Remember Knut The Polar Bear?? A Sad Up-date About Him

I think if Knut had been allowed to die, animal conservationists and groups like PETA would have been screaming about the injustice of it. Either way, I think the zoo has been put into a tough situation. Hopefully they can put him into an environment where he would have more interaction with other polar bears and less with humans.

I don't think that zoos create more problems for the animals in their care if the animals were born in captivity. If an animal is taken from the wild and put into a zoo, I think it is unhealthy for the animal because they're now in a restricted environment.

I view zoos as a needed extension of the gene pool for some animals.

For the last 50 years zoos have taken great care to prevent interbreeding of the captive population - with some noted failures and a lot of success.

The Florida puma has had a genetic shot in the arm by bringing in Texas pumas to diversify the gene pool, something humans may not have considered if not for the problems they had for a while with the zoo population.

That is so sad, because I think he is lonely for human companionship, if not notoriety. I feel sorry for him, I wish there was something to make him feel better. I really think zoos can do more harm than good sometimes. I would rather they be on a reserve somewhere where they can still act somewhat like wild animals.

That is so sad Pye.
The zoo is too blame for his mental health.
He should have been treated like a normal bear, as soon as he was old enough to be weaned.
Now they want to send him somewhere there is no people.
Why the heck don't they put a TV in his enclosure with him.
Even if they have to run non stop videos of people, that appear to be watching him.
If they send him away he is going to fret and die.

No I do not think killing him would have been the right thing to do. Man has made him the way he is so now they need to take the responsibility for undoing it. They have certainly earned enough from exploiting him so they can afford to give him what is necessary to help dehumanize him.

Bears are more human than one might suspect. A friend sent me Norbert Rosing's striking images of a wild polar bear coming upon tethered sled dogs in the wilds of Canada's Hudson Bay. The photographer was sure that he was going to see the end of his dogs when the polar bear wandered in. Instead, the polar bear played with the dogs and returned every night that week.

I wouldn't accept him being killed or left to die either. The Zoo decided to care for him, they better finish it up. They can't just throw up their hands due to this. Its a sad situation too, since they did do this wrong. I have problems with live animals being reduced to spectacles for slouch-browed, dull gaze people (and I remember the tiger situation in SF from earlier on for part of this).

pyewacket something very strange happened!!! When I received the amil notification of this discussionyour avatar was of a man not your pretty black cat. I copied it is it one of your photos do you know who it is?Copy of your(???)other avatar:

That is so sad pye..the poor thing awww.
whining for attention..that is what I do, I can relate bigtime! xoxooxox (((((pye))))xo
I think they should have done what they did rather than let him die..too bad he is so human adapted but hey I guess it could be worse.

Would you believe I haven't heard anything about this polar bear? No commercials, ads, tv stints, news, nothing..nada. Just finding out about it now. Odd that the polar bear thinks he's human but then again, he was raised from a tiny cub so could very well have imprinted like ducks and chickens as well as kittens/puppies can if the first thing they see is a human being when they come into this world. Lightning thought he was a dog or a person, not a cat and really didn't act like a cat either because his mom died less than 12hrs. after his birth so he imprinted on me and our dogs.