Abuse allegations haunt Bowmanville Zoo owner
PETA releases footage where man appears to whip tiger
A zoo owner who has been criticized for swearing at a monkey on live television is facing criticism once again — this time over an expletive-laden video appearing to show him repeatedly whipping a tiger.
In a hidden-camera clip posted to the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animal (PETA)’s website, a whip is cracked repeatedly by Bowmanville Zoo owner Michael Hackenberger around 19 times as he trains a Siberian tiger named Uno.
The footage is too dark to clearly decipher whether the whip makes contact with the animal, but later, Hackenberger appears on screen, saying, “The beauty of the paws being on the, uh, rock, when you hit him, it’s like a vice . . . It stings more.”
“If we’d been running a videotape the whole time you were here and you did a 45-second montage of the times I struck this animal, PETA would burn this place to the ground,” he continues.
Zoo staff said Hackenberger was not at the site Tuesday to comment on the matter and directed the Star to a video rebuttal posted by the owner on YouTube on Monday.
In it, Hackenberger admits his “language is atrocious and I apologize for that,” but says “PETA, once again, is lying . . . Maybe I viciously whipped the ground. Maybe I viciously whipped the air, but I did not viciously whip that tiger,” he said. “I didn’t strike the tiger except twice to get her turned around.”
In the 31-minute video response, Uno lays on the ground of the same ring where PETA’s footage was captured. Hackenberger demonstrates thrashing the air and ground with a whip, while Uno barely flinches. In one scene, the animal even gently paws at the whip’s tip.
“A tiger will not lay on the ground and allow itself to be struck as this videotape suggests,” says Hackenberger. “They will turn around and try to kill you. That is not what we are about.”
In the wake of the video’s release, the Canada’s Accredited Zoos and Aquariums, a non-profit animal welfare agency, said it was launching an investigation into the matter.
“The welfare of the animals in the care of our accredited member institutions is our paramount concern,” said CAZA. “The issues raised by the video are serious and require a thorough and fair review.”
In a post on its website PETA stood by the footage, saying, “the young tiger was so traumatized that he involuntarily emptied his anal sacs, a fear response in big cats.”
Hackenberger, who once trained the tiger used in the Life of Pi film, countered that log books show the cat had a touch of diarrhea that day.
“For too long, we have allowed PETA to interpret the actions of animals for us,” he said in the video response. “We are not going to do that today.”
In August, when Breakfast Television was filming at the zoo, a monkey that was meant to be riding atop a miniature horse, jumped off the equine’s back. A recording microphone picked up Hackenberger uttering, “f---ing c—ksucker.”
“I deeply regret my words,” he said in a written response released at the time. “I spoke out of frustration and failed to control my temper.”