At the Muller Circus, tiger cubs are born, exhibited and then disappear year after year...
In October 2021, whistleblowers alerted us to the fact that the Muller family, the owners exploiting Jumbo, were exhibiting a tiger cub to the public, and even allowing them to be touched. Our investigators went to the site and found two of them. This constitutes mistreatment and an offense. And what’s happening to the cubs? We are lodging a new complaint against the circus and putting the Drôme DDPP on notice.
Circuses are supposed to obey rules. In this case, it’s the decree of March 18, 2011. Each trainer has a license for certain animal species, and a maximum number is set. Muller has for instance a hippopotamus, Jumbo, and tigers. But not everything is allowed! These animals must all participate in the show (which is often far from being the case), otherwise why subject them to transport and confinement in cage trucks? As for the shows themselves, they must follow certain rules: no exhibition of tiger cubs, for example, in the decree authorizing the opening of this circus! But that’s exactly what our investigators witnessed! Cubs just a few weeks old, separated from their mothers at an early age, dragged brusquely from their cages by one paw, then groped by the audience.
Welfare, safety and health: trampled underfoot by trainers
Handling tiger cubs in particular is totally contrary to the well-being of the babies, but a simple separation is already a problem for both the cubs and their mother.
Such interactions are strictly forbidden. For safety reasons, of course, but also for health reasons: diseases, known as zoonoses when they are transmissible from one species to another, can be transmitted. What the Muller Circus is doing even goes against the recommendations of the European Association of Zoos and Aquariums (EAZA).
How, under such conditions, can we expect children to see animals – particularly tigers, whose species is disappearing – as anything other than objects at their disposal? How can we hope to protect the planet if nature is objectified in this way?
For the baby tigers and their mother, we have lodged a complaint against the circus for mistreatment by an operator, irregular exploitation and detention methods likely to cause suffering.
What happens to the babies? Do they feed the traffic?
What’s more, as we’ve already said in other cases, we’re deeply concerned about the fate of these babies. At Parc Saint Léger, at Mario Masson‘s, at Triomphe, Paris, Idéal or Gougeon cousins’ Italiano circuses: what happens to the babies after a few weeks? A few months? After all, circuses cannot exceed the number of felines authorized in each opening decree. And although the births are always described as “unusual”, there are still some every year. What happens to them, then, since circus performers have to give them up, or even get rid of them, on pain of being fined?
We are also putting the Drôme prefecture (DDPP department) on notice to find out how many births have taken place in this circus, and what has happened to the animals. The bill on animal mistreatment (PPL Animaux) only provides that breeding be prohibited in traveling circuses within two years. This will do nothing to help these baby big cats, victims of this and other forms of trafficking, such as ending up in a taxidermist’s shop where their remains are sold for tens of thousands of euros!
Two proceedings are therefore underway: one criminal, the other administrative.