zoocheck

Toronto Zoo Enrichment Opportunities Introduction:

They have control over their environment They have opportunities for exploration and play Increasing environmental novelty, change and complexity to provide animals meaningful interactions with their surroundings, diversify their behaviour, and mediate social interactions. Presenting cognitive challenges such as learning what a trainer is requesting or solving a problem. Meeting specific behavioural needs, such as a need for shelter/hiding or foraging, to encourage the expression of diverse, species-appropriate behaviour. Stimulating and mediating social interaction by providing social groupings of appropriate sex ratio, age classes, genetic relatedness and experience Animals are said to have optimal welfare when:1 "Environmental Enrichment" includes activities in zoos that generally proceed with one or more of the following benefits to animals:2

Enrichment Opportunity:
No longer should animal welfare be considered complete by simply providing animals with food, water, shelter, and medical care. The psychological well-being of an animal must be considered when evaluating the optimal welfare for an animal. A formal enrichment program will provide the Toronto Zoo with a great opportunity to help ensure the animals in it's care are experiencing an optimal level of care. Many components of an enrichment program are already being practiced by the keepers at the Toronto Zoo3. However, a more formal program needs to be developed and implemented which should aim at incorporating enrichment into the daily routine of the keeper's schedule and involve all animals. It should also include scientific evaluation of enrichment techniques being employed to ensure they are providing appropriate and optimal enrichment. Discussions with keepers has produced three general suggestions to aid in the implementation of a formal enrichment program. The first suggestion is to increase the accessibility of material required for the production and implementation of enrichment devices. The second suggestion is to increase the accessibility of enrichment ideas. This could be accomplished by providing a more organized set of resources for the keepers to easily access. Another suggestion with this point is to try to encourage exchange of enrichment ideas between keepers in different areas by providing opportunities such as enrichment workshops where keepers could meet to exchange ideas and easily design

enrichment devices. The final suggestion is to expedite the enrichment approval process. One way in which this could be accomplished would be through the formation of an enrichment committee, comprised of staff from various divisions in the zoo, to quickly allow approval to occur.

References:
1 2
Sheperdson, D. and K. Carlstead. (2000). When Did You Last Forget to Feed Your Tiger? AZA Annual Conference Proceedings, 227-229 Sheperdson, D. and K. Carlstead. (2000). When Did You Last Forget to Feed Your Tiger? Raising the Bar on Environmental Enrichment in AZA Zoos and Aquaria. AZA Annual Conference Proceedings, 231-235 Current enrichment practices which have been documented in this report

Lobby Like a Pro!

Lobby Like A Pro On A Shoestring Budget

By Holly Penfound Contrary to popular opinion, animal advocates working on shoestring budgets do have the capacity to pull off the lobbying tricks that high-priced, paid lobbyists do, and more. The blood, sweat and tears that dedicated amateur lobbyists will throw into the mix, undistracted by the lure of financial gain, cannot be matched by the "suits". The first step is to put yourself in the shoes of the paid lobbyist. Learn from the pros. Pick Your Political Issues Carefully Do a careful analysis of the situation. Familiarize yourself with the relevant laws. Do your research on past and existing legislation. Collect progressive examples from other jurisdictions. Consider all your options: should you lobby for new legislation, or work to amend existing laws or the regulations that flow from them? Pick your battles carefully. While actual passage of legislation into law isn't the only measure of success (sometimes we get mileage out of proposed legislation to raise public profile on an issue), we do need to be careful about allocating scarce resources. Don't spin your wheels on political activity that is so far ahead of public opinion, it's hard to get past first base. While such efforts may be ideologically sound, they burn people out and reduce credibility. Wherever possible, aim for legislative initiatives that will bring about an end to activities that harm animals. Regulations sometimes accomplish this by creating de facto bans--rules that are so stringent as to effectively abolish a practice. Legislation that establishes a licensing or regulatory system should be broad and general, with the specifics hammered out in the regulations that flow from it. This allows you to lobby for stricter controls without going back to the legislative assembly. Draft the legislation that you would like to see passed. Make sure your legislative proposal is factually and legally defensible. If you can, have a lawyer help you put the proposal into legalese. Know the Political System Do your research (call information, visit the library or a government bookstore) so that you know the organizational structure of the level of government you are dealing with and the rules of the road. Contact

