Arturo (1985 July 3, 2016) was a
polar bear living in
Mendoza Zoological Park in
Mendoza, Argentina
Mendoza (, ), officially the City of Mendoza ( es, Ciudad de Mendoza) is the capital of the province of Mendoza in Argentina. It is located in the northern-central part of the province, in a region of foothills and high plains, on the eastern si ...
, the only polar bear living in the country. He was born in the United States and transferred to Argentina in 1993. His companion, a female named Pelusa, died of cancer in 2012. The living conditions of the cage Arturo resided in were controversial, as temperatures reach up to in Argentina, and the pool in Arturo's cage was only deep. Animal rights activists had, in response, dubbed Arturo the "world's saddest animal" and promoted a petition to have him moved to
Assiniboine Park Zoo, a zoo in
Winnipeg
Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the province of Manitoba in Canada. It is centred on the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine rivers, near the longitudinal centre of North America. , Winnipeg had a city population of 749, ...
, Manitoba, Canada. The petition was created by Laura Morales of
Hamilton, Ontario
Hamilton is a port city in the Canadian Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Ontario. Hamilton has a Canada 2016 Census, population of 569,353, and its Census Metropolitan Area, census metropolitan area, which includes Burlington, ...
. It gained considerable attention after the hashtag #Freearturo began trending on
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
. Supporters of the petition also noted that a polar bear died in
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...
in December 2012 due to excessive heat, and argued that Arturo exhibited symptoms of depression and other mental health problems.
As of July 19, 2014, the petition had over 400,000 signatures, and had been endorsed by
Newt Gingrich and
Cher. Assiniboine Park Zoo responded that while they would have gladly accepted Arturo there, they did not have the authority to do so unless Argentina agreed to transfer him there, and that the Mendoza zoo could not supply the necessary medical records to make such a trip possible.
On July 24, 2014, the director of the Mendoza Zoo, Gustavo Pronotto, told the
Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. ne ...
that Arturo was too old to be moved to Canada. In social media, people also advocated for Arturo to be moved to Canada. and Twitter hashtag #FreeArturo.
Arturo died on July 3, 2016, aged 30–31, despite polar bears rarely living beyond 25.
See also
*
List of individual bears
The following is a list of individual bears which garnered national or worldwide attention:
Actors
* Bart the Bear, a male Alaskan Kodiak bear, played the leading role in the 1988 wilderness drama, '' The Bear''. Between 1980 and his death in 20 ...
References
2016 animal deaths
Individual polar bears
2014 in Argentina
Individual animals in Argentina
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