Visit to the Circus Krone Farm

On 16.10.21 we visited the Circus Krone farm in Wessling near Munich. It's great that a circus has set up a sanctuary for its animals and also cares for animal welfare outside the circus with the Lacey Fund. At the moment, however, active animals such as lions and tigers can also be seen at the Krone Farm.

Saving endangered wild animals and animals in the circus - is then compatible? Yes, at least in this specific case of Circus Krone. Why? A few years ago we petted a lion running free in a national park without any further preparation. He was 18 months old. At that age it is still possible. So if you come into contact with the big wild cats early enough, you can build up wonderful relationships.

Yes, but wild cats can walk a lot of kilometres/day in the wild. That's right, but they only do that to look for food and, if necessary, to defend their territory or to mate. When they have enough to eat, they lie around lazily. I observed a large pride of lions in the African wilderness sleeping about 20 m away from drinking zebras. The lions were full. The zebras, which are usually prey for the lions, knew this and dared to approach the lions. Domestic cats also sleep for about 18 hours a day. The big cats also sleep when they are full. The rest of the time they want to be kept busy.

The tigers and lions regard the circus performances as training and employment units. And these units are really fun for these animals at Circus Krone, otherwise they wouldn't do them. Thanks to Martin and Alexander Lacey's enormous experience, empathy and love of animals, this happens completely without coercion. As the lions and tigers need these sessions, the trainer cannot take a holiday of more than 2 weeks. All the animals that are in the arena at the same time as their trainer form a pack. That is why they get along.

What would happen if these animals were released into the wild? According to Dirk Steffens (information at the University of Bayreuth on 19.10.21 on the occasion of the award of the honorary doctorate), there is no longer a sufficiently large habitat for tigers on earth. The abandoned tigers would have real problems with the already existing ones. Give them to the zoo? Who would be so intensively concerned with these animals? Lions could still be released into the wild in Africa. But here, too, the habitat for these animals has become very, very narrow, as I experienced myself. In addition, the big cats that have grown up in human hands would be a found object for the unfortunately still existing big game hunters to kill mercilessly. These horrible people spend about $50,000 for this.

In summary, we could see that the tigers and lions we observed at Krone Farm were doing really well, as were all the other animals. At the same time, the adults and especially the children have a wonderful opportunity to get to know and love these animals. Most children in Africa no longer know any wild animals. Accordingly, the emotional relationship is missing, which in turn gives impetus to poaching.

As the picture shows, this girl completed the same training sessions with her cats without any problems right after her visit to the Krone Farm.

Tiger in the Krone Farm

Lioness jumps over 2 tigers

little girl feeds tiger

The little girl immediately implemented what she saw at Krone Farm at home with her cats