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Wolves will be hunted WASHINGTON, D.C.– – G r a y 2008 for menacing livestock is anyone’s guess. wolves may soon be legally hunted in several Among the restored populations of of the Lower 48 states of the U.S., for the first Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming, together time in more than 80 years––but whether that including about 1,650 wolves, Wildlife means more wolves will be killed than the 300- Services in 2008 killed 264 wolves, more than plus dispatched by USDA Wildlife Services in one wolf in six, exterminating 21 entire packs as well as alleged rogue individuals. Wildlife Services, other agencies, and farmers protecting livestock also killed 45 wolves in Wisconsin, plus some in Michigan and Minnesota. Ranchers, blaming wolves for the confirmed loss of 601 cattle, sheep, llamas, and guard dogs in 2008, and sport hunters who allege that wolves have reduced the numbers of elk and deer, would like to kill even more wolves. Some elected officials in the northern Rockies would openly prefer to hunt wolves Harp seal pup. (Animal Protection Institute) back to regional extirpation. The 2008-2009 winter wolf count found 846 wolves in Idaho, 497 in Montana, and 302 in Wyoming. Russia halts seal hunt “I’m prepared to bid for that first ticket to shoot a wolf myself,” said Idaho gov- MOSCOW, OTTAWA––Russian about 35,000 seals per year was about a tenth ernor C.L. “Butch” Otter on March 6, 2009. minister of natural resources Yury Trutnyev the size of recent Atlantic Canadian sealing Otter howled like a wolf for reporters on March 11, 2009 told the world that quotas, but amounted to a third of the White after U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar Russia has halted hunting seals under one Sea seal population. The White Sea seal announced that the Barack Obama presidential year old on the frozen White Sea. herd has reportedly declined by 95% since it administration will abide by the January 14, “This bloody hunting is from now on was first surveyed in 1928. However, the 2009 decision of the George W. Bush adminis- banned in our country, as in most developed first herd estimate, produced in the early tration to remove gray wolves from the U.S. countries,” Trutnyev told media. years of the Communist era to assess the endangered species list. Trutnyev described the ban as “an potential for economic expolitation, may Wolf. (Kim Bartlett) (continued on page 11) important measure to preserve Russian biodi- have been grossly exaggerated. versity.” The recent White Sea quota of Marine biologist Masha Voront- sova, a longtime critic of the White Sea seal hunt, called the ban “a fantastic achieve- ment.” Vorontsova heads Moscow office of the International Fund for Animal Welfare. Momentum toward the ban built, ANIMAL PEOPLE recalled a written statement from the Moscow-based animal rights group VITA, News For People Who Care About Animals after VITA members in March 2008 took a delegation of Russian celebrities to witness the annual seal pup massacre. “Countless TV clips that followed April 2009 the event led to the Russian ban,” said Volume XIX, #3 VITA. Early indications of an eventual posi- tive response from the Kremlin included an award presented to VITA by the Russian (continued on page 7)
U.S. Army bans pit bulls & WASHINGTON D.C.––U.S. Army microchipped for identification, and forbids commanders at more than 40 bases around the keeping pets “tied or staked outside the home world are moving to implement a new “Pet or any building.” Policy for Privatized Housing Under the The order further prohibits keeping Army’s Residential Communities Initiative “Any other dog who demonstrates a propensity Privatization Program,” which prohibits pit for dominance or aggressive behavior,” indi- bull terriers, Rottweilers, Doberman pinsch- cated by “Unprovoked barking, growling or ers, chows, and wolf hybrids. snarling at people approaching the animal, Issued as an order on January 5, aggressively running along fence lines when 2009, the new Army policy also limits person- people are present, biting or scratching peo- nel living in base housing to keeping no more ple,” or “escaping confinement or restriction than two dogs or cats, forbids keeping exotic to chase people.” pets and farm animals, requires all pets to be Additional provisions of order stipu- late that “Voice command is not an acceptable means of control,” that “Pets are not allowed in playgrounds or tot lots at any time,” and that pet keepers in military housing must “Maintain appropriate, humane care of pets (e.g. food, water, shelter from extreme weath- er, etc.).” The Army became the first branch of The USDA on March 14, 2009 banned slaughtering downed cattle. [Page 13.] (Kim Bartlett) the U.S. armed services to adopt breed-specific legislation after at least six dog attack fatalities Meat kills, confirms National Cancer in five years and one near-fatal mauling either occurred in military housing or involved per- Institute study of half million Americans sonnel who had lived in military housing. Of the nine dogs involved, five were pit bulls, WASHINGTON D.C.––”H i g h vided by follow-up searches of the National two were Rotttweilers, and two were Siberian intakes of red or processed meat may increase Death Index,” explained study authors huskies, not included in the Army order. the risk of mortality,” National Cancer Rashmi Sinha, Amanda J. Cross, Barry I. Most recently, in May 2008, a visi- Institute researchers conservatively reported in Graubard, Michael F. Leitzmann, and Arthur tor’s pit bull killed a three-year-old boy at the March 23, 2009 edition of Annals of Schatzkin. Pit bull terrier. (Kim Bartlett) (continued on page 9) Internal Medicine. The authors corrected the findings Annals of Internal Medicine is a to exclude the effects of smoking. The study ANIMAL PEOPLE peer-reviewed journal published by the examined many other potential variables Nonprofit Organization American Medical Association––and what the affecting mortality, but none of the others PO Box 960 study authors actually found was the strongest appeared to have statistical significance Clinton, WA 98236-0960 U.S. Postage Paid scientific condemnation yet of the health approaching that of meat consumption––espe- ANIMAL PEOPLE, Inc. effects of a meat-centered diet, regardless of cially red and processed meat intake. the type of meat consumed. There were 47,976 male deaths and The National Cancer Institute exam- 23,276 female deaths among the study cohort ined the relationship of diet and mortality of 322,263 men and 223,390 women. among more than half a million middle-aged “Red and processed meat intakes and elderly Americans from 1995 until the were associated with modest increases in total end of 2005. The participants, all between 52 mortality, cancer mortality, and cardiovascu- and 71 years old, joined the study by com- lar disease mortality,” Sinha et al found, as pleting a 124-question survey about their eat- compared to the norms of the study group. ing habits, distributed by the American But the differences between the peo- Association of Retired Persons. ple who ate the most red and processed meat “Follow-up for vital status was per- and those who ate the least were much greater. formed by annual linkage of the cohort to the The 20% of men who ate the most red meat Social Security Administration Death Master were 35% more likely to likely to die than the File, and cause of death information was pro- (continued on page 13) April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 2
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Editorial feature ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 3 Helping more animals with fewer resources A year into the global financial meltdown, the humane community as a whole seems record profits, ANIMAL PEOPLE has always been published on a nonprofit basis, to fulfill to be holding up relatively well, so far––but precariously. a community need. Our modus operandi has always been close to the model that mass media Puppy mills, by contrast, are collapsing at an unprecedented pace. 2008 brought analysts suggest is most likely to succeed in the 21st century. Thus, though the times are dif- more than twice as many dogs and cats into animal shelters as result of breeder failures than ficult, we are as optimistic about our own future as about the future of the humane cause. 2007, and the 2009 volume from breeder failures is on pace to eclipse the 2008 record. Animal advocacy has actually expanded in many past recessions, in part because Some animal charities have collapsed, as well, leaving hundreds of animals in need national and international economic calamity has tended to expose the failings of major animal of accommodation by the surviving organizations. Through 2008, however, the numbers of use industries. For example, the first few dozen humane societies in the U.S. formed during animals left in need by animal charity failures had increased only marginally from 2007. the recession that followed the end of the U.S. Civil War. The number of U.S. animal shelters Because many animal charities had rapidly expanded their holding capacity during earlier increased by half during the Great Depression. The Humane Society of the U.S., Friends of boom years, the humane community has so far managed to absorb most of the animals left by Animals, and the Animal Welfare Institute are among the most prominent of a generation of puppy mill and animal charity failures with only occasional reversion to the on-the-spot mass animal charities that emerged amid the post-Korean War recession. The animal rights move- killing of impounded animals that frequently resulted from such cases in past decades. ment debuted during the post-Vietnam War recession. After a few years of national economic There have been exceptions, however, and there is much anxiety among the humane recovery, the U.S. unemployment rate soared during the first few years of the 1980s––but community that continued economic distress could force a return to high-volume shelter those same years brought the formation of PETA, the Best Friends Animal Society, and In killing. Animal advocates in cities and counties whose shelters are now pursuing the elusive Defense of Animals, among dozens of other animal charities of continuing prominence. goal of no-kill animal control fear that momentum and public support will be lost if killing The present recession coincides with increased recognition of global warming and rates blip upward. Activists in cities and counties that have only just begun to promote low- ecological damage to the world’s oceans, of which overfishing is a leading cause. The rise of cost dog and cat sterilization fear that the urgently needed sterilization programs will be lost to concern for farm animal welfare is already a political fact in many nations, driven by out- budget cuts. Where gassing animals has recently been abolished but gas chambers remain in breaks of deadly zoonotic diseases in some parts of the world where there are no strong farm place, there is concern that gassing will resume as a perceiving cost-trimming measure––even animal advocacy voices. The role of violence toward animals as a precursor to violent crime though shelter consultant Doug Fakkema has assembled hard data demonstrating that gassing against humans is increasingly recognized, even where there are no humane laws. is actually a more expensive way to kill animals than use of pentobarbital injection. There is, in short, every reason to believe that current events favor the humane mes- The good news, so far, is that even though shelter surrenders of animals have sage. On multiple fronts the humane community is uniquely positioned to help humanity to increased, and even though adoptions are markedly down, shelter killing in the U.S. does not effectively address problems which are at once more urgent and more enduring than how we appear to have increased since ANIMAL PEOPLE in July/August 2008 published our most organize the exchange of chits representing assets and credit. The economic crisis is an recent set of regional tables. Two-thirds of the way to publishing our 2009 tables, most administrative issue. When the global economy recovers through administrative changes, and incoming data continues to show modest declines in shelter killing. it will recover, sooner or later, the issues that the humane community can help with will The bad news is that data from fiscal years ending in 2008 may not include the num- remain, and will continue to demand humane leadership. bers from the worst of the economic crisis. If 2008 brought a downturn in the numbers of dogs and cats who were sterilized by nonprofit programs, the result will be more puppies and kit- Trust funds lost when most needed tens born during the 2009 “puppy and kitten season” that is now just beginning. Humane societies and animal control agencies are used to working in crisis mode. Meanwhile, there is the reality that animal charities are as squeezed by the financial Coping with whatever the emergency for days, weeks, or even months is familiar to veterans crisis as anyone else. Amplifying humane perspectives is inhibited when cash flow is of animal rescue. The most stressful part of the present situation, for many and perhaps most stretched just to provide basic care to animals in need. An inescapable irony is that the animal agency administrators, is not being able to look ahead to a specific time that may bring humane community might have all the resources necessary to fulfill present needs and oppor- respite. Floods recede and fires burn out, but a recession does not hit bottom on a predictable tunities, if only the wishes of legators had been honored. schedule. No one knows how long resources may have to be stretched, how secure program Manhattan Surrogate Court judge Troy Webber on February 25, 2009 ruled that the funding is, or how secure jobs are. trustees of the Leona M. & Harry Helmsley Charitable Trust are not bound by the first clause What we all do know is that if lean times get leaner, the need for humane services of Leona Helmsley’s 2004 mission statement, to make grants for “purposes related to the pro- will only increase, and donations decrease. vision of care for dogs,” and may instead follow the second clause, to fund “such other chari- For many individual donors, the most frustrating part of the crisis is not being able table activities as the trustees shall determine.” to respond as generously as they would like, because they themselves have lost jobs, or fear Helmsley Charitable Trust spokesperson Howard Rubenstein stated that the trust’s their jobs may be at risk, or are using whatever extra resources they have to help stricken fam- funds, estimated at $5 billion to $8 billion, will be allocated “as soon as possible in such areas ily members––and the family members’ animals. as health care, medical research, human services, education and various other areas” that he ANIMAL PEOPLE is coping with the same pressures as the rest of the humane did not specify. community, and other print media too. In 2007 we were obliged by a 35% increase in printing “Rubenstein did not say whether dog-related charities would be guaranteed recipients and mailing costs to reduce our frequency of publication from 10 editions per year to nine. In of the trust,” reported Amy Westfeldt of Associated Press. September 2008 we suspended mailing free subscriptions to foreign animal charities. At the The Helmsley Charitable Trust assets alone could have trebled the resources of the end of 2008, having lost several pages of pre-sold advertising, including from one organiza- U.S. hands-on animal welfare community, with enough left over to extinguish canine rabies tion whose budget was frozen by an archaic law that prevents it from using a significant worldwide. Instead, it may do nothing for animals whatever. endowment, we dropped from 24 pages per edition, our size since mid-1995, to 20 pages, The Helmsley debacle came 16 years after tobacco heiress Doris Duke left $1.2 bil- our count in 1992-1995. lion to endow the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, mandated to fund projects in the areas We have, nonetheless, fared much better––through the much appreciated continued of the performing arts; the environment; prevention of cruelty to children and animals; and support of our generous readers––than many of the largest and most prestigious U.S. daily biomedical research. Duke also expressed her interest in animals by leaving smaller sums to newspapers. Unlike the collapsing dailies, most of them failing only a few years after turning the Doris Duke Foundation for the Preservation of Endangered Wildlife, the Doris Duke Foundation for the Preservation of New Jersey Farmland and Farm Animals, and the New SEARCHABLE ARCHIVES: www.animalpeoplenews.org York Zoological Society. Then, recalled HSUS president Wayne Pacelle when the Helmsley verdict was announced, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation trustees “parsed the language of Duke’s will to justify exclusion of animal welfare funding as a priority.” ANIMAL PEOPLE This too had a precedent. Candy heiress Helen Vorhees Brach was murdered in News for People Who Care About Animals 1977 while personally investigating a ring who killed race horses to collect insurance. The perpetrators were finally brought to justice nearly 20 years later. Brach had already formed the Published by Animal People, Inc. Helen V. Brach Foundation. During her lifetime, 100% of the Brach Foundation went to pro- President & Administrator: jects benefiting animals, reported Steve Warmbir of the Elgin Daily Herald. After Brach’s Kim Bartlett – [email protected] death, projects benefiting animals got just 20% of the grant money allocated during the next five years, Warmbir found. This had dropped to 10% by the time Brach’s brother Charles Editor: Merritt Clifton – [email protected] Vorhees died in 2002, and was 7% in fiscal 2008. Web producer: Patrice Greanville Helen Brach’s will has been cited in at least four estate planning handbooks as an Newswire monitor: Cathy Young Czapla example of sloppy wording that enabled the Helen V. Brach Foundation trustees to circumvent P.O. Box 960 her own intentions, and to instead fund projects of personal interest to them. The same could Clinton, WA 98236-0960 be said of the Duke and Helmsley estates. But Brach, Duke, and Helmsley also made a more fundamental error in putting their estates into perpetual trusts, instead of liquidating their ISSN 1071-0035. Federal I.D: 14-1752216 assets to directly endow the charities they meant to support. Telephone: 360-579-2505. Fax: 360-579-2575. Contrary to common belief, creating a perpetual trust does not help to ensure that Web: www.animalpeoplenews.org an estate will not be misused. Rather, it gives more people the opportunity to misuse it, while keeping the money away from the purpose it is supposed to be used for. Copyright © 2009 for the authors, artists, and photographers. The whole notion of endowing a charity in itself also requires revisiting. Reprint inquiries are welcome. Conventional wisdom in nonprofit management holds that legacies not specifically designated ANIMAL PEOPLE: News for People Who Care About Animals is published for a here-and-now purpose should be kept in permanent reserve, to generate interest or divi- nine times annually by Animal People, Inc., a nonprofit, charitable corporation dedicated dends. Typically these returns are invested in fundraising from the public. The endowment to exposing the existence of cruelty to animals and to informing and educating the public of income thus drives institutional growth. However, while 5% to 10% of the endowment helps the need to prevent and eliminate such cruelty. Donations to Animal People, Inc. are tax- to fund the work of the charity, 90% to 95% helps to fund whatever for-profit enterprise the deductible. Financial information on Animal People, Inc. and other charities can be rest is invested in, via banks and stock brokers. accessed at
