Send Happy to Sanctuary!

Action Alert

Take Action to Help #FreeHappy

This month marks the 45th year that Happy has been imprisoned at the Bronx Zoo. After almost a lifetime in captivity, 51-year-old Happy deserves to be freed from the Bronx Zoo and sent to an elephant sanctuary.

Science and human experience make clear that elephants are autonomous animals. They are cognitively, emotionally, and socially complex beings who have the capacity to exercise free will and make choices about how to spend their days and live their lives, just as human beings do. Forcing an elephant like Happy to live alone in a small unnatural environment, where she is prevented from exercising free will and engaging in her innate behaviors, causes physical and emotional suffering.

It's time for the Bronx Zoo to send Happy to an elephant sanctuary where she can live freely with other elephants in an environment that is similar to her natural habitat.

TAKE ACTION NOW

Please email the newest ex-officio trustees of the Wildlife Conservation Society—New York City Council Speaker Adrienne E. Adams, Bronx Borough President Vanessa L. Gibson, New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, and Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso—and ask that they urge the Bronx Zoo to send Happy to an elephant sanctuary.

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Please urge the Bronx Zoo to send Happy the elephant to a sanctuary

Hello,

As an elected official representing New York City residents and an ex-officio trustee of the Wildlife Conservation Society, you are in a powerful position to help secure the release of Happy—a 51-year-old Asian elephant who has spent 45 years in captivity at the Bronx Zoo—to a sanctuary where she can live freely with other elephants.

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The Bronx Zoo, by forcing Happy to live a solitary life on display in a small enclosure, has deprived her of the freedom and environmental stimuli necessary to meet her physical, psychological, and social needs. As Dr. Joyce Poole, one of the foremost authorities on elephants, wrote in a New York Daily News op-ed, “Simply put, the Bronx Zoo’s exhibit is too small to meet the needs of Happy or any elephant. Happy deserves to live the rest of her life at one of [the] two [US elephant] sanctuaries, where the utmost care will be given to her individual needs and she’ll have the space and conditions needed to heal and to form psychologically necessary bonds with other elephants.”

Happy has the opportunity to follow in the footsteps of other elephants who, having suffered for years in solitary confinement as she has, thrived when released to sanctuaries like The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee and the Performing Animal Welfare Society.

The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), which manages the Bronx Zoo, committed to closing its elephant exhibit upon the death of one or more of its elephants, which happened over two years ago when it euthanized Maxine. Today, Happy and another elephant, Patty, each live alone in separate parts of the exhibit.

Now is the time for the WCS to follow through on its promise and close the elephant exhibit. Please join Dr. Joyce Poole, numerous celebrities such as Mia Farrow, and almost 1.5 million people who signed a petition calling for Happy’s freedom in urging the Bronx Zoo to release Happy to an elephant sanctuary.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely, [Your information here]