This is not exactly a new idea of mine. I was a teen when it first hit me that what my riparian community desperately needed — besides shoes and fire — was a municipal zoo.

Of course, back then, in the 1960s, there were like eight people calling the Santa Clarita Valley home and a zoo would have been minimalist, housing, like, a horse and a tarantula. I’d type in, “… dwelling in separate cages,” but that’s unnecessary. Horses and tarantulas live together in the wild in harmony already. So? My zoo back then would be somewhat designed along the honor system. No cages. No parking. No annoying staff and signs warning, “Please Don’t Dangle Toddlers Over The Starving Albeit Angry Mountain Lion Enclosure.”

Which leads me to current events.

Just read from Associated Press that a Denmark zoo is looking for its kind-hearted socialist citizens to donate their unwanted pets as hors d’oeuvres for their four-legged meat-eating inmates.

“In zoos we have a responsibility to imitate the natural food chain of the animals — in terms of both animal welfare and professional integrity,” the Aalborg Zoo said in a recently released statement. Aalborg was founded in 1935 and keeps 1,500 animals belonging to 126 species, including tigers and lions and bears — sing it with me — oh my!

Of course, that pesky animal-loving social media crowd took umbrage. Some thought it barbaric, immoral, cruel and blood-curdling. I’ve had some run-ins with pets over the years and, pray PETA isn’t reading, but I could see donating a dog to Velociraptor Aid International........

© Santa Clarita Valley Signal