4 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 PAWS arranged a last meal for LETTERS I represented the Philippine Animal because of the volume of pigs and the limited Welfare Society at Bulacan on March 1, 2009, budget and resources that the government had when officials began culling 6,011 pigs due to for culling them. Portuguese bullfights an outbreak of the Reston strain of Ebola virus. Based on what I observed––which Defensor Moura, the mayor of Secretary Eric Tayag of the was personally very traumatic for me–– Viana do Castelo, Portugal since 1993, Philippine Department of Health had informed PAWS’ recommendations were to: decided in December 2008 to have the city buy us that the decision to kill all the pigs, even 1 . Refine how pigs were handled. the local bullring and turn it into a science and those who were not infected or had not been Some piglets were held by the ear or by one education center. He told news media that tested, was final and non-negotiable. The best leg while being transferred from their pens to Viana do Castelo has no bullfighting tradition that PAWS could do at that point was to the truck that took them to their deaths. and that it is no longer acceptable to torture encourage government officials to use the most 2. Keep the captive bolts in good animals for fun. humane possible methods. repair, as this is a more humane method of ANIMAL asked people to send mes- Some newspapers erroneously killing than the use of guns. Although the sages congratulating Moura, and asking him reported that the pigs would be electrically jammed captive bolts were eventually repaired, to declare Viana do Castelo to be officially an TNR in Armenia stunned. The equipment actually used were half of each batch of pigs were shot by the anti-bullfighting city––the first in Portugal. penetrating captive bolts––an irreversible stun- police, because of the large numbers who Moura received more than 1,000 e-mails, In collaboration with the Humane ning method that results in immediate death have to be put down each day. The official tar- from all regions of Portugal and all over the Society of the United States, we have founded because the bolt penetrates both the skull and get was to kill 1,000 a day. world. He has now declared Viana do Castelo the first-ever spay/neuter project in the former the brain. Police were on standby with guns 3. Ensure that no pigs are thrown to be Portugal’s first anti-bullfighting city. Soviet Republic of Armenia, where dogs and using .22 caliber bullets, as provided by the into the dead pit still alive, as happened to two We next asked Braga mayor Fran- puppies are at times still shot in the streets. Philippine Animal Welfare Act, in case the pigs on the first day. They were immediately cisco Mesquita Machado to not authorise a In 2008 the HSUS Remote Area captive bolts did not do the job. shot when police finally found them. bullfight that was to have taken place on June Veterinary Services team, led by Jennifer Only five captive bolts were avail- 4. Ensure that pigs will be fed up 20, 2009 at a local festival. Less than 24 Scarlett, DVM, traveled to the capital city of able for the culling. These were on loan to the until the last day. To our horror, we were hours after the beginning of our e-campaign to Armenia to train veterinary students and sever- government by the supplier. Three of the five informed on our March 1 visit to the farm that stop this bullfight, the communication officer al working veterinarians in trap/neuter/ release captive bolts jammed during the first hour. the pigs were last fed on February 24––which for the Mayor of Braga responded that, “The technique. After the training, we hired one of The police were told to shoot the remainder of meant that the condemned pigs had been living President of the Municipality of Braga, upon the graduates of the class, and sterilized more a truckload of 50 pigs. Most of the pigs were for days on only water. We pressured govern- becoming aware of this alleged announcement than 100 dogs in a pilot TNR program. We moving when shot. Because the shots were not ment officials to direct the farm owner to feed of the organization of a bullfight in this city, tagged and collared the dogs, and posted signs accurate, the pigs had to be shot three or four the pigs immediately, and to monitor the has instructed the relevant municipal services where we returned the fixed dogs explaining times before they died. feeding until the culling was completed on to not authorise it. This means that no bull- that the mayor ordered that these dogs not be I had already asked if there was a March 6. I wish I had recorded the sound of fight will take place in Braga.” shot. We began receiving calls from residents way to hold the pigs to ensure more accuracy, the hungry pigs when they were fed. I will We are now trying to stop the legis- seeking to help more dogs. and to have the pigs shot out of sight of the never forget it as long as I live. lative bodies of the Azores from legalising In April 2009 we are sending two other pigs who were waiting to be killed. We also recommended that pigs killing bulls and using picadors in bullfighting. Armenian veterinarians to Romania for TNR However, I was told that this was not possible weighing 110 kilograms or more be bled out, The legislative regional assembly of the training, who will be employed full time at a even after the use of the captive bolt, to make Azores now has the constitutional power to do new farm/shelter/sanctuary, Armenia’s first sure that death comes quicker. this, in an active bullfighting region where ever, to perform TNR with 50 dogs per week. Treats for We tried to be as diplomatic as pos- this legislative step has long been sought. Who said that an entirely volunteer sible. This is the first time a Philippine animal ––Miguel Moutinho organization can’t do much? welfare group has been called to supervise Executive Director ––Garo Alexanian chained dogs The 2009 Dogs Deserve Better Have culling. We want this to continue, to ensure ANIMAL Companion Animal Network a Heart for Chained Dogs campaign mailed or that animals are not burned or buried alive in Apartado 2028 P.O. Box 656712 hand-delivered Valentines to 12,113 dogs! the future, if culling is to be done. 8501-902 Portimão Fresh Meadows, NY 11365 This was 1,678 more dogs in 2009 than 2008. ––Anna Cabrera Portugal Phone: 718-544-PETS We send a heartfelt thank you to everyone who Program Director Phone: 00-351-282-491-216
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Teaching young people to kill Indian animal advocates B I S M A R C K ––The North Dakota have involved youth who were introduced to AHMEDABAD, THRISSUR– – ning all sorts of nefarious activities, including Senate on March 19, 2008 voted 47-0 for a hunting at an early age. The Kerala Elephant Lovers' Association on gambling and liquor trade,” Jhala added, “and bill to allow “apprentice hunters” aged at least Tim Kretschmer, 17, of Winnen- March 24, 2009 asked the Indian federal gov- the local police are also assisting him,” she 16 to hunt without taking a safety course first, den, Germany, on March 11, 2009 killed ernment to investigate the ambush beating of alleged. Wrote Kumar, “Jhala said Dipak if accompanied by a hunter at least 18 years eight girls, a boy, and three female teachers Thrissur SPCA senior inspector E.R. Jayan. Patel and her neighbours wanted her to vacate old who has taken the state safety course. at his school, killed three more people as he Jayan was allegedly assaulted by four men on the ground-floor flat where she has lived for The move to ease the rules for youth fled the scene, and then shot himself as police March 19 after responding to a false report that more than 11 years so that they could use the hunters followed a national legislative trend closed in to arrest him. Kretschmer reportedly an elephant was being abused. area for business purposes.” Charges were promoted by wildlife agencies and the gun took his weapon from his father’s arsenal. Jayan was attacked two weeks after filed against the suspects, but they remained at lobby, in hopes of rekindling youth interest in Using a shotgun that his father Animal Lovers Emergency Rescue Team large, Kumar reported. hunting. Hunting license sales have fallen Christopher Brown gave him for Christmas, founder Sandra Jhala, 53, of Ahmedabad, Rahul Sehgal, founder of the Ani- steadily throughout the U.S. for nearly 30 Jordan Brown, 11, of Wampum, Pennsyl- “suffered multiple fractures, cuts and bruises mal Help Foundation in Ahmedabad, was in years, with the steepest decline among teens. vania, on February 14, 2009 won a Valen- after men went into her yard and attacked dogs mid-2007 beaten in a similar gang attack, and The Washington House of Rep- tine’s Day turkey shoot at a local gun club. kept there,” reported the Times of India o n the Animal Help computers were smashed. resentatives bucked the trend on March 10, Two days later he shot his father’s girlfriend, March 3, 2009. Beaten when she intervened, Sehgal also named his assailants, whom he voting 70-26 for a bill that would require Kenzie Marie Houk, 26, as she lay in bed. “Jhala received more than 50 stitches on her said were associated with a rival animal chari- hunters younger than 14 to have adult supervi- Houk was eight months pregnant. Jordan head and has five fractures on her left hand,” ty, but to little avail. sion when hunting on public land. Washing- Brown is charged with premeditated homicide. elaborated Roshan Kumar of the investigative An early 2000 crackdown on illegal ton state law since 1994 has allowed anyone In St. Johns, Arizona, a nine-year- newspaper DNA. slaughter in Ahmedabad turned violent after of any age to hunt alone if licensed and if the old boy on February 19, 2009 pleaded guilty Jhala named her assailants. “It was vigilantes helped police to seize 2,125 animals hunter has completed a safety course. to one count of negligent homicide for killing an attempt by my neighbours and local goon- from illegal butchers, including 641 cows. The Washington bill was introduced his father, Vincent Romero, 29, and Timothy das, including Nainesh Patel, Shailesh Patel, 180 people were arrested, 58 vehicles were after a 14-year-old was charged with first- Romans, 39, on November 5, 2008. The Dipak Patel and Daya Patel, to kill me,” Jhala impounded, and one person was killed in degree manslaughter for killing hiker Pamela boy’s mother, Erin Bloomfield, 26, who alleged to Kumar. “Dipak Patel has been run- fights between the butchers and the vigilantes. Almli, 54, on August 2, 2008. The 14-year- divorced Romero in 2002, told New York old and his 16-year-old brother told investiga- T i m e s reporter Solomon Moore that Romero tors that they were hunting bears. gave her son the .22 rifle he used to kill the At least three recent murder cases men, and that he had hunted with both. MORE LETTERS The cause of disaster Art use of animals Your March, 2009 cover article The Animal Rights Action Network “Hell and high water hit Down Under” was recently inundated with calls and e-mails described the major negative effects on ani- seeking help to stop a proposed art project by mals and humans in Australia caused by Seamus Nolan that would have featured two severe drought and major wild fires in one homeless dogs from the Louth dog pound. section of the country, and major flooding in The dogs would have been caged for the dura- another. This should be still another wake-up tion of the project, except for being taken out call to the need for major changes to avoid an for walks and given food and water. ARAN unprecedented international catastrophe due to offered to work with Nolan to develop an art global warming. project that would expose the killing of many The animal rights movement can thousands of homeless dogs in pounds across and should help to avoid that potential cata- Ireland. The story went national. strophe by increasing awareness of the major Both dogs have been adopted to role that animal-based agriculture plays in good homes, we believe, and Seamus Nolan producing global warming. According to the and the art galley have no plans to use animals 2006 United Nations report Livestock’s Long in future exhibitions. S h a d o w , animal agriculture emits more ––John Carmody greenhouse gases than all means of transporta- Campaigns Coordinator tion worldwide combined. This same report Animal Rights indicates that the number of farmed animals is Action Network projected to double in the next 50 years. If 120 Vale Avenue that happens, the increased greenhouse gas Carew Park, Limerick emissions will negate improvements from Ireland many positive changes, such as switches to Phone: 353-087-6275579 more efficient light bulbs, cars, etc.
ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 7 Russia halts seal hunt –– but Canada raises quota (from page 1) ministry of natural resources for producing the proposed European Union legislation, and a Norwegian companies with the financial back- fling by Irish environment minister John “Best Ecological Project of 2008.” slap at Canada. ing of Norwegian investors. The local Russian Gormley on the proposed European Union Continued VITA, “On January 16, “The words of a man often accused workers are paid a pittance. It seems to us that sealing ban. “The Irish government have 2009,” nearly two months before Trutnyev’s of using military force to quash dissent in areas Russia has better things to do than supply the today signaled their support for a total E.U. announcement, “the Federal Agency for of Russia with separatist leanings clearly people of Norway with employment and trade ban on seal products, with no loopholes Fisheries issued an order banning the slaugh- packed a punch––and they have seemingly left Norwegian businessmen with profits.” and no exemptions,” e-mailed Carmody, after ter. This decision was confirmed by Russian Canada even more isolated,” wrote Michael orchestrating a week-long campaign of e- prime minister Vladimir Putin.” McKiernan of the Toronto-based N a t i o n a l Canadian motion mails, letters, and calls asking Gormley to The Russian state newspaper P o s t . “Although Putin has yet to indicate Unable to gain a Parliamentary commit to supporting the European Union Rossisskaya Gazeta reported that Putin on whether his sympathies extend far enough to majority without significant support from anti-sealing bill as written. February 26, 2009 told a cabinet meeting that copy the European Union approach and ban Atlantic Canada, all major Canadian political Approximately 100 sealing oppo- he personally considers seal hunting a “bloody imports, his stance has pushed Canada further parties have strongly backed the Atlantic nents organized by the Spanish animal rights industry” that “clearly should have been into the proverbial corner.” Canadian seal hunt since it was revived after a group Equanimal on March 15, 2009 held a banned long ago.” “Anti-sealing advocates dispute the 10-year suspension in 1994. nude and nearly nude protest in central Madrid size of the Russian market for Canadian seal Noting growing global opposition to to rally support for the proposed E.U. seal European Parliament pelts, but a Newfoundland processor said in the seal hunt, however, Canadian Senator product import ban. Trutnyev disclosed the end of the 2007 that the country was the leading customer Mac Harb on March 3, 2009 broke ranks with Other anti-sealing demonstrations White Sea seal hunt a week after the European for his products, with China not far behind,” his own Liberal Party to introduce a private were held as far away as Multan, Pakistan, Parliament’s internal market and consumer wrote Moore of the Globe & Mail. member’s bill to halt sealing. The bill quickly reported Animal Save Movement Pakistan protection committee on March 2, 2009 voted VITA noted that “The ban applies died from lack of a second. president Khalid Qureshi. 25-7 to prohibit the import of seal products only to baby seals. Now, on the eve of the “There was silence. Total silence! I Anticipating that the European into the 27 European Union member nations. hunting season for greycoats, young animals was amazed that not one of my colleagues, Union bill will pass, and that the importance The bill exempts seal products made “for cul- whose coats are no longer white, VITA and from any one of the political parties, would of China as the last remaining major purchaser tural, educational or ceremonial purposes” by other animal protection activists are deter- even want to debate the issue,” Harb told A.G. of Canadian seal pelts will increase, the Hong the Inuit people of northern Canada. mined to obtain a ban on the commercial Sulzberger of The New York Times. Kong SPCA and Humane Society International “The full European Parliament is to killing of all young seals. With this aim, But the Harb bill had political fall- in March 2009 sent actress and singer Karen vote on the ban at a April 1 plenary session in VITA and the Living Nature Club on March out. On March 5, 2009, the ruling Conserv- Mok Man-wai to witness the Atlantic Brussels. The measure also has to be approved 10, 2009 organized a flight for journalists to ative Party conceded that it had improperly Canadian seal hunt. by EU governments before it can be imple- the White Sea. used federal funding to distribute three press This predictably infuriated the Hong mented,” explained Oliver Moore of the “We want the journalists to see for releases, two of them from fisheries minister Kong Fur Federation, reported Hazel Parry of Toronto Globe & Mail. themselves that seal watching is a unique kind Gail Shea, attacking an alleged Liberal “hid- the South China Morning Post. “I’m very disappointed that elected of tourism which is already successful and in den agenda” against the seal hunt. John F. Robins, campaign consul- officials in Europe are going against World terms of jobs is an effective alternative to the World Society for the Protection of tant for the Scottish organization Animal Trade Organization rulings and legal opin- two-week slaughter,” explained VITA coordi- Animals board president Dominic Bellemare Concern, meanwhile sought to draw attention ions,” Rob Cahill of the Canadian Fur nator Alexey Skrobanskiy of Arkhangels, the helped to form the Conservative Party via to seal hunting along the coast of Scotland. Institute told media. major seaport on the White Sea. merger of two older parties in 2003, and ran “As many as 5,000 seals are legally Cahill hinted that Canada will appeal Added VITA president Irina unsuccessfully for Parliament as a Conserv- killed every year by Scottish aquacultural and to the WTO to try to overturn a European Novozhilova, “We are delighted with the gov- ative in 2008. However, while WSPA offi- fishery interests,” said Robins, seeking to Union ban on seal pelts, if the ban is adopted. ernment ban; it is an unprecedented victory cially opposes the Atlantic Canadian seal hunt, add language to a pending omnibus Marine As if in defiance of world opinion, for public opinion. The first step has now been Bellemare has apparently never opposed it on Bill that would prohibit killing seals in Canadian fisheries minister Gail Shea on taken. However, we want to point out to the the public record, and has refused to say Scotland and Scottish waters. March 21, 2009 increased the 2009 Atlantic government that the commercial slaughter of whether he supports or opposes it in response “The Scottish Government wants to Canada sealing quota to 338,200, 55,000 more greycoats is of absolutely no use as a way of to questions from ANIMAL PEOPLE. use the new Marine Bill to tinker with the situ- than in 2008, but 27,000 fewer than the ensuring an income for local residents; indeed, ation and bring in a few rules regarding the 365,000 seals who were killed in 2004, the not only is it unethical, it is also unprofitable.” World response shooting of seals,” Robins explained. “We highest total of the past half century. Explained the VITA written state- Animal Rights Activist Network only require one rule and that is to make it ille- Putin’s condemnation of sealing ment, “The commercial slaughter of seals in founder John Carmody, of Limerick, Ireland, gal to shoot seals. The Scottish seal slaughter came as both an indirect endorsement of the the White Sea is carried out nowadays by on March 17, 2009 hoped to have ended waf- shames our nation and must be stopped.” April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 8
