Editorial Standards and Corrections

ZooReviews covers zoos, aquariums and animal parks as a news beat. This page sets out where our stories come from, what we will not do, and how we handle it when we get something wrong. If you think we have, the last section tells you how to reach us.

Where our stories come from

Most of what we publish begins with a facility: a press release sent to our newsroom, an announcement on an official news page, or a conversation with the people who run a program. We also work from public records, published research, and the trade and local reporting that covers this field.

We rewrite in our own words. A press release is written to sell an experience, and it is a starting point rather than an article. Quotations from a release are reproduced accurately and attributed to the person who said them.

Where a source publishes in another language, facts and paraphrase are translated freely, but a direct quotation from a person carries a note saying so. We will not present a translation as though we transcribed it in English.

Every article names the facility it is about and links to our full coverage of that facility and to that facility’s own newsroom, so you can read the source for yourself.

What we will not do

We do not invent anything. Not a quote, not a date, not a number, not a detail that would round out a paragraph. When a fact we would like to have is not available, the article is shorter or it waits. This is the rule that governs all the others.

We do not overstate. We are glad about the things we cover and we say so, but enthusiasm is a register, not a license. “The largest coalition at any AZA facility” is a fact we can cite. “The most incredible habitat ever built” is not a fact at all.

We do not use marketing language as though it were description. A park markets one guest experience; a designer built a set of spaces with walls between them. Both descriptions can be true, and where they diverge, the animal-facing structure is the fact. In a story about animal care we lead with the structure.

Corrections

When we get something wrong, we fix it quickly, and we would rather hear about it than not.

A working example. We published a story about Lion & Hyena Ridge at Busch Gardens Tampa under a headline built around the paradox of two rival species in one habitat. The body of the article said correctly that the animals are never in the same space at the same time, but the headline and the opening line left readers with the impression of a single shared pen. It is in fact one guest experience built around two separate yards that both species rotate between. The person who designed it told us so, and they were right. We corrected it.

Two things follow from that, and they are now house rules. Where a story’s appeal is a seeming contradiction, we state the mechanism that resolves it in the same breath as the hook. And a designer, curator or keeper who corrects us is a primary source who outranks the press release, because the release is written to sell the experience and routinely leaves the count out.

Coverage is editorial, and it is not for sale

We do not charge a facility to be written about, and no facility can buy an article, a placement, or a favorable line. Attending an event costs the facility nothing. Sending us a release costs nothing. Being covered has never depended on any commercial relationship and it never will.

We are open to advertising, sponsorship and partnership conversations, and those are handled entirely separately from what we publish. If a commercial relationship ever becomes relevant to a story, we will say so in the story.

Accreditation is a fact we report, not a filter we apply

ZooReviews covers this field. It does not police it.

Accreditation status is worth reporting when it is part of a story, and we report what happened and what the accrediting body actually said. It is not a test a facility has to pass before we will write about it. Accreditation can lapse for reasons that have nothing to do with animal welfare, including dues, paperwork, or a governance change at a state-run park, so a lapse is not evidence of anything on its own and we do not let it stand in as a verdict.

The bar for reconsidering whether we cover a facility at all is high and specific: gross evidence of animal abuse, poaching, or violation of federal law. Short of that, we cover the facility on the merits of the story.

Animals that die

We do not run memorials, and we do not build stories around a facility’s loss. That is an editorial choice about what this publication is for, not a claim that these things do not happen.

We do cover rescues, including when the animal being rescued is an orphan. An orphaned cub or calf or chick that gets a second chance is a showcase for the veterinarians, keepers and transport teams who make that possible. We state the loss plainly, once, and spend the article on the save.

Reaching us

Corrections, questions, press releases and story tips all go to news@zooreviews.org. If you are correcting something, tell us what is wrong and how you know. We will take it seriously and we will say thank you.