Month: April 2007

Wildlife SOS “franchises” dancing bear sanctuaries

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:
AGRA–Wildlife SOS, operating three sanctuaries for dancing
bears, has made a speciality of helping Kalandar dancing bear
exhibitors into other occupations, in exchange for their bears and a
pledge to stay out of promoting animal acts.
Frequently the price of a dancing bear is the training and
start-up capital to enable a Kalandar family to start a small
business, a sharp break from a tradition so ancient that many of the
oldest circus families worldwide–such as the Chipperfields,
performing in Britain since 1683–appear to have Kalandar origins.
“We have seen a change in attitude amongst the Kalandar
people themselves,” says Wildlife SOS cofounder Kartick
Satyanarayan. “Bear poachers in Uttar Pradesh state recently tried
to sell a young cub to a Kalandar community, but the villagers
refused to buy the cub because they knew this would be against the
law. I truly feel there is an end in sight,” Satyanarayn
emphasizes, “and one day the streets of India will be free of
captive bears being tortured for entertainment.”

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Muschel photo caption

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:
“As there has been no funding from leading animal rights
groups for a sustained anti-fur campaign in the affluent
neighborhoods of New York City, I decided to put up an anti-fur
mural,” wrote New York City resident Irene Muschel. The mural went
up in March 2007, “recognizing,” Muschel said, “that the best time
for anti-fur murals is when the weather is warmer, so people can
learn before they buy fur.”

Succeeding in Galapagos, Animal Balance takes s/n to the Dominican

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:
SAN FRANCISCO– Moving to the Dominican Republic with her
personal pets in February 2007, planning to start surgeries in
March, Animal Balance founder Emma Clifford hopes that lessons
learned in introducing dog and cat sterilization to the Galapagos
Islands off Ecuador, human population 30,000, can be applied in a
Caribbean island nation of more than nine million.
“I think we’ll be the first to do a focused spay/neuter
campaign in the Dominican,” Clifford told ANIMAL PEOPLE. “We are
targeting villages across the northern coast, starting in Cabrera.
We will work with the local vets and the national veterinary school.
As the Dominican Republic is the place for baseball,” where more
people of all ages play than anywhere else in the world, “we have
been collecting used baseball gloves, and will be giving them out as
incentives for people to get their animals sterilized, along with
the collars and leashes. St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa
has joined us and lent his name to the project to help gain
interest,” with credibility on animal issues earned as cofounder
with his wife Elaine of Tony La Russa’s Animal Foundation.

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BOOKS: Making Tracks: The Marin Humane Society Celebrates 100 Years

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:

Making Tracks: The Marin Humane Society Celebrates 100 Years
Edited by Elaine Sichel & Pam Williams.
Photos & photo editing by Sumner W. Fowler
Marine Humane Society (171 Bel Marin Keys Blvd., Novato, CA
94949), 2007. 96 pages, hardcover. $24.95.

The most remarkable aspect of the Marin Humane Society
turning 100, as it will on December 14, 2007, is not that it has
endured as long as it has, but rather that it has endured so long
with only three generations of longterm leadership, through repeated
redefinitions of role, in a community changing almost beyond
recognition.
Making Tracks: The Marin Humane Society Celebrates 100 Years
is a souvenir album, including only transient discussion of most of
the controversies that Marin Humane has addressed or been part
of–but a three-page timeline gives hints.
Founder Ethel H. Tompkins lived almost her entire life in the
San Anselmo home where she was born in 1876 and died in 1969. She
briefly attended a New York City boarding school, but was expelled
in 1894 for leaving class to ride a policeman’s horse. She had
obtained the policeman’s permission.

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Lancaster captive turkey shooters convicted–a first in Pennsylvania

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:
LANCASTER, Pa.–The Elstonville Sportsmen’s Association on
March 9, 2007 pleaded “no contest” to eight cruelty counts brought
against the club for hosting a live turkey shoot in Rapho Township
on September 9, 2006.
The “no contest” plea acknowledged the facts of the case,
including an agreement to pay all fines, without admitting guilt.
Elstonville Sportsmen’s Association attorney Michael Winters
told Ad Crable of the Lancaster New Era that in response to the
charges the club had elected new leadership, and had adopted a new
rule that forbids “the use of any living entity for the sole purpose
of being a target,” even if the use is allowed by law.

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Beirut animal rescuers are back online

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:
“Just now, after seven months, were we able to establish a
new e-mailing system,” Beirut for the Ethical Treatment of Animals
wrote on March 27, 2007, after last e-mailing directly to ANIMAL
PEOPLE on October 3, 2006, eight days after evacuating 300 animals
to the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary in Utah.
BETA had rescued 237 dogs and 2005 cats during two months of
fighting in southern Lebanon between Israeli troops and the Hezbollah
militia.
“Even though the war is over, the political situation is
still unstable,” BETA said. “Everybody is concerned with personal
survival, scared of what will happen the next day, and defending
animals seems insignificant to most people. Rescues never stopped.
We now have 200 dogs and 130 cats in our care,” with an “urgent need
for evacuation of our dog shelter. Our neighbors are not very fond
of dogs and have issued us a month’s notice,” BETA explained.

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Kenya wildlife policy policy committee pushes “cropping,” not “hunting”

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:

NAIROBI–“The National Steering Committee,” drafting
revisions to Kenyan wildlife policy, “has dropped recommendations
for killing animals for fun,” revealed The Nation environment
correspondent John Mbaria on March 16, 2007. Instead, Mbaria
wrote, “it has adopted cropping wildlife.” Mbaria explained that
the draft policy “defines cropping as ‘harvesting free-ranging
animals for a range of products, including meat and wildlife
trophies.’
“In Kenya,” Mbaria continued, “most animals are
free-ranging. Apart from Saiwa Swamp in Western Kenya, and
Aberdares and Lake Nakuru national parks, which have electric
fences, the rest of the parks and reserves are open.”

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Visakhapatnam Animal Rescue Center helped to save a troubled zoo

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:
VISAKHAPATNAM–Built to a then-state-of-the-art plan in 1972,
the 625-acre Indira Gandhi Zoological Park in Vis-akhapatnam is among
the world’s most spacious zoos, and is among the few in India with
authentic conservation breeding credentials.
“Captive breeding for species survival” is the mission touted
on page one of the Indira Gandhi Zoological Park brochures. Captive
breeding successes include the December 2007 births of eight dholes,
Asian cousins of the better known African wild dog.
Yet while captive breeding may have enhanced the prestige of
the Indira Gandhi Zoo among fellow zoo professionals, the mission
that really saved the zoo appears to have been opening one of the
first CZA-accredited Animal Rescue Centres for ex-circus animals, in
February 2001.

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Anti-gassing verdict

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2007:
Atlanta–Fulton County Superior Court Judge Cynthia D. Wright
on March 23, 2007 ordered the Georgia Department of Agriculture to
enforce the 1990 state Humane Euthanasia Act, which requires that
animal shelters must use sodium pentobarbital to kill dogs and cats,
and prohibits leaving dying animals unattended. The law allowed
county animal control agencies that used carbon monoxide gas chambers
in 1990 to continue using them, but did not allow new gas chambers
to be installed. It exempted counties of under 25,000 residents.
The case was filed by former state representative Chesley
Morton, author of the Humane Euthanasia Act, and veterinary
technician Jennifer Robinson, whose dog Pacino was gassed by Clayton
County Animal Control after being hit by two cars.

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