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Tips For The Compassionate Traveler
The number one
way you can protect animals is by harnessing the power of
your pocketbook. When you support animal-friendly services and
avoid those that exploit animals, you use economics to your advantage.
As a compassionate traveler, you'll want to be aware of the following
ways in which you can keep your travel dollars from harming animals.
Avoid Certain Tours
and Rides
Donkeys and horses are often used as a way to earn income from
tourists through pony rides and donkey safaris. The animals are
often malnourished, physically abused, and may even walk about
with open wounds. These animals are expected to carry very heavy
loads for extended periods of time. All too often, old, ill or
pregnant animals who should not be ridden are offered for hire.
Please do not support these enterprises. Let your tour guide and
the manager in your hotel know that you are disturbed by such
cruelty.
Don't Swim with
the Dolphins
Humans are fascinated by the intelligent and gregarious nature
of dolphins. As a result, dolphins are commercially exploited
in marine parks, aquaria, and "swim with the dolphin" (SWTD) programs
worldwide.
In the wild, dolphins
live in large groups (called pods), often in tight family units.
Social bonds may last a lifetime. They travel long distances each
day, diving up to several hundred feet and staying underwater
for up to half an hour. The sea is to dolphins as the air is to
birds—a three-dimensional environment, where they can move up
and down and side to side. Understanding this, it becomes clear
to anyone that a life in captivity is tragic for these ocean creatures,
even under the best possible conditions.
In addition, there
are safety concerns associated with SWTD programs—particularly
overseas, where regulation is often absent. Please do not participate
in such programs and consider avoiding marine parks and aquaria
that exhibit dolphins, manatees, and sharks. Make your concerns
known to hotel and resort managers.
Help Stray Dogs
and Cats
Stray dogs and cats are a common sight in many countries, and
in the spring breeding season the problem is exacerbated. Feeding
street animals does little to overcome the long-term problem of
animal overpopulation. You can make a difference by encouraging
restaurant and hotel management to work with local animal protection
organizations to deal in a humane fashion with stray animals near
these establishments, pointing out that doing so would make the
area more appealing to visitors and safer for both animals and
humans. You may also wish to make a contribution to a local animal
welfare society to support spay/neuter programs.
Choose Souvenirs
Carefully
Almost everyone wants to bring home a souvenir from their vacation.
But before you purchase that souvenir, stop to consider its composition
and origin. Was it made from an animal product such as ivory,
bone, shell, or fur? If so, an animal died—probably many animals—to
make the many copies of that souvenir to be sold to tourists like
you. Consider also that trade in products such as coral or wood
may involve destruction of habitat and threaten ecosystems. These
products are natural resources whose removal is harmful to wilderness
areas that provide homes to wildlife. Both animals and the environment
will benefit if travelers refuse to purchase such items.
Avoid Cruel Photo-ops
Tourists generally love a good photo-op. Pictures of interesting
or exotic spots capture happy memories of good times. They can
also, however, serve as records of man's inhumanity towards the
animal kingdom.
Cute monkeys, young
lions, colorful parrots, and other animals and birds taken from
the wild are sometimes posed outside restaurants or busy tourist
attractions. For a nominal fee, needy local entrepreneurs will
take the visitor's picture with these creatures. Tempting as it
may be to want to support the local economy in this modest way,
stop for a moment to consider the animals. Taken from the wild,
usually as babies and often at the expense of killing their parents,
these creatures are over handled and kept for long periods without
food, water, and shelter. The larger and more dangerous animals
may be drugged. When out of the public eye, they generally live
in tiny cages, are fed inadequate and inappropriate diets, and
denied veterinary care. And when they are old, sick or simply
not cute any longer, they are abandoned.
Please help put a stop
to such cruelty. Don't have your picture taken with animals that
have been captured from the wild. Make your objection to such
practices known to restaurant owners, your tour guide or another
appropriate official. Remember that the best photo-op for animals
is in their undisturbed natural habitat.
Study the Menu Carefully
You may have traveled only as far as your corner restaurant, or
you may be dining in an eatery halfway around the world. However
far you have roamed for your meal, you can make choices that affect
animals.
There is a growing
trend in fashionable restaurants: exotic fare. Lion, monkey, turtle,
shark, and snake are only a few of the species that may appear
on menus around the world.
In some cases, restaurants
are offering as meals species on the brink of extinction because
of overhunting or overfishing. Even if the animals are not from
jeopardized species, their capture may have caused habitat damage.
And in many cases, individual animals have suffered in captivity
prior to being killed for food.
Commonly served delicacies,
such as milk-fed veal and paté de fois gras, may be made from
animals who have endured abnormal conditions and force-feeding
prior to slaughter.
You can help animals
by avoiding such menu items. Better still, avoid frequenting establishments
that advertise and serve these dishes. Be sure to let these restaurants
know why you have chosen not to be a patron.
Entertainment or
Cruelty?
Both in this country and abroad, animals are widely used for entertainment.
They are made to participate in rodeos, bullfights, and circuses,
are displayed in zoos and aquaria, and are sometimes even exhibited
in hotels and restaurants. Many of these captive animals have
been taken from their habitats and trained to perform unnatural
tricks for tourists. The dancing bears in Eastern Europe are one
example.
These animals often
are subjected to improper housing and care. Many receive little,
if any, veterinary attention. Everything about their lives—from
diet to exercise (or lack thereof)—may be inappropriate and inadequate
to their needs.
You can help reduce
the proliferation of animal entertainments and displays by refusing
to attend events involving animals or to visit animal displays.
When a hotel, restaurant, or other tourist attraction features
animals or birds, let your objections be known. Speak to the manager
and to your tour operator and encourage your travel companions
to do so as well.
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