20 Year Plan 2005-2025
It is a working document that was last updated in 2013 so it’s time to re evaluate where we are and how to get where we are going. I inaccurately predicted that by 2014 we would have passed the Big Cat Act. I originally thought we would have it introduced by 2010, but it was 5/21/2013 before we managed to get in introduced and my new prediction is that it will pass in the 2019-2020 session.
Turns out I was way too optimistic about having Florida, the worst state in the union when it comes to big cat ownership, pass a law to ban private possession by 2009. The next worst state, Ohio, did pass such a law in 2012 and the third worst state, Texas, finally did require that owners register and be overseen by local authorities, but no one really does that. Howie has had the facts, for many years, to prove that legislators CAN pass a bill to ban private possession in Florida (despite the Florida Wildlife Commission’s claim to the contrary) but we put it on a back burner because the federal ban will make that point moot. Recently Howie has been working more on the Florida constitution issue by engaging the Florida Bar Animal Section. My new prediction is that Florida will pass such a ban after the federal bill passes in the upcoming session, just to save face.
I had predicted that the circus would meet with its demise in 2011, so I was off by 7 years if you consider Ringling’s closure this year to be the death nell in the U.S. For the past several years similar bans have been passing in 40 other countries. I think by 2020 it will be gone everywhere.
I thought we could end fur farming and trapping by 2007 with our campaign that focused on “Fur makes you smell bad and look fat.” The photo is me in 2005 protesting in front of Westshore Mall on Fur Free Friday (an annual November event). 2018 turned out to be the year that fashion turned its back on the barbaric use of fur and it became a shameful act of selfishness to wear fur.
In some ways, I’m glad to have been wrong in my prophecies, because in 2005 I thought that by 2012 all wild cat species would be in such peril that they would all be on the IUCN Red List. I thought that the resultant protections for wild counterparts would result in such intensive inbreeding in zoos that they would not be able to breed and exhibit big cats by 2013 or any species of exotic cat by 2015. Where I was sadly wrong is that I thought people would be so much better educated by then that they wouldn’t patronize zoos.
Zoos have been around for 190 years under the auspices of furthering our education and concern for preserving habitat starting with London's Regent's Park in 1828. Zoo attendance had started to decline but lately is increasing. I’m not too concerned though because I think it’s more a matter of zoos changing their business model from jail cells full of languishing wildlife to theme parks with roller coasters and rides to be playgrounds for children to run wild. I think zoos are uniquely positioned to make the most of 360, immersive, virtual reality and will transition from prisons to edu-tainment meccas. For big cats; I am going to predict that none will be displayed in zoos by 2023 and smaller cat species will no longer be held captive in zoos by 2025.
Given my overly optimistic projections in 2005, where I thought exotic cats would no longer be held in private possession, zoos or circuses by 2015, I had reasoned that all of them in cages would have died out by 2025. Now I have to push that back a bit so here is my updated timeline:
2020 - Ban on private ownership results in most captive cats going into sanctuaries where they will die out by 2028. Fur farming and fur trapping will end because 2018 saw massive adoption of a NO FUR policy across most popular designers and brands, with some cities even passing bans.
2023 - Zoos ditch the last of their big cats to make space for more lucrative experiences on that valuable real estate. Those cats end up in sanctuaries where most will die out by 2031. Since there are currently about 800 big cats in AZA zoos and maybe another 1000 in non accredited zoos, there are plenty of sanctuaries who can manage the cast off cats.
2025 - Zoos ditch the last of their small cats to make space for more lucrative experiences on that valuable real estate. Those cats end up in sanctuaries where most will die out by 2033. Since small cats are not a big draw in zoos, I believe their numbers to only be about 1/3 of the big cat census. There are very, very few small cats in private possession and plenty of sanctuary space for them. Heck, Big Cat Rescue alone could probably take in all of the currently possessed for the rest of their lives.
Hunting wasn’t a topic I’d included in the original 20 year plan. Hunters and anglers combined are 3% of the population and although I couldn’t find exact stats, I believe that hunters are only about 1% of our population. Recent reports based on hunting permits indicate a 1% net loss in hunters as fewer begin hunting and more stop hunting. What will cause those 3-3.5 million (mostly men) from killing for sport? Public opinion. As new fathers fail to introduce their children to the concept of killing animals for fun, it will die out within the next generation. I think sport hunting for cats will be a thing of the past by 2024. Yesterday Apple News listed their top 6 stories for the day and one was the public outcry at a hunter killing a cougar. We are on our way.
But will it be in time to save them in the wild?
At our current rate of poaching, tigers will be gone in the wild by 2024. Leopards will be gone by 2027 and lions will be gone by 2030. I could begin backdating from those inevitabilities with plans to change the outcome, but climate change may make that all pointless. Most scientist now concur that by 2030 we will already be experiencing the point of no return, with oceans dying, sea levels rising above coastal cities, and our food sources being wiped out due to the loss of bees, uncontrollable fires and droughts.
The world has warmed more than one degree Celsius since the Industrial Revolution. The Paris climate agreement signed on Earth Day in 2016 hoped to restrict warming to two degrees. The odds of succeeding, according to a recent study based on current emissions trends, are one in 20. If by some miracle we are able to limit warming to two degrees, we will only have to negotiate the extinction of the world’s tropical reefs, sea-level rise of several meters and the abandonment of the Persian Gulf. The climate scientist James Hansen has called two-degree warming “a prescription for long-term disaster.” Long-term disaster is now the best-case scenario. Three-degree warming is a prescription for short-term disaster: the loss of most coastal cities (Tampa). Four degrees: Europe in permanent drought; vast areas of China, India and Bangladesh claimed by desert; Polynesia swallowed by the sea; the Colorado River thinned to a trickle; the American Southwest largely uninhabitable. The prospect of a five-degree warming has prompted some of the world’s leading climate scientists to warn of the end of human civilization.
If human beings really were able to take the long view — to consider seriously the fate of civilization decades or centuries after our deaths — we would be forced to grapple with the transience of all we know and love in the great sweep of time. So we have trained ourselves, whether culturally or evolutionarily, to obsess over the present, worry about the medium term and cast the long term out of our minds, as we might spit out a poison. As Jim Hansen said, “From a technology and economics standpoint, it is still readily possible to stay under two degrees Celsius.” We can trust the technology and the economics. It’s harder to trust human nature. Keeping the planet to two degrees of warming, let alone 1.5 degrees, would require transformative action. It will take more than good works and voluntary commitments; it will take a revolution. But in order to become a revolutionary, you need first to suffer.
The earth is now as warm as it was before the last ice age, 115,000 years ago, when the seas were more than six meters higher than they are today. We can’t just cut back on emissions to stop the race toward our own extinction. We have to extract more carbon dioxide from the air than we contribute to it. Stats from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/08/01/magazine/climate-change-losing-earth.html
I believe that people will save the tiger when they won’t think about saving the planet. The two are intricately interlinked because healthy wild tiger populations can only happen where there are healthy forests and drinkable water. Some people may think I have a very limited focus and have mis spent my life protecting exotic cats when our planet may soon be uninhabitable, but I’ve always believed we have to save the tiger to save our own life support system.
