Summary
A baby red panda named Roxie at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland died from “stress caused by fireworks” after choking on her vomit, just days after her mother’s sudden death.
The incident, occurring around the U.K.’s Bonfire Night celebrations, has led to renewed calls for stricter fireworks regulations.
A petition with over a million signatures urging restrictions on public fireworks sales was submitted to the U.K. government.
Edinburgh recently implemented limited fireworks control zones, but animal welfare advocates argue for broader measures to prevent similar tragedies.
I’m dubious. Mom dies suddenly, then baby dies suddenly after choking on it’s own vomit. Yeah, no, let’s blame the fireworks. Surely, nothing else could be the cause of Red Panda deaths at this zoo.
Maybe they should have called some vet experts to investigate. Oh wait that is exactly what they did but I am sure people on the internets know more about animals. Not a big fan of zoos but people who armchair are magnitudes worse.
They didn’t call in an outside vet to investigate. The fucking zoo keepers are vets. The zoo keepers are telling you what happened. You can believe them or not, but it’s not accountability.
Check under the vet team here:
https://www.rzss.org.uk/conservation/meet-the-team
Professors, veterinary surgeons, veterinary nurses etc. Edinburgh zoo is not just your run of the mill local village zoo. So sorry buddy, I am sure you will understand if I still trust the word of these people on the matter and not you, a random person with distaste against zoos (not a big fan either to be honest). I mean this is not just any field as well, this is zoology. People usually get into it because they love animals and such. It is not completely impossible for someone in this field to lie to cover up but now it is just your personal distaste against zoos and human kind vs several very well trained people on the field… As I said, I am not a big fan of zoos either and somewhat undecided about conservatories (which is what “Edinburgh Zoo” actually is) but that does not make people working there terrible lying scum bags.
And no medical professional has ever been found to be biased in their opinion. And no reporter ever misrepresented what someone said to make a more sensational article. Stress is not a well understood thing. There is no test for confirming the source of stress. And the vets aren’t saying their is. Did the fireworks contribute, sure I would trust a vet who says that, and it was probably what they actually said. But a babies Mom dieing, and not being there to comfort the baby from the stress of fireworks is probably a bigger contributor. Also read a little further down where the expert says we can’t rule out fireworks as the cause. That is totally different. Seems like the vets don’t agree.
right and random strangers on the internet are completely unbiased and generally reasonable? It does not give one enough reason to completely disregard experts’opinions. vets are saying that it probably is a contributing factor whereas people in this thread are claiming that it is the zoo who is trying to cover up for bad conditions and negligence in the zoo. tell me which one sounds more reasonable?
Neither one has to be correct. One experts opinion is that they couldn’t rule it out. That sounds reasonable. I do think that the zoo bares some responsibility for bringing such a fragile species into a city. Zoo’s do a lot of good too. But they knew there would be fireworks. Where were they? Why wasn’t someone there to take the baby to it’s enclosure. Or sedate it during the fireworks. People do more for their adult dogs than the zoo did for this baby. I don’t think it’s a cover up or anything. They have lot’s of experts. They quoted the one that said the most sensational thing. I am not saying disregard the experts, I am saying a hand picked (by people with an agenda) sample size of one is not evidence of anything. I am willing to bet if you took a poll of all of the experts at that zoo, you would get a much less confident opinion, more like the “can’t rule it out” than the “fireworks killed the baby” person.
People do more for their adult dogs than the zoo did for this baby
The fact of the matter is that you or I don’t really have any information what the zoo did for this baby or did not. Most everything in this topic is pure speculation and has to do with more how people see the world through their eyes than any evidence or fact. The only piece of evidence we have is what the vet experts have said. Anything else is a huge “maybe”.
One experts opinion is that they couldn’t rule it out
That is a much stronger statement that, “fireworks was probably not the cause of this”. They could also have just gone with “stress due to loss of the mother” easily and no one would really think twice about it. But they did choose to make this statement. Experienced vet surgeons/nurses etc who have had the opportunity to experience how animals behave under these conditions many many times. Also mind you this one way the news has been reported, I have seen multiple instance where the wording is more stronger such as:
"Very sadly, she choked on her vomit on Bonfire Night and our vets believe this was probably a reaction to fireworks,” said Ben Supple, RZSS’s deputy chief executive. Roxie had access to her den but the frightening noises seem to have been too much for her. We are also concerned that fireworks cause stress to other animals in the zoo.”
I have seen remarks in this topic ranging from “their vets are just the zookepers” to “animals don’t vomit because of fireworks”. It is just ridiculous. Even these vet experts have not made their statements in such certainty as the people in this topic.
“But they did choose to make this statement” they answered a question honestly. They didn’t choose the question. And I agree we don’t know what the vets are actually saying. We know only what the media reports. Which is my point. People are putting words into the vets mouths that maybe one vet might say, but others clearly disagree with. The article doesn’t represent the vets (collective) point of view. So anyone saying the vets are wrong is mistaken because they don’t even know what the vets really think. And similar for saying the vets are right.
