Zoo Accreditation and the AZA

The Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) is an industry trade organization that "accredits" zoos and is regulated and funded by the operators of zoos themselves.

The AZA claims elephants in zoos are ambassadors for conservation, but AZA standards allow them to be treated more like POW’s than diplomats.

• AZA standards allow zoos to cram two 7,000-10,000 pound elephants into an outdoor enclosure the size of a tennis court and an indoor space the size of a handball court.
• AZA standards do not prohibit the use of chains, bullhooks, and electric shock in the handling of elephants.
• AZA standards allow zoos to separate three-year old elephant calves from their mothers. (In the wild, most three-year old elephants are not yet weaned. Females stay with mothers for life; males don’t leave the herd until their teens.)
• AZA accredits facilities like Six Flags Discovery Kingdom that give elephant rides and present circus-style shows, and Have Trunk Will Travel, a California business that rents elephants out for movies and events, such as the September 2006 Banksy art exhibit in Los Angeles – pictured at left – which featured a spray-painted elephant named Tai.
• Elephants are the only species in zoos to be routinely chained (or habituated to chaining) and managed through force, physical punishment, and use of the bullhook.
• Over 60 percent of zoo elephants have foot disease and nearly half have arthritis; these painful conditions are the leading cause of euthanasia.
• Of the 56 elephants who died in AZA-accredited facilities since 2000, fewer than half reached their 40th birthday; in contrast, an elephant’s natural lifespan is 60-70 years.
• It is at least 50 times more expensive to maintain elephants in zoos than to protect equivalent numbers of elephants in the wild.
• Zoos will spend in excess of $200 million on elephant exhibit renovations that still will not provide nearly enough space to accommodate the needs of earth’s largest land mammal

The AZA claims to be a conservation and education organization, but in reality member zoos spend a tiny percentage of their annual budgets on actual conservation efforts (conserving endangered species where they live, rather than in zoos).

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September 2006: El Paso Zoo employee Allan Seidon was fired for allegedly abusing an elephant named Juno. Seidon is the same employee who was captured on video beating an elephant named Sissy at the El Paso Zoo in 1999. Following that beating, public outcry led to the transfer of Sissy to The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee, where she currently thrives.

2002: A 1-year-old elephant named Hansa was struck repeatedly with a bullhook and ran screaming into a public viewing area at the Woodland Park Zoo.

2000: The Oregon Zoo paid a $10,000 federal fine for the abuse of a 5-year-old elephant named Rose-Tu. A police report said she suffered 176 gashes and cuts after being repeatedly poked with a bullhook.

2000: Kala, a 2-year-old baby elephant died six months after he was prematurely separated from his mother at Dickerson Park Zoo in Missouri and shipped to Six Flags Marine World in California.

1998: A videotape showed Sissy, an elephant at El Paso Zoo, tightly chained and beaten for hours on the back of her legs with ax handles, sometimes so hard that she collapsed from the blows. The City of El Paso paid a $20,000 fine to settle charges of violating the Animal Welfare Act.

1998: Dickerson Park Zoo employees beat an elephant on breeding loan and later paid a $5,000 fine to settle charges of violating the federal Animal Welfare Act in connection with the incident. According to a witness, the elephant was beaten for 2½ hours with bullhooks and pieces of wood.

1993: A videotape showed two elephants at Milwaukee Zoo, Tammy and Annie, sprawled out with block and tackle while being beaten by trainers wielding bullhooks.

1990: Lota, an Asian elephant who spent 36 years at the Milwaukee Zoo, was sold to a circus trainer. Lota was badly beaten to load her onto the truck that transported her to northern Illinois. During the ordeal she fell and began urinating blood. Lota contracted a humane strain of tuberculosis, became emaciated, and died 15 years later.

1988: An 18-year-old African elephant at the San Diego Wild Animal Park was chained by four legs and beaten for two consecutive days with hickory ax handles and bullhooks. An investigation into that highly publicized beating prompted California state Senator Dan McCorquodale to sponsor a bill outlawing any method of training or management that scars an elephant's skin. The bill became law in 1989.