Category: Companion Animals

Dog and exotic pet bite statistics

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1993:

In our January/February issue, we published Saginaw County Animal Control
division head Mark Wachner’s advice that pit bull terriers trained to fight should be eutha-
nized rather than being put up for adoption, along with Ohio animal health technician
Donna Robb’s account of how a young pit bull she rescued and had apparently successfully
socialized went berserk on Christmas Eve, breaking down a locked door dividing two parts
of her house to kill two cats and a rabbit. We published a letter defending pit bulls in our
March issue, and responded that while some people may be more successful than others in
handling pit bulls (or any kind of dangerous animal), this does not mean we should
encourage anyone to keep any kind of high risk animal as a pet. This brought a barrage of
letters and calls from pit bull fanciers, who swear it’s all a matter of training, that pit bulls
are no more dangerous than any other dog.

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Religion & Animals

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1993:

The General Association of Davidian
Seventh Day Adventists, a 500-member vege-
tarian sect active in New York, California, and
South Carolina, wish to make known that they
have nothing whatever to do with the Branch
Davidians, who have been involved in an armed
standoff with police and the FBI since February
28 at their compound near Waco, Texas.

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North Shore Animal League changes guard, offers free neutering

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1993:

PORT WASHINGTON, N.Y. –– North Shore Animal League president David Ganz resigned
March 1, just as the March issue of ANIMAL PEOPLE reached readers with a page one probe of NSAL’s
unconventional approach to promoting adoptions and neutering. The investigation discovered that the NSAL
approach is substantially reducing both pet overpopulation and euthanasia rates wherever tried, and found little
current evidence to support criticisms often directed at NSAL by more conventional humane groups.
Although a successor to Ganz was not named immediately, NSAL chairperson Elizabeth Lewyt said,
“It is business as usual at NSAL, with all divisions running smoothly,” adding, “All NSAL programs and poli-
cies, including support and assistance for other animal shelters, will continue without interuption.”
NSAL attorney John Stevenson is now acting chief executive officer. “As chairprerson,” Lewyt con-
tinued, “I am now taking a more active role in the management of the shelter.”
As Lewyt’s first public action, she announced that, “Commencing April 1, NSAL will be providing
free spaying and neutering to all NSAL adopters.”

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Houston Humane Society then and now; $15 neutering vs. 93% euthanasia rate

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1993:

Then
In September 1980, Houston Humane Society
board president Sherry Ferguson drafted a 12-page report to
her fellow board members. Opened in February 1963, HHS
was in every sort of trouble: badly overcrowded because of
a no-kill policy, financially shaky because of weak admin-
istration, and struggling to adopt out 700 animals a year.
By comparison, the Houston SPCA was adopting out
15,000 a year, and Citizens for Animal Protection, a group
founded to reform HHS, was adopting out 2,500 even
though it had no shelter.
That wasn’t the worst of it. HHS had no neutering
requirement for animals who were adopted out. When there
wasn’t space for newcomers, people who tried to surrender
animals were turned away––so many came at night and sim-
ply abandoned the animals on the property, alongside a
busy secondary highway. Many were killed by traffic
before staff arrived in the morning. Vermin infestations
were so severe that Ferguson said she wondered if HHS had
become a shelter for rats.

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The Project BREED Directory: access to a lifesaving network

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1993:

GERMANTOWN, Maryland––
Shirley Weber, by her own admission, is in
over her head. Her savings are gone, her
telephone bills sky-high. Her assets include
four dogs and four cats, a condominium in
a rough part of town, and two volumes of
something called The Project BREED
Directory. (BREED is short for Breed
Rescue Efforts and Education.)
Weber also has the belief that what
she has done in creating The Project
BREED Directory is important, that it will
make a difference for thousands of animals
from coast to coast. The paperback direct-
ory includes contact information for every
group Weber could find that rescues pure-
bred dogs, some groups who rescue other
specific kinds of animal, and a considerable
amount of useful advice.

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Guest column: Helping all dogs through breed rescue by Gina Spadafori

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1993:

Some nights the telephone never stops ringing for
Sheltie Rescue.
The local humane society is holding a dog and
hopes we will pick her up soon––like today. A rescuer who
works with a different breed has pulled a Sheltie from a
municipal shelter two counties away––when can we pick
him up? A veterinarian is calling in hopes we can help a
middle-aged dog left for euthanasia when the family
moved. Two people want to dump their dogs tonight, and
we have no place to put them.
“If you don’t come get this dog right now,” hisses
one caller, “it’s dead. And I’m going to tell everyone what
hypocrites you are. Sheltie Rescue my ass.”

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American SPCA drops New York pound contract: “Killing animals shouldn’t be the business of a humane society.”

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1993:

NEW YORK, N.Y.––The Amer-
ican SPCA announced March 25 that it will
cease providing animal control service to
New York City after September 1994, and
will begin turning operations over to the city
as promptly as possible.
Losing money on animal control
work, the ASPCA has threatened to pull out
many times since 1977, most recently in
1991. Each time, New York offered conces-
sions and the work of picking up and eutha-
nizing strays went on as usual. In 1991, for
instance, the ASPCA returned responsibility
for selling dog licenses to the city––an intend-
ed fundraising function that had become a
loser––and accepted a bigger direct subsidy
instead.

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CHILDREN & ANIMALS

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 1993:

$40 million in public funds are
used to teach “hunter education” to
700,000 U.S. school children a year. The
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service puts up $32.2
million, while the balance comes from the
states; all 50 states participate. “They’re
teaching hunting as ‘gun safety,’ ‘physical
education,’ and any other excuse they cna
think of,” says Katherine Trimnal of
Columbia, South Carolina, who has been
investigating the program for some time.
This program is completely separate from
Project Wild, which also promotes a pro-
hunting message at cost of $23 million a
year.

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A fish named Alice by Margaret Hehman-Smith

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 1993:

I have an unusual animal I’d like to tell
you about: a fish named Alice who does tricks.
You don’t believe it? Everyone says that until they
see my fish for real. Then they admit they have
never seen a fish do that before; and then they
don’t know what to say or do. On the one hand
here is a koi fish who performs learned behaviors
on cue, and on the other, there is the suggestion
that we should regard fish as intelligent, sentient
beings, who don’t belong grilled on a plate.
My Japanese Imperial koi fish is sleekly
beautiful, pearl-white, 24 years old, about the
size of a small dog. She lives in a 100-gallon tank
in my den. She has been taught to ring a bell, go
through a hoop, react to hand signals, push a ball,

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