Deslorelin takes the lead in quest for non-surgical birth control

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)
NAIROBI–Veterinary contraceptive
researcher Henk J. Bertschinger wowed the Africa
Animal Welfare Action conference in Nairobi on
September 8, 2010 with two presentations hinting
that the anti-GnRH agonist approach to animal
birth control may be applicable in cats and dogs.
Bertschinger, of the University of
Pretoria in South Africa, recapped and updated a
2007 paper he and colleagues published in the
journal Wildlife Research, describing “the
treatment and contraception of 23 captive and 40
free-ranging lionesses and four captive tigers in
South Africa,” using a range of different sized
deslorelin implants. Deslorelin is a hormone
analog, modeled on the natural hormone LHRH
(lutenizing-hormone releasing hormone) that turns
reproductive processes on and off in the brains
of both male and female animals.

BOOKS: Do Fish Feel Pain?

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)

Do Fish Feel Pain?
by Victoria Braithwaite
Oxford University Press (198 Madison Ave.,
New York, NY 10016), 2010.
194 pages, hardcover. $29.95.

Victoria Braithwaite, a professor of fisheries biology at
Pennsylvania State University and a visting professor at the
University of Bergen, Norway, had no idea in 2003 that she was
about to make a discovery that would change her life, the direction
of her field, and the perception that much of humanity has of fish.
Braithwaite certainly did not foresee, as an animal researcher,
that she would open a whole new direction in animal advocacy. Even
three years later, when Braithwaite summarized her work in an op-ed
essay for the Los Angeles Times, she was surprised by the intensity
of the response she drew from readers.

Avocados & ivory

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)
NAIROBI–Inspectors at the Jomo Kenyata Inter-national
Airport in Nairobi thought there was something odd about a two-ton
cargo of “avocados” that were to be flown to Malaysia on August 21,
2010.
Avocados, after all, are among the major exports of Sabah
state, Malaysia.
Opening the boxes, the inspectors found 317 pieces of ivory
and five rhino horns. Two suspects were arrested.

Animal obits [Sept 2010]

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)

Cedric, 6, a captive-born Tasmanian devil who was the
first known to produce an immune response to Deadly Facial Tumor
Disease, was euthanized in late August 2010 after X-rays showed
tumors in his lungs. Taz survived two years of repeated injections
with DFTD cells at the Menzies Research Institute in Hobart,
Australia, which has been trying to find a cure or a prophylactic
for the disease. Discovered in 2006, DFTD has killed about 80% of
the Tazmanian devils left in the wild. The disease, which began
with a mutation circa 20 years ago in the devils’ nerve
tissue-producing cells, is transmitted when devils bite each other.
The tumor gene was identified in March 2010. Discovery of a colony
of apparently immune wild devils was reported the same month.
Australian National Univ-ersity researcher Elizabeth Murchison
announced on September 16, 2010 that mapping the devils’ genome had
been completed. Together, the findings raised hope that a vaccine
can be engineered to save the species.

Obituaries

BOOKS: The Lost Dogs: Michael Vick’s dogs and their tale of rescue & redemption

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)

The Lost Dogs:
Michael Vick’s dogs and their tale of rescue & redemption
by Jim Gorant
Gotham Books (375 Hudson St., New York, NY 10014), 2010.
287 pages, hardcover. $26.00.

The Lost Dogs, like a Three Stooges film, should open with
the warning, “Don’t try this at home, kids.”
Yes, the American SPCA, Best Friends Animal Society, and
several other partner organizations were able to avoid euthanizing 47
of the 51 pit bull terriers who were confiscated from football star
and dogfighter Michael Vick in April 2007. About two-thirds of the
dogs were eventually placed in homes; the rest remain in sanctuary
care.

NACA & Philippines move against gassing

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)

KANSAS CITY, MANILA–Gassing homeless animals moved closer
toward abolition worldwide on September 15, 2010 when the U.S.
National Animal Control Association withdrew approval of gassing,
three weeks after Philippine Department of Agriculture secretary
Proceso Alcala deleted gassing with automotive exhaust fumes from the
Philippine Revised Rules & Regulations on the Euthanasia of Animals.
Alcala referred the proposed administrative rule that would have
authorized gassing with exhaust back to the departmental committee on
animal welfare for reconsideration. Philippine animal control
agencies are still allowed to kill animals with bottled carbon
monoxide or carbon dioxide.

Greenpeacers sentenced

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)
TOKYO–Greenpeace Japan anti-whaling campaigners Junichi Sato,
33, and Toru Suzuki, 43, were on September 6, 2010 convicted of
stealing more than 20 kilograms of whale meat from a warehouse in
April 2008, and were sentenced to a year in jail each, suspended
for three years. Sato and Suzuki contended that they took the whale
meat as evidence that members of the crew of the whaling ship Nissan
Maru were illegally selling meat from whales who had been killed in
the name of scientific research. The case, the award-winning film
The Cove, and the July 2010 deportation of Sea Shepherd
Conserv-ation Society activist Pete Betheune, whose boat the Ady Gil
was sunk by a Japanese whaler in January 2010, have greatly raised
Japanese awareness of the nation’s involvement in whaling.

Voting to end Wild Animal Orphanage, board seeks new homes for 297 animals

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)

SAN ANTONIO–Wild Animal Orphanage
directors Suzanne Straw, Michelle Cryer, and
Chris Smith on August 31, 2010 unanimously voted
to dissolve the 17-year-old sanctuary, one of
the largest in the world, with 297 animals–some
at the seven-acre original site just outside San
Antonio, most at a 102-acre site located farther
away.
Founders Carol and Ron Asvestas were
ousted from the Wildife Animal Orphanage
management in an October 2009 coup d’etat led by
their daughter Nicole Garcia, amid financial
stress following years of allegations of
mismanagement by former volunteers and donors.

BOOKS: Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat

September 1, 2010 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2010:
(published October 5, 2010)

Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat:
Why It’s So Hard to Think Straight About Animals by Hal Herzog
HarperCollins Publishers (10 East 53rd St., New York, NY 10022),
2010. 324 pages, hardcover. $24.99.

“When I first started studying human/animal interactions, I
was troubled by the flagrant moral incoherence I have described in
these pages,” concludes Western Carolina University psychology
professor Hal Herzog in Some We Love, Some We Hate, Some We Eat.
Examples include “vegetarians who sheepishly admitted to me they ate
meat; cockfighters who proclaimed their love for their roosters;
purebred dog enthusiasts whose desire to improve their breed has
created generations of genetically defective animals; hoarders who
caused untold suffering to the creatures living in filth they claim
to have rescued. I have come to believe that these sorts of
contradictions are not anomalies or hypocrisies,” Herzog states.
“Rather, they are inevitable.”

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