This is just sensational reporting. From the comments, it looks like it is working. Usesome of the critical thinking we ask trump supporters to use. Medical science isn’t at the point that it can know which source of stress caused a thing. And in this case the baby had also lost it’s mother, a source of comfort. And read the whole article. “We know that fireworks can cause stress to other animals in the zoo and we cannot rule out that they may have contributed to the untimely death of Roxie’s mother Ginger, just five days’ earlier.”
They don’t even know what killed the mother.
I am sure the fireworks were a contributing factor, but sounds like the baby was already in a weakened state.
We collectively need to get over this concept that media is accurately representing the truth with intent to inform. Media is a business. It’s intent is to make money. And with lot’s of competitors, it can only survive by making the stories it reports more sensational than they are (cause their competitors are doing it) to get the clicks. Some are better than others, but they all have to do it to survive.
I used to think fireworks were fun, but after getting a dog that is terrified of them, you start noticing all the little things.
People shoot then off randomly throughout the year. They leave behind garbage waste. Animals and even some humans seem to get PTSD from them.
I’m in favor of very limited fireworks in specific areas.
I’m a veteran and used to get worked up by them. It took a few years but I mostly got over it because they were predictable, the city put out notices as well as the local baseball team. And then they were legalized for a specific time frame for everybody. Any random asshole could buy and shoot off fireworks during a 3 day window.
Cool, I can hang with that. But then they shoot them off randomly for the 2 weeks surrounding the weekend that they’re allowed. That I can’t hang with. Especially during the day. Why the fuck are you shooting them off during the day anyways?!? You can’t see it! The thing that pisses me off the most? The motherfuckers shooting shit off at random times and days? Those assholes would happily suck my dick if I told them I’m a veteran and told them to do so. But then they’d fire off more fireworks to celebrate doing so.
That’s sad. Why are they selling baby red pandas?
Sale of Fireworks
Fireworks fucking suck & it’s exactly the assholes you expect who promote/buy/use them.
Yeah if man made noise is a problem for a species maybe don’t house them in the FUCKING CITY…
Here’s Another thought too. Zoos are notorious for animal cruelty issues. How about not have animals locked up cruelly for our entertainment.
😭
So susceptible to stres. Zoos often lack enough cover and “hide away” spots for them. Poor thing
Hey, if your country is overrun by red panda infestations, you know exactly what to do!
Die from cuteness overload?
No! Fireworks! 🎇🎆🎇🎇🎆. Just pop a whole bunch and your panda problems would be history. C’mon man 😂. We can save the world! From red pandas
but… I don’t want to save the world from red pandas.
I want to leave, and dying from cuteness overload sounds like not such a bad way to go.
Let me tell you the story of the great Knocrates. He was a Greek philosophy major from ancient UCLA. He really liked cute things and one day he was between two of the most beautiful tits women kind had ever grown. Look the point is that you probably don’t want cute 🥺🥰. It doesn’t last. Anyway you want Hot 🥵🔥🥵. You want 🔥!
You don’t hear about a great red panda browser. But you hear about Firefox a lot! See what I mean? So fireworks 🎆🎇🎇 it is!
Plz no. We are so cute. 🥺
"Veterinary experts at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland announced on Wednesday that a 3-month-old panda named Roxie died “due to stress caused by fireworks being let off across the city centre.”
Go on guys teach those no good experts how to do their jobs!
I feel the need to put the /s tag seeing the comments in this topic.
I find it immensely infuriating that the article’s byline shows they are reporting from ‘London’ when in fact this happened not just in a different city, Edinburgh, but in a completely different country, Scotland.
Sad about the pandas, there are far too many people that simply can’t be trusted with fireworks. Limiting it to a single night in dedicated display venues run by licensed organisations wouldn’t remove the noise entirely, but it would reduce the frequency and would probably help all animals.
I’m glad to hear these little red dudes aren’t extinct yet, tbh.
Me too.
A lot of people in the comment here are being pretty obtuse, I’m doubtful many are even from the UK and understand the scale of celebrations with Guy Fawks and Divali being so close together this year
We’re super cute, so you’d expect that people would want to keep us around, but our existence is still endangered. Please don’t scare us to death.
Signed:
- A fuzzy red panda
Says it was the “fireworks causing stress” that killed it not imprisoning a wild animal in a foreign environment. I am having a hard time blaming the fireworks here.
Fireworks and red pandas have both existed at the same time for hundreds of years. Red pandas first discovered in 1825 by a French zoologist. One would assume it didn’t just blink into existence (however, I can’t prove it). Fireworks came about around 200 BC.
One would presume that there’s been a lot of overlap.
It’s possible the fireworks exacerbated a problem but it’s not the root cause.
