Outrage over the recent killing of a healthy giraffe at a Danish zoo misses a crucial point, an official argued. "Conservation is not always simple. It's not always clean," said Lesley Dickie, executive director of the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, a European body governing 345 institutions. "I'm afraid that when we have limited space in zoos -- and it's limited because of problems in the wild, of course, and more and more animals need our help -- then we sometimes have to make these really tough decisions." The Copenhagen Zoo said it "euthanized" the animal, named Marius, to avoid inbreeding. A veterinarian shot Marius with a rifle as he leaned down to munch on rye bread, a favorite snack. After a necropsy, the giraffe was dismembered in front of an audience that included children and fed to the zoo's lions, tigers and leopards.
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Copenhagen Zoo staff get death threats
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Those outraged don't understand zoo protocol, "Danish culture," official says
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Copenhagen Zoo said it shot Marius with rifle, fed his carcass to zoo's carnivores
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Killing sparked outrage, with many people expressing revulsion on Facebook
In the @placeholder's history, which dates to the early 1800s, its member zoos have put down only five giraffes, Dickie said.