HUNTERS IN CADILLACS DECIMATED ORYX
In my years as PR director of the San Diego Zoo, the worst case of human decimation of a beautiful animal species occurred in Saudi Arabia.
During the early ’60s, rich Arab hunters chased this animal through the desert in their Cadillacs and shot them with high-powered rifles.
How sporting was that, folks?
I’m talking about the princely Arabian Oryx, once hunted to extinction in the wild.
These strikingly beautiful antelope have long, slender horns and used to move in small, mixed groups or large herds of 100 or more, searching for food and water.
Sadly, this native of the Arabian Peninsula and Sinai Desert was gone from the wild by the late ’60s.
Later, In a heroic effort to help save these animals, nine of the species from private collections in Aman, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, as well as from the London Zoo, were moved to the Phoenix Zoo in Arizona. These nine animals were known as the World Herd.
A second breeding group of three oryx, from a zoo in Saudi Arabia, was started in the Los Angeles Zoo, and in the 1970s, animals from both of these herds were sent to the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park. By 1991, an amazing 239 Arabian oryx had been born at the park!
In one of the great success stories of conservation, Arabian oryx have been returned to Oman and Jordan for reintroduction in their native range.
It’s a proud chapter in the zoo’s history that I will always remember.