Bride of Knut? A Lesson for Survival of Species
by Christine Lepisto, Berlin 
on 01.12.08
Death and drama in Nuremberg. Dag Encke, Director of the Nuremberg Zoo where cubs were recently born to polar mommas Vilma and Vera, was reported as recently as the 4th of January to have said that he would have let Berlin's famous polar bear, Knut, die rather than raise him with humans. Only three days later, the news broke: Vilma's babies are dead! And now, mother Vera roams and moans the loss of her cub, taken away to be “the next Knut”, or perhaps “Mrs. Knut” as the media whirlwind has tagged the still nameless cub. Is this a tempest in a teapot? Or a metaphor for man's place in nature? Which is best: trusting the goodness of mother nature or intervening with the superior intellect of man?
The Original Bear Baby: Knut in Berlin
Knut-mania reigned at the Berlin Zoo for over a year. Eventually, cuddly Knut grew into a threat to his handler -- anthropomorphized cuteness competing with subconsciously invoked primal images of a deadly predator. A wild creature turned into a rollicking, croissant-eating clown who is now the subject of negotiations with Hollywood studios looking for opportunities to capitalize on his fame, and the debate over the Knut-rescue continues.
Leading the Knut naysayers: Dag Encke of the Nuremberg Zoo. When his turn came, Encke's strong statements made one thing clear: no polar bear babies would be raised by humans in the Nuremberg Zoo. Two polar bear mommies in Nuremberg, Vilma and Vera, would be left to raise their young undisturbed. It is the natural way. Encke substantiated his position with advances in animal management theory. The old-fashioned practice of rescuing zoo babies was necessitated due to over-management of the young families, frequent intrusions making zoo mothers nervous. Modern theory requires that the young mothers be left to themselves in their brooding areas; this helps the young mothers learn to raise their babies, leading to a lifelong contribution to captive breeding programs, and results in offspring that can continue to live among their kind.
The reverse logic was used to justify the removal of Vera's cub (or to cover-up for the fact that political intervention rather than scientific expertise now reigns). The excitement over the death of Vilma's cubs resulted in disturbances by media teams swarming the polar bear area in Nuremberg Zoo. Vera became nervous. Soon, she was seen roaming outside the brood cave, desperately searching for a safe place for her cub, according to zookeepers. Her behavior sealed her fate: zookeepers declared a clear and present danger to the final bear cub. Vera lost her baby.
A confession is due: I will be glad if little snowflake, or whatever her name will be, survives. I too indulge in the cute snapshots of the tiny white ball of yawning, suckling, or perfect sleeping. But this article aims not merely to beat Cute Overload in the next Webbies. Our hearts are torn by mommy Vera's loss. But the scientist in us seeks the truth.
One truth: humans have a natural tendency to imagine that animals think, live, experience the world like we humans do. The case of a Chinese man attempting to hug panda Gu-Gu at the Beijing Zoo exemplifies romanticizing Mother Nature even more extremely than Knut-mania.
Another truth: most creatures sharing this planet are pitted against or allied with each other in battle for survival. When a black bear abandons a single cub in order to preserve her strength in hopes of a larger litter the following season, it is not a carefully balanced ethical decision; it is simple instinct. When a black widow spider eats her mate, it is not because 'he didn't take out the trash, ... again'. It is a recipe for survival.
One conclusion: Humans are unique in our capability to engage in such complex thought as sustainability, to consider that the success of our species may have to be deliberately reigned in so that the ultimate success (survival) of the species, and our ecosystem, can be assured. But with this realization comes an admission. Capability for complex thought may cloud decisions and delay actions. How do we ensure that the science is sufficiently well established to make decisions otherwise contradictory to our survival instinct? How do we communicate so that the potential loss can be accepted due to the greater potential good? Should Nuremberg have risked public outrage in order to communicate expert Encke's conviction that non-intervention is a better strategy?
In the big picture, the case of Vilma and Vera is a tempest in a teapot. But it is also a metaphor. We must learn how to communicate, and how to make decisions which weigh risks and benefits—with scientific knowledge as a firm foundation for action. The survival of our species depends on it.
Via: splashed on every newspaper, tabloid and webpage in Germany!
Encke's let Knut die quote via ::Die Welt, 04 January 2008
Images Via ::Sweet, Sweeter, Sweetest in Die Welt and ::Sueddeutsche
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I will agree human intervention is inappropriate IF this situation were in the wild but it's NOT. This is a zoo, an artificial environment that no matter how well we simulate, serves a variable that can alter the natural progression and development of these animals. They are played with, they see humans gawking at them, most don't even hunt. If I were to believe they had some abstract cognitive thinking, they might wonder where all this free easy food is coming from.
My point, We already intervened when we placed these animals in a zoo. Therefor it is our responsibility to care for them, protect their offspring even if it's from their own parents.
"My point, We already intervened when we placed these animals in a zoo. Therefor it is our responsibility to care for them, protect their offspring even if it's from their own parents."
I could not agree more, good post
Well electro, i somewhat agree with you
but what if the mother was thinking for the best of her cubs
lets think about it this way,
You are put in a house, its nice SURE! it has everything you need, clean sheets, running water, but you can never leave.
you are CONSTANTLY being monitored, during the day you have visitors but they cant speak to you through a 3 inch piece of glass, nor do you have a telephone, internet, anything to connect you to the outside world.. you are absolutely alone, always.
