Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
Wildlife park defends conditions after ‘malicious’ videos on Tiktok
Wingham Wildlife Park says it is considering legal action after videos claiming to show animals being kept in poor conditions were posted on social media.
The popular attraction near Canterbury released a statement after short clips appeared on Tiktok showing chimpanzees and moon bears in their enclosures.
A caption on the chimp video read: “They all just look so sad. Their fur was falling out, rocking back and forth, not playing or interacting with each other, no toys for entertainment.”
The second clip said the bears were pacing back and forth and clawing to get out, with the user adding: “Seeing the bears broke my heart”.
But in an a lengthy statement, a park spokesperson said the videos were malicious, and defended the conditions the animals are kept in.
“I will start with the bear video, over which we are currently investigating legal action against this Tiktok user,” said the spokesperson.
“It is easy for people to forget that in your search for internet fame it is not OK to try to bring down another person or institution in the process.
“The claim about the bear enclosure being a 12ft x 10ft concrete box is 100% fabricated and done so maliciously. The building which can be seen in the video itself is 47ft x 18ft – a very vast difference in size to what has been claimed.
“However, this is just their bedrooms where they spend the least amount of time during the day. Most of their day is spent in their 16,160 sq ft outdoor enclosure filled with climbing apparatus and natural substrate and plants. This user had to walk past this enclosure in order to get to the house, so there is no way to possibly miss this area. It’s an over 150ft-long path alongside the outdoor area to get to the bedrooms.
“The bear is also clawing at the window, that is true, and it is not a reaction to being stuck in a tiny room (they know very well where their housing is), it is a reaction to the person who can be seen teasing her at the window, at one point right next to the sign asking people to not touch the window.”
The statement noted a similar situation applied to the chimpanzee enclosure, which they said covers a total of 5,600 sq ft of usable space up to a height of 19 ft, along with a further 1,000 sq ft of bedroom space.
They said the video failed to show the 7,400 sq ft outdoor garden, which the chimps have access to all day.
“They just prefer to spend their nap time indoors,” added the statement. “Who wouldn’t on a slightly chilly day? Especially when they have a lovely big area with underfloor heating! This underfloor heating keeping them at a beautifully tropical temperature all year round is the main reason why we chose to have a plain floor for them. In one video you can see Georgia, our oldest chimp, sitting on the ground because she doesn’t climb too much any more due to getting stiff joints, which the heated floor really helps with. By the way, for the part where they claim that they have no soft material, please note that the whole time they are all sitting on soft material nests which they build themselves from wood wool, which we give them fresh each day.”
The statement also addressed claims the chimps are sad, and noted they had arrived at the park with certain behaviours, having been rehomed from a laboratory.
They said: “We have a very settled group of chimps, and for much of the day they spend their time grooming one another, using enrichment items, eating and nest building. But depending on the time of day, chimps are also renowned for taking siestas where they like to just chill out, lay down or sit about not doing much. An animal doesn’t need to be running around all day so that you have something interesting to look at. Just like us, they do like to just spend some time doing nothing.
“Next time you come to the park take the time to see animals at different times of the day or catch some of our talks and you will then see them doing different things. They also don’t have an all you can eat buffet set out for them all day long. Just because you don’t see food in there at that time doesn’t mean that they don’t get fed! They get fed three times per day with the option of some other small enrichment feeds thrown in – getting a mixture of a specialist diet, browse (fresh leaves) and fresh fruit and veg which we drive to Spitalfields market once per week to ensure they have the freshest seasonal produce we can get.
“Let us talk about the rocking, which is a behaviour which you will see in two of our chimpanzees, the two males, Fritz and Lucas. We’re not going to pretend that they don’t do it, because clearly they do – Lucas also rubs his nipples as a stereotypical behaviour. And again there is a sign which explains this and explains how you can behave around them to reduce how much they do it.
“We have a very extensive enrichment programme for the chimps as well as a training programme to keep them busy and engaged with the staff and one another. These are all designed to help reduce these behaviours, and they have reduced a lot since they arrived, but with some behaviours it can be impossible or very difficult to remove them completely, and just like with people, chimps can have good days as well as worse days.
“Our chimps arrived with these behaviours, and now we actually only have them in two of them, whilst others came to us with similar issues. We re-homed these chimps from a university-run laboratory in the USA to give them a retirement home where they can live out the rest of their lives, and on the whole they really are having a great time, even having reproduced with us.
“Sometimes you really do need to have a little bit of context and history to fully understand why some animals do what they do, why we look after them in certain ways and why some people think that Tiktok followers are worth getting into a legal fight over. Yes, they’ll be hearing from us shortly - hopefully they take the time to read this andact accordingly.”
It is easy for people to forget that in your search for internet fame it is not OK to try to bring down another person or institution in the process...