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Wednesday, Aug. 12, 2009 | 1:45 p.m.
Dolphins in the Desert, seg. 3
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14 dolphins have died in the 19 years since Steve Wynn opened the Dolphin Habitat at the Mirage. Now, an animal rights group wants to stop the casino from bringing more dolphins to the desert.
Sun Archives
A federal agency has granted MGM Mirage a permit to import two Atlantic bottlenose dolphins for public display in Siegfried and Roy's Secret Garden on the Las Vegas Strip.
The Mirage filed an application April 15 with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Marine Fisheries Service to import two captive Atlantic bottlenose dolphins, a male and a female, from Bermuda for breeding.
The permit was granted on Aug. 4 and was published in the Federal Register on Monday, said Jennifer Skidmore, spokeswoman for the service.
After the deaths of two dolphins, Sgt. Pepper in early June and Sage last year, animal rights organizations Born Free USA and The World Society for the Protection of Animals filed a complaint against the Mirage's petition to import during a 30-day public comment period.
MGM Mirage spokesman Gordon Absher said the permit for the two dolphins is just the first step in a process to bring new mammals to the resort. "We have not announced anything," Absher said.
By breeding dolphins at the habitat, the Mirage could increase its dolphin population and continue ongoing research, Absher said.
The Siegfried and Roy Secret Garden Web site describes the dolphin habitat as 2.5 million gallons in four connected pools. An artificial coral reef and sandy bottom try to replicate the dolphins' natural habitat.
The Mirage's dolphin display is open to school students and research is an integral part of the display, according to MGM Mirage. Guests may become "dolphin trainer for a day," for example.
But animal rights activists said the Mirage's quest for new dolphins is motivated by profit, noting the dolphin display is open to paying visitors, for parties and for private dolphin encounters.
The Born Free and WSPA letter cited stress that 10- or 11-year-old dolphins undergo when being transported from the tropical climes of Bermuda to Southern Nevada's desert, causing acute stress.
Sgt. Pepper was the 14th dolphin to die at the Mirage habitat since it opened in 1990. Five of the 14 dolphins were stillborn or died shortly after birth; others died from respiratory infections such as pneumonia, pulmonary abscesses and stomach tears.
In the case of Sage, an investigation found "inconclusive" causes.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture initiated an investigation in Sgt. Pepper's death, but results are not yet available.
The Mirage permit was issued under the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972. The Mirage last imported a dolphin, Lightning, Sgt. Pepper's father, from a captive facility in Florida more than three years ago.
I don't know why the hell MGM/Mirage insists on keeping animals at the Mirage..it's gotta be the money. I don't care how well Roy takes care of the animals or what he provides for them there, most of them, when not in the SecretGarden, are kept in the kennel there, in cages, away from public view. The animals are only "rotated" into the Secret Garden every few hours.
With tigers dying over there (a couple of them recently) and the dolphins that have died there over the years, is ANYBODY really caring about the well being of the animals? That tiger enclosure over there (Secret Garden) is too small for all those tigers and the other animals, they need more room to run around in..not two or three acres of land!!! And no, Roy does not have acres and acres of private land to transport the animals to and let them "roam" around either.
By removing all the animals and dolphins out of the Mirage, it will remove the kids out of there as well. Children don't belong in casinos.
Get the animals out of the Mirage AND get the dolphins in a bigger, more realistic enclosure, away from the bright lights of Las Vegas (and the paying public!!!)
Part 1 of 2:
I make the same comment I did the last time a story was written about protests against MGM Mirage's dolphin permits.
There is no question that people who truly care about marine mammals would have concerns about MGM Mirage housing more dolphins, given the number of dolphin deaths in the exhibit's history. However, there is no context to that number, in comparison with the various other small aquariums across the United States.
However, I once again read the letter above, linked to The Sun's previous story on this issue, criticizing MGM Mirage's permit application. The letter was ostensibly written by two women claiming to represent "Born Free" and "World Society for the Protection of Animals". The letter is peculiar for two reasons:
First, it is not written on any stationery of any organization, and does not contain the address, telephone number, email address and Federal tax exempt organization tax identification number which is found on the letterhead of most legitimate charities. In other words, from that letter, there is no way for anyone to find out about the bonafides of either organization which the two women claim to represent.
