Five pair of eyes blink into the light when the door of the rusty horsetrailer swings open. Complaints about chicken wandering around free have directed inspectors of the AID (Dutch governmental Animal Inspection Service) to a house in Brummen, in the province of Gelderland, on a day in August. In the back yard an unexpected find is made in the trailer: in a cage made from concrete slabs, five adult baboons (Papio hamadryas, Lat.) crawl together in fear. "The smell was beyond words", inspector Jan Reijngoud says. "The animals must have been inside there for months. There was a huge layer of shit, they hung in the fence to try and stay dry. One female monkey had only a small stump of her tail left. Another monkey had grown crooked, as if it had been living in too small a cage for years on. A third monkey had its guts hanging out. Their only access to water was a bowl outside the cage that they could grab for." Owner of the baboons is 34 years old Bernard E., a merchant. "I'll trade in anything", he explains. "Scrap iron, rafters, animals. Look here, I had five hundred geese, the other guy had five baboons. Seemed like a good deal to me." According to him the monkeys came from Belgium and had only been kept in the cage for a few days yet. "They were only here for a short while for a film shot". To the managing director of the AAP Foundation David van Gennep they are the hundred-somethingth guests. "Film shots", he sneers. "Those baboons were much too frightened and agressive. They have been dumped, probably come from a zoo and consequently ended up in the rag-and-bone business.

They breed animals, but regularly don't have enough space for them. The "young life in the zoo" that attracts millions of parents and children every year and often brings the gardens extensive media exposure, is hard to get rid of. Even in zoos animals are born of which it is known in advance that there'll be no room for them. Such animals are called "the overspill". What is prohibited in Germany, happens in almost every Dutch zoo: protected animals, young as well as old ones, are being put to sleep if the zoo cannot find a place for them elsewhere. Monkeys, felines, bears, antelopes -species sometimes of endangered wildlife- await a bullet or a deadly injection. What can be eaten, is being fed to the predators. Next to that, both living as well as dead animals disappear into the trade circuit. Or they are being dumped, far away, in zoological gardens in Sofia, Caïro and the Ukraine; they never seem to become overcrowded. It is the different reality in gardens where, for the public, bears are being called sweet names such as Vetje "little fat-one" or Oogje "little eye", while behind the scenes cheetahs disappear (Dierenpark Amersfoort). Animals have "little babies", as cheerful leaflets put it, and polarbear cubs are called Taco and Winner, but nobody gets to hear that young monkeys are being sold to Czechia or Poland (Diergaarde Blijdorp, Rotterdam). In the annual report it is called "memorable that the spider monkeys have babies", but the public is not made aware that due to "overpopulation" white-snout nosebears end up in the freezer (Noorder Dierenpark, Emmen).

"Yes, that's a major problem", says zoobroker or merchant in zoo-animals John Hop from Ermelo. "Male animals f.i. are in a delicate position anyhow. As soon as they grow older they menace the group. Many animals live in groups with one male. But just as many males as females are born. What that means? Dont't ask me." A veterinary surgeon who works for large zoo, anonimously, says: "That can mean you send a bullet through their head, in order to be able to feed them to the predators because after putting them to sleep, you can't. It is still a taboo. If it concerns monkeys, bears or lions emotion turns up as a factor. It is pitiful than. But people do eat meat themselves, that's hypocrisy."
Officially everything is under control. The eleven major zoo's have united in the Dutch Union of Zoos (NVD). They take a pride in the fact that they meet the high demands regarding housing and medical care as well as education for the public. Euthanasia is extremely exceptional and only takes place with seriously ill or old animals. The fate of animals is even so important that the zoos state they are no longer in business with merchants. Instead they try to exchange animals through a network of 250 "improved" European gardens (EAZA).