8 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 Is diplomacy making gains against Japanese whaling? R O M E––Some International Whaling Commission fishers have clamored to be allowed to hunt whales legally. ered by the Australian patrol ship Oceanic Viking last year have insiders believe the IWC is close to brokering a deal that would Iceland, not currently an IWC member, will allow been rejected. The Environment Department has ruled that allow the Japanese government to end so-called “research whal- whalers to kill 150 minke whales and 150 endangered fin releasing images or data would “adversely affect the confidence ing” without losing political credibility. whales this year, under a quota allocated by a former coalition Japan would have in our diplomatic efforts to achieve an end to Others believe Japanese actions against whaling government on the day it left office. The new government has ‘scientific whaling.’” opponents show that the Japanese government believes it has hinted that it may cut the quota next year. In Japan, meanwhile, Greenpeace on March 20, the upper hand and can force the IWC to reopen commercial “We have been warning all along that if Japan gets a 2009 asked the Fisheries Agency of Japan via Japanese legisla- whaling, after a 23-year suspension. deal, other countries are going to want part of the action,” tor Shokichi Kina for uncensored copies of whale meat sales After initially refusing to honor the 1986 commercial Whale & Dolphin Conservation Society policy director Sue documents. Copies obtained through a 2008 Freedom of whaling moratorium, Japan in 1988 accepted the moratorium Fisher told Andrew Darby, covering whaling issues for the Information request were “supposed to detail whale meat sales, but began killing whales in the name of “scientific research,” Sydney Morning Herald and Melbourne Age. as well as contracts between the FAJ and the Institute of continuing to sell whale meat. The 2009 self-allocated Japan’s “political will is far greater than the com- Cetacean Research,” said a Greenpeace press release. Japanese “research” quota includes 935 minke whales and 50 bined political will of the pro-conservation governments,” “However, copies of the documents released on January 19, fin whales. Fisher added, to Dogget of Agence France-Presse. 2009 were so heavily redacted that they were worthless.” The 63rd annual IWC meeting, to be held in The IWC Rome intersessional meeting adopted a res- The request was made as Greenpeace Japan members Madeira, Portugal, in June 2009, appears likely to open with olution deploring “acts of violence against ships” and calling Junichi Sato, 31, and Toru Suzuki, 41, face trial for allegedly the U.S. and Australian delegations taking ambiguous positions. for “action to be taken by the relevant authorities” in response stealing whale meat. Nominally opposed to whaling, both the U.S. and Australian to the efforts of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, in par- Sato and Suzuki “tracked a package of whale meat to governments appear to endorse concessions that are mostly not ticular, to obstruct Japanese whaling within the Southern a mail depot in northern Japan, summarized Los Angeles Times supported by anti-whaling advocacy groups. Oceans Whale Sanctuary, declared by the IWC in 1994. Tokyo correspondent John M. Glionna, “after tipsters told “It is our view that any package, to be acceptable, Australian federal police on February 20, 2009 them it contained whale meat bound for the Japanese black must result in a significant improvement in the conservation seized 157 video rolls from Discovery Channel personnel market, smuggled by crew members of a ship commissioned to status of whales,” White House Council on Environmental aboard the Sea Shepherd flagship Steve Irwin, along with Sea kill whales for scientific research. But when they held a cam- Quality chair Nancy Sutley told Gina Dogget of Agence Shepherd navigational records, as the ship docked in Hobart. eras-flashing news conference to turn the meat over to police, France-Presse on March 11, 2009, after the inconclusive end “The videos show the Sea Shepherd clashes with the officers instead arrested the activists for trespass and theft. of an IWC intersessional meeting held in Rome. Japanese whalers,” including a collision between the S t e v e Japanese officials say the men are eco-terrorists who stole the The present IWC chair, serving until the end of the Irwin and the Japanese whale-catching vessel Yushin Maru #2 meat from a legitimate transporter to falsely malign the nation’s June 2009 meeting, is Florida Atlantic University professor on February 6, 2009, “and may be given to the Japanese gov- whaling establishment. The pair could receive up to 10 years in William Hogarth, a George W. Bush administration appointee. ernment,” wrote Andrew Darby. “A federal agent said yester- jail if convicted.” Hogarth is believed to be the chief author of a trade-off that day’s raid resulted from a formal referral from Japanese author- “Our activists handed over a box of whale meat as would allow IWC member nations to authorize commercial ities. Australian National University law professor Don evidence of the whale meat smuggling operation, and the whaling in their territorial waters in exchange for the end of Rothwell said international legal obligations meant evidence of Tokyo public prosecutor agreed there was sufficient evidence “research whaling.” alleged maritime offences could be forwarded to Japan. of wrongdoing,” said Greenpeace oceans campaigner John That deal would allow the annual Taiji dolphin mas- “People actively opposing whaling could be persecut- Hocevar on June 20, 2008, after Sato and Suzuki were arrest- sacre and other hunts of small whales in Japanese waters to ed or worse because of video evidence if it is sent to the ed. However, the Tokyo District Public Prosecutor’s Office in continue without the risk of the IWC claiming an expanded Japanese,” said Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson. “I wish July 2008 cleared the implicated employees of the whaling mandate to protect smaller whales. The IWC has historically the Australian Government would apply the same diplomatic company Kyodo Senpaku Kaisha Ltd and the Institute of regulated only hunting of baleen and sperm whales. pressure on Japan to end their illegal whaling operations,” Cetacean Research of the Greenpeace allegations against them. Whether the rumored deal would actually reduce the Watson added in a written statement. numbers of regulated species that the Japanese fleet kills is “The Japanese ships have not been board- unclear. Such a deal would formalize IWC acceptance of the ed by the Australian federal police. They Pilot charged with killing Norwegian assertion of a right to kill minke whales in coastal have not had their video and navigational C O V E N T R Y ––Heating tech- The incident came just over a waters, with a 2009 quota of 885. An IWC rule allowing data confiscated. They have not been nician, hunting opponent, and gyro- month after the British High Court coastal whaling would also almost certainly bring other nations questioned, nor will they be, yet they copter pilot Bryan Griffiths, 54, of upheld the acquittal of fox hunter back into commercial whaling. violently attacked my ship and crew.” Bedworth, Warwickshire, has been held Anthony Wright, who in 2006 was the South Korea, in particular, already has a small Noted Darby, “Attempts by by police since March 9, 2009 on a first person charged with violating the whale-butchering industry, which processes the meat of whales Green Party Senator Bob Brown to obtain charge of murdering hunt follower 2004 Hunting Act. The court ruled that nominally caught by accident by fishing vessels. South Korean information on Japanese whaling gath- Trevor Morse, 48, of Alderminster, while the Act forbids any deliberate pur- Warwickshire. suit of a wild mammal with hounds, “Morse died of head injuries including hare coursing, it does not for- after he was struck by the gyrocopter’s bid using hounds to stalk and flush out propeller at Long Marston airfield, near foxes to be shot, using up to two dogs to Stratford-upon-Avon,” reported the track a wounded animal, using dogs to London T i m e s . “Magistrates in Nun- flush out animals to be hunted by fal- eaton, Warwickshire, were told that a cons, using dogs to flush birds to be witness videotaped the incident, and the shot, and using dogs to hunt rodents. moments before it. The court was told The pro-hunting Countryside that Griffiths was a member of an anti- Alliance asserted that the High Court hunt animal rights campaign and worked verdict rendered the Hunting Act mean- as a volunteer hunt monitor, liaising ingless. The League Against Cruel closely with police. Warwickshire Police Sports is reportedly having to reassess 18 said that a second man arrested on suspi- pending prosecutions for alleged Hunting cion of murder was released on police Act violations, but both League Against bail pending further inquiries.” Cruel Sports chief executive Douglas “A gyrocopter had been fol- Batchelor and Royal SPCA director of lowing us for a couple of weeks and we animal welfare promotion John Rolls had made a formal complaint to the Civil told media that the law can still be used. Aviation Authority 10 days ago,” Of the first 31 prosecutions Warwickshire Hunt joint master Sam under the Hunting Act, Guardian envi- Butler told BBC News. ronment editor John Vidal wrote, 28 Summarized Lucy Bannerman were for hare coursing; only three were and Valerie Elliott of the London Times, for traditional fox hunting. Fox hunt par- “It is believed that Morse went with a ticipation has soared since the Hunting friend to the airfield to try to discover Act took effect in 2005, but polls com- who piloted the gyrocopter. He and a missioned by the League Against Cruel woman were believed to have Sports continue to show that more than approached the aircraft as it was refu- 70% of the British public favor the act, elling.” which was billed as ending fox hunting. ALF burns T U R I N––An arson claimed by the Animal Liberation Front with spray-painted slogans and a posting to the Florida-based Bite Back web site on February 25, 2009 razed the newly built Zoom Zoo near Turin, Italy. The zoo was to open in April. “Several bottles filled with petrol were used to start the fire, which killed some 40 hawks, buzzards and owls,” Europe News and Italian media reported. The ALF claimed to have released about 30 birds. Also killed were two hedgehogs, but firefighters kept the blaze from harming several tigers who were also on the premises. CATHOLIC CONCERN FOR ANIMALS began in 1929 in the UK. We now have a branch in the USA. www.catholic-ani mals.org 973-694-5155 April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 9
ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 9 U.S. Army bans pit bulls & Rottweilers (from page 8) Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. The attack biting someone on base had been pit bulls and pointed out, however, that the came as the U.S. Marine Corps faced a $5 mil- 8% were Rottweilers. U.S. Army policy chiefly con- lion lawsuit over a 2005 attack by a Rottweiler A July 2007 fatal attack on an 11- solidates and makes uniform at Camp Lejeune that cost a child an ear. month-old boy by two Siberian huskies in a the policies that were already On November 6, 2007 an 11-year- home near Cookeville, Tennessee, involved in effect at many bases. “The old boy who had been mauled by a pit bull ter- two families who met while living in U.S. U.S. Army enacted the new rier died at the Carl Darnall Army Medical Marine Corps housing. The father of the vic- policy to protect base housing Center at Fort Hood, near Killeen, Texas. tim was a U.S. Marine Corps recruiter, who citizens from serious attacks Believed to have had the least restrictive dog was still on active duty, but the attack appears and to prevent pet owners policy of any major Army installation, having to have occurred on private property. from encountering uneven only prohibited possession of wolf hybrids, Two pit bulls in May 2007 killed a policies when moving between coyotes, and jackals, Fort Hood banned pit three-year-old boy in base housing at Hunter installations,” Linn said. bulls in November 2008, but allowed pit bulls Army Airfield, Georgia. “DogsBite.org expresses great who were registered at the Fort Hood A Rottweiler in February 2006 fatal- gratitude to the U.S. Army.” Veterinary Clinic before July 10, 2008 to ly mauled the four-year-old son of a woman Researching the remain on base. who was stationed at Malmstrom Air Force Army order, Linn learned that Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lydon, Base, near Ulm, Montana. The victim and all 10 bases in the U.S. Air then the Fort Hood provost marshal, told his mother were staying with relatives. Force Space Command bar pit Amanda Kim Stairrett of the Killeen Daily In May 2005 a pit bull terrier whose bulls and Rottweilers from Herald that over the preceding six years, 68% family acquired him while living in military base housing. of the dogs who were declared dangerous after housing in Texas killed a two-year-old girl in Andrews Air Force Huntington, West Virginia. Base in Maryland, Ellsworth 11.5 years for dog About 950,000 military personnel Air Force Base in South Dakota, Kirtland Air ing for listing through March 22, 2009, and SEATTLE––Travis Dean Cunningham, and more than two million wives and children Force Base in New Mexico, and McGuire Air have caused 75% of the fatalities. 36, of SeaTac, Washington, on March 13, of military personnel occupy military housing. Force in New Jersey likewise prohibit pit bulls Pit bulls have been involved in 1,332 2009 was sentenced to serve 11.5 years in The rate of fatal dog attacks among the chil- and Rottweilers. Ellsworth and McGuire addi- of the 2,560 incidents and 133 of the 320 fatal- prison for allowing his two pit bull terriers to dren of military personnel living on base tionally name Dobermas, and Kirtland names ities. Rottweilers have been involved in 435 maul a 72-year-old woman, illegal posses- appears to be approximately five times the wolf hybrids. incidents and 66 fatalities. Wolf hybrids have sion of a firearm, and parole violations. background level of fatal attacks for the U.S. Pit bulls are also banned from hous- been involved in 80 incidents, producing 19 Cunningham reportedly had four prior felony as a whole. ing at the U.S. Marine Corps bases in Quant- fatalities. Pit bull mixes, exclusive of mixes convictions. The Cunningham sentence is the Best Friends Animal Society attor- ico, Virginia, and Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii. with other fighting breeds, have been involved longest known to ANIMAL PEOPLE in a ney Ledy Van Kavage and radio columnist The ANIMAL PEOPLE log of dog in 80 incidents, resulting in seven fatalities. non-fatal dog attack case. Former attorney Steve Dale of WGB radio in Chicago attack fatalities and maimings occurring in the Chows have been involved in 52 incidents, Margaret Knoller is serving 15 years to life in denounced the breed-specific aspect of the new U.S. and Canada since September 1982 shows resulting in seven fatalities. California for the fatal mauling of neighbor Army policy on the air on February 15. that breeds banned by the U.S. Army policy Dobermans have been involved in Diane Whipple in January 2001. DogsBite.org founder Colleen Linn have committed 83% of the incidents qualify- only 12 incidents and four fatalities. Events A p r i l : National Adopt-A- Greyhound Month. Info: < w w w . a d o p t - a - greyhound.org>. April 6-9: Animal Care E x p o, Las Vegas. Info: 1- 800-248-EXPO; (continued on page 10) TRIBUTES In honor of Richard H. Schwartz and Reverend Andrew Linzey. ––Brien Comerford –––––––––––––––––––––––– April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 10 10 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 Chimp attack wins attention of WASHINGTON D.C––Boosted by icut Department of Environmental Protection deferred sentence on a felony the February 16, 2009 rampage of a longtime biologist, whom Haigh did not name, warned charge of writing a bad check pet chimpanzee named Travis in Stamford, superiors on October 28, 2008 that Herold for $155,000, contingent on Connecticut, the Captive Primate Safety Act was keeping Travis in violation of state law. paying a fine of $1,000 and on February 24, 2009 cleared the U.S. House The biologist concluded “I would like to making restitution for the full of Representatives by a vote of 323-95 and express the urgency of addressing this issue.” amount, Halsted Acharya said. returned to the U.S. Senate. Travis had previously escaped and Nor are nonhuman “The bill will ban interstate com- run loose through Stamford in 2003. primates the only kind of dan- merce in apes, monkeys, lemurs, marmosets, However, the DEP “chose not to gerous exotic pet that lawmak- and other nonhuman primates for the pet enter into what we believed would be a battle ers and law enforcement are trade,” explained Humane Society Legislative to take custody of a local celebrity,” DEP now wrestling with, after more Fund director Mike Markarian. “A number of commissioner Gina McCarthy responded in a than 30 years of warnings from states and communities already prohibit pri- written statement to Connecticut legislators. the humane community about Travis the chimp attacked a Stamford police cruiser. vate ownership of primates as pets, but the The existing Connecticut law forbids the growth of the exotic pet industry. 