PETA insists Feld elephants are being moved, but admits it’s a ‘rumor’

Reports that Feld Entertainment will move most or all of its elephants from its Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Center for Elephant Conservation in Polk County to another facility are so far unconfirmed. In fact, even the organization that is the source of the information calls it “a rumor.”

“I have to admit that at the end of the day, it’s a rumor,” said Delcianna Winders, vice president of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals Foundation.

Still, Winders said, she’s pretty confident that the rumor is true.

“We’ve heard it from so many different sources that I’m pretty sure it’s accurate,” she said.

PETA states that Feld will be moving most of its elephants from the center to White Oak Conservation in Yulee. White Oak holds animals and then provides them to zoos when there is a demand for them, Winders said.

The rumors have come from “people in the zoo industry, people in the circus industry and visitors to White Oak,” Winders said.

Calls to White Oak Conservation have not been returned.

Feld Entertainment replied to the rumor only with a prepared statement: “The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Center for Elephant Conservation is still operating, and elephants are being cared for there.”

Palmetto-based Feld owns the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. The venerable circus ceased touring earlier this year.

The elephant center has been in operation since 1995. It has been home to dozens of retired circus elephants. In 2015, long before Feld announced that it was closing the Ringling Bros. Circus, it cut elephant performances from the circus shows and sent many of its elephants to the center.

PETA has long alleged that Ringling Bros. mistreats animals, and Winders said that PETA thinks moving the animals to White Oak would be a good thing.

“Frankly, those elephants could not be in any worse circumstances than they are right now,” she said. “Anything that gets them out of the center is a step up.”

Winders contends that many elephants at the center are chained for most of the day and that they are routinely handled with bullhooks. Bullhooks are metal goads that have been used by some elephant trainers, who prod elephants in sensitive parts of their animals’ bodies.

Feld officials did not comment on Winder’s allegations of mistreatment.

In 2014, Feld won a $25.2 million settlement from a number of animal-rights groups after a 14-year legal battle over allegations that Ringling Bros. employees had mistreated elephants.

This story was originally published July 18, 2017 at 4:20 PM with the headline "PETA insists Feld elephants are being moved, but admits it’s a ‘rumor’."