It is a remarkable breach, the one with the zoobrokers. During tenths of years they were the solid business partners of every park. The broker supplied the animals. In autumn he came and collected all the overspill. On German television a 1995 program by journalist Stephan Eckhart showed this practice for the very first time. Young bears and tigers were being collected from respected zoos. In order to meet the prohibition on killing them in Germany itself, they were transported to Belgium. A secret camera recorded how the animals were shot dead at a knackery. This practice still continues. Dutch zoos too have historical bonds with skinners. "There were bad experiences", managing director A. Dorresteyn of Blijdorp explains the turning down of brokers. "Animals went to different destinations than was agreed upon". That way a young rhino of the Safaripark Beekse Bergen (Hilvarenbeek) vanished after having been deported to Spain by a zoobroker. "The animal was later discovered in a circus, where it trotted about with a partyhat on.", says safaripark director Wim Verberkmoes.
But what happens now than with the overspill? "A good zoo has hardly any overspill", says Koen Brouwer who is employed with the NVD bureau (Dutch Union of Zoos) and the European zoo-network EAZA, with its residence in Amsterdam. "Animals get the pill by way of contraception, or one separates the males and females. With birds you can shake the eggs. Furthermore European zoos have an increasing number of breeding programmes. In pedigree-books it is registered how many animals of a species exist within the gardens and which animals can be allowed to have offspring. In that way redundancy and breeding-in are being prevented and we don't have to lend on merchants or capture animals from wildlife." But that is what zoos dream about.

Animal attendant Ria is willing to talk, but without making mention of her name. "Everybody has nasty experiences, but to talk about it is not done, than you're out of it. It is a beautiful profession, and for each attendant ten others are waiting." She tells about two old bears, shop servants. Noorder Dierenpark made its apologies for some time: the animals could not be removed from their old den for that would mean their death. "Later a sign was put up that said they'd been taken into some breeding programme elsewhere. In fact they went to the skinner".
Another example: the tiger that was moved on to an other zoo. Some months later the exposition-hall of the zoo was brightened up with a - stuffed - tiger. Ria: "It was the same animal ! They'd had her killed. You hear nice stories and you want to believe them, but they're lies." During the conversation she is gravely worried about a panther, Sherl, who is about to be euthanised. Ria is not the only animal attendant who speaks shame upon it. "Redundant animals, whether young or animals too old to breed with, are being killed. Usually in september when the season is over and fewer visitors come", is the opinion of old hands from Artis, Blijdorp and Noorder Dierenpark.
Also they call it 'horrible' that animals are being sent to 'saddening' zoos. F.e. Artis gave a group of bears to the Dubai zoo, whereupon a very much wanted sloth-bear came to Amsterdam. "Out there they do performances with dressed-up chimpanzees. Only four of the bears are still present. Where is the rest of them? Dead?"
Theo van Hilst of Wolvenopvang Nederland (wolves asylum) is an outsider, but also wrinkles his eyebrows now and again. Burgers Zoo in Arnhem kept a population of eleven wolves for many years. "A protected animal" he says. "But all of a sudden six of them had gone. They had not been moved to an other zoo, they had vanished. We asked after them, but the reaction was "What concern is it to you! Those animals have been euthanised."
Arno van de Valk of the Pantera Foundation, sheltering tigers, lions and bears on a farm in the Dutch province of Friesland, says: "Eighty percent of our animals was born in zoos. Often they have first lived in a circus or nightclub". The remarkable thing is, he says, that in his shelter only foreign animals are being kept. "They come from Germany, Belgium and France. But Dutch zoos don't bring any animals, because dumped lions generate bad publicity. Such animals are being exposed of in silence".
Van Gennep, of the AAP Foundation: Overspill is a European problem. "Some animals from zoos -the rare ones- are worth a fortune. But many of them are impossible to sell anywhere. Such as the baboons, a yearly twenty to thirty of which are being born in the Noorder Dierenpark. For brown bears or lions also no-one is waiting. Lately it is mainly the felines -lynxes, ocelots, panthers, pumas- that are hard to find a place for, at least with zoos. For a mara (Dolichotis patagonum), a super guinea-pig from Patagonia, they spare themselves even the effort.