That is significant because in the United States there is a very low key, wealthy group of individuals who are to put it politely, "animal welfare nuts", as well as people whose political agenda is to force all Americans to become vegetarians. These wealthy individuals, including a "Mafia Princess" who grew up in Las Vegas, are the money behind small fringe animal rights and animal welfare groups, with important sounding names, who have no regard for the property rights of animal owners. These groups also have no addresses, no phone numbers, and no public accounting for their what they are doing, despite their claiming tax exempt status. The groups funded by these wealthy extremists appear, act, disappear, rename themselves, and then act again, all the while hiding both the identity of their contributors, directors, officers and activist volunteers.
Currently, there is pending in the U.S. District Court, for the District of Columbia, a lawsuit against Feld Entertainment, owner of the Barnum & Bailey Circus. The case has been going on for years, under the Endangered Species Act, and was filed with the stated purpose of prohibiting the circus from having any elephants in its shows, and for the purpose of taking away all of the circus' retired elephants from Barnum & Bailey's private elephant retirement facility in Florida.
Don't get your panties in a bunch. They're just big fishies.
Part 2 of 3:
That lawsuit has already been tried, and is awaiting the judge writing a final opinion. The lawsuit against the circus was "fronted" by a group called the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). HSUS is an extremist fringe group which tries to legitimize its reputation by infringing on the national reputation of the American Humane Society, which has been around for years, and which is still run by rational people.
In the HSUS v. Feld case, the judge has already determined, under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, that none of the animal rights group plaintiffs in the case have "standing" to sue Feld Entertainment. The case has been left with one individual man, a former elephant caretaker for the circus, who voluntarily quit, as the sole plaintiff. The judge has also determined that one man is a "paid plaintiff", who has earned his living expenses from money funneled to him by HSUS's and the other plaintiffs' law firms.
The concept of a "paid plaintiff", hired and compensated by lawyers to front a case for them, is widely discouraged if not illegal in most states. After weeding through all of the disqualified plaintiffs' claims, the judge determined that the man only had "standing" to sue Feld concerning his faked emotional worries about the welfare of 3 of the circus' more than 100 performing and retired elephants.
Nevertheless, the lawyers for the disqualified plaintiffs have continued to be paid by someone other than the "paid plaintiff" who is, essentially, an indigent living in a double wide. The plaintiff's attorneys have refused to disclose who is paying the costs of the litigation, or the payments to the paid plaintiff living in the double wide or who is funding the thousands and thousands of billable hours of legal work on the case for the indigent plaintiff. Most people familiar with the HSUS v. Feld case believe the plaintiffs' activities, in terms of lawyers and the paid plaintiff, are being funded by these same wealthy animal lovers and radical vegetarians who fund the extreme groups like PETA, Sea Sheppard, and a long list of others.
HSUS, PETA and the usual crew are now regrouping in California, infiltrating the circus, zoos and large aquariums with "double agent" employees who act as spies, and use hidden television cameras and stage animal abuse events for the cameras. One such group, funded by the Mafia Princess, is running around California shutting down rodeos, using the badges of a newly formed humane society which she personally funds and controls.
Part 3 of 3:
So presumptuous and dangerous are these groups, they have been incorporating non-profit "humane societies" in states where they are allowed, in order to have private, volunteer individuals "put on the badge" of a law enforcement officer, seize animals which are private property, stop events involving animals like horse shows, dog shows and rodeos, and filing "animal abuse" charges with the courts as if these private humane officers (aka nuts) were trained law enforcement officials.
These extremely wealthy animal rights activists oppose all forms of rodeos, circuses, horse shows, dog shows, cat shows, and zoos, let alone the commercial raising of chickens, cattle and pigs for food.
These people have vehemently criticized people likes Sigfried & Roy and Dirk Arthur, for daring to own "big cats". These animal rights nuts and extreme vegetarians don't even like animal retirement sanctuaries run by other animal lovers like those in Kanab and Acton. The fringe animal rights nuts have even had the temerity to attack Ms. Greenspun, who has donated millions of dollars, and her own time, to make dog and cat sanctuaries in Las Vegas a more humane environment.
The bottom line is that there are ordinary almost penniless animal rights nuts, and there are a small number of wealthy animal rights "activists" and radical vegetarians who quietly fund the activities of the nuts.
Which brings me back to the second reason the letter posted by The Sun, which objected to the issuance of a permit for MGM Mirage to acquire more dolphins, is so ominous. The letter to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Services was very professionally written, from a legal point of view. It had all of the hallmarks of being written by well educated lawyers, rather than by volunteers of an obscure animal rights organization. Neither of the two ladies who signed the letters are members of the bar in any state.