a friendly political ally for a road map behind the scenes. Find out whom to lobby (and on whom not to waste your time), the committees you'll need to deal with, which staff will be assigned to the issue, timelines for deputations (verbal presentations) and written submissions, etc. Get To Know Politicians and Their Staff Many things go into lobbying before you actually knock on a politician's door for a formal meeting to present your case. Professional lobbyists work the system long before they need something. The first step is positioning. Get to know politicians before you need them. Establish friendly relations. Make sure they know who you are, and what your cause is. (One simple way of doing this is to wear a button with a slogan on it.) Use your social or professional connections to cross paths. If this isn't feasible, there are other options including working in party associations or election campaigns as a volunteer. There is no better way to make your presence known and appreciated to politicians than to stuff envelopes, canvas voters, answer telephones, raise campaign funds, put up election signs, or any of the other numerous tasks required to get a politician elected. Similarly, between elections, party associations need volunteers to build membership and support for their political machines. Establish relationships with key donors, supporters and staff. Politicians rely heavily on these people for research, analysis and advice. It's equally important to get them on side. Often they're the ones you'll get to know first when you volunteer in party associations or election campaigns. They'll be your entre to the politician's inner circle. Diversify. Have people in your group cultivate politicians and their associates from different political parties so you're not left high and dry when a government changes hands. In fact, make a personal contribution to as many political parties or campaigns as you can so you'll be added to their invitation lists for special functions; then attend. Become a familiar face everywhere. Watch for politicians who have been elected with razor-thin majorities; they may be more open to well-organized constituent interest groups. As you spend time with politicians and their associates, gradually introduce animal issues into the conversation in an unthreatening way. Try to find links between their interests and yours. There is no milieu better for this than an election campaign work party or a political fund raising dinner. Develop a team of people to participate in these pre- lobbying activities. They should be comfortable at social functions and have intimate knowledge of the issues. Include experts in this group if you can. Politicians like people with lots of initials after their names. Increasingly, professionals are donating their services on a pro bono basis to work on animal causes. After you have established an informal rapport, ask for meetings with politicians or their staff as a general introduction to your concerns or your organization. Make contact on a regular basis to keep lines of communication open. Offer to help out on animal issues. Political offices often have few resources to draw upon for assistance in specialized areas. Politicians won't forget that you provided information or resources that made them look good. Map Out Your Strategy Don't fly by the seat of your pants. Good campaigns look easy because of the hours of thoughtful preparation put into strategic planning. Make sure that the human and financial resources needed to run your campaign effectively will be available to the finish. On the plus side, hard costs can be kept down by using labour-intensive strategies, particularly donated time and services. Vary your tactics to keep your opponents hopping. Build some small victories into your plans to keep your workers and supporters motivated as they work toward the long-term goal. Be ready to counter last minute manoeuvres; always remain calm, articulate and reasonable. Get Your Facts Straight Know your facts inside out, and your statistics too (numbers simultaneously scare and impress people). To gain credibility you have to know every nuance of your issue. Rest assured you will be put to the test during the lobbying process. Develop an Extensive Material Resource Base Collect evidence in the form of videos, photographs, inspection reports, newspaper clippings, articles, books, eyewitness accounts and expert testimony of veterinarians, ethologists, primatologists, wildlife rehabilitators, cruelty inspectors, zoo keepers, lawyers, economists and celebrities to name a few.