The popularity of each animal species can be clearly read from the long list with overspill and the wishes that the EAZA-zoos send each other. It is a confidential list, eagerly wanted by merchants, by means of which zoos try to promote exchanges. The summing up of animals that gardens want to get rid of is enormous. Gerard Baars, director of Ouwehands Dierenpark in Rhenen: "Sometimes you have them listed that way for years on, and never get any reaction." Obvious causes for the surplusses can by the way be pointed at. "Zoos want larger groups of one species", says broker Hop. "That means other species are being cleared away. Moreover animals get out of fashion. People by now know the bear, chimpanzee or Java-monkey." And next to that there are the breeding programmes (EEP's). To participate in them means status. So zoos replace non-thoroughbred animals by true-bred ones. The non-thoroughbred disappear to smaller gardens, to Africa and Eastern European countries, or to merchants who think it'll pay, dead or alive. "And if replacing redundant animals takes too much money, they are being euthanised. They go for the cheapest solution", says Hop. "Many zoos have a hard time making both ends meet".

The number of hybrids (bastards) and inbred-animals in the European zoos is enormous. Even cross-breeding of lions and tigers occurs: the ligers. In many cases the zoo-variant genetically only has a whimp of its wild congener. Dorresteyn of Blijdorp zoo: "Through decades breeding was done at random. If a couple could have offspring, is was allright. So you see bastards of Siberian and Sumatran tigers, of Sumatran orang-oetans mixed with the ones from Borneo. At present the zoos let them extinguish." Amongst the bastards specifically giraffes, zebra's and lions are the meltingpots of species and underspecies that no-one is waiting for. Yet 'ashtray-lions' are still being born, in Burgers Zoo for instance. "We've been looking for years already if we can get rid of the lion troupe", zoo manager Joep Wensing says. "Impopular species we'd like to loose".

The zoological gardens claim to strive for the maintenance of animal species, for that reason the breeding programmes exist. It is a "Noah's Arc" plan: when a species is about to extinguish in the wild, still some of them are being kept in the zoo and may be can be placed back in the wilderness someday. Therefore it is tried to establish animals that genetically look a lot like their congeners in wildlife. Placing such animals back into real nature is by the way no easy job: many projects woefully fail. The noble motivations on the other hand also result in high numbers of protected animals, such as tigers, becoming redundant due to the fact that they are not pure-bred. The largest gardens meanwhile brought back the number of bastards to a minimum, by way of export and euthanasia. Other gardens are still filled up with them. The vet: "A liger is the best example, that is a monster of nature. But our raccoons are also crap genetically, theirs is a dying story. Killing them is not yet necessary, the room they occupy is not yet needed to house other animals. But in fact you leave them there in the interest of the attendants who are emotionally tied up with them".

A great many zoos by the way actively breed raccoons. Merchants can easily place them: common people have discovered the animal. In terms of business a good lion is ever so often a dead lion. Also a dead tiger or bear raises more money than a living one. In Belgium specialised buyers of zoo-animals are active, who collect the animals from all over Europe. In Liège the "warehouse" of Jean-Pierre Gerard is based. In a barak on the outskirt of the town he shoots lions, tigers, bears and antelopes. For their fur, their meat or their heads. Bear meat is a delicacy in Eastern Germany, impala sells well within luxurious catering. The animals are being skinned, their skins sold. To Holland amongst other countries, f.e. the company of Jacques Boute in Venlo where animal heads are being stuffed and their skins serve as floormats. The skins come with a statement that the animal was born in a zoo. Another address like this is that of one of the biggest merchants Louis Lenaerts in Wortel, just across the Belgian border, a couple of kilometres from Breda. Lenaerts is one of the main merchants. In case he can sell an animal, or in case he sees opportunities to breed with it, it stays alive. If not, the creature gets a bullet (small calibre, in order to avoid too much damage to the skin). The skins he sells. A stuffed lion? "That can be arranged. For five thousand guilders (€ 2.250). Lenaerts used to buy animals from Dutch zoos many years on. But since it is supposed that he was the main character in the German television documentary ("Some people have recognized him" a managing director of a zoo says), directors have become reluctant to do business with him. Also with small Belgian zoos like Olmense Zoo and St. Niklaas, where Lenaerts used to lodge his animals, no official contacts exist anymore. Nevertheless Lenaerts whereabouts are not illegal. Only once the ministry of Justice was able to put a claim against him. That was in recent years, when he slaughtered four young tigers. On that crucial moment there was a police raid on his premises. He was fined; Lenaerts had no permit to slaughter.

