Your confusion about the outside cat cage[s] stems from one of the several differences in how circuses operate in our two countries. We haven't kept cats in little shifting cages for 40 years or more. By law, the smallest space for 4 cats [lions or tigers] was 40' by 8' which equals a normal size semi-trailer.
This is what an outside cat cage or "beast wagon" is that Steve mentions. It is one piece that can be divided into separate units by dividing walls. It is what has been used in Europe since the dawn of time because of their environment of the one ring round tent. If they work in a "building" it is a round building, basically a round tent made out of steel and concrete. America has the exact same "beast wagon" with the difference being it can be split into 8'X8' separate smaller "beast wagons" or put end to end with the dividers out for a 8'X80' "beast wagon" Seven of these 8X8 units are loaded in one truck.
Ringling transports by train, and their animals are kept in a beast wagon that Steve describes, but they also have to transport empty 8X8 units, which the animals are shifted into from the beast wagon that the are taken in and lined up to the arena. After the performance the animals are taken back to the beast wagon until the next performance. When America started playing buildings in the 1950's They could no longer use the beast wagon from the Beatty day's that Europe used today, because often the animals were stable a mile or more away from the performance building.
JUST A NOTE; DUE TO THE NATURE OF A BLOG TO FOLLOW THIS DISCUSSION GO BACKWARDS TO THE FIRST DIAGRAM TO START, AND PROCEED TO THE CURRENT DIAGRAM.
Monday, June 23, 2008
European Beast wagon
Posted by
Wade G. Burck
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9 comments:
Steve,
I suggest the animals at entering the same place each time. They are only leaving from a different direction.
Wade
What do you mean "we haven't kept cats in shifting cages for 40 years" I haven't been around a cat act for a dozen years, but every act used cages that could be loaded 2 side by side with as many as 10 cats loaded in a semi. By your statement, an act of 12 cats would reuire 3 semis to move.
Ian
Ian,
Pay attention. The public can not be educated if they have preconceived notions, and want to find fault. The cages when you were around were basically 8X4 for yes two animals. For quite some time they have been 8X8 for two animals. 7 eight foot cages go in a trailer for 14 animals. If you have 6 animals it requires 3 cages at 24 foot and you have half a trailer empty for anything els. If you take the above mentioned 7 cages and put them end to end, and take out the sides, you have one big cage of 8 foot X 56 foot for 14 animals similar to a beast wagon. It you take the above mentioned 3 cages for 6 animal and put them end to end with the side out you have one big cage of 8' X 24' for 6 animals similar to a smaller beast wagon. What you were around Ian may not have been the standard, it may have been the end of an era and you may have some wrong notions of the whole industry based on that. A semi trailer is one size and is what is predominantly used given the distances they must travel. If somebody choses a different smaller trailer because of short distances, and builds the cages to fit that does not concern me, and is not the norm.
Wade
Well Wade, not to belabor the point, and todays circus should not be judged on the past, but as recently as 6 years ago, I watched Bruno's (don't ask me to spell his name)cages being unloaded and they were the same as they have always been. If more acts are using larger cages, that's excellent, but 40 years was a mis statement. Heck, I wasn't even in the country 40 years ago, and every single cat act I've ever seen in America had shifting cages. If that has changed in the last couple of years, I'm glad to hear it.
Ian
Ian,
Like Casey you can't pick a side yet. You have to stay in the middle if you are going to learn and understand. NO NAMES. Unless it is to compliment. And the American Circus is not named Bruno. I didn't say anything about 40 years. I said the American Circus became two different things the 3 ring oval tent, and the 3 ring any shape you want tent. The animals are kept in that tent many times. The tent may be Madison Sq Garden on the 8th floor, or the county hockey arena. It may have 20 doors in some big, some small, some done a long ramp, some up a winding ramp, some with only an elevator to get in. We had to stop using a beast wagon with 8 units and 4 wheels, and make 8 units with 24 wheels to get in and out of the tent. The units as I have explained can be made what ever size you need, exactly like a beast wagon, 8 units or the dividers out and one big unit.
Ringling is is an isolated environment like a one ring tent show, built a beast wagon in 1991 when I had Gunther's animals, and take the animals from the stable to a different location to work in smaller units, and take them back to the beast wagon stable after each performance. Independent act like Casey and Hawthorn and many, many others. Have potentially 3 different environments to contend with.
