Trentham Monkey Forest: For Better or Worse?
First of all I want to apologise for my lack of posts! I
recently got a full-time job that now occupies my time and I have also been
reluctant to post on here as I’m not happy with the look of my blog, but this
is something I’m working on so bear with!
We all know my stance on zoos after my post in May.
But sometimes there are blurred lines when it comes to what constitutes a zoo
environment and what can be as somewhat of a sanctuary for the animals. A
primary difference is, of course, money. But what is also important is the
breed of animal, their natural habitat, the size of the enclosure and if they
are actually helping the animals.
This takes me to my trip to Trentham Monkey Forest back in
September. I should probably highlight that I didn’t pay to go as my boyfriend
used to work these during his summers and so got free tickets. When he first
got the job there I wasn’t best pleased, but I pride myself on not forcing my
beliefs and opinions on others. I don’t think you should ever guilt trip anyone
in to thinking the same as you, you can only educate but never discriminate.
The Monkey Forest portrayed to me everything that I hated about zoos and so I
never took him up on the offer to go around the place.
As my views on animals got stronger, I began to research into
more and more things and the forest was one of them. I believe that you should
always educate yourself on every aspect of something before making presumptions
and this is something that I had failed to do prior to making my mind up on the
forest. Upon reading I found that although how the animals had got there was a
blur, the rehabilitation programme was comforting. They claim themselves that
“over 600 Barbary macaques have already been successfully re-introduced into
their natural habitat in the Atlas Mountain in Morocco”. This is something that
zoos claim to do but provide no evidence on and in reality, it very rarely
happens. The park only has one breed of monkey, the Barbary macaques and they
are endangered. The fact that over 600 have been successfully moved back into their
habitat is amazing, as well as 72 babies being born in the park.
Upon arrival at the park, the first thing that took me by
surprise was the sheer size of the park – it was massive. With 60 acres of land
and 140 monkeys, the ratio seemed perfect. Another thing that I didn’t expect
was NO cages. Not one cage, not one box, nothing. There is an initial fence
that the public enter through but that was it, and the trees tower over this.
Therefore I think that the fence is primarily there to control the humans. Seeing
the animals in what seemed a calm, relaxing environment was very reassuring to
me. Also, due to the vast size of the forest, the public can only see about 15%
of it as the rest is covered in trees and streams of water. This also made me
happy as it meant that the animals weren’t trapped for us to see, they were
free to roam wherever they wanted to, even if that meant me nearly tripping over them!
The picturesque park and the roaming animals were enough for
me to feel that this park is not entirely a money-grabbing exhibition but
rather somewhat of a sanctuary. For me, I would rather them be in their natural habitat in a mountain range in Morocco and be able to live their lives as they wish but with the
Barbary macaques being endangered and this being a positive rehabilitation
programme, I believe that this is a happy compromise in our current world.
Happy World Monkey Day!
What do you think to the grey areas? Have you ever been to
the forest?
Thank you for reading, my lovelies,
Jade
X
1 comments
Thank you for this. I too was concerned about the ethics bejind the park as I am strongly anti zoo.
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