1995 by Jeffrey Harsh of Oakley, Kansas, patchwork of local laws and the interstate keeping a nonhuman primate who will weigh For example, while the Connecticut had cleared health checks, and would be com- nature of the primate pet trade call out for a more than 50 pounds at maturity. The general assembly considered banning danger- ing to the zoo within a few more days. Two federal response. The Senate bill passed the Connecticut general assembly environment ous pets, a small alligator was captured on tigers kept by Harsh at a facility he called the Environment and Public Works Committee in committee on March 20, 2009 voted 28-2 to March 23, 2009 in South Windsor, just north Prairie Cat Animal Refuge will be sent to the July 2008,” Markarian continued, “and has prohibit outright keeping chimpanzees and of the state capitol in Hartford. Carnivore Preservation Trust in North been awaiting further action. Identical legisla- other potentially dangerous species. “The Captive Primate Safety Act is Carolina. Harsh is divesting of the big cats to tion passed the Senate unanimously in 2006.” With the injuries to Nash in the similar to a bill that Congress passed unani- avoid charges in connection with injuries suf- Charla Nash, 55, “lost her hands, news, the board of health in Carbon County, mously in 2003,” Markarian noted, “prohibit- fered by one of his employees. “Bradley Jeff nose, lips and eyelids and may be blind and Montana on March 12, 2009 voted unani- ing interstate commerce in tigers, lions, and Buchanan, who was apparently under the suffering brain damage” after Travis attacked mously to require chimp keeper Jeanne other dangerous big cats for the pet trade.” influence according to law enforcement her at the home of her friend Sandra Herold, Rizzotto to “quarantine her two chimps, pro- The Captive Wildlife Protection Act, authorities, for some reason stuck his arm in 70,” reported Associated Press writer Dave vide current medical records, and update their also called the Shambala Act after actress one of the cages and was bitten,” summarized Collins on March 17, 2009. Receiving treat- vaccinations. The board stopped short of Tippi Hedren’s Shambala sanctuary near Los Mike Corn of the Hays Daily News. ment at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, where ordering Rizzotto to send the primates to a Angeles, appears to have reduced the big cat Also on March 22, 2009 the USDA the first U.S. face transplant surgery was per- chimp sanctuary,” reported Linda Halsted traffic, but animals acquired before the law confiscated two tigers and a lion, reportedly formed, Nash remained in critical condition. Acharya of the Billings Gazette. was passed still turn up in bad situations, not properly fed in weeks, from North Texas Her family has sued Herold, seeking One of Rizzotto’s chimps in sanctuaries struggle to accommodate them, wildlife exhibitor Marcus Cook. The animals $50 million in damages. November 2008 bit a woman who was visiting and law enforcement continues to have diffi- were taken to the In-Sync Exotic Wildlife Police shot Travis after he attacked a a neighbor. Rizzotto claimed someone had culty preventing recidivism by big cat keepers Rescue and Education Center in Wylie. police car, trying to get at the officers inside. tampered with the locks on the chimp’s cage. who are repeatedly cited for violations. “The sudden addition is a strain for Associated Press writer Susan Haigh The chimps are not Rizzotto’s only The Detroit Zoo on March 22, 2009 the Wylie center, which is already reeling revealed on March 20, 2009 that a Connect- legal issue. On March 4, 2009 she accepted a announced that three African lions kept since from slumping donations,” reported Jonathan Betz of WFAA-TV. Cook, a former police officer, quit that job in 1997 “because of con- cerns about his credibili- ty,” the Dallas Morning News reported. Cook sub- sequently ran into trouble in connection with exotic cat exhibition. A N I M A L P E O P L E detailed his his- tory in 2002. Animals in his custody later injured people on at least three occasions. In 2007 four white tiger cubs died in his care. Texas and Florida have charged Cook with animal handling offenses, and he has also been inves- tigated at least twice in Minnesota. More events canvegan.org>. June 13: Natl. Pigeon Day. Info: IF YOUR GROUP IS HOLDING AN EVENT, please let us know–– we’ll be happy to announce it here, and we’ll be happy to send free samples of ANIMAL PEOPLE for your guests. April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 11 ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 11 Alaska suspends shooting wolves from the air Wolves will be FAIRBANKS–– The Alaska Department of Fish & that planes can no longer land to retrieve wolves who are Game on March 19, 2009 suspended shooting wolves from a shot,” Mowry said. helicopter, after killing 84 wolves in five days to try to More than 800 wolves have been killed as part of the hunted (from page 1) increase the numbers of caribou and moose accessible to Alaska aerial wolf control program during the past five years, human hunters in the Fortymile region. but the annual toll has been consistently far short of the DFG Currently numbering about 40,000, the Fortymile goals. The wolf killing this winter focused on the Fortymile The announcement came just five days before Bush caribou herd reputedly stretched from Fairbanks to White- calving grounds adjacent to the Yukon-Charley Rivers left office. White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel had sus- horse, and included about 568,000 caribou in 1920, when National Preserve, where predator control is prohibited. The pended the delisting for review. first surveyed. Subsequent counts have never found more then National Park Service does not allow any kind of predator con- Otter also declared his interest in hunting wolves after 46,000, and the 1975 count fell below 4,000, but the trol in the preserve. the Bush administration floated the delisting proposal in Department of Fish & Game continues to try to increase the “Many of those wolves have home ranges centered January 2007, and has pushed an Idaho wolf management plan herd to 60,000. in the preserve,” preserve manager Greg Dudgeon told that will allow hunters to kill as many as 320 wolves in the first “The department pulled the plug on the program one Mowry. “If a person traveling the upper Yukon corridor wolf season. The plan requires Idaho to maintain only 15 of the day after Defenders of Wildlife went to court in Anchorage to doesn’t have the opportunity to hear a wolf howl, I’m not present 39 breeding pairs of wolves, distributed among 88 file for an injunction to stop it,” reported Tim Mowry of the doing my job,” Dudgeon said. packs. But whether recreational hunters are able to kill wolves Fairbanks Daily News-Miner. Wrote Mowry, “The National Park Service request- in anything like the numbers killed by helicopter-flying But DFG Fairbanks regional supervisor David James ed a no-kill buffer zone around the preserve, but the state Wildlife Services personnel remains to be seen. told Mowry that the aerial shooting was stopped only because refused on the grounds that…it would be biologically and The wolf delisting was delayed for nearly two years wolves were becoming harder to find, and about 80% of the politically unfeasible.” because the Wyoming governor Dave Freudenthal, the $100,000 allocated to the project had been spent. The Fortymile wolf-strafing began a week after the Wyoming legislature, and the Wyoming wildlife and agricul- “After the first few days of an operation like this the Alaska Board of Game authorized the use of snares to trap ture agencies sought to confine wolves to the northwestern part productivity curve falls steeply,” James said. bears in the name of predator control, and the use of heli- of the state with a “predator” designation that would have “They couldn’t find any more wolves to kill,” copters for trappers to access bear habitat. The Board of Game allowed anyone to kill wolves anywhere else at any time. responded Defenders of Wildlife representative Wade Willis also allowed state personnel to use lethal gases to kill Eventually the Interior Department delinked said. “They ran out of wolves; it’s plain and simple.” orphaned wolf pups in their dens. Wyoming from all other Lower 48 states with wolf populations. Estimating that about 300 wolves inhabit the The underlying issue, pointed out Willis of Because Wyoming officials continue to resist adopting a wolf Fortymile region, and hoping to reduce the population to 88, Defenders to Kyle Hopkins of the Anchorage Daily News, is management plan that allows wolves to expand their range and the DFG expected to kill 150 by using a fixed-wing airplane to that years of aggressive predator killing, escalated under pre- maintain a viable population, wolves remain federally endan- spot their tracks, radioing in the helicopter to do the actual sent Alaska governor Sarah Palin, have failed to produce any gered in Wyoming. gunnery. “Prior to the helicopter strategy, the DFG relied on substantial increase in the Fortymile caribou herd beyond Under the terms of delisting, states are allowed to hunters, trappers and private pilot-gunner teams in fixed-wing approximately the present level, but proponents of predator establish wolf hunting seasons and quotas. But state wildlife aircraft who received permits from the state to kill wolves in control continue to believe that if they can just find a way to agencies may not permit wolves to be hunted to renewed the area,” wrote Mowry, but the private pilot-gunner teams kill even more predators, the herd will grow. endangerment. If Idaho hunters, for example, killed the full had killed only 39 all winter. Predator control critics suspect that the Fortymile state quota of 320 wolves this year, there might be no wolf Private pilot-gunner teams and trappers “can contin- caribou carrying capacity is not more than 50,000, and that hunting season, or a severely restricted wolf season, in 2010. ue to take wolves until April 30, or until conditions are such the 1920 count was either grossly exaggerated or an aberation. Wildlife Services will continue to kill wolves, along with other livestock predators, as contracted by state agencies, but wolves killed by Wildlife Services count against the num- bers killed by sport hunters. If Wildlife Services kills more wolves than anticipated in future management plans, the state quotas must be cut back. Wildlife Services spent nearly $1 million to kill wolves in the northern Rockies in 2008, about a fourth of total federal expenditure on regional wolf management. Most of the cost of wolf management will now pass to state agencies. Wolves vs. elk Governor Otter and other Idaho hunters hope that killing wolves will help to rebuild the elk population in the Lolo elk management zone. This region, described by Associated Press writer Todd Dvorak as “a vast stretch that incorporates the Lochsa and North Fork of the Clearwater River drainages,” twenty years ago supported as many as 16,000 elk. “In the last two decades,” Dvorak summarized on The pronghorn herd in the Yellowstone region is up 60% since the wolf reintroduction. (Kim Bartlett) March 9, 2009, “that herd has diminished to a little more than In Montana, “The northern Yellowstone elk herd is and lethal responses fell so steeply that after killing 5,302 coy- 3,000 elk due to habitat changes, hunting, and depredation larger than last year, according to a recent aerial survey,” wrote otes in Wyoming in 1994, the seventh highest state total, from bear, mountain lions, and wolves.” Brett French of the Billings Gazette, “but the number of calves Wildlife Services killed just 2,446 in 1997, eleventh among the Elsewhere, Dvorak reported, “Wildlife managers remains one-half to one-third of what wildlife managers would states. have met or exceeded the National Elk Refuge population like to see. Predation of elk calves by grizzly bears and wolves By November 1997, reported Wildlife objective in Wyoming for nine consecutive years. Of the seven is blamed for the lower calf numbers. But the overall drop in Conservation Society researcher Kim Murray Berger and elk hunting units overlapped by Wyoming’s trophy game area, elk numbers has also been attributed to extended drought and USDA scientist Eric Gese, the Yellowstone National Park coy- where wolves could be hunted only with a license during a reg- hunter harvests.” ote population had fallen 40% since the wolf reintroduction. ulated season,” according to the present state plan, “only two The Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks The coyote population of Grand Teton National Park, to the are below herd objectives, and one of these is by 48 animals “decreased the number of antlerless elk permits from 1,102 in south, fell 33%. while the other is about 500 below desired levels.” 2005 to 100 per season between 2006 and 2009,” explained This restored the proportions of predators and prey French, “to increase the number of breeding-age to those of the 19th century, before wolves were extirpated, cow elk. Berger and Gese believed. The return of wolves introduced “Elk numbers in the northern herd have significant predation of elk and bison, for the first time in more dropped 60% from all-time highs,” since the 1995 than a century, but because coyotes learn to avoid wolves, wolf reintroduction, French wrote, “but wolf num- while wolves mostly hunt larger prey, predation on sheep, bers in Yellowstone are down 40% from 2008, deer, and pronghorn had declined, Berger and Gese found. dropping from 94 to 56 wolves in the northern Berger told Associated Press that unpublished data range. The wolf decline has been blamed on dis- suggested the pronghorn population had increased by 6% per ease and lethal fights between packs battling over year in areas where wolves replaced coyotes. limited resources.” Wolf restoration unexpectedly benefitted beaver, found Oregon State University ecologists William Ripple and Wolves vs. coyotes Robert Beschta. The coyote population declined by half in the Whatever influence wolves have had on portions of the Yellowstone region accessible to beaver, while elk, coyotes have probably taken proportionately the beaver population increased by 900%. Apparently coyotes the biggest hit from wolf reintroduction of any hit dispersing young beavers much harder than anyone realized. species––both from wolves and from hunters, Wolves tend to leave beavers alone, as they are not big enough ranchers, and USDA Wildlife Services. to feed a pack. “Long hated and persecuted for resembling As beaver create habitat for many other species, wolves, coyotes again figure to pay the price for including muskrats, otter, fish and birds, wolf recovery boost- their bigger cousins as wolves, their own image ed biodiversity throughout the northern Rockies. rehabilitated, are reintroduced to fragments of their But the political pendulum swung with the election of former habitat,” ANIMAL PEOPLE predicted in former U.S. President George W. Bush. The Bush administra- October 1994. “The strongest argument wolf tion placated rancher and hunter anger over the wolf reintroduc- defenders have for reintroduction, they have tion by boosting the USDA Wildlife Services coyote toll in found, is not that wild wolves have never verifi- Wyoming to 7,857 in 2001, and kept it between 6,079 and ably attacked a human being within the U.S., nor 7,069 through 2006. that they are the lovable creatures whose family life Then, while trying to woo Wyoming into adopting an Farley Mowat recorded in Never Cry Wolf! Rather, acceptable wolf management plan, the Bush administration it’s that a wolf will kill a coyote if he sees it.” allocated $6 million more to coyote killing in Wyoming in 2007 Within months of release in Yellowstone and 2008. The USDA Wildlife Services staff in Wyoming was National Park, wolves drove coyotes to the fringes increased from 20 to 45. The coyote toll jumped to 10,914 in of the Lamar Valley, a former coyote stronghold. 2007. Rod Krischke, Wildlife Services program director for As wolves spread out of Yellowstone into sur- Wyoming, predicted in August 2008 that the 2008 toll would rounding states, coyote numbers initially thinned be higher, once the numbers are tallied. wherever wolf packs became established. Killing coyotes in steeply increased volume is possi- Irate about wolf predation on livestock ble in Wyoming, despite the wolf reintroduction, for two rea- and elk, ranchers and hunters said little about the sons. The first is that wolves still have a strong presence only parallel decline in coyote predation. But USDA in the northwest part of Wyoming, near Yellowstone and Wildlife Services records tell the story––especially Grand Teton National Parks. The second is that killing coyotes, Wolf. (Kim Bartlett) in Wyoming. Calls about alleged problem coyotes (continued on page 12) April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 12 12 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 Wolves will be hunted (from page 11) unlike killing wolves, tends to accelerate their rates of repro- Amid scoffing that “ADC” stood for Accelerated duction and dispersal. Distribution of Coyotes, studies begun in the mid-1950s dis- Coyotes came to be on the Wildlife Services hit list in covered what had happened. A Texas study, confirmed in other the first place because wolves were extirpated from most of the states, found that intense hunting made more food available to Lower 48. The U.S. Forest Service initiated wolf “control” in surviving pregnant female coyotes, whose average litter size 1905, in partnership with the U.S. Biological Survey. Formed increased from four to as many as seven. in 1884 as the Office of Economic Ornithology and Biology, Along with the extermination of wolves, a vogue for the latter agency 20 years later faced termination by Congress fox fur collars throughout the 1930s and 1940s had opened up unless it could find a justification for its continued existence. new habitat. As foxes were hunted and trapped out of the east, By 1915, the Biological Survey had an annual wolf-killing coyotes moved in, despite every effort of the ADC, and budget of $125,000. Two years later, as political enthusiasm despite state after state introducing an open season on coyotes, for wolf eradication grew, the budget was up to $250,000, often reinforced by bounties. equivalent to perhaps $5 million today. The Biological Survey ADC became USDA Wildlife Services in 1997. The killed a high of 523 wolves in 1920, but could kill just 47 by House of Representatives in June 1998 approved a budget cut 1927 and only nine a year later. that would have abolished Wildlife Services, but the agency As wolves were exterminated, coyotes spread into budget was later more than doubled, and the agency mandate their former range, in far greater numbers, and soon killed was expanded to include exterminating “invasive species” as many times more domestic sheep and calves than wolves ever well as wildlife threats to human economic interests. had. Congress in A coalition self-described as “115 conservation, ani- 1931 formed the mal protection, ranching, and faith-based organizations from There are now about 3,000 wolves in Minnesota, 520 department of Animal across the United States” on January 2, 2009 asked then newly in Michigan, and 550 in Wisconsin. The current Minnesota Damage Control with appointed agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack to reform Wildlife state wolf conservation plan calls for a five-year moratorium a mandate to extirpate Services so that it would no longer be essentially a government- after federal delisting before any legal wolf hunting might be coyotes. The ADC managed extermination agency. Confirmed in the appointment authorized. Michigan also has no immediate plans to allow killed as many as a on January 20, 2009, Vilsack in his first 60 days in office did wolf hunting. But, pressured by the Wisconsin Conservation quarter of a million not take any major actions involving Wildlife Services. Congress and the Wisconsin Hunters Rights Coalition, the coyotes per year at Coyotes briefly got a break from the beginnings of Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources in August 2008 peak, but coyotes wolf recovery. A few wolves had either survived the ADC told the state Natural Resources Board that hunters could kill proved more resilient onslaught in Minnesota, or had recolonized the region from from 29 to 41 wolves per year without harming the population. than wolves. Despite Canada. In 1970 some of the Minnesota wolves dispersed into Known wolf mortality in Wisconsin in 2007 was 92, the killing, coyotes Wisconsin. Allegedly mistaking the wolves for coyotes, said Adrian Wydeven of the Wisconsin DNR, including 37 increased their num- hunters and ranchers shot many of them. In 1979 Wisconsin wolves killed by government personnel in response to preda- bers and range, reach- banned coyote hunting in counties known to have wolves––but tion, three shot by property owners to protect livestock or pets, Beaver. (Kim Bartlett) ing Maine by 1948. lifted the ban in 1983 due to protests from deer hunters. and 28 who were hit by vehicles. ––Merritt Clifton Vietnam drops dog meat regs after rabies case H A N O I ––Two recent human rabies deaths appear to have influenced the Vietnamese govern- ment to withdraw a proposal to draft standards for preparing dog meat for human consumption, and to reiterate a decade-old but lightly enforced ban on eating cats. The first rabies victim “had prepared and eaten a dog who had been killed in a road accident; rabid dogs were known to inhabit the neighborhood,” reported Heiman Wertheim, M.D., of the National Institute of Infectious and Tropical Diseases and the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidem- iology in Hanoi. “The second patient,” Wertheim said, “had butchered and eaten a cat who had been sick for days.” “In early February,” e- mailed Animals Asia Foundation founder Jill Robinson, “our Viet- nam director, Tuan Bendixsen, received an official letter from the Central Department of Animal Health, Ministry of Agriculture. Apparently they had received offi- cial requests from various provin- cial governments asking for guide- lines on slaughtering dogs for human consumption.” Bendixsen responded by pointing out health risks to those involved in preparing and consum- ing dog-meat, “highlighting para- sites, rabies, and leptospirosis,” Robinson said. Bendixsen in early March was notified, Robinson added, that the Vietnamese government had decided not to enact a regulation on processing of dog meat for human consumption. “Although a local gov- ernment can enact such a regulation for their own area,” Robinson said, “usually they will not go against the Central Government’s directive. I’m now looking at getting the Central Government to officially ban it instead of just not enacting it,” Robinson concluded. “I don’t have actual fig- ures on dog eating in Vietnam,” said Bendixsen, “but I feel dog eat- ing is only popular in the north. There is hardly any sign of dog meat restaurants in Saigon or else- where in the south, and most of the people who eat dogs in the south are from the north.” April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 13 ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 13 Meat kills, confirms Natl. Cancer Institute Obama bans slaughtering study of half million Americans (from page 1) 20% who ate the least. The 20% of women intake tended to consume a slightly lower WASHINGTON D.C.