Endangered Animals

Stossel investigates methods of protecting endangered animals.

Educators are encouraged to visit www.StosselInTheClassroom.org to order their own free Stossel In The Classroom DVDs or to watch additional videos streamed live from the site which didn't make the cut to be on the DVD with questions. The DVDs not only include these videos, but also worksheets and activity ideas. (Video taken from Stossel In The Classroom, though this account is unaffiliated with Stossel In The Classroom, ABC, the Center for Independent Thought, and/or John Stossel.)

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Endangered Animals
• Animal Conservation
• Tiger Farms
• Saving Animals
• Stossel In The Classroom

[hcger77]

farming chickens and bison are totally different than farming tigers. should the owner of a prospective tiger farm be responsible for any human lives lost when and if a tiger escapes? Most farmers only raise docile animals and this is not a concern. would farmers resort to feeding the tiger inferior food as they do on traditional farms thus decreasing the quality of life? Tigers require mass amounts of meat daily. Where would this come from? Does one solution create another problem?

[StosselClassroom]

@hcger77 An interesting reply. Stossel's video addresses concerns over whether or not freer markets could save tigers, not whether or not tiger farming is detrimental overall. I think he has, at least, proven the former. In response to your first question, the owners would be liable for damages caused by the tiger, just as a zoo is. The tiger's nutrition, however, would probably not be too much a concern to farmers except to have the tiger fit enough to be harvested - same with cows/chickens.

[StosselClassroom]

Worth noting tigers are not harvested as a food source, but to use tiny amounts of the tiger for its alleged use in traditional Chinese medicine. It may be a valid argument the value of these products is created only because they are illegal, similar to why the prices of marijuana or gun-shaped lighters are so high relative to the cost to manufacture. Because of this, tiger farms may actually NOT be viable in a free market because the price may drop too low to justify the risk of farming tigers.

[ecuadmail]

@StosselClassroom What about the african locals owning their rhinos?

[StosselClassroom]

@ecuadmail The poaching which's been going on lately in S. Africa is unsustainable, if that's what you're getting at. It's a bad business move to kill off your money-makers. S.A. conservation organizations appear to lack either the funding or competence to protect the rhinos. As poaching is already illegal, and smuggling the horns illegal as well - with both prosecuted, it's obvious having government handle it has failed. I wonder how far a farmer'd go to protect his precious horn-growers.

[Jeswise22]

@hcger77 The USDA does regulate tiger owners, and they DO have to have special training, are required to be bonded and insured and a whole host of other regulations. For more information, search "Feline Conservation Federation" and "an inCATvienent truth"

Thanks.

[rehwr]

@hcger77 Somaybe people shouldn't own hogs, because hogs kill more people than tigers!

[1993rrrrr]

what stossel forgets is the concern of tigers diminishing in the wild. His proposition of farming them will basically lead to their domestication when the problem is their disappearance from their natural habitat. and he forgets how the tiger population and population of other wild animals also are decreasing because of deforestation

[breakingthe4thwall]

Clearly farming cows has made them extinct.

*rolls eyes*

[ANBUwarrior13]

This actually makes sense.

[poop2poop2]

@micahstork If done it would probably be a scenario similar to rhinos in Africa. Breed Tigers in captivity, release them onto land and let people in the area have a stake in keeping them alive. Although that is China so the whole property rights issue arises