The section of the Ministery of Agriculture is situated opposite Dordrecht's Central Station. Here the bureau resides that controls the performance of the Cites-treaty, a number of international rules against the eradication of endangered animals and plants. A small team closely watches the trade. The officers screen every permit application by means of lists. List # 1 mentions the animals that are so highly endangered that no trade in them is allowed and also they are not allowed to be kept. The list contains all tigers, a great number of monkeys, lynxes, antelopes, birds and amphibians. On the second list animals are mentioned for which trade is allowed in a very limited way only: wolves, foxes, antelopes, bisons but also monkeys, birds and the ant eater. The zoos in Holland are in an extraordinary position. Members of the NVD receive a "general exempt" for the keeping and breeding of endangered animals. In exchange they must yearly report how many animals they keep. But it turns out to be a simple bookkeeping at the Ministery. Reports are incomplete or lacking. Some gardens did report for a while after receiving their eagerly awaited permit, but concerning the past few years there is nothing (Apenheul in Apeldoorn, Noorder Dierenpark). Diergaarde Blijdorp, a zoo that receives an annual nine million guilders worth of government payments, has not even once in all those years stated its responsibilities on the number of endangered animals inside its zoo. And this whereas at the same time Blijdorp together with the Noorder Dierenpark, requires the largest number of exportlicenses compared to all other zoos. Other zoos never seem to need permits; Dierenpark Amersfoort only applies for them when it delivers dead animals to the trade. To take a view on the list of import and export licenses dating back before 1997, is "technically impossible". A new computersystem caused that all the older data cannot be read anymore. An employee of the Cites-bureau raises his shoulders; checking up on zoölogical gardens has no priority, the bureau receives 13.000 applications every year.

That question rises after a dive in the papers that are still present. On the 10th of December 1998 Burgers Zoo requests for a permit for the exportation of eleven chimpanzees. That is odd. The annual report namely states that no single chimp has been exported. Upon checking the permit, it turns out that the destination was the Laboratory of the University of Zürich (Switzerland): ten dead chimpanzeebodies and one foetus. Purpose: science. According to Burgers Zoo the animals are destined for genetical research. Within short a new application will follow, this time for fourteen chimps. Burgers Zoo is not the only garden that delivers to science. In 1994 six rare Goeldi-monkeys, alive this time, went on transport from Apenheul to the primates centre that is related to the same university, director L. de Boer of Apenheul says. "Not for biomedical tests, but for behavioural research".
One more randomly chosen example. Last year Blijdorp three times applied for a permit for the exportation of each time five Pinché or Liszt-monkeys (Oedipomidas oedipus) to Poland and Czechia. "Permit 10593" shows that, true, the animals were sent to the zoo of Pilzen, but the purpose of the delivery was quite different. Purpose: trade, it says. So trade it is. Blijdorp also supplies to private collectons. For example to the collection of animals of an oil sheik in the U.A.E. He'll be sent a very very rare Arabic oryx: a snowwhite antelope, a species extinguished in wildlife in the early '70s of the previous century. This sale does not concern a re-introduction project, as is the present case in Oman.
The sheik now has four of them on his estate. These animals by the way are indeed registered with an important databank, ISIS, that keeps track of collections of rare animals worldwide.