––U . S . “The state legislation was approved who ate the most red meat were 43% more amount of white meat but a higher amount of President Barack Obama in his weekly video last summer after the largest beef recall in his- likely to likely to die than the 20% who ate the processed meat compared with those in the and radio address to the nation on March 14, tory,” wrote John Ellis of the Fresno Bee. least. The differentials for the highest and lowest quintile,” the study reported. 2009 announced that the U.S. would reinforce “That recall came after the Humane Society lowest consumption of processed meat were “From Table 1 of the paper,” com- and make permanent a ban on killing downed of the U.S. secretly videotaped animal abuse 20% for men, 31% for women. mented Burnham Institute for Medical cattle at federally inspected meat plants. at a Southern California slaughterhouse, “Eleven percent of deaths in men Research biochemist Shi Huang in a posting to “As part of our commitment to pub- including a man dragging and shocking sick and 16% of deaths in women could be prevent- Med Page Today, “it is shown that the group lic health, our Agriculture Department is cows. But the National Meat Association and ed if people decreased their red meat consump- with the highest red meat intake consumed 119 closing a loophole in the system to ensure that the American Meat Institute challenged the tion to the level of intake in the first quintile,” grams [of all forms of meat] per kilogram of diseased cows don’t find their way into the California law, saying federal law preempts the study authors determined. caloric intake. The data of total amount of all food supply,” Obama said. state law. The legal battle isn’t over,” Ellis “Red meat intake was calculated meat [consumed] for the group with the high- Newly confirmed Agriculture continued. “O’Neill’s ruling is preliminary. using the frequency of consumption and por- est white meat intake is not shown, but my Secretary Tom Vilsack called the ban “a step But if the state doesn’t appeal the ruling, the tion size information of all types of beef and estimate based on the reported data for this forward for both food safety and the standards National Meat Association and the American pork,” said the study, “and included bacon, group is 69 grams per kilogram of caloric for humane treatment of animals.” Meat Institute will ask O’Neill to make it per- beef, cold cuts, ham, hamburger, hotdogs, intake. So, it seems that people who mostly “Under the previous regulations,” manent.” liver, pork, sausage, steak, and meats in eat white meat consumed [about half as much said Farm Sanctuary cofounder Gene Baur, California attorney general Jerry foods such as pizza, chili, lasagna, and stew. meat of all types] than people who eat red “a case-by-case assessment was made of cat- Brown on March 5, 2009 appealed O’Neill’s Processed meat included bacon, red meat meat. The people with the highest intake of tle who went down at the slaughterhouse after verdict to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals sausage, poultry sausage, luncheon meats, white meat have a lower risk of death than passing the pre-slaughter inspection. This in San Francisco. cold cuts, ham, regular hotdogs, and low-fat those with lowest intake, as reported. But encouraged slaughterhouse workers to try to Judge O’Neill a week before issuing hotdogs made from poultry.” those with low intake of white meat actually get cattle to stand and walk, pulling them by his preliminary ruling allowed the Animal “There are various mechanisms by consume more red meat and total meat in gen- the ears and tails, prodding them with electric Legal Defense Fund, the Humane Farming which meat may be related to mortality,” eral. The bottom line,” Huang concluded, is shocks, even dragging them with chains and Association, Farm Sanctuary, and the Sinha et al explained. “In relation to cancer, that “the data overall shows a link between pushing them with forklifts.” Humane Society of the U.S. to petition the meat is a source of several multisite carcino- total amount of meat and mortality. The color “We believe this policy should court in favor of the state law. ALDF, HFA, gens…Iron in red meat may increase oxidative of meat is irrelevant.” apply to pigs and all other species as well,” Farm Sanctuary, and HSUS filed a joint damage and increase the formation of N- The study did not separately investi- Baur added. Farm Sanctuary debuted in 1986 appeal of the verdict to the Ninth Circuit nitroso compounds. Furthermore, meat is a gate mortality among vegetarians, who in the with a “No Downers” campaign after Baur appellate court one day after Brown filed. major source of saturated fat, which has been middle-aged and elderly age brackets would be and others rescued a downed sheep named “The ruling could set a precedent positively associated with breast and colorectal only about 2% of the U.S. population. Hilda from a stockyard near Philadelphia, for other farm animal processors seeking to cancer…Elevated blood pressure has been Editorialized Barry M. Popkin, and has pursued anti-downer laws ever since. skirt food safety laws and put meat from other shown to be positively associated with higher Ph.D., of the University of North Carolina at U.S. District Judge Lawrence J. sick and injured animals, including cattle, intakes of red and processed meat.” Chapel Hill, in the same edition of the Annals O’Neill on February 19, 2009 ruled in into the public food supply,” said ALDF of Internal Medicine that published the Sinha Fresno, California that downed pigs may still spokesperson Lisa Franzetta. White meat et al findings, “We are seeing the confluence be slaughtered for human consumption, “Downed cattle are more likely to “It would be better to shift from red of growing constraints on water, energy and under the 1907 Federal Meat Inspection Act, be infected with mad cow disease and more meat to white meat such as chicken and fish,” food supplies combined with the rapid shift despite a 2008 California law that was meant likely to harbor foodborne bacteria, such as Harvard School of Public Health nutrition sci- toward greater consumption of all animal to keep downed pigs and cattle out of the E. coli and S a l m o n e l l a ,” pointed out entist Walter Willet told Rob Stein of the source foods…The need is for a major reduc- human food supply. Franzetta. Washington Post, “which if anything is asso- tion in total meat intake, an even larger reduc- ciated with lower mortality.” tion in processed meat and other highly Similar comments from others were processed and salted animal source food prod- Congress vs. states over horse slaughter widely echoed. ucts, and a reduction in total saturated fat.” BISMARCK, BOISE, HELENA, The North Dakota Senate was mean- But that is not what the study found. A recent study by agricultural econo- WASHINGTON D.C.––A political race to while considering a bill passed by the state Mortality among the 20% of the study cohort mists James Mintert, Ted Schroeder, and the wire over horse slaughter pits Congress- assembly which would allocate $50,000 to who ate the most poultry and fish was slightly Glynn Tonsor found that the number of med- ional support for the proposed Prevention of study the feasibility of opening a horse slaugh- lower than among those who ate the least, but ical journal articles linking dietary fat to cho- Equine Cruelty Act, which would prohibit terhouse. At least 10 states were considering the participants who ate the most poultry and lesterol and heart disease nearly quadrupled interstate transport of horses for slaughter, or had already passed resolutions asking fish tended to eat the least red meat. “In gen- from 1982 to 2004, coinciding with a 9% against a field of state legislation written to Congress to defeat the Prevention of Equine eral, those in the highest quintile of red meat decline in U.S. beef consumption. expedite the resumption of horse slaughter, Cruelty Act. suspended in the U.S. since the last three horse The resolutions were boosted by Los Angeles dog & cat sterilization funds cut slaughterhouses closed in 2007. publicity over horse neglect and abandonment The Prevention of Equine Cruelty cases, which typically peak each year in late LOS ANGELES––“Our spay/neuter niques that are now standard operating proce- Act 2009, introduced by Representative John winter, when hay supplies are low and prices program has not been terminated,” Los dure worldwide. Conyers (D-Michigan) had 103 cosponsors as are high. Despite the weak U.S. economy, Angeles Animal Services general manager Ed There was one previous interruption Boks clarified on March 19, 2009, six days of funding, after the “Rodney King Riots” of of March 23. however, ANIMAL PEOPLE files indicate after rumors swept the animal welfare world 1992 drained the city budget––and that was the Montana governor Brian Schweitzer, that the numbers of horses involved in such that the oldest city-funded dog and cat steril- only time in the past 37 years that Los Angeles a Democrat, had on his desk a bill passed by cases in early 2009 are similar to the numbers the Republican majorities in the state house of involved when horse slaughter was booming. ization program anywhere was a casualty of shelter killing increased relative to the human representatives and senate to encourage con- “The pro-slaughter side has used the the U.S. economic crisis. population of the city. struction of a horse slaughterhouse. media to great effect, seeding articles that “Distribution of our spay/neuter Only a week before suspending spay/ “The bill would require those chal- have wrongly tied horse neglect and abandon- coupons under this program was temporarily neuter coupon distribution, Boks on March 6, suspended,” Boks acknowledged. “Since 2009 celebrated “the lowest January/February lenging a slaughter facility permit to post a ment cases to an end to domestic slaughter,” implementation of the Los Angeles spay/neuter euthanasia rate in the department’s history,” bond worth 20% of its construction costs. It observed online equine issues commentator ordinance, the demand for these coupons has achieved “despite the highest January/February would also prohibit courts from halting con- Alex Brown. “Sadly these stories are easy for struction of a facility once it has been general audiences to believe and allow politi- exceeded our funding. We are working with impound rates in nearly a decade. With the approved by the state,” summarized cians to justify their position on a bill without the mayor’s office to restore distribution in a opening of our new and expanded centers,” Associated Press writer Kahren Deines. researching the veracity of the claims.” manner that can be sustained,” Boks said. Boks said, “we experienced nearly a 250% Explained Los Angeles Daily News increase in kennels and workload, while our staff writer Rick Orlov, “The city last year staffing increased only 100%.” Uncertain times for hunter/con- adopted a law requiring dog and cat owners to Meanwhile, facing a 2008 budget Commerce Department i n s p e c t o r donors had expected to give through charita- have pets spayed or neutered when they reach deficit of nearly $500 million, the Los Angeles general Todd Zinser in early March 2009 ble remainder trusts, gift annuities, and other four months of age. As a way to promote the city council cut $300,000 from Animal sent an administrative subpoena to the planned gifts are on hold because of the econ- program, the city included the certificates to Services’ dog and cat sterilization budget, National Wildlife Federation, demanding omy, said Angela Sosdian, the Nature cover most of the costs of the procedure.” Boks explained, and then for 2009 ordered documents that would identify whoever Conservancy’s director of philanthropy for During the 2007-08 fiscal year, Los Animal Services to absorb a further cut of leaked information to the NWF about the gift planning. That is equivalent to the Angeles Animal Services assistant general $414,000. Animal Services trimmed $250,000 plans of the George W. Bush administration amount such gifts typically produce in an manager Linda Barth told Orlov, the depart- from other budgets, Boks said, before cutting to weaken the Endangered Species Act with entire year.” ment issued 22,000 coupons good for a $30 the sterilization program. administrative rules changes introduced just Reputedly the world’s largest phil- discount and 12,000 coupons good for a $70 “With an alarming increase in the before leaving office. The leak helped the anthropic land trust, the Nature Conservancy discount. About 35% were redeemed within number of dogs and cats entering the city sys- NWF and other Endangered Species Act refuses to accept gifts of property where hunt- the 90-day time limit, Barth said. tem, we need to maintain staffing,” Boks said. defenders to ensure that reversing the rules ing, trapping, and fishing are not to be per- The coupon program was the latest “Our only recourse is to make up the remaining changes is a high priority for the Barack mitted, and purges non-native species by incarnation of a series of initiatives begun in deficit through another reduction in our Obama administration. Zinser, appointed by methods described in 2005 by retired Channel 1972. A year after Mercy Crusade opened a spay/neuter coupon and mobile programs.” Bush in November 2007, issued the unusual Islands National Park superintendent Tim J. low-cost dog and cat sterilization clinic in Los Angeles city council member subpoena at request of Senator James Inhofe Setnicka as “biological genocide.” 1973, Los Angeles Animal Services took over Tony Cardenas introduced a motion to restore of Oklahoma, the senior Republican on the The Nature Conservancy as of 2007 the management, and has been a low-cost ster- the sterilization budget, seconded by council U.S. Senate Committee on Environment had annual revenues of $827 million, with ilization service provider ever since. member Dennis Zine. and Public Works. The leaked documents financial reserves of nearly $1.7 billion. “From 1972 to 2008, 479,269 cost- “Canceling the voucher program was “were not marked sensitive, secret or other- The Sierra Club is seeking an assisted pet sterilizations were performed insincere to the community and a step back- wise confidential or classified,” reported executive director to succeed Carl Pope. under various Los Angeles programs,” wards in trying to reach a no-kill policy,” Associated Press writer Pete Yost. Pope announced on January 23, 2009 that he recounted Animal Issues Movement founder Cardenas told Orlov. The Nature Conservancy, ranked will transition to chairperson after a new suc- Phyllis Daugherty. “This reduced the number “Although the city faces extreme the 25th largest charity in the U.S. by the cessor is hired. A Sierra Club employee for of animals impounded from 83,500 to 25,478,” budget challenges, this decision is an error in Chronicle of Philanthropy, on February 11, more than 30 years, executive director since and reduced shelter killing from 110,000 ani- fiscal and moral judgment,” agreed Zine. 2009 announced a 10% staff cut. “Unfortun- 1992, Pope pushed policies and introduced mals to 18,000, including surrendered dogs But cuts to other Animal Services ately, the recession and subsequent declines programs meant to attract hunters. S e a and cats as well as impounds. programs might not have produced the same in revenue require that we implement staff Shepherd Conservation Society f o u n d e r Working for the Los Angeles steril- outcry in favor of restoring some of the money. reductions,” Nature Conservancy president Paul Watson in April 2006 resigned from the ization program from inception, surgeon Operating on total funding of $19 Mark Tercek said in a written statement. Sierra Club board in protest, pointing out that Marvin Mackey, DVM, developed and popu- million in 2008, Los Angeles Animal Services Wrote Chronicle of Philanthropy Sierra Club founder John Muir called hunt- larized the small-incision, high-speed tech- is scheduled to receive $21 million in 2009. editor Holly Hall, “At least $32 million that ing “the murder business.” April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 14 14 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 What would Dr. Dolittle think of the Dancing Star SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif.