LETTERS [Sep 2000]

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2000:

AHA mag is free

Your July/August 2000 article on recent happenings in Utah and Albuquerque indicated that shelters must pay for subscriptions to AHA’s sheltering publication, Protecting Animals.

Actually, we provide Protecting Animals to every shelter and animal control agency for which we have an address free of charge. This is similar to your philosophy of providing ANIMAL PEOPLE t o all shelters and agencies without charge. We provide extra copies to shelters which are members of AHA. But regardless of membership, we send every shelter at least one copy for free.

We do charge for participation in our professional training events and workshops. But we provide a scholarship for every training event we hold, and the application process is not burdensome. We also offer special scholarships to people who provide animal care and control on Native American reservations.

We are always seeking funding to keep our training events and workshops as inexpensive as possible.

––Jack Sparks

Director of Communications

American Humane Association

63 Inverness Drive E. Englewood, CO 80112

303-925-9453

<jsparks@americanhumane.org>

 

Jay Dinshah

Sorry to hear about the sad demise of American Vegan Society founder Jay Dinshah. He was really a devoted and truthful person. He had a goal before him and wanted to achieve that goal. Such persons are not only needed by us but needed by God also.

––Geeta Mehta, Ph.D.

Bombay, India

<mehtageeta40@hotmail.com>

 

Harassment
Your article “Inspectors
are killed—cattle are not,” in your
July/August edition, reported that I
“met both physical threats and
harassment from superiors” when I
“tried to enforce the Humane
Slaughter Act and sanitation rules as
a USDA meat inspector 1979-1984.”
This is not quite correct. I
worked for USDA Veterinary
Services, 1979-1984. When the
Vermont state veterinarian and the
head of meat inspection were fired
for incompetence in 1984, the
USDA sent me to do their jobs. I
did meat inspection on loan from
USDA to the state of Vermont.
But yes, I was harassed,
both as a meat inspector and as a
USDA veterinary medical officer.

––Peggy Larson, DVM, JD
Williston, Vermont

 

Slaughterhouses

Concerning “Inspectors
are killed—cattle are not,” and
the Humane Farming Association
ad about the conditions at the IBP
slaughterhouse in Wallula,
Washington, in the July/August
edition of ANIMAL PEOPLE, I
did not see anything about this in
mainstream media when the case
broke back in May. This is a
shocking, inexcusable, and intolerable
situation, which warrants
the attention of all of the principal
animal protection organizations
using all available resources.
I’m thinking in terms of
immediate injunctions to assure
that no animal can be subjected to
live flaying, dismemberment, and
butchering.
U n c i r c u m v e n t a b l e
enforcement of a better Humane
Slaughter Act would be nice.
If there were ever a time
to use nonviolent direct action to
prevent such extreme inhuman
abuse of innocent beasts, this is it!
Those responsible are willingly
subjecting animals to excruciating
pain simply to maximize profits:
“to keep the line moving.”

––Pinckney Wood
New Orleans, Louisiana

 

Cellars & garrets

We need your help in persuading the municipal officials in Poznan, Poland, to ease an ordinance requiring residents to keep cellars and garret windows closed. The ordinance is meant to keep wild or feral animals out of houses for socalled sanitary reasons. It will harm feral cats, who usually live in cellars, and some birds and bats who find safe places in garrets. It will also cause an increase in the mouse and rat population, as the numbers of cats and owls will be reduced.

To solve the rat problem, the municipal authorities have hired a professional rat catcher from another town 400 kilometres away.

A couple of days ago, one local municipal housing administrator demanded that Ms. Genowefa Zawala, who cares for wild cats, evict the animals from her cellar. The cellar is rented only by Ms. Genowefa Zawala, and four cats enter it through the skylight.

Please write to: Dariusz Lipiski, Chair, Poznan Municipal Council, and Jadwiga Rotnicka, President of the Committee for Environmental Protection, c/o Pl. Kolegiacki 17, 60-967 Poznan-9, Poland; fax 48-61-852-92-75, .

––Jurek Duszynski.

Help to People and to Animals

ul. Lazurowa 14/74 60-655 Poznan, Poland

 

Rodeo injuries
In response to rodeo industry
claims that animal injuries in the
arena are rare, Steve Hindi of
SHARK and I are compiling a
U.S./Canadian list of rodeo animal
injuries and deaths during the past 25
years. If you have relevant newspaper
accounts, photos, eyewitness
reports, or veterinary or humane
society reports, please mail them to
me, along with any other pertinent
details you may have.
This is to be an ongoing,
constantly updated project.
Thank you.

––Eric Mills
Action For Animals
P.O. Box 20184
Oakland, CA 94620
510-652-5603

 

THANKS FROM INDIA

We thank you and your subscribers profusely for all the wonderful greeting cards, books and other gifts you sent for our poor animals through Bonny and Rati Shah of Ahimsa of Texas. All the funds that will come in by selling those trinkets and cards will go toward feeding and treating our homeless animals.

