Did you hear about SeaWorld's announcement!?

[lostpony]

Thanks ringwraithe10 for answering my question as to Elephant Sanctuary.  Do they have room for SeaWorld's whales there?      I agree there is a world of difference between for-profit and non-profit.

Nonprofits serve an essential function but for-profits are a vastly larger percentage of the economy.  Responsible for-profit corporations are essential for sustainability overall, in my opinion.

Dragonflitter, that is great information and suggests maybe SeaWorld should be looking for some way to maybe have their whales be in the ocean with monitoring instead of cooping them up, and maybe have a big dome where patrons watch whale footage from the wild or a live Internet feed to watch at home or some other responsible ideas for ways to make profit.  Breaking away from old ideas is hard though.  Further is it known whether Orca born in captivity can be successfully reintroduced, or do they depend on learned skills that will leave them unable to survive out of captivity?  Try reintroducing people to the wild and see how we do, for example...

I have enough information now to have an opinion!  To me it sounds like a great thing to begin by not making any new captive whales, and we should hold them to it.  It may not necessarily be irresponsible to continue with the ones they have already for now, and maybe it's even OK for them to "rescue" captive bred whales from other groups...so long as they are subject to scrutiny to ensure they stay within reasonable guidelines.  (cough)

Thanks lovesbabysquirmy for the links and stats:  seems like Elephant Sanctuary is a most impressive nonprofit!  I'm glad to have learned about them in this thread.  And they already stole my idea!  I'll definitely check it out.

But do they have any ponies?  Oh wait WE at the arena are the stray pony sanctuary!

[LadyMoondancer]

I wonder how the Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee is funded if not by visitors...conservation costs money.

Take a look: http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=7257

82% of a donation goes towards the programs - what I would imagine is food, water maintenance, healthcare, salaries for vets & other staff, utilities, etc.  What one would consider "taking care of the elephants". 
11% is admin because obviously, they do have to have security and issue tax receipts and answer the phone! 
6.5% fundraising costs - those are things like direct mail solicitation (I bet they don't do this, it raises costs quite a bit), any kind of campaign they may be publicaly running  , the cost of any fundraising software they might have....

Oh and you *can* visit the elephants.... from the digital world:  http://www.elephants.com/elecam/ 

True, I do that all the time.  I love seeing "the girls." 

[Galactica]

It is a tiny step but it would be great if it signaled a change in focus for Seaworld.   I would love to hear that they are going to be focused on rescue efforts and conservation.

There are so many animals that are waaaaaay too intelligent/sophisticated to be kept in captivity for no reason than to amuse people.

[lovesbabysquirmy]

It is a tiny step but it would be great if it signaled a change in focus for Seaworld.   I would love to hear that they are going to be focused on rescue efforts and conservation.
There are so many animals that are waaaaaay too intelligent/sophisticated to be kept in captivity for no reason than to amuse people.

Oh how I wish.  But we DO take their habitats. How on EARTH, quite literally, shall we share that space?   

[melodys_angel]

Nothing directed towards any one person--just that some views on the topic can get sensitive <3