Finally euthanized by her captors, Bamboo will never again have to endure the painful phyusical and psychological wounds that assailed her during her 54 years in captivity.
Please read From December 2016: Seattle zoo's Elephant Bamboo attacked, bitten at new home in Oklahoma
On November 15, 2022, 56-year-old Bamboo finally escaped her miserable life at the Oklahoma City Zoo in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, by being euthanized by her captors.
Bamboo will never again have to
endure the painful physical and psychological wounds that assailed
her during her 54 years in captivity. Tragically unable to form
bonds with any other elephants she was introduced to, Bamboo spent
most of her life in captivity in mind-numbing isolation. At her
final destination at the Oklahoma City Zoo, she was bullied and
assaulted repeatedly. In Bamboo's honor, call on the Oklahoma City
Zoo and the Association of Zoos & Aquariums to stop condemning any
more elephants to suffer and die in captivity.
Bamboo's life began in Thailand in 1966. In 1968 at just two years
old, she was ripped from her home and family and sent to the
Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. There she existed with two other
elephants in a tiny one-acre enclosure. There was no room for the
incompatible elephants to get away from each other. To keep the
peace, one of the elephants was locked away an indoor cage for
months at a time. In Defense of Animals, along with a core group of
dedicated advocates, fought to free the three elephants to a
sanctuary.
In 2015, all efforts failed and the zoo, despite fervent public
opposition, sent the elephants to the Oklahoma City Zoo. Watoto died
before the journey even began, while Chai only lasted one year at
the new zoo before she also died. Bamboo lived for seven more years,
but every day of those seven years was fraught with the agony of
debilitating arthritis, a common condition for elephants confined in
zoos for years on end. She also suffered from extreme bullying from
the other Asian elephants including one bite to her tail which
severed the tip and took months to heal. The zoo referred to it as
an “amputation.”
On November 21, 2022, just one week after Bamboo's death, the
Oklahoma City Zoo brought in a nine-year-old male Asian elephant,
Bowie, from the Fort Worth Zoo where he joins two other male Asian
elephants and three female Asian elephants. His “job” is to help
breed more babies to raise more money for the zoo. The Oklahoma City
Zoo participates in the Association of Zoos & Aquariums (AZA)
fraudulently named Species Survival Program (SSP), which does
nothing to contribute to the survival of elephants in the wild, or
even in captivity. Shockingly, more elephants die in zoos than are
born there!
The Oklahoma City Zoo was named the #6 worst zoo on In Defense of
Animals' list for good reason. Tell the Oklahoma City Zoo and the
AZA to stop confining these intelligent and sensitive animals, and
further to cease breeding, which only dooms even more elephants to
lifetimes of boredom, trauma, and physical suffering in captivity.