––“We have received a mals in or are going out of business because of the economy.” Another former Dancing Star employee, Jennifer written agreement from Dancing Star Foundation to enact a Within the next 24 hours, “The foundation brought in Smith, told Tanner that in January 2009 she was told to ‘get moratorium on killing animals under their care,” e-mailed mouthpiece Roger Gillott to deal with press inquiries and pro- rid of anything that needs special care,’ and empty out two of Farm Sanctuary communications director Tricia Berry on testers,” wrote San Luis Obispo Tribune columnist Bill the three cattle barns. She called a veterinarian for advice. February 26, 2009, affirming earlier statements to ANIMAL Morem––who found Gillott’s answers “underwhelming.” She said she was suspended for 10 days. At the end of her sus- PEOPLE by Farm Sanctuary attorney Russ Mead. Explained Gillott of the apparent drift of the Dancing pension, her employment was terminated.” “We are now monitoring the situation to ensure that Star mission, “Our founder, the late Sue Stiles, was instrumen- “Hamaker said he watched local horse veterinarian Dancing Star abides by the agreement,” Berry added. “If they tal in enlarging the scope of the foundation…to embrace… Tristen Weltner and a sanctuary employee give horses a num- fail to do so, Farm Sanctuary will have no other recourse than funding and encouraging a broad range of environmental, cul- ber based on the amount of mush and hay they required and the to contact the California Attorney General and urge that tural and animal care activities. At the sanctuaries,” Gillot said, cost of their medications,” added Velie of C a l C o a s t N e w s . Dancing Star be investigated.” “we are unwavering in our commitment to compassion and to “The more a horse cost the foundation, the sooner the horse Berry forwarded a brief message from Dancing Star sound conservation strategies needed to restore and preserve was slated for lethal injection. Employees at the sanctuary say Foundation president Michael Tobias. “While it is our obliga- healthy free populations––both farm animals and rare and they were told to move infirm animals out of the barns to tion to our animals to regularly assess their quality of life,” endangered species, as well as safeguarding precious habitat.” muddy hillsides where many would fail to thrive. In mid- Tobias said, “there are no plans to put any to rest at this time.” Applied to farm animals, the phrase “free popula- December, most medications and vitamins meant to improve Sue Stiles, an heir to the McClatchy newspaper for- tions” seemed incongruous––until allegations surfaced from the quality of life for the foundation’s wards were halted.” tune, opened the Dancing Star Foundation sanctuaries near now ex-employees that Dancing Star was killing animals who Velie obtained “death certificates, medical records, Cayucos and Paso Robles, California, in 1993. At Stiles’ needed barn care. and the actual list of animals slated for the needle,” she wrote. death from cancer in 1999, the two sanctuaries reportedly kept Continued Gillott, “We recognize that when an ani- According to the documentation, 15 cattle and 17 horses were about 320 animals on more than 1,000 acres. The present pop- mal’s quality of life has significantly deteriorated and the ani- killed on the Dancing Star premises between December 12, ulation is about 265 animals, Mead told ANIMAL PEOPLE. mal requires permanent medication or invasive surgical proce- 2008 and February 19, 2009. The last three horse killings, Longtime friends of Stiles told ANIMAL PEOPLE dures, difficult decisions must sometimes be made. Neither including one in which the horse vigorously resisted, were that she conducted a frantic search for a successor as her death has the foundation been immune to the prolonged economic videotaped by witnesses, and the video was posted online. approached. Tobias and his wife Jane Gray Morrison downturn that is affecting individuals, companies and other “After getting through the first wave of euthanasia, impressed Stiles as the authors and producers of numerous nonprofit foundations around the world,” Gillott acknowl- we were to start getting rid of employees,” Hamaker said. books and documentaries about animals and ecology. edged. “This has forced the foundation to make significant Within a week of dismissing Rowley, Dancing Star Within a few years of Stiles’ death, few if any of her reductions in operating expenditures, including reductions in began requiring former staff “to sign a stringent agreement pro- personal hirees and acquaintances remained involved with workforce and salaries.” hibiting them from talking publicly about the sanctuary before Dancing Star. Directors listed on the Dancing Star filing of IRS Gillott told Los Angeles Times reporter Steve receiving a severance check equivalent to about a week’s pay,” Form 990 for fiscal year 2007, the most recent available, Chawkins that the salaries paid to Tobias, Morrison, and reported Vellie and Daniel Blackburn of CalCoastNews. “The include Robert Radin, Geoffrey Holland, and Pat Fitzgerald. Cannon “have been cut twice” since the most recent Dancing four-page ‘severance and general release agreement’ was first All three appeared with Tobias and Morrison on lists of film Star filing of IRS Form 990. distributed to cashiered employees on Friday the 13th [of credits between 1994 and 1999. Assessed Morem, “If large numbers of animals are February]. The agreement seeks to prohibit former employees being put down as a cost-saving measure, contrary to Stiles’ from ‘making disparaging statements or remarks about the Money written wishes, the foundation should lose its nonprofit status foundation, any of its officers, directors, employees or any of The Dancing Star Foundation assets, according to and its assets should be placed in a court-appointed trust.” its activities.’ It also attempts to limit contact with the IRS Form 990 filings, stood at $46.4 million at the end of The Dancing Star Foundation web site mentions that media…Also contained is a prohibition against former employ- 2007, including just under $10 million in land, buildings, and Tobias and Morrison have done “research and documentation” ees ‘assisting or engaging in any litigation against the founda- equipment. Program-related spending was $3.1 million. at the Farm Sanctuary location in upstate New York. tion, except as compelled by order of a court or as necessary to Tobias was paid $285,000, Morrison was paid “Farm Sanctuary emphatically condemns the killing participate in an investigation or proceeding conducted by [gov- $244,000, and accountant Don C. Cannon was paid $240,000. of any animal whose quality of life remains at a reasonable ernmental agencies].’” Though not open to the public, the Dancing Star level. It has been reported that animals are being killed for the After Hamaker spoke to Velie, Dancing Star foreman Foundation spent $391,728 on “educational outreach” in 2006, wrong reasons at Dancing Star and that confounds us,” said Jerry Smith on February 25, 2009 “ordered Hamaker to vacate and $359,317 on “educational outreach” in 2007. These Farm Sanctuary publicist Berry. “We do not want to enable the ranch home he occupies within 24 hours, and fired the out- amounts may have been the cost of producing videos and books sanctuaries to lightly unload their charges any time their ani- spoken employee,” Velie wrote. by Tobias and Morrison under the Dancing Star imprint. mals become inconvenient. Dancing Star is one of the wealthi- Hamaker obtained representation from San Luis The Dancing Star Foundation has also spent more est farm animal sanctuaries in the nation, with the financial Obispo attorney Jeff Stulburg. than $200,000 annually in recent years on conservation projects resources to care for these animals.” “It is my general practice not to discuss pending civil in New Zealand. Flying to California to meet with Tobias, Farm cases with the media,” Stulberg told ANIMAL PEOPLE. “Former and present employees of the Dancing Star Sanctuary attorney Mead “urged Tobias to stop killing the ani- Rob Bryn of the San Luis Opispo County rural crime Foundation claim that Tobias and Morrison intend to focus on mals,” Berry summarized. unit told Tanner that Dancing Star apparently did not break any endangered animals,” and have “commenced the systematic Mead also visited both Dancing Star locations. laws by killing the animals. San Luis Obispo County Animal elimination of aged and infirm farm animals under the founda- Mead, a longtime employee of the Best Friends Services chief Eric Anderson told Tanner that the animals were tion’s care,” reported Karen Velie of C a l C o a s t N e w s o n Animal Society before joining Farm Sanctuary, told ANIMAL “either beyond treatment or had conditions for which euthana- February 17, 2009. PEOPLE that he “never saw better physical facilities. They sia would be at least one of the considerations that could “Both horse veterinarian Tristen Weltner and cattle are at the Farm Sanctuary or Best Friends level. I didn’t see responsibly be made.” veterinarian Gary Evans assert that all the animals that have anything hinting at extermination of non-native species,” Mead Rowley acknowledged that the animals who were been put down have had health problems,” Velie added, added. “The place is set up as a sanctuary, with nothing native killed had required special care, “But that’s what a sanctuary is “though both have also noticed a change in the treatment of ani- about the habitat.” for,” he told Tanner. “Sue Stiles wanted them to stay there as mals at the sanctuary during the last month.” long as they lived.” Said Evans, “I was told they were out of money. Care regimen changed Sue Stiles would not approve of the way things are being done. Former Dancing Star maintenance manager Jason Writing Dolittle Her whole deal was rescuing animals.” Hamaker and other former employees allege, however, that Asked by C a l C o a s t N e w s why animals were being the Dancing Star sanctuaries’ animal care regimen changed in author’s bio killed and staff were being laid off, Dancing Star manager late 2008, beginning by “cutting back on medications and feed Among the five titles listed as “Forthcoming Books” Jerry Smith responded, according to Velie, “These questions for some of the older animals,” summarized Los Angeles Times at the Dancing Star Foundation web site, all by Tobias and have nothing to do with you. This doesn’t concern you. It is reporter Steve Chawkins of Hamaker’s statements. Morrison, is The World Of Doctor Dolittle: The Life & Times none of your business.” “They said they wanted a total of 50 gone within a of Hugh Lofting, scheduled for “late 2009” publication. Kathe Tanner of the San Luis Obispo Tribune reached couple of months, and then another 30 after that,” Hamaker Lofting, while enduring World War I trench warfare, Morrison the following day. Morrison “did not address specific told Chawkins. in his letters home created the fictional character Doctor allegations,” Tanner wrote, “but made a blanket denial.” Agreed former Dancing Star employee Sheldon Dolittle. Lofting went on to write 12 volumes of Doctor Dancing Star has “a lot of animals whose time has Rowley, who was fired on February 6, 2009, “They said if Dolittle stories between 1920 and 1948, which have inspired at really come,” Morrison told Tanner. “We’re actually adopting we didn’t thin out the herd, animals wouldn’t get the care they least 14 film, stage, and radio adaptations. some animals out, “ Morrison added, “and have tried to find needed. First we were told it was financial. Then we were told Trained as a human physician, Doctor Dolittle gave sanctuaries or homes for other animals where they’d have a safe it was a quality-of-life issue.” up his medical practice to become a veterinarian and naturalist, haven. We’d absolutely love to find homes,” Morrison said, Hamaker told Kathe Tanner of the San Luis Obispo who learned to converse with animals in their own languages. but lamented that other sanctuaries are “either not taking ani- Tribune that he was ordered “to clean house, get rid of all the Dolittle’s premises were always quasi-sanctuaries, but Lofting old animals, the ones being fed mush, because they were pay- depicted him and his animal friends making ends meet by oper- ing too much for grain…Most of the animals who were put ating a post office, a circus, and a zoo. Donate your old car & down,” Hamaker alleged, “were brought in with the same Dolittle didn’t kill any animals, even when broke, help support symptoms” for which they were later killed. and despite having to become “a reluctant but sincere vegetari- Scottish SPCA slams RSPCA in ad campaign The Scottish SPCA in February The RSPCA, in a prepared England and Wales, the Scottish SPCA 2009 published £100,000 worth of full- response, said “Every piece of [RSPCA] raised £10 million, and has struggled page ads in several Scottish newspapers printed literature, television advertising with cash flow for most of the decade. that accused the Royal SPCA of Britain and internet banner advertising always Threatening to close seven of 13 regional It's easy to make a contribution that supports of “stealing food from the mouths of features the wording ‘The RSPCA is a rescue centers in 2002, the Scottish ANIMAL PEOPLE! Here's how it works: Scotland’s defenseless animals.” charity registered in England and Wales.’ SPCA now operates 10 regional rescue Call Toll-Free 877-537-5277, or e-mail Alleged Scottish SPCA chief We always make every effort to exclude centers plus wildlife rescue units in Fife ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 15 Congratulations to the 3,550 animal shelters and rescue groups in 17 countries for completing 1,202,751 adoptions during the 10th annual "Iams Home 4 the Holidays" drive! Pennsylvania SPCA accepts CEO’s resignation Bide A Wee closes P H I L A D E L P H I A––T he Pennsylvania SPCA Susan Koomar took a more critical view of Nelson’s per- WANTAGH, New York––The 94-year-old Bide A Wee board of directors on February 19, 2009 unanimously formance. “Nelson is responsible for closing the Monroe Adoption Center in Wantagh was closed for financial reasons on March 8, accepted the February 11 resignation of chief executive County shelter at the end of January,” Koomer wrote. 2009. Founded in 1903 by Flora Kibbe of Manhattan, Bide A Wee contin- officer Howard Nelson, 45, effective immediately. “Local rescue groups took charge of the shelter’s ani- ues to operate shelters at the original site in Manhattan and in Westhampton. “One-year board member Beth Ann White, 43, mals. Unwanted pets have been abandoned at a pet shop Thirty-six of the 135 Bide A Wee staff were laid off, Bide A Wee a former banker, was named interim chief executive,” and veterinarian’s office since the closing.” chief executive Nancy Taylor told Christina Hernandez of Long Island reported Philadelphia Inquirer staff writer Gail Shister. The Monroe County shelter in Stroudsburg N e w s d a y . Taylor said donations had dropped 30% since October 2008, White will serve while the PSPCA conducts a national reportedly lost about $125,000 in 2008. It had four while Bide A Wee lost $2 million in investments. Bide A Wee had revenue CEO search. directors in less than two years after the June 2007 resig- of about $8 million per year in recent years, with nearly $14 million in Hired in May 2007, Nelson “engineered nation of Barbara Balsama, the director for nearly 20 financial reserves. PSPCA’s successful bid late last year for the city’s $2.9 years, according to Pocono Record staff writer Beth Bide A Wee was the second of the oldest and wealthiest humane million animal-control contract,” recalled Shister. “He Brelje. Balsama clashed with Nelson, said Brelje, who societies in the U.S. to announce shelter closures in early 2009. The increased staff and oversaw major improvements in the repeatedly exposed trouble under Balsama’s successors. Massachusetts SPCA announced earlier that it will close shelters in deteriorating Feltonville shelter.” Nelson closed the Stroudsburg shelter a year Springfield, Martha’s Vineyard, and Brockton on March 31, May 1, and But Pocono Record senior managing editor after closing the PSPCA shelter in Clarion County. September 30, respectively. Big trouble at South Jersey Animal Rescue, Clean Slate, and Cats With No Name The New Jersey SPCA on March 4, “found cocaine, ketamine, marijuana, doxy- Volunteers mobilized by the R u t h were stacked at the scene, rescuers said, but 2009 filed three civil and three criminal counts cycline and oxytetracycline, several thousand Steinert Memorial SPCA reportedly found 70 according to police the defendants were selling of cruelty to animals against Daniel C. Tyce, hypodermic needles, and materials used for live cats, a deer, four ferrets, two chickens, donated cat food to buy drugs, rather than 26, of Atlantic City, and filed a similar set of packaging drugs,” Andruscavage recounted. a rooster, and four geese at Cats With No feeding the animals. Claims of severe neglect charges against his alleged assistant, S a m Oxenrider was on February 19 charged with 20 Name, plus many dead cats. Of the live cats, at Cats With No Name were were posted to the S m i t h . Tyce for about two years allegedly drug-related offenses. Justiniano was charged 13 were euthanized due to irrecoverable effects Internet in September 2007, but were appar- pretended to be a female veteterinarian, “Dr. with six drug-related offenses. of disease and starvation. Pallets of cat food ently not investigated by law enforcement. Danielle Smith,” of “South Jersey Small Animal Rescue.” Arrested on January 9, 2009 in Vineland, New Jersey, for practicing medicine without a license, Tyce was held in the Cumberland County Jail in lieu of posting $10,000 bond. After police and state conservation officers raided his home on January 12, Tyce was indicted by an Atlantic County grand jury for alleged illegal possession of prescription-strength ibuprofen and possession of a prescription drug with intent to distribute. The Bowling Green- Warren County Humane Society and the Humane Society of the U.S. on March 2, 2009 evacuated to a temporary shelter in Bowling Green the last 96 of 240 dogs and 31 cats who were surrendered to the G r e e n River Animal Shelter on February 24 by Clean Slate Animal Rescue founder David Howery. H o w e r y , 50, of Sparksville, Kentucky, was charged with 295 counts of cruelty. The Clean Slate animals also included “53 chickens, 13 goats, three sheep, three potbellied pigs, seven ducks, three chinchillas, one horse, two donkeys and a large bird thought to be a parrot,” wrote Paul B. Hayes of the Columbia Adair P r o g r e s s . Howery founded Clean Slate in Estacada, Oregon, but moved to Sparksville in March 2007. Virginia E. Justiniano, 49, and Andrew J. Oxenrider, 37, of Pine Grove Township, Pennsyl- vania, were on February 19, 2009 charged with 118 counts of cruelty for alleged neglect of cats at the Cats With No Name sanctuary, founded by Justiniano in 1996. She was then known by her former married name, Virginia Kresge. “The neglected cats were discovered after a January 24 traffic incident, in which Oxenrider was arrested, charged with drug posses- sion and attempting to bribe a police officer,” wrote Pottsville Republican & Herald staff reporter Frank Andruscavage. Searching the Cats With No Name premises, police Please m ake the most www.maddies.org/Funded_Pr ojects/Colleges_of_Vet gen er ou s gift y ou can to help A NIMAL PEOPLE shine the bright light on cruelty and greed! Your generous gift of $25, $50, $ 100, $500 or more help s to build a world where caring counts. Please send your check to: ANIMAL PEOPLE April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 16 16 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 The Watchdog monitors fundraising, spending, and The political activity in the name of animal and habitat protec - tion—both pro and con. His empty bowl stands for all the bowls left empty when some Watchdog take more than they need. Katrina fraud Mike Baker of Brooke Hospital named to head WSPA Donald D. Chambers, 40, of L O N D O N ––Mike Baker, chief 2008. Also under Baker the Brooke added “WSPA is opposed to the taking from the wild Amherst, Ohio, on January 30, 2009 was executive officer of the Brooke Hospital for programs in Guatemala, Kenya, Nepal, of animals for their fur or skins, and to the sentenced to serve a year in prison, was Animals since June 2001, will in June 2009 Palestinian settlements in Israel, and on the farming of animals for the same purpose,” and fined $1,000, and was ordered to pay succeed Peter Davies as director general of the West Bank. that “WSPA is opposed to the manufacture, $62,124 in restitution to the Best Friends World Society for the Protection of Animals, Bringing to the Brooke the aggres- sale, possession and use of any snares and Animal Society, of Kanab, Utah. Chambers WSPA announced on March 6, 2009. sive IFAW approach to fundraising, Baker traps which cause suffering or death....WSPA on October 24, 2008 pleaded guilty to “I hope still to be active in the move- nearly doubled fundraising investment in opposes, on both ethical and humane grounds, defrauding Best Friends by taking 28 dogs ment,” Davies told ANIMAL PEOPLE. 