Science in Zoos

Abstract

Twenty years since the founding of the Japanese Society of Zoo and Wildlife Medicine, I regret to report that the operation of Japanese zoos still lacks an academic basis. In order to mitigate this ongoing problem, it is necessary to further develop an emerging discipline called “Zoo Science”. This new area of academic study is a comprehensive field that is built by combining the study of both the arts and the sciences, as they relate to zoo operations. If this new area of academic study is recognized by the scholastic community and established as a culture in Japan, zoos could easily be established as a place of academic study. To improve Japanese zoos, quotidian struggles will be required for all persons associated with zoos.