So, my bottom line, now that the MGM Mirage is to receive its new dolphin permits, MGM Mirage must be very, very careful to take exceptionally good care of these dolphins, because the wealthy animal rights extremists and wealthy radical vegetarians appear to be writing checks for fancy lawyers, and lurking in the background, behind "Born Free" and the "World Socienty for the Protection of Animals, which in their letter posted by the Sun have no offices, no mailing addresses, no telephone numbers and no email addresses.
MGM Mirage has lots of very serious issues to deal with, without having to fight off the publicity nightmare of a staged "raid" by one of these private animal rights groups.
Making my point about people having no respect for the rights of animal owners, see the comment of "Long Time Las Vegas Resident". She has no legal standing to make any comment, let alone a directive, as to where and how Sigfried & Roy's tigers and lions are housed. She is also very illiterate, in terms of the care large cats born and raised in captivity require.
I happened to have found their large properties, where they keep their tigers and lions, by way of looking at the properties using Google Earth. The big cats are living a fine life.
Anyone who knows a whit about big cats born in captivity will tell you that they will die if you just throw them out on a huge tract of land and expect them to "live a natural life". They need to be fed regularly, and separately, by humans, because big cats born in captivity have never learned to hunt and have never learned to "share the kill" with their fellow cats.
My two "big cats", weighing 10 and 15 pounds, are happily sleeping in air conditioned comfort, on my bed, with their food and water available whenever they feel like eating and drinking. If they were simply dumped out into the "savannah", in a place like the old Lion Country Safari in Orange County, they would die. Same story with 1,000+ pound cats who have always lived with Sigfried and Roy.
First off cynical, I am a male, living in Las Vegas for the last 42 years of my life. Can you say the same? Or are you one of those rabid (no pun intended) Sigfrid and Roy fans?
No matter, I am not affiliated with any animal pro/con group, I just have an opinion and should be allowed to voice it. And no one stated the animals should be "dumped on the savannah". Please read more closely. Unless you are an employee of the entertainers, you have no first hand knowledge to enable you to speak against anyone else who might have worked for them years ago.
One more thing Cynical.I am not "illiterate" as you called me. Sheesh!!
I know perfectly well domesticated animals of any species cannot be returned to the wild.
Please and kindly go back and re-read my post before you attack other posters with opinions different than your own. Try the Las Vegas 2009 poster as well, they posted something a lot more "terrible" than I did.
And please, make sure you know what you're talking about..meaning first hand, eyewitness day to day knowledge of the workings at the hotel and Roy's homes. Looking at a google map as you said...sheesh wiz!!! What ya think you're looking at? Hundreds of acres? His houses are smack in the middle of residential neighborhoods..no places for tigers to live permanently, not enough room for them to live permanently, that's why they're housed at the Secret Garden. Well that, and to make money from their percentage of the ticket sales.
To long time Las Vegas resident: I'm not talking about the house in the older elite area of town where the mayor lives. I'm talking about three big properties outside the city limits.
And yes, I do know lots of legitimate big cat sanctuary operators, who are not worrying about the care of Sigfried & Roy's tigers and lions.
They are worried about the big cats at the canned hunt ranches in Texas and kept in people's houses or in the case of one clown in NYC, in his bathroom.
The bottom line is that you do not own Sigfried & Roy's big cats, so it is none of your f'ing business in terms of whether you "approve of" how they are housed or cared for. I suspect you are friends with or one of the former employees who wrote the "tell all book".
That's what's wrong with all animal-know-it-alls who are not veterinarians. How other people care for their animals, which are property in this state and most others, is simply none of your business.
If you want to do some good for animals in the world, volunteer your time to try to save the wild horses and burros the BLM is rounding up and killing.
Here we are spending time trying to get these marine mammals OUT of these places, and now they are bringing more in! In the words of Pete Seeger, "When will they ever learn, oh, when will they ever learn?" Marine mammals belong in the sea, not in aquariums. I don't care how big the facility is or what they are doing to "create a natural habitat", it's NOT the same as living in an ocean.
In the words of Jacques Cousteau, ""There is about as much educational benefit to be gained in studying dolphins in captivity as there would be studying mankind by only observing prisoners held in solitary confinement".
Free the Dolphins! Free Lolita!!! Free Corky!!!
