Sealing protest & media response

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:
Conventional activist wisdom is that confrontation attracts
publicity, which builds opposition to a grievance. An ANIMAL PEOPLE
analysis of Atlantic Canadian seal hunt coverage, however, shows a
low yield from ongoing efforts to confront and document the
activities of sealers on the ice, the chief protest tactic since the
1970s.
The New York Times during the first two weeks of the 2008
sealing season published just one brief article about it, and since
1981 has published an average of just 1.4 articles per year about the
hunt. The New York Times total of 39 articles about Atlantic
Canadian seal hunting and related protest contrasts with 312 articles
about Japanese research whaling published in the same years.

Will seizing Sea Shepherd ship help Canada to hold off European seal product import ban?

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:

TOKYO; SYDNEY, N.S.-The Institute of Cetacean Research
acknowledged on April 14, 2008 that pursuit of the Japanese whaling
fleet by the Sea Shepherd Conserv-ation Society vessel Steve Irwin
had held their winter “research whaling” catch to just 551 minke
whales, 55% of their self-assigned quota of 985 minke whales and 50
fin whales.
“We did not have enough time for research because we had to
avoid sabotage,” said a prepared statement from the Japan Fisheries
Agency.

About six million U.S. dogs live on chains, Dogs Deserve Better count projects

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:
TIPTON, Pa.–How many dogs are chained or penned in
abnormally close quarters as their primary means of confinement?
The quick answer appears to be about six million dogs, 9% of
the U.S. dog population, based on an ANIMAL PEOPLE analysis of data
gathered by Dogs Deserve Better founder Tammy Grimes and public
liaison director Dawn Ashby.
Grimes and Ashby in mid-April 2008 spent 12 days counting
chained or closely penned dogs in a dozen southern and southeastern
states. They found 1,051 chained dogs in 1,483 residential road
miles, or about one mile in 2,648 of the U.S. residential road mile
total.

Order protecting duck said to be a legal first

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:
MASTIC, N.Y.–A protective order issued on April 3, 2008
on behalf of a duck named Circles was believed to be a legal first.
Ylik Mathews, 21, a neighbor who allegedly shot Circles in the neck
with a pellet gun, received the order after pleading not guilty to
felony cruelty in Central Islip First District Court. Previously
convicted of first degree robbery, Mathews faces up to two years in
prison. He was held on bail of $5,000 cash or $10,000 bond.
“To my knowledge, it’s the first order of protection for a
pet in Suffolk County outside of domestic violence cases,”
prosecutor Michelle Auletta told Luis Perez of Newsday.

High-tech cameras help to put the Japanese spotlight on Taiji dolphin killing

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:

TOKYO–Dolphin Project founder Ric
O’Barry thought the 2007 discovery that the
mercury content of meat from dolphins killed at
Taiji is 30 times higher than the Japanese
government-recommended limit might rouse enough
citizen outrage to end the annual “drive fishery”
massacres.
The main reason why Japanese whaling is
not stopped by the Japanese people, O’Barry has
believed since his first visit to Japan in 1976,
is that most Japanese people don’t know about it.
Neither coastal whaling as practiced at Taiji nor
so-called “research whaling” on the high seas has
ever drawn much Japanese media notice, so while
Japanese donors strongly support causes such as
saving koala bears, Japanese whaling opponents
remain isolated and underfunded.

Spared by court, sea lions are shot by night raiders

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:
PORTLAND–The National Marine Fisheries Service is
investigating the early May 5 fatal shooting of six California sea
lions who were trapped in floating cages used by the Oregon
Department of Fish & Wildlife to capture sea lions who are believed
to be contributing to the depletion of endangered salmon runs.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on April 23, 2008
granted an injunction to the Humane Society of the U.S. and
coplaintiffs which allowed Oregon wildlife wardens to capture sea
lions who eat endangered salmon below the Bonneville Dam on the
Columbia River, but prohibited killing sea lions.
Eight of 61 sea lions targeted for removal were trapped on
April 24, of whom one died while awaiting transfer to Sea World.
Zoos and aquariums had agreed to accept about 20. No others were
impounded before the program was suspended. The National Marine
Fisheries Service had authorized Oregon officials to kill any for
whom homes could not be found.

Swinging Canadian elections keeps the sealers swinging clubs

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:
Swinging Canadian elections keeps the sealers swinging clubs
Commentary by Merritt Clifton

Thirty years ago, when I first wrote
about the Atlantic Canadian seal hunt as a rural
Quebec newspaper reporter, both the hunt and
protests against it already seemed to have gone
on forever–but I had hopes that the efforts of
Brigitte Bardot and Paul Watson would soon end
it. Bardot brought global celebrity status to
the campaign; Watson had just introduced the
then new tactic of actually confronting the
sealers on the ice, as cameras rolled.
I had known about the hunt and the
protests for close to 10 years, first hearing
of it soon after Brian Davies moved his Save The
Seals Fund to the U.S. from New Brunswick and
retitled it the International Fund for Animal
Welfare.
When the U.S. Postal Service introduced
nonprofit bulk mail discounts in 1969, the seal
hunt was among the topics that built IFAW, the
Animal Protection Institute, Greenpeace, and
the Fund for Animals. The seal hunt was already
a cause celebré before Bardot gave up acting to
start the Brigitte Bardot Foundation, before
Watson formed the Sea Shepherd Conservation
Society while Greenpeace retreated from the
sealing issue.

“Activist vegetarian” elected to head Canadian SPCA

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:
MONTREAL–The Canadian SPCA board of directors on April 9,
2008 affirmed the promotion of former vice president Nancy Breitman
to acting president, following the ouster of Pierre Barnoti,
president since 1995. The CSPCA board also elected six new members
to fill eight vacancies.
Breitman told Max Harrold of the Montreal Gazette that under
Barnoti she was ostracized as “a radical, tree-hugging, activist
vegetarian.”
Breitman pledged to reduce the numbers of animals killed at
the two CSPCA shelters, in Montreal and Laval, by “as much as
possible.”
Read more

BOOKS: Redemption

May 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:

Redemption:
The Myth of Pet Overpopulation
& the No Kill Revolution in America
by Nathan J. Winograd
Almaden (www.almadenbooks.com), 2007.
229 pages, paperback. $16.95.

The very title of Nathan Winograd’s book
Redemption: The Myth of Pet Overpopulation & the
No Kill Revolution in America offers a challenge
to conventional thinking.
Winograd introduces Redemption as, “The
story of animal sheltering in the United States,
a movement that was born of compassion and then
lost its wayŠThe story of the No Kill movement,
which says we can and must stop the killingŠmost
of all, a story about believing in the community
and trusting in the power of compassion.”

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