SHAC leaders sentenced in Britain & New Jersey

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:
LONDON, TRENTON–Five alleged
instigators of property damage and threats
directed at facilities, business partners, and
employees of Huntingdon Life Sciences in
mid-September 2006 drew prison terms ranging from
three to six years.
Northampton Crown Court Judge Ian
Alexander on September 20 sentenced molecular
biologist Joseph Harris, 26, to three years as
the first person convicted under a new British
law against economic sabotage.
“Harris, of Bursledon, Hampshire, broke
into premises in Nottingham, Bicester and
Northampton,” summarized Nicola Woolcock of the
London Times, “where he slashed tires, flooded
offices, and poured glue into locks. He caused
more than £25,000 in damage.” Harris apparently
began the attacks in a futile bid to keep a
girlfriend who left him, the court was told,
because of animal experiments he did in
connection with pancreatic cancer research.

Injectible female chemosterilant goes to field trials

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:
PORTLAND, Oregon–Among the last actions of the Doris Day
Animal League before it was absorbed on August 31, 2006 by the
Humane Society of the U.S. was funding a grant issued on July 26 by
the Alliance for Contraception for Cats and Dogs to help underwrite
tests of a chemosterilant for female animals called ChemSpay, now
underway on the Navajo Nation.
Headquartered in Windowrock, Arizona, near the junction of
Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, and Utah, the Navajo Nation presently
has the highest rate of animal control killing of any incorporated
entity in the U.S., at 135 dogs and cats killed per 1,000 humans per
year, nearly 10 times the U.S. average of 14.5.

How gassing came & went

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:
Gassing pound animals with carbon monoxide gained acceptance
across the U.S. after the American SPCA took over the New York City
animal control contract in 1895 and introduced carbide gassing in
lieu of drowning mass-caged strays in the Hudson River.
Carbon monoxide gassing prevailed over many attempts to
introduce other killing methods partly because it was inexpensive and
easily done, but perhaps mostly because it was perceived as painless.
The most successful challenge to carbon monoxide came from
the introduction of decompression chambers to kill animals, after
World War II, when the San Francisco SPCA developed a side business
in purchasing and adapting to shelter use Navy surplus decompression
chambers originally used to help divers who developed “the bends.”

Accra zoo to be rebuilt

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:
ACCRA, Ghana–The Accra Zoo, serving about 120,000 visitors
per year, is to be relocated and rebuilt over the next five years,
Ghanian minister of lands, forestry, and mines Dominic Fobih
announced on August 1, 2006. The animals are to be moved to the
Kumasi Zoo, about 200 miles inland, by the end of September 2006 to
make room for a new presidential complex. The new zoo is to be built
with the help of the London Zoological Society, Fobih said.
Founded as first Ghanian president Kwame Nkrumah’s private
menagerie in the early 1960s, the Accra Zoo opened to the public
after his overthrow in 1966.

Help at last for the Addis Ababa zoo

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:

ADDIS ABABA–That little was done for more than 30 years to
improve the Haile Selassie Zoo in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, might be
no surprise, in view of the usually dilapidated state of African
zoos–but the zoo holds a well-documented population of the rarest of
all lion subspecies, believed to be the oldest captive lion colony
in existence.
The black-maned Atlas lion, Barbary lion, or Lion of Judah,
hauled to Imperial Rome by the thousands for use and slaughter in
Colossium spectacles, was extirpated from Libya by 1700, from Egypt
by 1800, from Tunisia in 1891, from Algeria in 1912, and from
Morocco in 1921. This was a year after the lion was deleted from the
World Encyclopedia of Animals as already extinct.

Letters [Oct 2006]

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:

Sanctuarians cross no-man’s-land to save asses

I hope that you will let me update your
readers on the work of the British charity Safe
Haven for Donkeys in the Holy Land, dedicated to
caring for working and abandoned donkeys in
Israel and the Palestinian Territories.
Safe Haven was founded in 2000 by former
British Airways flight attendant and Jerusalem
SPCA volunteer Lucy Fensom, who saw first-hand
the cruelty and neglect inflicted on many of the
thousands of donkeys still used as beasts of
burden in the region.
Today, at the Safe Haven sanctuary near
the Israeli town of Netanya, 100 donkeys live
free from pain and overwork, and have the chance
to form herds and roam freely on the 4-acre site.
Safe Haven’s work does not stop at the
sanctuary gates. Aware that the donkeys living
there are just a tiny percentage of those
desperately needing help, Lucy has initiated
free veterinary clinics in the Palestinian
Territories. Each week Lucy and her team make
the sometimes risky border crossing with Safe
Haven’s well-equipped mobile clinic to visit a
different village and provide veterinary care,
farriery and tooth rasping for the animals, and
of course advice and support for the owners.
Read more

Letters

Walking horse industry quick-steps after failed USDA soring inspections

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:
NASHVILLE–Between allegedly “sored” horses and sore losers,
walking horse competition burst into national view as never before in
late August 2006. But the attention was almost all embarrassing to
breeders and exhibitors in a business whose excesses, a generation
ago, prompted passage of the federal Horse Protection Act a year
before the passage of the Animal Welfare Act.
The Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration championship
competition in Shelbyville was cancelled on August 26 after USDA
inspectors disqualified seven of the 10 finalists for alleged soring
violations of the Horse Protection Act. For the first time in the
67-year history of the event, it named no grand champion.
The National Celebration reportedly brings as much as $38.5
million a year into Shelbyville.

Editorial: Voting to help animals

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:
On midterm election day, November 2, 2006, depending on
the will of the U.S. electorate, both the House of Representatives
and the Senate may shift from Republican to Democratic control.
President George W. Bush, a Republican, will remain in the White
House until 2008, but history suggests that if either the House or
the Senate goes to the Democrats–or both–the outcome for the next
two years will probably be much better for animals than if either
party controlled all three elected branches of the federal government.
That possibility alone should be sufficient incentive to get
pro-animal voters out to the polls in the many closely contested
districts, even where neither candidate has a record on animal
issues that especially inspires either support or opposition.
Pro-animal voters will obviously want to support strongly pro-animal
candidates of either party, and oppose those with anti-animal
records, as indicated by the legislative scorecards published by
such organizations as Humane USA PAC and the Humane Society
Legislative Fund, but this year there is a further consideration.
Almost all of the major pro-animal federal legislation, including
the Animal Welfare Act, Endangered Species Act, and Marine Mammal
Protection Act, was originally passed and has been most positively
amended by divided Congresses. Precedent thus indicates that this
year the outcome of every seriously contested House and Senate race
matters to people who care about animals.

Thai coup may hit wildlife traffic

October 1, 2006 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2006:
BANGKOK–The September 20, 2006 Thai
military coup postponed for six days the already
long delayed return of 41 smuggled orangutans
from Thailand to Indonesia. Still, Wildlife
Friends Found-ation Thailand founder Edwin Wiek
told members of the Asian Animal Protection
Network, “We believe that under the new rule the
conservation of wildlife will improve.”
The repatriation flight, orginally set
for September 23, was rescheduled for September
29.
Another seven orangutans are suffering
from hepatitis, the Jakarta Post reported on
September 16. Indonesia has refused to accept
them, at least until after they recover.
“The Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation
and Wildlife Friends, who were to facilitate the
repatriation for the Indonesian government, were
told that the Indonesian Navy plane that was to
pick up the apes could not land in Thailand until
further notice,” Wiek said earlier.

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