Photographs and video material are crucial for dramatic impact. Photos can be laser printed at a copy shop for reasonable cost (both black and white, and colour). Try to have one or more dramatic pictures blown up poster size and mounted. Contact organizations that provide videos for free, or low cost. Prepare an information package setting out your major points in an abstract or Executive Summary (think of it as a "cheat sheet" for politicians who won't take the time to read more than a few lines). The body of your report can be more detailed for reference purposes, and for credibility. Make your package professional, but not too slick (glossy reports can send the wrong message about spending priorities). Generally, written materials should be neat, factually accurate and rational; there should be some contrast ii) typeface; have lots of white space for legibility; and include visuals (photos, illustrations, graphs and charts). Check for accuracy in spelling, grammar and punctuation. Put Together an Impeccable Team Identify and train one or more key spokespeople in your organization with intimate knowledge of the issues, people who are comfortable with people. What the pros don't want you to know is that there's no great mystery to lobbying. The trick is to be friendly, knowledgeable, assertive but courteous. Your spokesperson must have a presentable demeanour (to politicians, that tends to mean businesslike). If you normally hang out in sweat pants and t-shirts, buy a suit for lobbying. Get your experts lined up. Politicians and the media like people with lots of initials. Increasingly, professional men and women (lawyers, veterinarians, behaviourists and educators, for example) are making themselves available pro bono (i.e. donating their services). Approach a legal defence fund, law clinic or other type of professional association for backing. Line the pros up to do media, personal meetings with politicians and presentations to committees. Network Line up experts to speak at public hearings, or to personally lobby elected officials. Network with other animal protection organizations locally to develop a coordinated plan of action. Contact groups in other jurisdictions for letters of support; draw upon their resources and expertise. Get students and teachers involved in your campaign. Solicit endorsements from celebrities, or use direct quotes. Be diversified in how your get the word out; use the mail, phone or fax, and increasingly, worldwide computer communication networks such as the Internet. Leave your ideology at the door and don't avoid working with groups who don't share all your values if you can find common ground on some issues, for the sake of the animals. Those very groups often have legitimacy with the people you are trying to lobby. While you're at it, park your ego at the door too! Know Your Opposition Familiarize yourself with your opposition: the players, the arguments they will use and their tactics. Compare notes with other animal advocates. Expect to be called a zealot, a terrorist, a crazy or any number of other names, or worse. Personal intimidation from "eco-opponents" is on the rise. Turn the tables. Expose their histrionics and scare tactics. Show them to be the irrational extremists that they try to portray us as. In contrast, use your team of experts, and your high profile or diversified base of support to strengthen your credibility. Get the Media to Work for You Politicians are incredibly sensitive to media coverage, good and bad. Be proactive with the media. Plan a dramatic, not-to-be-missed media event. Animal exploiters can buy advertising; we often can't, so use the free media at every opportunity. Prepare a media release and media kit with a brief summary outlining your major points plus more detailed attachments. Have extra copies of visual material for both the print and television media to take with them. Try to come up with a unique angle--for example, an unusual location for your media event; or a gimmick like slogan t-shirts, stuffed toys or hot-air balloons in the shape of animals. Use celebrity endorsements with the media to catch their interest. Send an information package to the editorial boards of your newspapers requesting a favourable editorial position; ask for an opportunity to meet with them. Be reactive in terms of media. Respond immediately to current events; send out media releases promptly and you'll be called for a quote. News doesn't work if there aren't two sides to the story. The Canadian press is generally interested in animal issues, particularly in rural areas, and small to mid-size cities where there isn't as much competition for news. Now Get to Work Lobbying

When you're ready to work on a specific issue, identify a sympathetic politician and develop a good working relationship. Ask the politician to sponsor proposed legislation and see it through the political process (politicos can keep an eye on the twists and turns better than an outsider and quickly alert you to problems). Ask for a point person to be assigned on the politician's staff, and keep in close touch. Communicate with other bureaucratic staff whose specialized expertise may be called upon in the decision-making process. You can influence their thinking. Be relentless in your pursuit of meetings with politicians. Be polite and courteous, but persistent. Make appointments to meet politicians in both their head offices and their constituency offices. Ask to meet with the party caucus (a group of politicians of the same political persuasion). Get your supporters out lobbying: bring in your experts, your powerful or high profile people, and don't forget the constituents (politicians are especially responsive to the people who elected them and who could potentially turf them out). Remember also, to keep communicating with key staff. Send correspondence, news and reports to politicians on a regular basis. Organize a petition or a letter-writing campaign to politicians. Launch your media campaign in full force. Consider other attention-getting techniques such as public events, lectures, fundraisers, protests and boycotts. As with the media, be flamboyant in your lobbying campaign so as to stand out from the crowd. By using your energy and commitment to helping animals in a creative, organized way, you too can deliver a professional lobbying campaign worth big bucks on a shoestring budget.

The Write Stuff!

