturally hunt in the wild.” Prey such as chickens, rabbits, ponies and guinea pigs.
The first reply set the tone for subsequent comments: “A deeply perverse and degrading mindset that is behind this sick invention, which has spread a terrible trend of indifference with animals in Denmark .... Imagine giving away your pet/animal as fodder, it hardly gets more disrespectful and unworthy than that.”
The zoo closed the comments “due to much international interest,” but the request still stands. On the zoo’s website a link for “Donation of horse etc” explains that living healthy horses are welcomed here – then euthanized, slaughtered, and fed to the resident meat-eaters. (Donations are tax deductible.)
The news has upset a lot of people, so the zoo has released a statement to the media: “When keeping carnivores, it is necessary to provide them with meat, preferably with fur, bones, etc., to give them as natural a diet as possible. … In Denmark, this practice is common, and many of our guests and partners appreciate the opportunity to contribute.” Zoo director and CEO Henrik Vesterskov Johansen hasn’t commented publicly, but feel free to contact him here.
The backlash is reminiscent of the outcry that followed when the Copenhagen Zoo euthanized a healthy giraffe named Marius – claiming his genes were overrepresentative in the zoo and therefore unfit for breeding – then fed him to the lions.
It sure feels like something is rotten in Denmark, but Danes don’t seem to be particularly big boozers: they rank 33rd in the world in per capita alcohol consumption. Maybe it’s a Scandinavian thing; remember when Norway killed Freya, its friendly resident walrus? Go figure.
Photo credit: Alborg Zoo