Oh my sakes! CynicalObserver...puh leeze!
Don't take a public chat board so personal? What's wrong with you? Are you on medication?
Can't you discuss topics with some civility? Just remember that it's none of your business either, kindly and respectfully stop the harrassment of my posts. Go pick on the other posters who had more deragotory postings than mine.
For your information, I am a very active supporter of the wild burro and horses here in Nevada. I adopted a mustang that I keep in a boarding stable up towards Mt. Charleston. Do you pay for the care and upkeep of one of these animals? It's very expensive but I'm so grateful I am able to care for this beautiful wild animal and keep him happy and let him live a long, well cared for life! You really are getting nasty now, with foul language, so please stop and act normal.
Go take your meds now and calm down and stop minding other people's business.
To MarineNaturalist..good post! I agree with you.
Marine mammals belong in the sea, providing they were not raised in captivity. That's a different story in my opinion. A marine creature (or any animal for that fact), raised and fed by humans, doesn't have the capability of defending itself against its natural predators, it doesn't know how to catch its own food. Although I've read of stories that this can be accomplished, it's usually not a good idea to try and "free" an animal that was raised in captivity.
I agree with you also that no man-made marine enclosure or habitat is equal to the real thing.
I'm trying to figure out why only a handful of the world's governments are involved in this kind of decision. Seems well outside the boundaries of my government's Constitution... and the dolphins would surely do much better in a zoo than getting snagged in all the tuna fishermen's nets throughout the oceans.
Now I more carefully read all the comments... I am glad there are only three of you. I was starting to worry that I'd get a citation for keeping a Shetland Sheepdog named Shelbie here in the desert. She'd be dead, were it not for us, but it reads like you'd rather she die a long death of starvation and thirst rather than be adopted into an air-conditioned, home-cooked-meal environment with occasional short forays into the backyard for excretion.
Raising dolphins for display in a Casino Hotel, in the middle of the desert hundreds if not thousands of miles from there original habitat is simply cruel and done only for the purpose of raising revenue for the hotel. In fact its disgusting. The quote, "By breeding dolphins at the habitat, the Mirage could increase its dolphin population and continue ongoing research". This is a page right out of the Japanese whale research operation, where hundreds of whales are slaughtered for Japanese sushi under the cover of research. Frankly I don't see much difference here. I don't have any problem with the Tiger habitat, but this is one that is over the line as far as I am concerned. 14 dolphins have died there since the "habitat" has opened . This place is simply a prison for dolphins. Dolphins in the wild have been known to Migrate yearly hundreds of miles. Some dolphins known as local residence , reside in a area of 50 square miles. No dolphin is at home in a area of 4 small pools. Frankly to say that MGM Mirage must be very, very careful to take exceptionally good care of these dolphins, is a laughable statement. They can't. Its a pool in the desert.
You put it right angryreader !
why don't they import some fair slots. this is their answer to all thats wrong?. boy would like to see someones bonus for this earth shattering idea.
TO EVERYONE (especially CynicalObserver):
tl;dr
Synopsis, please?
Goingbust: are you trying to be funny when you say dolphins are "just fishes" - hope so, otherwise you're showing your ignorance.
Dolphins don't bring visitors to Vegas - looser slots and more affordable rooms, meals and entertainment does. Too bad MGM/Mirage and the rest of the industry doesn't realize that.
I can explian this in two words....
Campaign Contributions. The Corporations have way too much power in this country. It is all about money.
Oh, I know dolphins are mammals. So what.
So are pigs, sheep, cows, elk, deer, and bear. All quite tasty.
Being a mammal doesn't get you any sympathy from me.
Goingbust if thats all you can add to the debate then it shows how ignorant you are. The mammals you name are not endangered , they are not subject to a commercial ban on killing, they are not killed inhumanly [like the Japanese do] and so on.
Keeping wild dolphins in pools for the entertainment of humnas is sick. These animals live in family groups , have a highly structured communal living system. Ripping them out of their world into a concrete pool is not the actions of civilised people. The fact that they keep dying should prove that whoever grants permits does not have animal welfare at heart but have been bought by commercial interests.
Dave
Aotearoa-NZ
see my photos of what a wild dolphin can do when he has the choice.
Most dolphins are not at all endangered.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Dolp...
Conservation status: "Least Concern"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_being...
Conservation status: "Least Concern"
Who's ignorant now?