"When the Show's Over for Hollywood Chimps."

The Tuesday, March 22 Los Angeles Times has a story on the front page of the Metro Section headed, "When the Show's Over for Hollywood Chimps." It is also on the New York Newsday, and South Florida Sun-Sentinel websites.

It opens:

"Ollie and Buddy, the chimpanzees shot dead earlier this month after they viciously attacked a couple at a Kern County animal sanctuary, had been retired from show business after having spent their early years working for one of Hollywood's top animal trainers.

"Their background underscores how tough a business Hollywood can be for chimps these days and how hard it is to find a place for them to live once their performing days are over.

"The 11-year-old male chimps had been sent to Animal Haven Ranch in Havilah seven years ago after they grew too strong and unpredictable to work with humans. Chimps are used in the entertainment industry only for the first few years of their lives because they become too difficult to handle, animal experts said.

"Many end up spending the rest of their lives — which can be another 50 years — in sanctuaries similar to the one in Kern County. Others, animal rights activists fear, end up being used for medical research."

There is good news:

"But in recent years, the demand for live chimps and other simians has declined as digital animation allows filmmakers and TV producers to create their likenesses on computers. The chimps and other animals in Eddie Murphy's remake of 'Dr. Dolittle,' for example, were computer-generated."

You can read the whole story on line at: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-chimps22mar22,0,7405519.story?coll=la-home-local
OR http://tinyurl.com/5ezao

The story gives us an opportunity to write letters against the use of any wild animals for human entertainment. A good resource on the Chimp Issue is http://www.chimpcollaboratory.org/projects/pubed.asp

The Los Angeles Times take letters at: letters [at] latimes.com (Include your name, address, and phone number.) Newsday takes letters at: http://cf.newsday.com/newsdayemail/email.cfm
And the Sun Sentinel takes letters at: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/sfl-letterseditor.customform

Yours and the animals',
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. If you forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts, please do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this tag line.)