2005, doubling revenue by the end of 2006. the harassment, capture or killing of marine rescued after Hurricane Katrina, plus $1,000 WSPA had announced Davies’ retirement in In November 2006 the Brooke elected as board mammals for commercial and sport purposes.” apiece for their care and feeding, on the July 2008. Davies, previously director gener- president the Duchess of Cornwall, known as These were among the first policies promise to find adoptive homes for them. al of the Royal SPCA of Britain, had headed Camila Parker Bowles before her marriage to adopted by WSPA after it was formed in 1981 “The relationship between WSPA since mid-2002. Prince Charles. Both are avid fox hunters, by merging older organizations which had Chambers and Best Friends began when he Baker, 44, served as political man- and Charles is also a prolific bird shooter. The similar policies. WSPA board president presented himself as Don the Dog Guy, who ager for the British Union Against Vivisection, Duchess’ involvement coincided with a further Dominic Bellemare, however, has for more had a kennel and training facility in Lorain 1989-1994, and then headed the BUAV in surge in income. The Brooke raised nearly than 25 years been closely associated with County,” wrote Cleveland Plain Dealer 1995-1998, after an interlude with Amnesty £11.1 in fiscal 2007 and slightly more in fiscal Canadian political factions which favor the fur reporter Donna Miller. “He traveled to Best International. From November 1998 until 2008 despite the slowing world economy. and sealing industries. At the time of his elec- Friends’ sanctuary and spent time with the Baker became the Brooke chief executive he During 2008 the Brooke also extended future tion as WSPA board president, in June 2008, dog trainers there.” was United Kingdom director for the fundraising reach by incorporating a U.S. affil- Bellemare was unsuccessfully seeking a seat in “He claimed to have placed the International Fund for Animal Welfare. iate, American Friends of the Brooke. Parliament as a member of the Conservative dogs, and sent convincing photos and wrote Founded by Dorothy Brooke in 1934 Baker gained experience with multi- Party, headed by Canadian prime minister stories about the dogs for our web site,” Best as The Old War Horse Hospital, the Brooke at organization coalitions as chair of the Stephen Harper. Harper has outspokenly pro- Friends spokesperson John Polis told Miller. Baker’s arrival raised about £3 million per European Coalition Against Cosmetics Tests moted the Atlantic Canadian seal hunt. “Don actually was quite popular with the year, supporting Dorothy Brooke’s original on Animals in both 1993-1994 and 1996-1998. Noting that Bellemare has apparent- trainers here, and had somewhat of a follow- equine aid program in Cairo, plus similar pro- He has headed Eurogroup for Animals, which ly never spoken out against either fur or seal- ing on our web site.” jects elsewhere in Egypt, Ethiopia, Jordan, lobbies the European Parliament, since April ing, ANIMAL PEOPLE asked him and all However, Best Friends eventually India, and Pakistan. 2006. Baker is also on the board of the WSPA board members whether they personal- learned that only three of the dogs given to In addition, since March 2001 the Marwar Trust, formed in 2003 by Help In ly support the WSPA policies. Only one board Chambers found homes. Brooke had treated the horses and donkeys of Suffering trustee Federico Spinola to sterilize member, Blue Cross of India chief executive “Ten were euthanized at the Lorain Afghan refugees at camps in Peshwar, and vaccinate street dogs in Jodhpur, India, Chinny Krishna, was willing to so state. County Kennel. One died in a dog fight. Pakistan. Under Baker, the Brooke followed following the model established by Help In “I cannot yet speak on behalf of One died of untreated heartworms. Three U.S. troops into Afghanistan in 2002, and by Suffering in Jaipur and Darjeeling. WSPA,” Baker said, “as I do not start there died and were tossed into a trash bin. Six are March 2003 was operating clinics in both ANIMAL PEOPLE asked Baker if for some months. However, I have no hesita- unaccounted for. Best Friends took back Kabul and Jalalabad. The Afghan programs he would be personally willing to endorse, on tion in fully endorsing the WSPA policies you three of them,” recounted Miller. reached approximately 130,000 equines in the record, the WSPA position statements that quote on a personal level.” Cumulative cost of PETA-funded lawsuits against Primarily SAN ANTONIO––Judge Solomon ed, treated, or cared for by a licensed veteri- The PETA case seeking to send the leave the chimps at Chimp Haven. Casseb III of the 288th Judicial District Court narian, an incorporated humane society or ani- chimps to Chimp Haven was dismissed, but Feral told ANIMAL PEOPLE t h a t of Bexar County, Texas, on March 11, 2009 mal shelter, or a person who holds a rehabili- five weeks later, while FoA was just begin- Primarily Primates and Friends of Animals rejected Primarily Primates’ motion for a sum- tation permit.” Hensley’s lawsuit argues that ning to restructure and make improvements at spent more than $50,000 defending against the mary judgement dismissing the latest round of “The dangerous wild animals at PPI are not Primarily Primates, Primarily Primates was initial PETA-backed case; spent more than four years of PETA-funded litigation against injured, infirm, orphaned or abandoned…and placed in receivership by the Texas Office of $240,000 to regain control of Primarily the sanctuary. therefore the exemption does not apply to Attorney General, based on allegations for- Primates after it was placed in receivership; Primarily Primates has since August them….the exemption authorizes only tempo- warded by PETA. The seven surviving former and have already spent more than $80,000 2006 been a program of Friends of Animals. rary housing….PPI is not a licensed veterinari- OSU chimps were relocated to Chimp Haven defending against the Hensley case. “This order only means that Judge an, an incorporated humane society or an ani- during the receivership. PETA and the plaintiffs aligned with Casseb believes there are issues to be decided mal shelter.” The Texas Office of Attorney PETA have not disclosed their legal expenses, by a factfinder,” FoA president Priscilla Feral Continues the Hensley lawsuit, in General in April 2007 rejected the PETA but the American Justice Partnership Found- told ANIMAL PEOPLE. “We have not yet reference to previous litigation involving claims against Primarily Primates, ended the ation estimates that plaintiffs on average incur discussed a trial setting with opposing coun- Primarily Primates and PETA, “PPI is also receivership, and agreed to “fully and com- about 60% of the cost of pressing a lawsuit, sel,” Feral said, “but we believe the earliest actively seeking to bring additional dangerous pletely release, acquit, and forever discharge while defendants incur about 40%. jury trial setting will be in December 2009 or wild animals to its Serene Hills facility. In Primarily Primates,” Swett, other staff and This ratio would suggest that total January 2010.” May 2007, PPI filed a lawsuit against Chimp board members, and Friends of Animals from cost of cases involving Primarily Primates Plaintiff Carl Hensley, a neighbor of Haven,” a sanctuary in Shreveport, Louisiana. “all claims” brought against them in connec- since 2006 now exceeds $925,000––more than the Primarily Primates sanctuary in Leon The lawsuit sought the return to tion with the seizure. In addition, the Texas the total income of the sanctuary in all but two Springs, Texas, acknowledged in deposition Primarily Primates of seven chimps who were Office of Attorney General agreed to try to years before FoA annexed it. Under FoA that he filed the case in 2008 after two attor- retired to Primarily Primates by Ohio State help Primarily Primates recover the former direction, according to the most recent avail- neys who have been employed by PETA University in February 2006. The ex-OSU OSU chimps from Chimp Haven. able IRS Form 990 filings, Primarily Primates approached him with the idea. Hensley also chimps, two others who died soon after However, Chimp Haven appealed a has approximately doubled both public support acknowledged that PETA is paying his legal arrival, and an endowment of $324,000 for the February 2008 Bexar county court order to and program-related spending. expenses. chimps’ habitat and upkeep were sent to return the chimps to Primarily Primates, and The cases involving Primarily Hensley contends that Primarily Primarily Primates over the objections of OSU in February 2009 won a Texas Fourth Court of Primates and PETA appear to be the longest- Primates is operating in violation of the Texas researcher Sally Boysen. Supporting Boysen, Appeals ruling that the Bexar county court did running and most costly series of litigation Dangerous Wildlife Act and the Texas legal PETA sued to try to force Primarily Primates not have jurisdiction over the case. among animal charities currently before U.S. definition of an animal shelter. The Dangerous to send the chimps to Chimp Haven. “Primarily Primates may well be courts. However, a defamation case filed in Wildlife Act, restricting private possession of While that case was underway, entitled to the return of the OSU chimpanzees, August 2004 by the British Columbia SPCA a list of species including several kept at Primarily Primates founder Wally Swett but that issue is for the Travis County probate against the Animal Advocates Society may be Primarily Primates, includes an exemption for resigned after 28 years as president, and court to decide,” ruled Appellate Judge as expensive. Animal Advocates Society pres- “an injured, infirm, orphaned, or abandoned Primarily Primates formally became a project Catherine M. Stone. Rather than incur the cost ident Judy Stone is using her home equity to dangerous wild animal while being rehabilitat- of Friends of Animals. of refiling the case, FoA opted at that point to fight the lawsuit, due for trial later in 2009. Please enter my subscription for: ____ One year (9 issues.) Enclosed is $24. YES! I’M AN ____ Two years (18 issues.) Enclosed is $38. ANIMAL PERSON! ____ Three years (27 issues.) Enclosed is $50. ____Please send additional subscriptions as gifts to the addresses I have listed below or on a separate sheet. Enclosed is $24 apiece. ____Please send the 2008 ANIMAL PEOPLE Watchdog Report on Animal Protection Charities, which provides the background I need to make my donations more effective. Enclosed is $25. ____I want to help support your outreach with a tax-deductible contribution of: $25 ____ $50 ____ $100 ____ $250 ____ $500 ____ Other ____ Name: Name of gift recipient: Number and street: Number and street: City and state: City and state: ––Wolf Clifton ZIP code: ZIP code: Please make checks payable to: ANIMAL PEOPLE, P.O. Box 960, Clinton, WA 98236, or call 360-579-2505 to order by MasterCard or VISA. April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 17 ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 17 If Only They Could Speak: Understanding the powerful bond ANIMAL PEOPLE between dogs and their owners thanks you for your generous support by Nicholas H. Dodman Honoring the parable of the widow's mite–– W.W. Norton & Co. (500 Fifth Ave., New York, in which a poor woman gives but one coin NY 10110), 2003, 2008. 262 pages, paperback. $15.95. to charity, yet that is all she possesses–– we do not list our donors by how much they give, W.W. Norton & Co. published this cal solutions, but instead of simply tackling but we greatly appreciate large gifts second edition of one of Nicholas Dodman’s the symptoms, owners should be encouraged that help us do more for animals. most popular books in September 2008. to look at the underlying causes of difficult ––Wolf Clifton Dodman heads the Tufts Behavior Clinic at the behaviour, rather than create a culture of pill- Tufts University School of Veterinary popping dogs.” Heather Abraham, Animal Lovers Society, John Arnold, Elisabeth Arvin, Pauline Baba, Medicine. His 1999 volume Dogs Behaving Many of the 13 case histories Nelson Babb, Brenda Barnette, Gini Barrett, Doris Bickford, Pamela Bishop, B a d l y made him one of the more acclaimed described in If Only They Could Speak may be Laura Black, Heather Blanchette, Michael Bluejay, Robert Blumberg & Andrea Yates, dog behavior gurus of our time––but Dodman seen as either arguments for the Dodman Mary Anne Bonavita, Herman Brooks, Bonney Brown, Dr. Joanne Brown, was already well known to news media for approach, or as thinly disguised commercials. Elizabeth Buley, Michael Burton, Diann Butler, Nancy Campbell, Donna & Jim Carter, promoting the idea that many dog behavior Prozac, by itself, was clearly not Gian Castelli, Gloria Cobb, Myrna Cohen, Gale Cohen-Demarco, Jane Courtney, problems can pharmaceutically treated. the right answer in one of the cases most often Dave & Susana Crow, Sherry DeBoer/Long Charitable Trust, Carol Dupuis, “Throw in a shrink” has long been mentioned by reviewers. A young German Federico Fund, Lisa Gagnon, Margaret Gebhard, Phyllis George, Christine Gilman, standard editorial advice to reporters trying to shepherd, Tina, acquired from a pet store by a Gloria Gray, John Green, Barbara Hardin, Michelle Harvey, Luann Hickey, find experts to explain difficult or disturbing Mrs. Spinelli, became extremely jealous of Mildred Huey, Jerome Kahn, Aubrie Kavanaugh, Elizabeth Kirkpatrick, Joel Krupnik, news. Dodman’s recommendations, often Bonnie, an older poodle who came from a Benjamin Landau, Florence Lemke, John & Christina Leverenzzi, summarized as “Put your dog on Prozac,” shelter. “I think she’s going to kill her,” Mrs. Heather MacEwan-Foran, Maddie's Fund, Mariana Manzo, Emilie Martin, have made him perhaps the most quoted dog- Spinelli told Dodman. Paula McKenna, Lola Merritt, Marilee Meyer, Ida Miller, Bettie Montague, gie shrink ever. The problem, in gist, was that Fatemeh Motamedi, Evelyn Oynebraaten, E. Carlton Parrott Jr., Natalie Pepper, Dodman has developed his own ver- Spinelli showed favoritism. Bonnie, adopted Frank Perrino, Katherine Pickett, Richard Pollak, Marjorie Rogers, Kathy Ruopp, sions of behavior-modifying drugs for dogs. from a shelter, was queen. Spinelli also kept Dr. Rhoda Ruttenberg, Sharon Sargent, Stephen Serota, Kathleen Shopa, Darcy Silver, In 2007 Dodman and Tufts University sold several beloved exotic birds. Magda Simopoulos, Aileen Siracusa, Martha Skleder, Elisabeth Smith, licensing rights for Prozac-like anti-aggression Tina acted out. Dodman recom- Lindy & Marvin Sobel, Nancy Somers, Joseph Swierkosz, Rose Tardif, Dee Tharpe, and anti-obsessive compulsive disorder doggie mended that the dogs had to be kept carefully Voice for Animals/Caryl McIntire Edwards, Elaine Voltz, Ronald Winkler, drugs to the British firm Accura Pharma. separated, and that Tina would have to feel Rebecca Wittman, Kenneth Wuertz, Louise Wunsch Accura Pharma lists Dodman as an advisory secure and accepted as the dominant dog. board member, and projects sales potential for Tina was started on Prozac, but the shake and urinate submissively, or attempt to between dogs and their owners,” but three the behavior drugs as $1.2 billion per year. most essential part of the behavioral remedia- run and hide” when around most people, chapters are devoted to cats, including Honey, The Dodman approach is increasing- tion program was that Spinelli was to praise Dodman recalls. The sight of sticks, rakes or a Burmese who only trusted one person, ly popular with harried dog keepers who feel Tina and fuss over her when she returned even flyswatters caused him to panic, suggest- Susan Gale, and resisted all efforts to recon- they don’t have the time or budget to invest in home from work every day. Weeks later, she ing a history of abuse. Merlin later displayed cile her to Gale’s new husband when she mar- more training––or re-training––than the aver- admitted that she hadn’t done it. Instead, she aggressive tendencies. ried. Susan and her husband persisted in try- age dog receives. punished Tina for displaying hints of aggres- A treatment plan included Prozac as ing to cope with the jealous, cantankerous cat, But British dog training expert Ian sion toward Bonnie. well as behavior modification. During the with Dodman’s intervention––and Prozac. Dunbar, for one, is critical of drugging dogs. Several months later, Dodman heard course of treatment, however, the family Part of Dodman’s success in promot- “I’ve never had to resort to drugs to deal with Spinelli’s quivering voice on his answering home caught fire. Merlin hid under a bed. ing pharmacological behavioral intervention some quite serious mental problems. But the machine: “Bonnie’s dead. Tina killed her.” Firefighters were only able to rescue him after appears to be his insightful, entertaining, average pet owner wants a pill because he Spinelli kept Tina, despite the smoke overcame him. sometimes sad and always educational descrip- thinks it’s a simple solution,” Dunbar told attack, until Tina killed one of her treasured During the next several months a tions of dogs and cats with behavior problems. Tom Leonard of The Daily Telegraph i n parrots. Then Spinelli had Tina euthanized. parade of contractors, electricians and painters The books of noted dog writers Arden Moore, December 2008. Prozac was apparently part of suc- rebuilt the damaged part of the home. Merlin Roger Tabor, and Cesar Milan are worth- Added Royal SPCA chief veterinary cessfully treating Merlin, a shelter dog from remained skittish and fearful, but slowly his while, but Dodman presents an especially officer Mark Evans, to Jasper Copping of The New Hampshire, who was adopted as a com- behavior changed. clear picture of each dog or cat’s behavioral Daily Telegraph in March 2009, “Drug com- panion for Sammy, an older mongrel. Merlin If Only They Could Speak is subti- issue and how it impacts the animal’s people. panies are obviously keen to find pharmaceuti- bonded with Sammy, but “would cower, tled “understanding the powerful bond ––Debra J. White & Merritt Clifton The Adopted Dog Bible by Petfinder.com Harper Collins (10 East 53rd St., New York, NY 10022), 2009. 