Hawthorn built the 8X8 cages in 1992, and if you will go back in the posts you will see the use of a 40 foot round exercise cage that has been in use since 1978. If the tent/building that the animals had to be in was small we could not set it up. But next date when the tent was bigger we could use it.
Two of our units have side door, and are called T-cages. We can line the animals up straight if there is room, or we can put two straight and five to the left, or 5 to the right. Or we can put one straight and 3 to the left and 3 to the right for a T shape. Or we can put 3 straight and 2 left and 2 right for a Z shape. The combinations are many depending on how much space the environment allows. After the performance and the animals are taken back to the stable which also changes in each city, if there is room I can make a 8'X56' "beast wagon" for all the animals, or if the stable is wide and not long I can make 2 "beast wagons". A 8'X32' beast wagon and a 8'X18' beast wagon. Again the combinations are many.
I recall you being impressed with an act because the person was small, now that Mary Ann has pointed out what we all know if we think about it, you enjoyed an act that was more stressful for the animals. Maybe things are not what you think Ian, or like the public maybe you are assuming.
Wade
Ian - The statement that "we haven't kept cats in shifting cages for 40 years" was made by me about Australia. That was the law in this country. The law is now even tougher. 20 square metres for the first cat and 10 square metres for each and every additional cat. Minimum height 2 metres [6'6"].
No discernible difference in animal health has been recorded as a result of increased spatial requirements.
Wade - not really. The cats are entering [and leaving] at a different place. I won't draw it because my artistic skills are worse than yours [although I wouldn't have to draw anywhere near as many side seats!] but I'll try to describe how it works.
The audience is always in the same place in relation to everything else inside the tent.Back door, front entrance, king poles - the works. To the cats though, sometimes [most times] they enter the ring through the back door - seats are straight ahead, so approach your seat head on and climb on from the left or right [whatever you are used to]. Some cats are left handed, some are right handed. BUT - if you are entering from the left then you approach your seat from your right, necessitating a different action on your part to become seated. Same thing in reverse if you are entering from the right. Sounds simple to us but needs extra training for a cat to cope with.
Steve,
Am I interpreting "no discernible
difference" to mean no benefit mentally and physically. What studies have been done to validate that. A couple of years ago, one of Germany's greatest wild animals trainers and I were looking at some cats in an exercise cage, he mournfully looked at me and said, "I wish we had thought about this years ago, and I regret I am too old to train any more. Such things we could do."
The corbette tiger was conditioned from the time she was 9 months old, and conditioned daily to keep her fit, much as you would condition a fine Arabian, except I didn't put leg wraps on her. LOL
Wade
Wade - don't get me wrong. I love having my cats get out in to the sunshine, on to the grass or different substrates, even on to varying levels rather than just a straight floor. But we've been doing this for a long while now and there has been no discernible difference in their health or demeanour. Makes me feel better though!
With respect, your corbette tiger would not necessarily have been any fitter or in any better "condition" if it had had an exercise cage. Your conditioning of him/her achieved that.
Big cats, by their very nature, don't come out into the exercise area and exercise. They stroll out, have a sniff, maybe take a leak and then flop down and rest!
What did your German friend mean by "such things we could do" in relation to an exercise cage. Was he suggesting that he could have trained different tricks as a result? Or was he saying that it would have been easier to rebutt the AR critics if he could have had cats out of their cages?
Steve,
Who is the "we've" that have done this long enough? Were they the same one's who performed extensive autopsies on deceased animals? Enough of them so that they could confirm or deny any abnormalities or deformities. If the we is who I suspect it is, not a single one of us are qualified to make that blanket statement. I know I have seen enough roached backs all over the world to know something isn't right.
She was conditioned in an exercise cage as they all are. She had additional conditioning in the house cage. Mary Ann watched her sister Krishna conditioning when she was here a month ago.
What he meant was he could have taught them to much more then just roll overs, simple jumps, and poses, because they would have been more physically and mentally equip for it.
Exercise cages don't make me feel good or bad, unless I don't have one. Otherwise I just accept it as necessary and don't even think about.
Wade
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