Is A Solitary Female Member of a Different Species Held Captive Against Both Law and Nature Worth a 2nd Thought?
"When you get to the bottom of it, it is always greed"--to paraphrase Bob Barker's statement to the Toronto Star after his offer to buy Lucy was rebuffed by the Valley Zoo in Alberta, Canada--north lands with a near arctic climate. To lay to rest the zoo's specious reasons for its refusal, he
PAWS is retirement central for many of the elephants relinquished by all zoos above the snow line pursuant to a ruling by CAZA (Canadian Aquarium and Zoo Association)--all zoos except Edmonton's. Tender-hearted Bob offered to spend as much as $400K if necessary.
Edmonton's Valley Zoo, using a loophole in the law, would not let her go. To the best of my knowledge she is still held captive there--painting and playing the harmonica 364 days a year. She gets Christmas off. She has been
doing it for the past 40 years, for Lucy has spent her entire life in solitary servitude, beginning at age 2. She turned 43 in May of 2018.
doing it for the past 40 years, for Lucy has spent her entire life in solitary servitude, beginning at age 2. She turned 43 in May of 2018.
From Barb Greene-Mann's Lucy and Me:
She didn't of course, and the Queen's Bench ruling was upheld by the appellate court with one notably eloquent and sensible dissent. The Supreme Court would not consider the case. The solitary qualified advocate for the elephant, the Edmonton Humane Society, issued a statement in 2009 to the effect that it could not make an informed statement on Lucy until the elephant "stabilized." To my knowledge, no statement has been issued despite the passage of 9 years.
From Barbara's Greene-Mann's "Lucy and Me":
Plaintiffs PETA, Zoocheck Canada, et al, representing Lucy applied to the Bench that Edmonton Zoo and its owner, the City of Edmonton, be found in violation of laws established by the Canadian Association of Zoos and Aquarium (CAZA) and also wholesale infractions of administrative regulations attached to the Alberta Code (the law of the land) regarding animal exhibits. The zoo remains willfully in violation to the present day.
How does Edmonton's Valley Zoo get away with its flagrant disregard? One or two administrators have managed to stonewall justice for Lucy the elephant by exaggerating small, unassailable (?) law-quirks, and cite their unverified claims as extenuating circumstances. In truth the claims are all debatable issues--such as Lucy's health, her alleged estrangement from her own species, her history as a bad traveler, her supposed love for humans, etc. (mainly bunk, many feel)--but they will not be debated, a strategy that keeps animal rights activists at bay.
How does Edmonton's Valley Zoo get away with its flagrant disregard? One or two administrators have managed to stonewall justice for Lucy the elephant by exaggerating small, unassailable (?) law-quirks, and cite their unverified claims as extenuating circumstances. In truth the claims are all debatable issues--such as Lucy's health, her alleged estrangement from her own species, her history as a bad traveler, her supposed love for humans, etc. (mainly bunk, many feel)--but they will not be debated, a strategy that keeps animal rights activists at bay.
2017-6-10
No shakti in this female.
No shakti in this female.
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| This Minister of Justice and Solicitor General has authority over the Humane Society of Edmonton and could investigate the gridlock that holds Lucy in misery. Presumably she can cut through any unethical collusion. Please, please, go to contact links, call the toll-free number, write a letter, or click the blue link and direct your opinion to Kathleen. Bob Barker offered the City of Edmonton a reported $300,000 + to retire Lucy. No dice, says zoo. 
Lucy begs: Help Me Get to California!
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- Save Lucy
- Action Guide for Elephants (.pdf for teaching use)
- One Green Planet
- No Coat for Lucy
- Wikipedia Edmonton_Valley_Zoo
- Huffington Post Canada Lucy-the-Elephant-Edmonton
- In Defense of Animals: Worst Zoos
- Hall of Shame
- The Story of Lucy
- Facebook: Friends of Lucy
- Facebook: Free Lucy
- Supreme Court Declines to Hear Lucy's Case
- Elephant Journal: This is no Place for Lucy
.
I check on a regular basis to see if Bob Barker's "poor, poor Lucy" is still alive or has succumbed overnight. I keep calling and getting nowhere. If you feel any empathy at all with the smartest pet ever hemmed in by smug bureaucrats, you may want to drop a note to Ms. Ganley (or by now, her successor), and browse the below-listed links with its listings of many other persons of influence. Lucy is in the midst of the bitter cold winter again. Let's hope it's not her last.
Human Painter Detroit Expatriate Barbara Greene Mann's narrative paintings
and zany delusionaria (that she and Lucy are united in spirit) presently inspire my sleeplessness. Barb has advanced lung cancer and relies upon Lucy for strength. Nobody will give out info about Lucy. Click Barb's name for links galore.
Meantime, I have telephoned just about everybody in Edmonton connected with the whole seedy deal, including the Edmonton Humane Society ("no comment"), the Edmonton Zoo ("call our PR person's answering machine"), and the City of Edmonton ("Let me put you on hold while I find someone to answer your questions.") Put them all together and they present the most transparent stonewall you have ever been unable to see.
Did I mention that Lucy has spent most of her life in solitude?--the sole elephant at Edmonton's Valley Zoo, isolated from all the other critters because she had been born in the wild.
"Free Lucy" became a trending cause in media. The Valley Zoo found itself having to improvise their own factitious PR quick, about how happy Lucy was in Edmonton's deep-freeze, how she never did cotton to other elephants anyway, how she was too sickly to travel, and much preferred living under the 24/7 poking and electric prodding of her human captors.
Yet as reputedly sick as she is, the zoo charges families with kids to brave the cold and visit Lucy in her tiny barn. It is said that when she hears the kiddies coming she begins the elephant equivalent of cringing. Still, she remains the zoo's star attraction--in fact, the only thing the Edmonton zoo has going for it. The Valley Zoo gift shop sells Lucy's paintings for $1.46 per square inch. That works out to $210.00 for a square-foot painting.
This worries me.
The City of Edmonton has time on its stonewalling side. Soon, one official spokesman says, their inhumane treatment of elephants will be forever ended--once Lucy is dead. But in the meantime, she ain't going nowhere with anyone but the grim reaper. The Edmonton boys probably want to have her stuffed and put on eternal display. Sorry Lucy. Your usurpers will get theirs. Although the voice of the people--or Alberta's powerful Attorney General--might work a miracle.
In 1977, Gollembek sold Lucy at age two to Edmonton for $10K. The Valley Zoo designed their logo around her, trained the hell out of her in ten years isolation, and made her their star attraction. Indeed, she is talented. She paints, plays harmonica, waves signs, and behaves under constant threat of painful physical (and sometimes psychological) punishment. Few locals advocate for her rights because City Hall and the Valley Zoo has got the whole town brainwashed--except for a few notables, like the entire Edmonton Oilers team.
Lucy is neurotic, apparently--ever memorious of primal elephant rites, and her rights as an individual ever denied. She would bear no calves for the dealers.
The Canadian Association of Zoos and Aquariums (CAZA) ruled that all elephants be moved to climates less harsh to their health and natural inclinations. Most northern zoos complied. Gone from the Calgary, Toronto, Alaska, and even the Detroit and Chicago zoos are former elephant attractions, never to return. The lucky ones were transported to Elephant Sanctuaries in California and Tennessee. Less fortunate 'phants were sold into service in warm climates. Many, like Detroit's, simply died.
The average life-span of a captive elephant is 38 years; non-captive lifespan is about the same as humans. 70 years old is not unusual for a wild elephant. Lucy turns 43 in May of 2018