512 pages, paperback. $22.99. “Choosing a dog is much 1996, popularized choosing pets by needs, such as a dog who is blind or even if this has not been done, too important a task to be conducted viewing them at web sites, but the deaf. A section is devoted to pup- issues such as lack of housetraining in haste,” says The Adopted Dog authors recommend meeting a dog in pies: how to puppy-proof a home, and chronic chewing or digging can Bible, from Petfinder.com––exactly person before sealing an adoption. how often puppies eat, how many be worked out with time, patience, the message that the humane com- Shelters and rescues want each vaccinations they need, and proper and rewards-based training. munity has tried to teach potential adoption to last for the life of the housetraining. Petfinders.com Newer training methods, dog adopters since dog adoptions dog, so should allow everyone in encourages readers to consider older such as clicker training and the tar- began. Assembled by Petfinder.com the family a chance to personally dogs who are already housebroken, get stick, give the reader options to vice president of shelter outreach bond with the dog. Dogs who return behavior-trained, and simply look- modify behaviors like begging, and public relations Kim Saunders, to shelters have an increased sense ing for a good home. barking at the doorbell, or panic The Adopted Dog Bible i n c l u d e s of abandonment. With each failed Chapter seven begins, caused by thunderstorms. T h e ing for sick and senior dogs. As valuable contributions and helpful adoptiona dog can become more dif- “All dogs need training.” Shelter Adopted Dog Bible also helps dog dogs age, they become suscepti- hints from experts including Amy ficult to rehome successfully. dogs are no different. Often people keepers to introduce their dogs to ble––like humans––to chronic dis- Shojai, Susan McCullough, Liz The Adopted Dog Bible avoid adoption because they assume newborn babies, so that babies will eases including diabetes, liver fail- Palika, Sue Sternberg, and Lila asks potential adopters to consider that shelter and rescue dogs behave be safe and a confused pet is not ure, and heart ailments. These con- Miller, DVM, among others. the expense of keeping a dog, badly. Indeed, about half of the returned to a shelter. ditions can be treated at home, but Adoption is a great option whether all members of a household dogs in shelters at any given time are Nutrition is important to diabetes will require insulin injec- says The Adopted Dog Bible, guid- are in agreement about having a dog, there for behavioral reasons, but any dog’s health. Shelter dogs often tions or tablets. The Adopted Dog ing readers through finding a shelter whether the dog will be left alone about half are not. have had poor nutrition, from living Bible familiarizes the reader with or rescue near their home, and often, what kind of dog to adopt, Many shelters and rescues as strays or as victims of past basic medical care for older, sick explaining what adoption entails. and whether the adopters can ade- will train out any known behavioral neglect, so a proper diet is impor- dogs and offers first aid tips. Petfinder.com, founded in quately care for a dog with special problems that contributed to a dog tant. The Adopted Dog Bible d i s - If a person or family must being surrendered to a shelter. But cusses wet vs. dry foods, home- give up a dog, The Adopted Dog Badger-baiters busted in Ulster cooked foods, snacks, and even a Bible suggests that shelters should U L S T E R ––Many of the since the end of the Troubles, due to holistic diet. Canine obesity is dis- be the last option, not the first. The most prominent badger baiting web the significant reduction in police Hit them with cussed, as an increasing problem for authors recommend that keepers sites disappeared in early 2009, patrols in rural areas,” wrote dogs as well as humans. should try find suitable homes for John Mooney of the London Sunday MacManus. “Animal baiting was a 2-by-4! All dogs need exercise. dogs by interviewing applicants and T i m e s reported on March 3, 2009, outlawed in Ireland and Britain in Adopted dogs may have spent asking for references. Ideally one after an undercover investigation by 1835. Digging badgers using terri- More than 30,000 months or years chained, caged, should visit a new home, and should the Ulster SPCA and another Sunday ers was made illegal in Northern people who care about crated, or left alone in a yard with- not be afraid to say no if the new T i m e s reporter led to a series of Ireland by the Badgers Act of 1973. out being walked. If potential dog home seems inappropriate. police raids on the homes of several Badgers were afforded full protec- animals will read keepers are not prepared to walk a The last chapter says that alleged badger fighters. tion in Ireland under the 1976 this 2-by-4" ad. dog daily, they should put off the “losing a dog is like losing part of “We believe a number of Wildlife Act,” but enforcement of adoption or consider hiring a dog yourself.” Everyone who keeps prized dogs were moved south of the the laws has been erratic on both We'll let you have it walker. Dog parks, increasingly dogs will eventually confront border,” Ulster SPCA chief execu- sides of the border. for just $75––or $195 common now, are a great place to euthanasia. Most shelter personnel tive Stephen Philpott told Mooney. The subjects of the investi- for three issues–– socialize dogs and allow them to who perform euthanasia will testify “The baiters know the authorities in gation apparently did not read the romp and roll off leash. T h e that experience helps only up to a the republic will take no action.” Sunday Times. Eighteen pit bull ter- or $515 for a year. Adopted Dog Bible r e c o m m e n d s point. Saying goodbye to a beloved George MacManus of the riers were seized in the February waiting to take an adopted dog to a dog is a decision that no one wants Sunday Times on January 4, 2009 2009 raids, along with other evi- Then you can let dog park until the adopter knows the to make. Yet when a dog is old, disclosed that the Ulster SPCA had dence identifying “an international them have it. dog’s behavior and has earned the sick, and suffering, ending the begun investigating badger baiters, blood sports network operating dog’s trust. Adopted dogs may dog’s pain is often the kindest It's the only 2-by-4 to use in “in a bid to curtail the practice and between Ireland, Britain, France enjoy hiking and jogging, but a vet- choice. The authors say that grief the battle for public opinion. to prompt prosecutions,” after only and America,” Mooney said. erinary check up is recommended over a dog’s death is real. If a griev- 10 alleged badger baiters had been “Until now,” Mooney ANIMAL PEOPLE first. Dogs who may be predisposed ing owner has trouble coping, pet prosecuted in more than 20 years. wrote, “the existence of organised toward developing dysplacia will loss counseling is available, usually “Badger baiting has grown badger baiting was considered some- 360-579-2505 need a less strenuous regimen. through animal shelters or hospices. in popularity in Northern Ireland thing of an urban myth.” Other sections include car- ––Debra J. White April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 18 18 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 ANIMAL OBITUARIES OBITUARIES S o c k s , 18, the White House cat M u c h a n a , an 8-year-old western Paul Harvey, 90, died on February lions of listeners that this cause was not of the throughout the Bill Clinton administration, lowland gorilla, became tangled in a rope and 28, 2009 in Phoenix, Arizona. Beginning in left or the right, but is a cause that every died on February 20, 2009. Originally kept by strangled during the night of February 28, radio journalism while still in high school in decent American should embrace.” Paul former President Clinton’s daughter Chelsea, 2009 at the St. Louis Zoo. Tulsa, Oklahoma, Harvey met and married Harvey received a Genesis Award from the Lynne Cooper, whom he called Angel, while Ark Trust in 1986, and in 1987 received the who adopted Socks from a litter born in her H o p e , 35, who in 1989 birthed working for St. Louis radio station KXOK in inaugural James Herriot Award from HSUS. piano teacher’s yard when Clinton was gover- Kwanza, the only gorilla born at the North 1940. She became his chief researcher until nor of Arkansas, Socks had lived with Bill Carolina Zoo, was euthanized on March 19, Norman Seaton, 87, died on her death in 2008. They were later joined by Clinton's former secretary Betty Currie in 2009 due to severe health problems. “Hope March 20, 2009. Born in Vancouver, British their son, Paul Harvey Jr. At peak in the Hollywood, Maryland since the Clinton fami- arrived in 1984 after the National Institutes of Columbia, Seaton became a vegan at age 12. 1970s, their broadcasts reached more than 24 ly left the White House in early 2001. After Health discontinued a gorilla research program A laser researcher at Lawrence Livermore million listeners via more than 1,200 Socks and a newly acquired chocolate retriever in Louisiana,” recalled Raleigh News & Laboratory in California, Seaton refused to American Broadcasting Company affiliates named Buddy had several altercations on the Observer staff writer Martha Quillen. participate in projects of military purpose. White House grounds, then-First Lady Hilary plus 400 Armed Forces Radio stations. In The husband of Animal Switchboard M u k e , 44, a female western low- Clinton in 1998 published a book of children’s addition, 300 newspapers carried Paul cofounder Virginia Handley for 39 years, land gorilla who had lived at the Hogle Zoo in letters to the animals entitled Dear Socks, Harvey’s syndicated column. “Paul and Angel Seaton in 1971 cofounded the San Francisco Salt Lake City since 1996, was euthanized on Dear Buddy. Bill Clinton likened trying to were two of the best friends that animal pro- Vegetarian Society. Sailing with the March 23, 2009 after a year-long struggle achieve a truce between Socks and Buddy to tection and the Humane Society of the U.S. Greenpeace VII from San Francisco on July against cancer of the uterus. seeking peace in the Middle East, a problem ever had,” recalled HSUS president Wayne 12, 1975 to confront the Russian whaling ship Hilary now confronts as Secretary of State. Chalakka Mohanan, 53, an ele- Pacelle. “The same must be said of Paul V o s t o k off the Mendocino coast. Seaton Harvey Jr. The September 1956 issue of Angel, a severely beaten white dog phant brought by two unlicensed and ill-trained “rigged speakers outside the wheelhouse and HSUS News records that Harvey reported on who became mascot of the Selangor SPCA in mahouts to Kottuvally, near North Paravur, piped Gustav Holtz’s The Planets throughout the activity of the House Agricultural Com- Malaysia, died on February 26, 2009. Kerala, India, died from malnutrition and the ship,” recalled Rex Wyler in Greenpeace: neglect on March 17, 2009, The Hindu report- mittee in regard to humane slaughter,” during How A Group of Ecologists, Journalists, and I v a n , a 10-week-old blond cocker ed. The mahout apparently leased Chalakka the campaign for the Humane Slaughter Act, Visionaries Changed The World (2004). The spaniel adopted by television talk show host Mohanan from one Anwar Saddath, of passed in 1958. “He also appealed for an end voyage produced iconic photographs of Oprah Winfrey from the Pets Are Worth Perumbavoor. Locals tried unsuccessfully to to slaughterhouse cruelties in his newspaper Greenpeacers racing motorized rafts between Saving Shelter in Chicago, died on March 17, save Chalakka Mohanan, and demanded that column,” Pacelle continued. “He visited a the V o s t o k’s harpoon gun and the whales the 2009 of parvovirus. Winfrey first adopted one the mahouts be prosecuted. Chicago slaughterhouse to watch the killing as V o s t o k was trying to shoot, and of Paul of Ivan’s littermates, whom she named Sadie. part of his orientation to the issue, and gave S u b r a m a n i, 57, the oldest tusker Watson, who founded the Sea Shepherd She introduced Sadie and the rest of the litter the keynote address at the 1956 HSUS annual and second-oldest elephant at the Theppakadu Conservation Society two years later, stand- on her March 6, 2009 broadcast, then adopted conference. He spoke out against puppy mills, elephant camp within the Mudumalai Tiger ing on a fatally injured whale to try to keep the Ivan too. Ironically, PAWS is noted for pro- animal fighting, seal clubbing, and factory Reserve in India, died on March 14, three Vostok crew from pulling the whale aboard. viding a high standard of veterinary care. farming. He endorsed the landmark farm ani- weeks after he was gored by a wild elephant. The PAWS clinic has at least twice been a tour mal protection ballot initiatives in Arizona in Haren Kalita, 30, a member of the Captured in 1958, Subramani worked at first stop for participants in national humane con- 2006 and in California in 2008. With a gener- Home Guard at Pathsala, Assam, India, was in logging, and was later used to help capture ferences. “Winfrey has worked with and sup- ally conservative political orientation,” fatally shot on March 20, 2009 in a confronta- problematic wild elephants. ported PAWS in the past, most notably during Pacelle noted, “his unyielding support for ani- tion with poachers. Manas National Park a series of shows last year about puppy mills Girija, 43, an elephant used in tem- mal protection was a reminder to all his mil- deputy director C.R. Bhobora and another and pet overpopulation. She also has funded a ple parades, died on March 12, 2009 at Home Guard member were wounded. Sixteen pet room at the facility,” wrote Chicago Anuparpalayam, Tamil Nadu, allegedly of alleged poachers and the remains of leopards, Tribune staff reporter Willaim Hageman. dehydration caused by a neglectful mahout. MEMORIALS tigers, deer, and bison were captured. Kamaraju Bhuyan, a forester, Five sled dogs die in 2009 Iditarod In memory of Tiger. was trampled by elephants on February 16, ––Bette Buley 2009 at Raampu village, Berhampur, Orissa, ______A N C H O R A G E ––Five dogs died The deaths stoked PETA opposition India, while trying to rescue a two-year-old during the 2009 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, to the Iditarod. The Humane Society of the In memory of Kelev. elephant who fell into a well after her weight the most in any year since 1997. The race runs U.S., however, which campaigned against the ––Joel Krupnik broke the concrete cover. 1,131 miles, from Wasilla to Nome. Iditarod in the early 1990s, no longer opposes ______“The first dog to die this year was 6- it. “I would like to see the Iditarod celebrate In memory of Toby, another much-loved year-old Victor in the team of North Pole the history and culture of the event and not be rescued cat of Linda Piee, who has a big More Bali rabies musher Jeff Holt,” reported Craig Medred of just a timed event, but they’re trying to make heart for humans and animals. Jama Asmara, 46, on March 23, the Anchorage Daily News. Running 50th of it as safe as they can for both the animals and Love you, my dear friend. 2009 became the eighth human victim of a 67 teams, Holt’s goal was to just to finish. humans,” HSUS western region director Dave ––Barbara Hardin canine rabies outbreak afflicting southeastern “The dogs were fresh and well rested when he Pauli told Associated Press writer Rachel ______Bali, Indonesia since September 2008. Bitten left the Rainy Pass checkpoint,” wrote D’Oro. “We’re definitely reformists and not In memory of my little dog Que in November 2008, Jama Asmara reportedly Medred. “A veterinarian looked the team over abolitionists on an event like this,” Pauli said. and all the hurting animals. received post-exposure vaccination on and said they looked great. A few miles down At least 146 dogs have died during ––Hilde Wilson November 27, plus a later booster, but the trail, Victor fell over and died.” the 35 runnings of the Iditarod. About a third ______skipped two further prescribed boosters Maynard, age 5, ran in the team of of the deaths have been from undetermined In memory of Buddy, the dog who was because he did not feel ill. veteran Yellowknife musher Warren Palfrey, causes, some of them possibly involving companion to Socks, the White House cat Previous Bali rabies victims have who finished 19th. At Safety, just 20 miles inbred heart defects known to occur among who recently died. Buddy died tragically included two three-year-olds, a four-year-old, from Nome, “Maynard reportedly looked huskies. Many of the rest have resulted from some time ago, hit by a car and killed when two 32-year-olds, and a 45-year-old. fine,” Medred wrote. “Ten miles farther, collisions with snow machines, other vehicles, he innocently and playfully ran after a The Bali government has reportedly with the finish nearly in sight, he died.” and wildlife. worker who had just finished something on killed at least 2,000 dogs, mostly with strych- Omen, 8, running for 39th place Iditarod chief veterinarian Stuart the Clinton's residence. They were not nine, and has vaccinated about 20,000 near musher Rick Larson of Sand Coulee, Nelson Jr. in the mid-1990s hoped that the properly looking after Buddy or he would confirmed rabies cases, using an Indonesian- Montana, also died from no apparent cause. Iditarod safety rules could be improved to not have run into the street and died. made vaccine that requires revaccination after Dizzy and Grasshopper, running for eliminate dog deaths, he told Medred. ––Helen Kett only three months. As of late March 2009, physician Lou Packer, apparently died of But the odds are heavily against that ______Bali officials admitted that they were having hypothermia, after Packer, third from last at happening. Huskies typically live about 10 difficulty administering revaccinations. the halfway mark, ran into a blizzard that most years: 3,650 days. The 67 teams competing in Hospitals and clinics were mostly out of of the field had missed. Also hit by the bliz- 2009 included more than 1,200 dogs, who human post-exposure vaccine. zard, and fearing that her dog Cotton, 8, spent an average of about two weeks on the The Bali government, as first might be suffering from hypothermia, Kim trail: 16,884 days. Expected deaths among reported in ANIMAL PEOPLE in November/ Darst of Warren County, New Jersey, any random cohort of huskies over 16,884 days December 2008, continues to prohibit the Bali dropped out to get veterinary help. would be 4.6, which rounds off to five. Animal Welfare Association and other animal help agencies from either importing up-to-date ––$1.00 a word! • vaccines good for at least three years, or vac- CLASSIFIEDS In memory of Bonney Brown's cat Girly, cinating dogs outside the rabies zones. anpeopl e@whi dbey.com who bravely fought cancer but eventually succumbed. There is no better way to ______www.youtube. com/ w atch?v= www.animalsmatter.org remember animals or animal people WANTED: The Animal Rights Alliance, -0JXcPxkSGE In memory of Purr Box (12/3/87), than with an ANIMAL PEOPLE Inc. (TARA) a New York 501(c)(3), needs Prometheus (3/21/81), Friendl (10/30/87), Based on Hindu mythology, this is memorial. Send donations the story of Yudisthira, a pious king whose donation of a 30’-32’ diesel spay/neuter Lizzie (5/8/84), Boy Cat (12/26/85), (any amount), with address for place in Heaven is determined by his love mobile unit. Our 26’ LaBoit has exceeded Miss Penrose (11/18/98), Duke (11/1/98), for a dog. Animated by Wolf Clifton in the 28,000 surgeries in the past seven years, Purr Box, Jr. (5/1/04), Mylady (8/1/06), acknowledgement, if desired, to style of an Indonesian shadow puppet play. and will soon need to be “put to sleep”! We Muffin (1/2/08), Blackie (9/9/96), P.O. Box 960 ______can provide tax write-off and pick up. 845- and Honey Boy (11/1/05). Clinton, WA 98236-0960 798-6477, x8; [email protected]. TINY TOP HATS, Bowtie collars, Spats ______and More for you and your dog! FEEDING PETS OF THE HOMELESS www.BadDogHats.com A nonprofit national member organization Your love for animals Online or call for a catalog: 206-226-4834 ______www.petsofhomeless.org ______Want Art that Reflects Your Values? can go on forever. SUBSCRIBE NOW TO VEGAN VOICE, W W W . L I T T L E G I R L L O O K I N G . C O M The last thing we want is to lose our friends, Australia's celebrated and singular quarterly sells unique Art for Animal/Environmental but you can help continue our vital educational mission magazine! www.veganic.net Advocates. Dogs Deserve Better or your ______with a bequest to ANIMAL PEOPLE favorite Animal Charity receives 15-50% of FREE SPAY/NEUTER for stray and feral (a 501(c)(3) charitable corporation, federal ID# 14-1752216) the profits. ______cats and dogs in Arad, Romania. Please Animal People, Inc., SIGN THE PETITION TO THE help us with a donation: www.animed.ro ______PO Box 960, Clinton WA 98236 UNITED NATIONS to adopt the Universal Ask for our free brochure Estate Planning for Animal People Declaration on Animal Welfare: Register your pro-animal organization at April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 19 ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 - 19 April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 20 20 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2009 April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 21 April 2009 3/22/13 9:25 PM Page 25