Pet food contamination

March 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2008:

Hartz Mountain Inc. on February 11, 2008 named American SPCA
Poison Control Center director Steven R. Hansen “2007 Veterinarian of
the Year” for his response to the March 2007 international recall of
pet food that was contaminated with the coal byproduct melamine by
the Chinese makers of wheat glutens used as an ingredient. Adding
melamine produced a chemical reaction that caused tests to indicate
that the glutens contained more protein than they did–and killed
1,950 cats and 2,200 dogs, according to complaints reaching the U.S.
Food & Drug Administration.

U.S. Supreme Court upholds breed-specific legislation

March 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2008:
WASHINGTON D.C.–The U.S. Supreme Court on February 19, 2008
upheld the constitutionality of breed-specific dog regulation by
refusing to hear an appeal of Toledo vs. Tellings, a challenge to
the Toledo ordinance limiting possession of pit bull terriers to one
per person, and requiring that pit bulls be muzzled when off their
home property.
The Ohio Supreme Court ruled in favor of Toledo in August
2007. The Ohio Supreme Court verdict followed other court decisions
upholding breed-specific legislation in Arkansas, Colorado,
Florida, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, New Mexico, Utah, Washington,
and Wisconsin.

Dogs Deserve Better founder to be sentenced after Have A Heart for Chained Dogs Week

January 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2008:

HOLIDAYSBURG, Pa.–Tammy Grimes, 43, who founded the
anti-chaining organization Dogs Deserve Better in 2002, will
celebrate Valentine’s Day 2008 by coordinating her 6th annual “Have A
Heart for Chained Dogs Week,” which annually delivers valentines and
treats to as many as 8,000 dogs who live their lives on chains.
Grimes will then be sentenced on February 22 for theft and receiving
stolen property.
Grimes on September 11, 2006 removed an elderly and
apparently painfully dying dog from the yard of Steve and Lori Arnold
of East Freedom, Pennsylvania, after the Central Pennsylvania SPCA
failed to respond to repeated calls about the dog from neighbor Kim
Eichner. Grimes took the dog to the office of Altoona veterinarian
Noureldin Hassane, who testified that he found the dog was in
extremis. Later Grimes took the dog from the clinic and placed him
in a foster home for the remainder of his life. He died on March 1,
2007.

What did the Prophet Mohammed really say about dogs?

January 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2008:

What did the Prophet Mohammed really say about dogs?

Commentary by Merritt Clifton
CAIRO–Will the status of dogs rise in the Islamic world as
improved sanitation eliminates street dog habitat, the threat of
rabies recedes, and rising affluence enables more people to keep
pets?
Or, is prejudice against dogs so thoroughly built into
Muslim culture that the Middle East will remain the part of the
inhabited world with the fewest pet dogs per capita, despite having
the longest recorded history of keeping dogs?
Cairo, Damascus, Istanbul, Karachi, Tehran, Kuwait, and
Dubai all appear to have reached approximately the socio-demographic
transition point at which dog-keeping began exponential growth in the
U.S. and more recently China, and began more restrained growth in
western Europe.

Shelter intake of pit bulls may be leveling off

January 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2008:

The numbers of pit bull terriers and Rottweilers in U.S.
animal shelters may have leveled off since 2004, after a decade of
explosive increase, but are not falling, according to single day
shelter dog inventories collected by ANIMAL PEOPLE during the second
and third weeks of January 2008.
ANIMAL PEOPLE compared the data to single-day dog inventories
collected in June 2004 from 23 U.S. animal control and open admission
shelters, then housing 3,023 dogs.
Of the dogs in 2004, 23% were pit bulls or close mixes of
pit bull; 3% were Rottweilers or their close mixes; and 17% were
other purebreds. Counting pit bulls and Rottweilers but not their
mixes, plus purebreds, about 33% of the shelter dog population
appeared to have been purpose-bred, as opposed to products of
accidental breeding. The pit bull and pit mix percentage had
increased fivefold since ANIMAL PEOPLE did a breed-specific survey of
shelter dogs in 1993.

Guest column: A close look at the “bully movement”

January 1, 2008 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2008:
Guest column

A close look at the “bully movement”
by Phyllis M. Daugherty, director, Animal Issues Movement
ANIMALISSU@aol.com
The November/December 2007 ANIMAL PEOPLE editorial “Adding
consideration to compassionate acts” was heartwrenching in its
truth. It is so hard for kind, caring humans to ignore or forget
the eyes of a hungry or suffering animal. But our need to “save” the
animal must be tempered with realistic consideration for the animal,
rather than be done to boost our own egos. This is especially true
when our personal resources or future access will be limited. Thanks
for your diplomatic handling of a sensitive topic.

Most recent Baghdad pet market bombing is solved, says admiral

November 1, 2007 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November/December 2007:
BAGHDAD–U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Gregory Smith on November 24,
2007 told reporters that four members of an Iranian-backed Shiite
“special groups cell” had confessed to bombing the al-Ghazl pet
market in central Baghdad the preceding day.
The bombing, the fourth attack on the al-Ghazl pet market in
two years, killed at least 15 people and wounded 56, along with
killing and injuring countless birds, fish, and other animals.
The four suspects were captured overnight by U.S. and Iraqi
troops, Smith said. They were linked to the bombing by “subsequent
confessions, forensics, and other intelligence,” Smith explained.
Reported CNN, “Smith said the attackers wanted people to
believe that the bomb, packed with ball-bearings to maximize
casualties, was the work of al-Qaida in Iraq so that residents would
turn to Shiite militias for protection.”

History & PetSmart Charities adoption data shows the value of doing holiday adoptions

November 1, 2007 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November/December 2007:

RANCHO SANTE FE, Calif.– Helen Woodward Animal Center
president Mike Arms has been telling everyone who would listen for
more than 40 years that the winter holiday season should be the peak
season for shelter adoptions.
Arms demonstrated the potential for boosting adoptions during
the winter holidays during 20 years as shelter manager for the North
Shore Animal League, in Port Washington, New York, and then took
his campaign global by founding the Home 4 the Holidays program at
the Helen Woodward Center in 2000.
“I have always thought that the idea we shouldn’t do
adoptions during the holiday season was a plot by the puppy mill
industry to protect their profits,” Arms asserts.

Puppy mill cases raise animal rights vs. property rights

November 1, 2007 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November/December 2007:
“I think it’s called dog-napping,” Junior Horton of Horton’s
Pups told Donna Alvis-Banks of the Roanoke Times, after humane
societies from throughout the region took some of the 980 dogs who
were seized during the first few days of November from Horton’s
property in Hillsdale, Virginia.
Some of the rescuers made almost the same charge against Horton.
There were reportedly about 1,100 dogs on the premises when
the impoundments began. Someone allegedly removed 200 to 300 of the
dogs before they could be taken into custody, Danville Area Humane
Society director Paulette Dean told Danville Register & Bee staff
writer Rebecca Blanton.
“The authorities worked out an agreement with Horton, but
they didn’t tell him he couldn’t move any of the animals,” Dean
elaborated. “They thought he would honor his word about keeping the
dogs there.”
The conflict in perspectives exemplified the difference in
outlook between breeders and rescuers. In Horton’s view, the humane
societies were taking property that employee Timmy Bullion told
Associated Press might be worth as much as $450,000. To the
rescuers, the dogs were not property but individual lives in
distress.

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