The Elephant at the Ren Fest: Colorado Denies Permit For Elephants at Event

Let's talk about the elephant in the room...or at the Colorado Renaissance Festival. For years, the hulking beasts have joined in the festivities in Larkspur — but squeezed into a tiny pen, sometimes donning tapestries or flower crowns, and forced to do tricks and give rides when they could only walk in a slow, tight circle.

This year, there might not be elephants at the Renaissance Festival, slated for weekends June 14 through August 3: Colorado Parks and Wildlife has refused the elephants' keepers a permit to exhibit the animals at the event. The Animal Activist Legal Defense Project at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law had threatened litigation against the state if CPW issued the permit, but CPW public information officer Kara Van Hoose says that threat was not a factor in CPW's denial of the permit to Trumps and Humps, the traveling circus that wanted to bring the animals to Colorado.

"CPW is the agency that reviews applications for and, when appropriate, issues Temporary Exhibitors Licenses, a type of Commercial Wildlife Park License," reads CPW's official statement on the matter. "Elephants fall under CPW’s Commercial Wildlife Program, which refers to the use of captive wildlife for educational, commercial, or promotional purposes. The Trunks and Humps application for a Temporary Exhibitors License was denied by CPW because it did not meet the requirements."
Prior to AALDP's litigation threat, animal activists had asked CPW to review video evidence of the Trunks and Humps elephant program. While a press release from AALDP claims that CPW did not review the footage because it doesn't have an elephant expert on staff, Van Hoose says that CPW did review videos as part of its investigation into the permitting request. She also confirmed that the department doesn't have a dedicated elephant expert, since elephants aren't common in Colorado.

Videos on YouTube show the elephants being forced to lift their legs, lie down, sit upright on their hindquarters and balance their front feet on a platform. Colorado law prohibits using certain animals, including elephants, in traveling acts that involve making the animals perform unnatural behaviors, according to the AALDP.

"This decision follows the science and upholds Colorado law by recognizing that the tricks that Trunks and Humps forces elephants to perform under threat of a bull hook are not natural behaviors. This is a win for both animal welfare and the rule of law,” says Michael A. Pardo, elephant behaviorist and biologist at Cornell University.

“Denying this permit was both the legally correct and moral decision,” says DU law professor Justin Marceau, director of the AALDP. “Colorado has admirably outlawed the degrading, abusive use of elephants and other animals in cruel traveling circuses. These animals deserve to be treated with dignity, not dragged from city to city and forced to perform tricks for our entertainment.”

Editor's note: This story has been updated to include statements from CPW.