BOOKS: The Octopus & the Orangutan

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

The Octopus and the Orangutan:
More True Tales of Animal Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity
by Eugene Linden
Dutton (Dutton (375 Hudson St., New York, NY 10014), NY 2002. 256
pages, hardcover. $23.95.

The Octopus and the Orangutan: More True Tales of Animal
Intrigue, Intelligence, and Ingenuity is, as the name implies, a
sequel to The Parrot’s Lament. The title also reflects Linden’s
continuum of animals demonstrating intelligence: from the lowly
octopus, a mollusk, to the animal Linden thinks is closest to
thinking like a human, the orangutan. Some stories from The
Parrot’s Lament are repeated, a few with additional details. Many
of the new stories seem more compelling and unique than those in the
first book. The next-to-last chapter makes the same points as the
final chapter of The Parrot’s Lament, with additional insights about
our typical focus on obtaining short-term benefits through the use of
our intelligence, and the resulting long-term repercussions for our
species’ continued existence.

Animal Obituaries

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

Bubba, the last known Alabama sturgeon, died in August at
the Alabama state fish hatchery in Marion. Bubba was one of two
males who were captured for an attempted breeding program that failed
from lack of females. The Alabama sturgeon was added to the U.S.
endangered species list in 2000, the same year it was last seen in
the wild.

Obituaries

Human Obituaries

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

Eugene Underwood, 71, who died on February 27, was honored
in August when the Asociacion Humanitaria Para La Proteccion Animal
de Costa Rica dedicated in his honor a new humane education video
produced by Tom Rorstad, Richard Whitten, and Diana Fernandez.
Formerly senior vice president and general counsel for the American
SPCA in New York City, Under-wood retired to Ciudad Cariari, Costa
Rica, in 1995. An active member of the AHPPA, Underwood led
opposition to recreational bowhunting of feral pigs on Cocos Island.

Obituaries

O.J. Simpson among alleged threats to manatees

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

ORLANDO–Florida speedboaters smashed their 1999 record of
killing 82 manatees in one year on September 26, as the 83rd manatee
to be fatally injured in 2002 died under emergency care at Sea World
Orlando.
With three full months of 2002 remaining, manatee experts
expect that the total for this year may exceed 100, after three
years in a row of counts between 78 and 82. The average toll for the
fourth quarter over the past four years was 15.
The number of manatees killed by speedboats has risen ever
since records were first kept in 1974, but did not top 50 in a year
until 1989. Since then, the toll has soared –along with the number
of boats in the water.

Poaching & Zimbabwe turmoil may halt CITES bid to sell ivory

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

SANTIAGO, BONN–The ivory and whaling industries will go
into the 12th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Convention
on International Trade in Endangered Species on November 3 as
determined as ever to reopen legal global commerce in the body parts
of elephants and whales.
The ivory merchants and whalers are not considered likely to
get what they want.

Editorial: To save endangered species, don’t kill them

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

“About 19% of native animal species and 15% of native plant
species in the U.S. are ‘imperiled’ or ‘critically imperiled,’ and
another 1% of plants and 3% of animals may already be extinct–that
is, they have not been located despite intensive searches,”
declared the H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the
Environment on September 24, in a purported landmark report formally
titled The State of the Nation’s Ecosystems.
“When ‘vulnerable’ species are counted, about one third of
plant and animal species are considered to be ‘at risk,'” the report
continued.
Most U.S. newspapers gave The State of the Nation’s
Ecosystems just one paragraph.

Animal welfare in Japan by Elizabeth Oliver, founder, Animal Refuge Kansai

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

Visitors to Tokyo who expect to see street dogs, ubiquitous
in much of Asia, may be surprised to see only pampered purebreds.
Perhaps because Japan is an island, street dogs have never
been common here– although dogs did once enjoy much greater freedom.
Before World War II, dogs were kept primarily by people affluent
enough to have a house and land. They may have been kept as guard
dogs, but were seldom chained and could roam at will.
Because they were free and were usually greeted by everyone,
they tended to be friendly. Hachiko, for example, an Akita, used
to see his master off at the Shibuya railway station in Tokyo every
morning and go back to the station to greet him on his return in the
evening. One day his master died suddenly, but Hachiko continued to
go to the station every day until he died of old age. The Japanese
were so impressed by his devotion and loyalty that they erected a
statue to him, which still stands outside the Shibuya station.
A dog like Hachiko could not roam in Tokyo today. People
would be frightened of him, and the hokensho would quickly dispatch
him to the gas chamber.

Canadians try to revive pro-animal bills

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

VANCOUVER, OTTAWA, TORONTO– British Columbia Supreme Court
Justice James Shabbits on Sept-ember 3 ruled in response to a
petition from the Western Canada Wilderness Committee and
EarthJustice that Cattermole Timber Inc. may log 88 hectares of
old-growth spotted owl habitat because, in Shabbits’ view, the B.C.
Forest Practices Code includes no requirement that species be saved
from extirpation or extinction.
Such a requirement does exist in the U.S., where similar
cases have blocked or delayed logging throughout the Northwest, but
not in Canada, whose national endangered species protection law
still includes no enforcement provisions.

Suit seeks to end pheasant stocking by Park Service

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

BOSTON–The Fund for Animals, Humane Society of the U.S.,
Massachusetts SPCA, and individual Cape Cod residents on September
20 filed suit against the National Park Service for collaborating
with the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife to release
hundreds of captive-bred pheasants each year for hunters to shoot at
the ecologically fragile Cape Cod National Seashore.
“The National Park Service is exterminating black rats on
Anacapa Island, California, and evicting wild burros from the
Mojave desert because they are not native,” pointed out Fund for
Animals executive vice president president Mike Markarian, whose
organization has also contested those actions, “but is purposely
introducing exotic species for use as targets,”
Markarian was promoted to the presidency of The Fund on
September 24. Marian Probst, assistant to Fund founder Cleveland
Amory from the 1967 start of the organization until Amory died in
1998, and president since then, became chairperson, continuing as
chief financial officer and administrator.

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