Killer Whale kills trainer.

Since I grew up on a large sheep farm in the North of Scotland, I have been aware of the bad things we do to animals. Growing up close to nature gives you a unique understanding of all the wild things around us both animal and mineral and plants. I was always amazed by the power of nature, and also how nature could be beautiful one minute and then appear to be cruel the next. In winter we often saw the result of snowstorms that took the lives of wild animals. Down by the river below our house I often watched otters, and marvelled at their beauty and grace, until one day I found a Salmon with a big chunk missing behind it’s head, and it was explained to me that the Otter would only eat that bit of the Salmon. Then I realised that the Otter was performing in that way to feed it’s own young and survive. We also took Salmon and deer to feed our selves in winter. What it left me with wherever I travelled in the world was an understanding of the balance of nature and tremendous respect for it. It also angered me when I witnessed man's cruelty to wild animals, usually for financial gain, or to flatter their ego.

The shocking news today that a trainer in Florida was killed by a killer whale, whilst talking to an audience who had paid to see the whale perform tricks to entertain them left me with the same feeling. Sympathy for the lassie that was killed but revulsion for the mentality that thinks it is OK to cage wild animals and make them perform tricks to entertain fat lazy humans. These animals are usually coerced into these tricks by giving a reward when the trick is performed or more usually inflicting pain on the animal.

The clue is in the name of the animal. Killer Whale. It is the natural instinct of these animals to leap out of the water and take seals or other animals for food, of the beach; in the same way we fish for food. Whales are widely regarded as being very intelligent, I will go along with that, and further suggest that this poor trapped animal harboured resentment towards the person who it knew best, and that it saw it’s chance to kill and took it. I sincerely hope that this poor trapped animal is given it’s freedom, and that it is trained to survive in the wild ocean it does not know. Zoos and animal enclosures have no place in a civilised society and should be banned. Reservations are the way to preserve and maintain the populations we want to preserve, not bloody cages and chains.