Animal obituaries

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2009:

Lelani, 13, a German shepherd adopted from an animal
shelter who became foster mother to the orphaned bear cubs
rehabilitated by Idaho Black Bear Rehab in Garden City, Idaho, died
on December 28, 2008. “Until LeLani,” recalled Idaho Black Bear
Rehab founder Sally Maughn, “single cubs would bawl and pace when
they were left alone in our outdoor enclosures. I couldn’t be with
them all the time, so LeLani was a blessing to both the cubs and me.
Now comes the decision of trying to get another ‘bear dog’ or not,
and will I ever find one as good with the cubs as LeLani was.”

Joseph ‘Levi’ Travis, 15, companion to realtor and Best
Friends Network regional coordinator Carmel Travis of Pullman,
Washington, died of complications from melanoma on November 26,
2008 in Moscow, Idaho. Losing a leg at age seven, Levi became an
ambassador for special needs dogs as well as for mutts, greeting
many and perhaps most of the 660-plus attendees at the Best Friends
“No More Homeless Pets” conference in Las Vegas in October 2008.

Bamm-Bamm, seven months, a deer found as a newborn on
Mother’s Day 2008 by Patricia Sears of Gaston County, North
Carolina, was confiscated and killed by the North Carolina Wildlife
Resources Commission as contraband captive wildlife on December 30,
2009.
India, 18, the White House cat throughout the tenure of
former U.S. President George W. Bush, died on January 4, 2008. A
present to the Bush twin daughters, Jenna and Barbara, when they
were nine years old, India was named after then-Texas Rangers
outfielder Rueben Sierra, whose nickname was “El Indio.” George W.
Bush co-owned the Rangers at the time.

Izan, 8, “a male western lowland gorilla who became an
international symbol of illegal trade as part of the so-called
Taiping Four, died on December 26, 2008 at the Limbe Wildlife
Center in Cameroon following a lengthy illness,” reported Pan
African Sanctuary Alliance coordinator Doug Cress. “The Taiping
Four,” Cress explained, “were illegally captured as infants from
the wild in Cameroon in 2001, smuggled to Nigeria, and transferred
under forged permits to the Taiping Zoo in Malaysia. After the deal
was uncovered, the government of Malaysia confiscated the gorillas
and sent them to the Pretoria Zoo in South Africa despite repeated
requests from Cameroon for their return. A consortium of animal
conservation and welfare organizations lobbied aggressively for the
repatriation of the gorillas, and the Taiping Four were sent to the
Limbe Wildlife Center in late 2007.”

Cinci Freedom, 13, a Charolais cow who escaped from a
Cincinnati meatpacking plant in 2002 and became a folk heroine while
eluding capture in a city park for 10 days, was euthanized on
December 29, 2008 at the Farm Sanctuary location near Watkins Glen,
New York, after losing the use of her hind legs due to spinal
cancer. Eventually tranquilized by the Cincinnati SPCA, Cinci was
ceremonially presented with a key to the city, then transferred to
Farm Sanctuary at request of artist Peter Max, who sponsored her
transportation. At Farm Sanctuary she lived with several other cows
who made renowned escapes from slaughterhouses, named Queenie,
Maxine, and Annie Dodge.

The Hog Heaven Pack, 19 wolves who inhabited the Brown’s
Meadow and Niarada regions southwest of Kalispell in northwest
Montana, were massacred by USDA Wildlife Services during the first
week of December 2008 for repeatedly attacking livestock. Eight pack
members were killed earlier in the year. Fifteen of the last 19 were
not yet hunting on their own, said Suzanne Asha Stone, Northern
Rockies representative for Defenders of Wildlife.