All of us here at People For Animals are trained animal welfare officers, including training in animal laws and first aid. Working with us are 35 active volunteers who feed and treat street animals in Mumbai. As taking these animals to an animal hospital can be really expensive, we treat small injuries, maggot wounds, colds and fevers, and do antirabies vaccination all right on the streets, where the animals live. This enables us to look after thousands of additional animals.

Volunteers from many other organizations assist. Often these volunteers lack the funds to buy food and medication for the animals. PFA helps them by purchasing food and medicine, and any volunteer is free to come and collect whatever is in stock.

If we are out of stock, I begin telephoning compassionate people to ask for help. We are grateful for whatever anyone can do for animals.

––Rita Vazirani

People For Animals (Mumbai)

Bungalow No. 130 Chembur, India 400 071

<v_rita@vsnl.com>

 

SYLVESTER & TWEETY

Under the headline Cats vs. birds, on page 14 of the June 2000 edition of A N I M A L P E O P L E, you mentioned “an 18- month study by Wichita State University graduate student Carol Fiore, who estimated from fecal samples that free-roaming urban pet cats kill 4.2 birds apiece per year,” and wrote that, “Fiore’s estimate that they collectively kill 269 million birds per year was compromised because she counted the entire owned cat population as free-roaming. Most studies indicate––with regional variations––that about twothirds of urban cat owners keep their cats indoors.”

My study had several parts and my estimate of 4.2 birds/per cat/per year was not based solely on collection of fecal samples (that was one component of it.) If all of the 64 million owned pet cats in the U.S. were outside, then 269 million birds could be expected to be killed; however, I did address the subject of indoor cats. My study incorporated a lengthy random survey of Wichita residents which indicated that 43% of cat owners said their cats were strictly indoors. I said that assuming for the sake of argument that half of the pet cats in the U.S. were kept indoors, then at least 134 million birds could be expected to die from pet cats. I did not even address the subject of feral cats, which I think you will agree would greatly increase this figure.

Additionally, I am not aware of any scientific study that estimates 2/3 of cat owners keep their pets indoors. This is a very high figure and my study and observation of my many cat owner volunteers and results from the random survey (which was done in conjunction with a psychologist named Ellie Shore) seems to indicate that what owners say and what they do may very well be totally different.

––Carol Fiore

Wichita State University Department of Biological Sciences

<prairiezoo@aol.com>

 

The Editor replies: What Fiore actually wrote was, “Given an estimate of 64 mil – lion pet cats in the U.S…a total of 269 million birds died every year as a result of pet cats, and that doesn’t even include stray cats.” This was the only estimate cited in the May 9 press release distributed by Ascribe News on Fiore’s behalf, from which our information came.

Fiore’s description of her work, as stated above, also indi – cates that in estimating how many cats are allowed to roam, she con – fused the important distinction between “Number of cat owners” and “number of owned cats.”

ANIMAL PEOPLE d i s – covered in our 1992 and 1995 national surveys of cat rescuers that in addition to feeding and rescuing feral cats, rescuers kept an average of seven cats apiece at home—more than triple the national average of 2.1 cats per cat-keeping household.

We also found in a 1994 survey that people who have not fixed their pet cats, who are more likely to let them roam, kept an average of only 1.64 cats apiece.

Based on these findings and parallel studies by others, notably Karen Johnson of the National Pet Alliance, we suspect that the most responsible 20% of cat-keepers keep about half of the total number of cats, while the least responsible 20% keep barely 10%.</prairiezoo@aol.com>

Arad victory near

After years of letter writing, legal action, exposes, protests and political pressure, the city of Arad has agreed in principal to a trap/sterilize/vaccinate/return program to replace mass poisonings which were used to control the cat population for more than 30 years. The city has allocated $12,500 for this project, contingent upon receiving $40,500 from outside sources. Through the generosity of the Animal Fund of the Environment Ministry and a private British animal welfare organization, $42,500 has been collected. However, the city refuses to proceed until the last $8,000 is received.

We appeal to cat lovers everywhere to help make our dream of ending mass poisoning come true. Please make checks out to The Cat Welfare Society Arad Project.

––Rivi Mayer

Director Cat Welfare Society of Israel

Moshav Gan-Haim Israel 44910

c/o <ellen@bgumail.bgu.ac.il>

 

Pakistani reader

As chief editor of the magazine Lord and managing trustee of Animal Rights International, I am f i n d i n g ANIMAL PEOPLE v e r y useful for our comunity in Pakistan, and am regularly publishing major and important parts in L o r d. I will continue to do this as much as possible. Any suggestions from you will be appreciated.

––Muhammad Arif Mahmood (Advocate)

133 Pakiza Lodge Lodhi Colony, Multan Pakistan