Bronx Zoo elephant Happy spotted in public for first time in weeks — with ‘significant damage’ to feet, activists say?
Whether she’s happy or not is apparently up for debate.
Happy, the famous Bronx Zoo Asian elephant, was recently spotted in public for the first time in nearly 10 weeks — and sparked concern from the activist group that monitors her well-being.
A photo posted to the Nonhuman Rights Project Instagram account on Wednesday showed the pachyderm laying down in a sand pit inside her enclosure — a pattern of behavior which “isn’t normal” for Happy — with “significant damage” to her feet, the post’s caption read.
“As far as is known, this pattern of lying down in the exhibit yard isn’t normal for Happy,” the activists at the NhRP wrote.
“From the time we began monitoring this exhibit in 2018 until her disappearance from view this summer, we and our sources only ever observed Happy in a standing position in this yard.”
The zoo, however, maintains that Happy is in tip-top shape — and that the NhRP isn’t as attune to her needs as the zoo’s expert team.
“They know nothing of the individual elephant, her likes, dislikes or habits,” a spokesperson for the Bronx Zoo told The Post Thursday.
“It’s quite normal for healthy elephants to lie down and actually shows she is comfortable and feels secure in that area,” the spokesperson said, adding that there are “no serious issues” with Happy’s feet — and that any nail cracks are managed with routine pedicures.
Meanwhile, the NhRP called the zoo’s comments “minimizing” of the elephant’s ailments and contends Happy is anything but.
“Free-living elephants don’t need foot treatment or “pedicures,” and foot disease is one of the leading causes of captive elephant death,” Lauren Choplin, the communications director for NhRP, told The Post.
“She’s stuck in a tiny exhibit which can’t meet her physical or emotional needs or the needs of any elephant,” Choplin added.
“If the Bronx Zoo truly cared about elephants’ freedom of choice, she and Patty would be in a sanctuary already.”
The drama began in mid-July when the NhRP sounded alarms over Happy’s apparent disappearance from the public eye. In a July 31 statement, the Bronx Zoo contended “nothing is wrong with Happy” and concluded the elephant “has been choosing to not go out into the area visible from the monorail.”
“For some reason, she recently chose not to go out into the exhibit space during the day,” a Bronx Zoo spokesperson elaborated to The Post Thursday, “preferring to hang back by the barn, and we let her do what she wanted.”
The zoo said Happy finally returned to the area visible to monorail riders last week.
The NhRP has been fighting for Happy’s freedom since 2018, perhaps most famously taking Happy’s captivity case up to the New York Court of Appeals (which concluded in 2022 when the court ruled that Happy isn’t a person under the law).
The Bronx Zoo spokesperson pointed out that the USDA recently conducted an inspection in response to a complaint from the NhRP, which found no issues with Happy or any other elephants living at the zoo.
“Something is wrong with Happy,” the activist group wrote this summer after filing the Animal Welfare Act Complaint with the USDA on behalf of the elusive elephant.
“Happy’s confinement indoors for at least a week is deeply concerning and we fear that physical and psychological distress that she has suffered from for decades is now reaching a point of crisis.”
The Bronx Zoo paints a very different picture of the pachyderm’s psychological state, pointing The Post to a video taken last week of Happy appearing “relaxed and taking a dust bath.”
“Despite some reports, she is not confined indoors and has access to indoor and outdoor spaces,” the spokesperson added, “and she chooses where she wants to be.”
