ONCE again it seems Blackpool Zoo are desperate to have us believe they are working at the sharp edge of conservation (Citizen, Sept 9). Mrs Banks' letter highlights the incongruity of using words "zoo" and "conservation" in the same breath.

She informs us that gorillas may be totally extinct in the wild by 2016. She tells us that, in any case, wild animals are not safe in their natural habitat -- they aren't able to grow old in peace.

It may surprise Mrs Banks to learn that the majority of animals living in the wild are prey animals -- a peaceful death through old age is often a luxury afforded by captivity. Nature doesn't work that way.

These comments surely sum up the approach of zoo enthusiasts to conservation: preserve at all costs, with little thought to the existence preservation brings to a zoo animal. Deprived of their liberty and held in an unnatural setting, without opportunity to interact with other animals, incarcerated as an exhibit, on display for the purpose of human entertainment... It is little wonder that these unfortunate creatures go mad when this is all they have to look forward to in life.

Perhaps Mrs Banks could comment on the situation in Angola? A country trying to re-stock its wild places with animals after years of unrest has left its natural parks empty. Surely this is the very scenario used by zoos to justify their existence -- that there will come a time when the species they have preserved can be used to re-stock the wild? No zoo can help Angola though -- wild elephants are being shipped in from Botswana. Captive zoo-bred elephants wouldn't survive there.

This is the reality Mrs Banks. You can participate in as many animal exchange programmes as you like -- it won't help save the species in the world, only perhaps make you feel better about their extinction there -- after all, you will still be able to view them in captivity and sometimes one has to be cruel to be kind?

I congratulate Captive Animals Protection Society and Pat Simpson for the valuable work they are doing. I know the society produces a wide range of educational material -- perhaps Mrs Banks should take the trouble to look at this first and really think about the issues instead of dismissing their work out of hand.

Louise McGettigan,

South St,

Lytham.