The Write Stuff: The Importance of Letter Writing

Do not underestimate the power of a personal letter. Many people tend to drift toward the ease of a postcard or launching a petition. Politicians recognize this ease so you need thousands to make an impact. These tactics are effective for the less committed who won't take the time to write a letter. But 20 good letters are big guns, counting for 20,000 votes. There is no overestimating their impact. One of the biggest hurdles in effective letter writing is the groundless fear that you have to be an expert to discuss an issue. This is a fear that many civil servants cultivate. In fact, it is their job to help you understand the technical details. Interestingly, the minister himself will likely know less about the issue than you do. Letters are used to measure constituent's feelings and can serve as a basis for action. The successful letter applies the three R's: be right, reasonable and repetitive. Rule 1: State your position clearly and identify a specific request. The most weakness in letters is to be unclear about what you want. Rule 2: Ask specific, leading questions that require a civil servant to write the response. The strategy is not just to let them know your opinion, but to make them work on your behalf, and keep working until they resolve the issue. Rule 3: Make it clear that you expect an answer. Rule 4: Send copies to other politicians. Copies or a "c.c." are not guaranteed to obtain a response. Individually addressed letters will expand your effectiveness with little extra work. After all, you wrote the letter, so spread your impact far and wide. Rule 5: Keep a copy and send additional copies to organizations working on the issues.

Expect a long wait. Ministers are notoriously slow. When your letter arrives at its destination, if it addresses specific facts on an issue, it will passed down into the bowels of the bureaucracy for some civil servant to respond. General letters will be dealt with by a form response written over the Minister's signature. What should you expect for an answer? Response 1: Zero. The Minister has ignored your questions and said absolutely nothing. This is all too frequent. Response 2: Affirmative, agreeing with your stance. This is more likely the answer you'll receive from Opposition members of government or supportive backbenchers, If they're genuinely on your side, they'll appreciate the moral support. Response 3: Newspeak. This is the current Truth or Policy, which is a selection of the facts in support of their position. Facts to the government are simply whatever can be provided by the bureaucracy. The answer may also take the tact of trying to overwhelm you with technical details. Now you've received your response. Ministers live with the fantasy that you'll go away. Here's when the fun begins. Go back to your first letter and begin a second one. It is this follow-up letter that will be annoying enough to make them take you seriously. This time they will know they can't just brush you off as they have attempted with the first letter. Tactic 1: Ask again all the questions the Minister didn't answer or didn't answer fully. Tactic 2: Point out all the inconsistencies between their response and others you have received on the issue or with their government's public statements. If you've struck gold, there'll be inconsistencies within the letter itself. Point them out too. Tactic 3: Point out the weaknesses in their arguments. Tactic 4: Restate your position and make it clear that you expect a response. Letter writing is like a long slow game of ping pong. If you really want to have an effect, it's the second and third letters that start scoring. A phone call to a politician carries the weight of 100 votes, a letter the weight of 1,000. Conventional wisdom. Sending letters to the Opposition Leaders and critics can often be useful. Sometimes they will warm up and go after the Ministers in the Legislature. Sending to Ministers not directly responsible for the issue is a sign to the government that everyone is being drawn in and they can no longer avoid taking a stand. Lest we forget, there is your own Member of Parliament. If they're a backbencher, their days are quiet and lunches sometimes too long. A phone call or two on any issue tells them they've got a hot issue getting out of control. It'll ruin their whole day. You'll likely get a personal reply and it could sound very informed. Their facts are just newspeak from a Minister or their bureaucrats. (You can fantasize over how some faceless bureaucrat is sweating out how to respond without looking silly.) Once you've got your Member of Parliament on the run, keep them there. Letter-writing parties or just passing around paper and stamps at an event are a good way to get the jump. You might want to consider a contest for the most creative or witty letter. Don't forget letters-to-the-editor. Local papers almost always print letters. The larger papers cannot print every letter they receive - the volume is just too great. But don't be discouraged. Keep it brief, and remember that just one letter in a major newspaper may reach over half a million people. That's influence. But whatever technique, if you can get nine of your friends write a letter too, then you have just leaned 10,000 votes on a politician. Remember, the pen is still mightier than the sword. Have fun. Adapted from an article entitled "Game of Letters" by Ron Reid, Seasons, 1980.

Zoos
British Columbia Butterfly World Emerald Forest Bird Garden Greater Vancouver Zoo Grouse Mountain Zoo Hidden Valley Exotics Mini Zoo Kamloops Wildlife Park Kicking Horse Grizzly Bear Refuge North Island Wildlife Recovery Association Bear Rehabilitation Center Pacific Undersea Gardens Parrot Island Primate Estate Rainforest Reptile Refuge / Reported closed Raptor Rescue and Rehabilitation Society Speedwell Bird Sanctuary Vancouver Aquarium Marine Science Center Victoria Bug Zoo