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Virtual zookeeper visits Taipei

By David Momphard
STAFF REPORTER
Sunday, Nov 10, 2002, Page 18

Although he would normally live in a frigid habitat, life isn't so bad in Taipei for Elvis the Kodiak bear. COURTESY OF FILIP VAN DINGENEN

This is the story of a man, a bear and a zoo. The man's name is Filip Van Dingenen and he's from Belgium. The bear's name is Elvis -- he's from Belgium too. Though they're from the same place, Filip and Elvis would first travel thousands of kilometers from their native country before meeting up in Taiwan, a place where there are few Belgians and even fewer Kodiak bears. It was unfortunate circumstances that brought them together, but no matter; the story has a mostly happy ending.

It begins in the city of Ghent, Belgium at the Limburgse zoo, a privately owned and operated place long criticized by animal welfare groups as one of Europe's gloomiest "slum zoos."

Reports of the animals' living conditions in Limburgse ranged from the depressing to the outrageous: cement enclosures void of flora, polar bears swimming in their own feces and orangutans so depressed they hurt themselves. Bowing to government pressure, the zoo ultimately closed in 1997, but not before selling off or giving away all of its animals. Having housed more than 4,000 specimens of some 360 different species, the task took several years. A lone chimpanzee to Saudi Arabia; another to Spain; a rhinoceros, a pair of tigers and several birds to France; a quartet of bonobos to the US -- call them the Limburgse diaspora. Besides having once shared the same miserable address, these animals now have something else in common: They're all being paid a visit by a gregarious Belgian artist.

COURTESY OF FILIP VAN DINGENEN

"I went to the zoo at Limburgse after it had been closed, Van Dingenen said. "All the doors to the cages and habitats were wide open. There were no animals, no life at all. It was surreal. The first thing you wonder when you see something like that is `Where did all the animals go?'"

COURTESY OF FILIP VAN DINGENEN

Van Dingenen's bewilderment turned to motivation. He devised a plan to find as many of the animals as he could, check on their well-being, and report his findings to other similarly bewildered Belgians. The project, titled Transzoo, is being done in collaboration with the Provincial Center of Visual Arts in Hasselt, Belgium and has the support of Belgium's Ministry of the Environment and Animal Welfare, which was in charge of exporting the animals. It has been funded in part by arts foundation Z33 and in part by Van Dingenen himself.

"Zoos are the meeting point of science, entertainment and education. My project will show the social circles that zoos create, circles that most people don't even know exist."

--Filip Van Dingenen

He has so far visited a pair of Kodiak bears in Holland, several other bears in France, a rhinoceros in Spain and several animals in Germany. But the better part of a year after he first visited the Limburgse zoo was spent finding where the animals had been sent. In addition to information provided to him by the Belgian government, his search was aided by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. It was CITES, as the organization is known, that helped Van Dingenen ultimately track Elvis to the Singapore Zoological Gardens, where he and his mate, Priscilla, had been sent in 1994. From there he learned that the pair were sent to Taipei in January of 1997. Sadly, Priscilla died during the move.

"This is not unusual, though it is often highly suspect," Van Dingenen said of the circumstances surrounding Priscilla's death. He explained that many animals die in transport from the stress, and still others mysteriously disappear. "I contacted a zoological garden in France that was supposedly sent two tigers and a number of birds from Limburgse. They never received them."

What becomes of these animals is anyone's guess since their transportation is usually arranged through private channels and deaths and disappearances often go unreported, but organizations like CITES cite Europe's notorious black market for exotic pets and Asian desire for the purported medicinal properties of many animals as likely reasons for their disappearance. In cases where he is not able to track down the actual animal, Van Dingenen asks for veterinary records or photos and has collected all types of information for his project. "One of my contacts is a famous taxidermist in Belgium," he said and offered a photo of a handsome-looking rhinoceros that didn't fare well at its new home in France.

But on the whole, Van Dingenen's research has been far from disappointing. "I was not particularly a fan of zoos before the project started," he said, "but I've learned that they aren't the prisons they've been made out to be and they in fact play an important role."

As humans further trespass into the habitats of endangered animals, these animals risk extinction. There are several species of animal that exist only in zoos and conservationists projects that thousands more will share the same fate in the near future. But it is these stocks in captivity that ensure that the species will continue to exist. Zoologists are quick to point out that every Arabian oryx on the planet is descended from a single herd of nine and every Pere David's deer comes from a herd of 18.

Still, captivity is far from ideal for keeping a species from extinction. And several species commonly found in zoos, such as Kodiak bears like Elvis, aren't in any danger of dying out. The fact that Kodiaks adapt well to captivity means zoos seek them out as tenants.

Elvis, for his part, was born in captivity at Limburgse in 1990 and has none of the concerns of an average Kodiak bear in the wild, though he must certainly suffer from an identity crisis. At the Taipei Zoo, he's kept in what was once the polar bear habitat, is fed dog food and is referred to in the zoo's literature as a brown bear (Ursus arctus), even though he is technically of the subspecies Ursus arctus middendorffi, the largest omnivore on earth. Insultingly, he's housed next door to the famous emperor penguins so fawned over by Taiwan's media. The gift shop nearest his enclosure hasn't so much as a pencil with his image on it.

"All merchandise is penguin-related. People discriminate against some animals that don't deserve it," Van Dingenen said. "It's very ugly."

The story is far from complete as Van Dingenen still has several more countries and many more animals to visit, including a den of lions in South Africa and those bonobos in the US. When his travels are finished, his research will be compiled into a publication and an exhibition that he hopes can travel to the same countries to which the animals have gone. "Zoos are the meeting point of science, entertainment and education," he said. "My project will show the social circles that zoos create, circles that most people don't even know exist."

Belgium now has legislation in place that prohibits privately owned zoos and the grounds of the former Limburgse zoo have been rezoned for development. Of the animals that were sent away from there, a small herd of African buffalo were reintroduced to the wild. Closer to home, the Taipei Zoo is actively looking for a new mate for Elvis.
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