Wildlife trafficking & alleged criminal genius

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)

 

NEW DELHI–The Supreme Court of India on October 20, 2010
upheld the conviction of wildlife poacher and trafficker Sansar Chand
for possession of leopard skins.
Chand has been the most notorious poacher and trafficker in
India–and perhaps the world, rivaled only by international reptile
dealer Anson Wong, the so-called “Lizard King,” on trial in Malaysia
as the October 2010 edition of ANIMAL PEOPLE went to press. The
tabloid notoriety of both Chand and Wong has ascended since the
October 2004 death of Koose Munisamy Veerappan in a shootout with a
Tamil Nadu special task force sent to try to take him prisoner.

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BOOKS: Orphans of Katrina

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)

Orphans of Katrina
by Karen O’Toole
Give A Dog A Bone Press
(P.O. Box 5665, Carefree, AZ 85377), 2010. 244 pages, paperback. $16.96.

On August 29, 2005 Hurricane Katrina beat up New Orleans and
the Gulf Coast, sending frightened residents fleeing for safety.
Hurricane Rita followed. Tens of thousands of dogs, cats and other
animals were left behind, mostly by people who were at work and
unable to get back home when Katrina hit, or expected to be away for
just hours or days, not months or forever.

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BOOKS: CAFO

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)

CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations):
The Tragedy of Industrial Animal Factories edited by Daniel Imhoff
Watershed Media (513 Brown Street, Healdsburg,
CA 95448), 2010. 400 pages, hardcover. 450
photographs. $50.00.

CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feeding
Operations) is the latest and probably most
ambitious yet of a 20-volume series of coffee
table books produced by Watershed Media founder
Daniel Imhoff to help bring public attention to
major but often overlooked environmental issues.
CAFO is the fourth Imhoff edition to
address factory farming, following Farming with
the Wild (2003), Farming & the Fate of Wild
Nature (2006), and Food Fight: the Citizen’s
Guide to a Food & Farm Bill (2007).

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BOOKS: Tales of an African Vet

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)
 
Tales of an African Vet by Roy Aronson, VMD
Lyons Press (246 Goose Lane, Guilford, CT 06437), 2010.
227 pages, hardcover. $19.95
 
Tales of an African Vet, by Roy Aronson, VMD, captured my
attention. I have never been to South Africa and enjoyed sharing
Aronson’s acquaintance with the many wild and exotic animals who
inhabit the region, some of whom, like cheetahs, are endangered.

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BOOKS: Homer’s Odyssey

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)
 
Homer’s Odyssey by Gwen Cooper
Bantam Books (1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019), 2009. 296
pages, paperback. $15.00.
 
South Florida resident Gwen Cooper, already keeping two
rescued cats, Scarlett and Vashti, answered a call about Homer, a
scrappy black kitten without eyes. Would she adopt him? The
veterinarian’s office had barely finished describing Homer’s plight
when Cooper caved in. Shrugging off disability, Homer sharpened his
other senses, learning to snag flies in midair and to stack
cockroaches in piles, then meow for Cooper’s attention.

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BOOKS: Animal Magnetism

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)

Animal Magnetism by Rita Mae Brown
Ballantine Books
(1745 Broadway, New York,
NY 10019), 2009.
233 pages, paperback. $16.00.

Rita Mae Brown, best-selling author and fox hunter, in
Animal Magnetism shares poignant memories about the dogs, cats,
horses, and occasional other animals in her life and the lives of
her family members. After writing a seven-volume series of murder
mysteries set within a fox hunting club, none of which bring anyone
to justice for murdering foxes, Brown follows Ted Kerasote and
several other longtime defenders of hunting in presenting herself as
an animal lover–possibly because that’s where the money is.

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BOOKS: Astro: The Steller Sea Lion

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)

Astro: The Steller Sea Lion by Jeanne Walker Harvey
Sylvan Dell Publishing (612 Johnnie Dodds, Suite A2
Mount Pleasant, SC 29464), 2010. * 32 pages, paperback. $8.95.

No one knows how the baby sea lion washed upon the shore in
Morrow Bay Harbor, near San Luis Obispo, California, in December
2008. A scientist who saw the abandoned pup took him to the Marine
Mammal Center in Marin County, just across the Golden Gate Bridge
from San Francisco. Staff and volunteers named the sea lion Astro.
At ten months of age, when Astro was healthy enough for
release into the Pacific, he was fitted with a satellite tag so that
the Marine Mammal Center could monitor his travels. Astro was
returned to the beach where he was found, but the sea did not
interest him. Neither did the other sea lions lingering on the sand.
Astro waited for two days for his human friends to return for him.

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BOOKS: Pukka: The Pup After Merle

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)

Pukka: The pup after Merle
by Ted Kerasote
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
(215 Park Ave. S., New York, NY 10003), 2010.
197 pages, hardcover. $18.95

Outdoor writer Ted Kerasote, until 2007,
was best known for his 1994 volume Bloodties, a
culture-based defense of hunting if the victims
are eaten. But Kerasote rejected trophy
hunting, which made him not much more popular
within the hunting industry than among animal
advocates.

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Serenity Springs cofounder Nick Sculac convicted

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2010:
(Actual press date November 3.)

COLORADO SPRINGS–Serenity Springs Wildlife Center cofounder
Nick Sculac, 60, was on October 26, 2010 sentenced to serve six
years in a halfway house, with probation possible in six to eight
months. The conviction was Sculac’s third for felony theft, but
Colorado mandates a life sentence for a third felony conviction only
if the felonies involve violence.
“When a volunteer was mauled by a tiger last year,”
explained R. Scott Rappold of the Colorado Springs Gazette, Sculac
bilked the man out of $40,500 by falsely claiming– according to
court documents–that he faced fines from the U.S. Department of
Agriculture and that amount was his share. The USDA is still
investigating the April 2009 mauling and has not issued a fine. The
Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined the sanctuary
$7,000,” Rappold added.

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