I have a wildlife zoo

What kind of deer are we actually keeping here?

Fang Ye glanced at the sign on the fence and didn't know what to say.

Milu deer!

In an exhibit area paved with rough, uneven red bricks and devoid of even a few trees, there were actually milu deer, a national first-class protected animal.

Milu deer are also known as "hodgepodge four". Their wide primary hooves and well-developed side hooves allow them to walk and move in swamps. Their long and hairy tails are useful for driving away bothersome insects.

Their suitable habitat is wetlands and marshlands where they would bow their heads to graze on the green grass!

But now they could only shrink in the shadow of the sign to avoid the sun, which was too pitiful!

At least plant a few more trees in the exhibit area.

Milu deer in this kind of environment, how are they different from the livestock like pigs and sheep raised in the countryside?

Maybe even the pigs and sheep have it better. Breeders fear heatstroke in pigs might make them lose money, so they wouldn't just leave the pigs out in the sun.

A child expressed his disappointment, "I can't see clearly..."

The confident parent beside him said, "No problem, watch me make them move."

He picked up a small stone from the ground and threw it towards the milu deer.

The milu deer seemed to have grown accustomed to harassment and stone-throwing and gauged the small stone's threat before ignoring it.

The parent picked up another stone. Out of professional habit, Lan Li wanted to speak up and stop him, but Fang Ye noticed and pulled her hand, giving a gentle shake of his head.

Although Lan Li didn't understand why, she cooperated and remained silent.

This time, the milu deer gave in a little, as two of them dodged and shifted their positions.

"They moved! They moved!" The child cheered happily.

Fang Ye sighed and shook his head repeatedly as he continued walking forward.

Having moved away from the parents and child, Lan Li asked somewhat puzzled, "Director, why didn't you let me stop them just now?"

Fang Ye gave a wry smile and said, "Look at the condition of this exhibit, it's so poor, even a countryside vegetable garden is better than this. Can we really expect visitors to respect and cherish animals in such an environment?

The animal keepers here don't step in. If you, as a visitor, try to admonish someone over this, they'll surely think you're meddling and won't take kindly to it. If they confront you and you end up crying out of frustration, what then?"

"Oh, we're here to see the animals, not to cause trouble."

Lan Li understood the reasoning and nodded obediently, not wanting to spoil her date with the director.

Fang Ye explained further, "Public education should be approached in a way that people can accept. Uncivilized behavior is wrong, but people like to hear what they want to hear and don't like to hear what they don't want to hear. Even if you are right, if they don't want to listen, what can you do?"

It sounds like a pointless statement!

But in fact, this is the case with most things in the world.

People's obsessions run deep. Once a concept about something takes root, it's hard to change, no matter what you say.

If you try to pull someone's ear and tell them what's wrong and that they shouldn't do this or that, it often triggers their defiance and may cause them to become even more stubborn and extreme.

So it's all about the approach and method.

At Linhai Zoo, there was little effect in discouraging feeding by visitors at first. The visitors who were discouraged either didn't care or were upset inside.

Now, by providing animals with good living conditions and seeing for themselves how healthy and happy the animals are in such an environment, visitors can make their own comparisons with previous zoos they've visited. They will come to realize what a good zoo should be like, and that animals don't have to perform – simply exhibiting their natural behavior is fascinating enough.

Seeing with their own eyes is crucial!

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With introduction panels explaining the harms of feeding, such uncivilized behavior as feeding would naturally lessen, and the animal keepers' efforts at persuasion would become more convincing.

Changing people's mindsets is a gradual, imperceptible, and slow process; some things take time to develop, as the saying goes, "Rome wasn't built in a day."

After crossing a pretty stone bridge over a stream, Fang Ye couldn't help but frown, while Lan Li hurriedly pinched her nose.

It stinks so much!

The water here was green, not the clear green reflection of the grass and trees on the shore, but a murky green with a white tinge, giving off a foul, fishy odor.

There were hardly any visitors staying around this area.

The two ran across quickly, and Lan Li finally let go of her nose, exhaled a breath of air, yet still had a pained expression, "It smells terrible, how could it be like this…"

Fang Ye shook his head, "It's a dead pool of water with no circulation, no self-purification, of course it'll stink."

It was clear that the park wanted to create a scenic view with little bridges over flowing water, but the result was murky, filthy and as dirty as a drainage ditch.

Just as they were about to leave, Fang Ye suddenly noticed animals were being kept inside the stream!

The woods were enclosed with nets about a meter high, and standing at the shore was a bird mostly white in color, with black feathers at the tips of its wings, red narrow legs, gazing into the distance.

In the nearby stream lay a dead fish with its white belly turned up; the fish couldn't survive in such an environment, probably dumped there by an animal keeper, but it showed no interest in eating at all.

It was also a national first-class protected animal, the Oriental stork!

The Oriental stork is a gracefull large wading bird, but in this foul-smelling environment, its white feathers were filthy and unkempt, losing all semblance of grace.

Despite the foul-smelling squalor, at least there was grass and trees; comparing it with the deer enclosure, which was utterly barren except for scalding red bricks, it was hard to say which was better.

Lan Li, looking at the bird, said with compassion, "Such a poor red-crowned crane..."

Fang Ye was immediately startled, "Red-crowned crane? Isn't that an Oriental stork?"

Because the zoo had expanded and added a few lakes, he had planned to create a Waterfowl Lake, so he studied and learned some knowledge about water birds.

The red-crowned crane and the Oriental stork do look somewhat alike, but he remembered that the red-crowned crane's neck is black.

He quickly activated the Eye of Observation to check.

[Oriental Stork: ??

Age: 3 years

Mood: Poor

Health state: Not good]

"Huh?" Lan Li blinked in confusion, pointing to an information panel hanging on a tree beside her, which indeed was labeled as red-crowned crane.

"Damn, even the information panel is wrong..."

Fang Ye shook his head repeatedly, at a loss for words.

Looking more closely at the panel, half of the text description was about distribution, with only a brief mention of habits and reproduction towards the end.

Since all the content was condensed onto this single panel, could the distribution be mentioned a bit less, focusing more on habits?

Suddenly thinking of something, he pulled out his phone to search, and sure enough, it was a direct copy from Baidu Encyclopedia...

Wow, using Baidu Encyclopedia for reference is fine, but to lift it directly is really not afraid of copying mistakes!

However, the sign underneath did say "Please do not feed," probably the only reassuring thing there.

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