On a longline fishing boat off the Galapagos Islands, a concerned biologist working undercover as a cook films a horrifying scene. As the camera rolls, a blue shark is dragged upside down out of the water, a sharp hook piercing it through the roof of the mouth and out through the side of the face...

India leaps into his pool, pouncing on a purple plastic egg—his favorite toy, according to his caregivers. After a few minutes, the tiger ambles over to his watering tub. Instead of taking a drink, he plops in and closes his eyes in contentment. Although he’s young—roughly 10 months old on this June...

At Black Beauty Ranch, titles like “caregiver” and “maintenance technician” don’t do the people who hold them justice, and they don’t capture the dozens of unique tasks the team carries out every day: figuring out how to get pine sap off a goat’s horn (rub it with peanut oil), learning how to “drag”...