Although for the sake of conservation of nature zoos do not acquire animals from the wilderness, a clever garden knows more than one trick. In 1998 Apenheul wanted to have very rare bonobo-apes. Only a hundred of them live in captivity, and no garden that owns them wants to let them go. Prices for bonobos therefore go up to a million Dutch guilders each (€ 454.000.-). Therefore his "happiness" was great when managing director L. de Boer could get hold of six laboratory animals (three pair of them) in Zaïre, stemming from a "biomedical" research institute in Kinshasa. Laboratory animals that were to have a new life in Apeldoorn, could anything be better? But: is the Apenheul zoo a saviour now, or does this show a U-turn construction in order to lay hands on wild catch? The permit is slightly revealing. Under "source" it says "W", which means: all animals have been collected from the wild by merchants. It is an old tric. Years ago in this way Burgers Zoo "rescued" seven gorillas originating from Cameroun from the hands of a merchant. The transaction had a value of a quarter of a million guilders. International criticism followed. "They did come from a shady background", Burgers Zoo admits. "We were asked for shelter and are quite pleased with them."
Another transaction like this by a Dutch garden, concerning the most endangered primate in the world (the tiny Golden Lion monkey) of whose species less than only four hundred still remain in the wilderness. Via "Apenheul" six of them disappear from the ISIS worlddatabank in 1998, when the garden delivers three times two of these little monkeys to small zoos in Czechia. That country, like other eastern European countries, is famous with merchants for the fact that all of its animals are for sale and zoos hardly keep any registration, with the exception of the Zoo in Prague, that keeps only one of these little apes.
"All six of the animals are still there. I telephoned this morning", De Boer of Apenheul reassures. That this is impossible because two of the animals did not survive the transport ("2 animals dead on arrival" the permit says), is something he cannot apprehend. "I really did call." "Those apes are so much in demand and valuable that Czechia is no likely destination. The best gardens would have loved to have them", a foreign merchant says. He laughs about the export of a group of eight apes, Japanese "Macaca irus" to the Ukraïne, this time by Burgers Zoo. "No one wants them. Can't think of a reason for such an expensive transport, except dumping. That is why animals also go to Sofia in Bulgaria, or to Caïro; those gardens are never overcrowded." The exportregistration proves that the former Eastern bloc countries are a very popular destination for many gardens. The vet surgeon: "It is a choice. Of course the housing circumstances are worse in a country like that, but the people over there are also doing worse."

Outside the reception centre of the AAP Foundation in Almere is a small brick building. Inside five baboons are kept in quarantine for weeks already now. "A miserable bunch", director David van Gennep mutters. "The one with the tongue hanging from its mouth is mentally handicapped. That other one is pigeon-breasted, never seen it so bad." He sighs. "This does not look good." Where the apes came from, is not yet clear than. According to Van Gennep animals like these will continue to pop up as long as there is no solid registration for every individual animal. "I plead for animal accountancy. Isn't it horrible when animals that were a zoo's main attraction in spring, are kept in a Russian laboratory with electrode equipment on their heads a year later?" A week later the missing data are available. It is almost certain that the apes come from Belgium. "We received Lenaerts' name." The worst news comes with the results of the health tests. "One animal was tested positive on Herpes-B, the others are questionable. Someone who is being spat upon by an ape in that condition, wil inevitably die, that disease proces is irreversible." Bernard E. ran a high risk. What will happen with the animals, still remains a question. "We have to think deeply about their future. Maybe we should kill them. An animal who is infected with Herpes is highly dangerous."
Animal attendant Ria calls, fully upset: "They have killed Sherl, the panther! They've injected him!" The animal has been put down, Noorder Dierenpark confirms. "It was a hybrid, there was no market for it." "My God, what a bunch of dirt!", an emotional Van der Valk of the animal reception centre Pantera - 30 miles away - says. "We've got room, and they knew it."

See also "Protected animals in The Netherlands not sure of their lives".