THEN you get seeded.... (or have sex) and you get pregnant.. you go crazy from being alone and no interaction, and now you have babies.
would YOU as a NORMAL MOTHER, want your children to live like you do? do you think that her instincts are telling her to more than just hunt. maybe her instincts are telling her that no creature deserves to be held in this kind of loneliness and tried to, save, her cubs lives.
Thats my eight cents.
I've been deeply troubled by zoo tragedies that have been qualified with "in confinment" to say that the animal went "insane," hurt and/or murdered someone, or exhibited behavior that some might feel shocking. Don't worry, it's ok, because this kind of thing happens to animals in captivity.
How the Hell is this a good thing? Knut is not the first Polar Bear to have been abandoned by its mother only to be hand-raised by a zookeeper. Peace is a Polar Bear at Tobe Zoo in Ehime Prefecture, Japan. Like Knut, Peace was raised to be a wonderfully beautiful creature, and much like my respect and admitation for Thomas Dorflein (Knut's true mother), I have deep respect for Peace's true mother.
Dag Encke's logic apparently allows for the questionable belief that hand-raising a wild animal is not natural and should not be practiced. OK, I can understand that. But how the Hell is a zoo natural? No matter how much you try and fool yourself, it's still an animal in a well-appointed prison cell. If you're going to believe in Encke's extreme (and conveniently flawed) logic, you better damn well turn your back on factory farm-raised animal-based food, refuse to patronize circuses, and oh yeah - stop going to zoos. I guess Encke didn't think about that, eh?
It is fitting that the animal in this article is going to burden the after effects of global warming. By that I mean that if we are able to find an ongoing solution to global warming, we have to acknowledge that one possibility will be the extinction of certain animals. It would be horrible if the only Polar Bears in existence were those that lived in zoos, but if that is the case, then Knut, Peace, and my favorites - Gus and Ida (in the Central Park Zoo) will have to serve as living examples of where we went wrong, and our resolve to NEVER let this happen again.
We've intervened the other way around, why not in the positive?!?
Christian - I wish we had learned from any of the other animals that are maintained in zoos across the world but are extinct in the wild. Scimitar horned oryx and the American red wolf are two that promptly come to mind. I hope it doesnt come to that for polar bears, but if it does, will it force this realization on the public any better?
Carla - I think you have some great thoughts but we need to remember that polar bears are not truly social animals. Adults are generally solitary. Its probably more unnatural that they are so often exposed to their own species within zoo enclosures.
What I think it serves everyone to remember is that Encke's words are being SEVERELY twisted. He is following modern theory that human-raised wildlife never truly have a chance to maintain and learn behaviors that are normal for the species. The cub that is destined for hand rearing may never learn to be a good parent, which would be a heavy loss for the species overall should they be declared extinct in the wild in the next century.
If anyone out there really cares about polar bears perhaps they should try and reduce their carbon footprint to help arrest global warming. This poor little babies relatives habitat is melting into the sea.They hunt from ice packs and swim great ditances to floating platforms of ice. Recently four bears where found drowned ,they had attempted to swim 160 miles but could not make it.The problem of this little bear pales into insignificance when the bigger picture is looked at. Is the new Polar bears kingdom to be a shabby zoo. Perhaps the mothers which killed their young have tried to save them from this great indignity. half of all polar bear cubs in the wild are eaten by their fathers in their first year of life must be a reason I suppose.Looks like life is a bitch if your born a polar bear these days. Oh go and plant a tree or something its got to help somewhere down the line.
I have to get something off my chest, so I'd appreciate it if you'd bear with me. We as a species have accepted dominion over this planet and everything on it are our friggin' toys to do with as we please. I refuse as much as possible to take part of conventional approaches to life not because I am a jackass (and damend proud of it, thank you), but so far the conventional approaches have left us with far more long term problems than solutions. Maybe this is the best perspective we can adopt for this planet. Any solution we're gonna come up with will be inherently flawed, but the best we can hope for is minimizing the impact of the flaws.
I believe Bill Maher said something to the effect that he doesn't see how any parent isn't an ardent environmentalist. The best I can hope for is that when I die, I won't leave a hellacious mess for somebody else to clean up.
Sarah, you may be right about the potential dangers of hand-rearing as opposed to just letting the animal in question fend for itself "naturally," but their environment is the same one we've been abusing for our short-sighted benefit/ There isn't a whole lot left that's natural in their world. Having said that, I believe the best we can do for animals like Polar Bears is to give them as much as wel can. Thomas Dorflein, Knut's true mother, is a great example. I genuinely would like to believe that it would be possible to let an abandoned Polar Bear cub fend for itself and it would survive, but hasn't the rest of the planet suffered long enough?
Albert Camus' "The Myth of Sysiphus" seems all too painfully appropriate here. We are screwed. Our life is always going to amount to an uphill battle. We will NEVER win. The big question is whether or not we're gonna fight for the environment, the Polar Bears, and the memory of the Pink Dolphins - or ar we gonna give up? Make no mistake - this is a war. this is not something a crappy overhyped Earth Day Concert and recycled Starbucks cups will solve. We have to fight for those that cannot fight for themselves.