Ringling Bros. elephants to get an early retirement

In March of a year ago, Feld Entertainment announced all of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey’s touring elephants would move to the Ringling Bros.

Feld says once the company started planning for the pachyderms’ retirement, they realized it could happen quickly.

An increasing number of United States towns and cities have adopted anti-elephant ordinances forbidding circus acts with elephants to enter the municipal limits. Today our sources say that the reason for the early end on the elephant shows is that Disney is looking to push through with the acquisition later this year.

Ringling Brothers has been repeatedly criticized, picketed and even sued by several animal rights groups for its treatments of the elephants. Center for Elephant Conservation in Florida in May 2016.

Ringling Bros. has been under criticism from a host of animal welfare groups for the way it captures, breeds, and trains elephants.

Ringling said it’s ending elephant shows because of shifting consumer preferences.

All of the traveling Asian elephants will be retired to a permanent conservation home by May of this year.

“The Center for Elephant Conservation is an incredible place.” she said.

Eleven elephants now tour with the circus.

The Humane Society’s president, Wayne Pacelle, praised it on his blog as “a second wave of good news” from Ringling. Oakland, Calif., Los Angeles and other cities have banned the use of bullhooks, a tool that resembles a fire poker and is used by trainers to control elephants.

The circus will continue to use other animals, though, including horses, dogs, and tigers. For instance, the city of Asheville, North Carolina has prohibited exotic animals from performing in its huge multi-purpose arena. “We’re looking at a lot of new ways of doing things”.

It’s nice to know that these awesome animals are being retired from service and will be cared for the way they should be, helping to accomplish real good in the process. They will also take part in medical research, such as why cancer is much less common in elephants than it is in humans.

It urged Ringling to send the elephants to a bona fide animal sanctuary with conditions similar to those they would find in their natural habitat. This will bring the total count of elephants at the location up to 42.