Yoyo, died this Saturday in the municipal premises, which has closed to the public. The veterinarians, keepers and zoo staff were trying to stabilize the animal, but as reported by the City Council, the elephant died this morning. “She was a friendly animal and at the same time had a certain character, she was a reference caregiver for the other two elephants in the group, Susi and Bully,” the Zoo explained. The park has reported on its website: “For technical reasons, the Zoo will not open its doors today. We are sorry for the inconvenience caused. ”.
The zoo says Yoyo has lived about 54 years, “well above the life expectancy of African elephants living under human care.” The elephant who traveled to Barcelona to end the loneliness of the elephant Susi. At the Barcelona Zoo they estimate that Yoyo died this Saturday at the age of 53. Now the autopsy will determine the causes of death although the animal was already very old.
The story of the three elephants at the Zoo -Susi, Yoyo and Bully- is the result of the demands of the so-called animal activists. Susi is an African elephant who arrived at the park in 2002 from the Vergel Safari Park (Alicante) and they estimate that she is 54 years old today. They say that he was in a circus and even that he was the victim of a hippopotamus bite. Susi lived with the elephant Alicia for six years, but she died in 2008. Susi was left alone in the park and then they made the social mass grow against the Barcelona Zoo, taking refuge in the loneliness of the elephant. The zoo management then expanded the facilities for Susi and, in 2009, she arrived at Yoyo Park from the Rioleón Safari, in Albinyana (Tarragona). In fact, Yoyo was owned by the administration that had taken over Rioleón. This elephant had also been left alone in her park. At first the relationship between two solitary elephants was not easy, but they soon formed a colony.
In 2012 Bully arrived (today he is 41 years old) from the Bioparc in Valencia. In an interview with EL PAÍS, in October 2023, the Zoo’s chief conservator, Jordi Hernández, explained that many of the animals in the Barcelona park are elderly. In fact, Hernández recalled, in reference to the elephants, that the pachyderms do not exceed 60 years of age and assured that within the park the quality of life of the animals was continually evaluated and care was taken of nutrition, diseases, the psychology of the animal and the composition of the group.
In 2018, the municipal war broke out between those in favor of permanently closing the Barcelona Zoo and those who wanted to maintain it and turn it into a study and science center. Just in that environment between different sides, the director of the facility, Antoni Alarcón, argued: “He now has those to whom we will provide the greatest possible well-being during the last years of his life. They wouldn’t know how to live in nature. “We have never intended to have a breeding group of elephants in the park because it would make no sense.” Today only Susi and Bully remain in the park.
