MARINE MAMMAL NOTES

July 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1994:

The U.S. Navy plans to shut down

14 of its 18 Sound Surveillance System

(Sosus) underwater listening posts, perma-

nently disabling much of a $16 billion network

of more than 1,000 microphones linked by

30,000 miles of seabed cables. The Sosus

budget has been cut from $335 million in fis-

cal year 1991 to just $60 million for fiscal year

1995; staffing is to drop from 2,500 in 1993 to

750 in 1996. Set up 40 years ago to monitor

Soviet submarines, the system was used in

1992-1993 to track whale migrations––and

proved sensitive enough to follow one blue

whale for 1,700 miles. Hoping to keep using

Sosus to help check compliance with interna-

tional fishing and whaling treaties, Commerce

Secretary Ron Brown on May 17 asked the

Defense Department to keep what remains of

Sosus intact, pending completion of a joint

study into retaining it via interdepartmental

cost-sharing. However, The New York Times

reported on June 12, a National Oceanic and

Atmospheric Administration internal memo

indicates NOAA is not willing to contribute to

the upkeep costs.

COURT CALENDAR

July 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1994:

Activism

The U.S. Supreme Court on

June 13 upheld federal court and Court

of Appeals rulings that communities

cannot consititutionally ban the display

of political signs on citizens’ own prop-

erty. Issued on behalf of anti-Persian Gulf

War protester Margaret Gilleo, of Ladue,

Missouri, who is now a Congressional

candidate, the ruling applies as well to

people who have been ordered to cease

displaying signs on behalf of animals.

Friends of Animals in early

June won a judgement against the State

of Alaska for attorney’s fees incurred in

defending itself against governor Walter

Hickel’s failed attempt to sue FoA for libel.

The Hickel suit was filed in June 1993 in

an apparent attempt to prevent FoA from

further publicizing the Alaskan plan to kill

wolves in order to make more moose and

caribou available to hunters.

Horses

July 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1994:

Responding to an appeal from Brigitte Bardot,

Belgian interior minister Louis Tobback on June 13 banned the

controversial Krombeke trap-horse race––as well as any demon-

strations that might be held to gloat over the victory. Held on

slippery cobblestone streets, the race resulted in frequent injuries

to horses and drivers. Tobback, who said he’d always dreamed

of getting a letter from Bardot, last year banned a similar race at

nearby Sint-Eloois-Winkel.

Six-time Canadian Olympic equestrian Ian Millar,

of Perth, Ontario, on May 30 announced the retirement of Big

Ben, the 18-year-old Belgian he rode in three Olympics. Ben,

whom Millar began jumping in 1983, was the first North

American show jumper to win more than $1.5 million, achieving

40 grand prix victories; led Canada to the 1987 Pan American

Games gold medal; and won back-to-back World Cups.

Birds

July 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1994:

Bald eagle recovery in New

York and New Jersey reached milestones

this spring, as the former had 24 nesting

pairs and the latter five, up from one

apiece when DDT was banned in 1972.

Before the introduction of DDT, which

built up in the food chain and caused the

females to lay brittle eggs, New York had

75 pairs; New Jersey had 20 to 25. The

current population are descended from 198

eagles imported from Alaska between

1976 and 1988, plus 60 from Manitoba,

who were released between 1983 and

1988. Of the original 198, 32 are known

dead––half of them shot by vandals––and

another 32 are known to have reached

maturity and paired at least once. Eagles

from that group have now settled in seven

states. Curiously, half of the pairs who

have nested within New York state have

chosen trees that were documented nesting

sites around the end of the 19th century.

ANIMAL HEALTH

July 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1994:

Zoonosis

Tests by the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit have

concluded that the only sure way to prevent allergic reactions

to cats is “to remove the cat from the home,” Dr. Charles

Klucka recently told the American Academy of Allergy and

Immunology. “The next best thing is keeping the cat out of

the bedroom,” while the cat owner takes allergy drugs or

shots. Bathing cats in distilled water, applying a topical

spray 60 times per week, and giving them low-dose tranquil-

izers, all touted as antiallergen treatments, did not reduce the

dander of the 24 cats included in the Ford Hospital study.

Ten thousand volunteers in Connecticut, New

Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, and Wisconsin are field-

testing a Lyme disease vaccine developed by Connaught

Laboratories, following up on a 1992-1993 test that included

300 people. Preliminary data published in the June 8 edition

of the Journal of the American Medical Association showed

that levels of Lyme antibodies increased fourfold in 23 of 24

volunteers who participated in a limited test in Albuquerque,

none of whom suffered serious side effects. A rival firm,

SmithKline Beecham PLC, is reportedly also close to testing

a vaccine for Lyme disease, which afflicts about 10,000

Americans a year, and has been found in 44 of the 50 states.

Animal control & rescue

July 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1994:

Consistent with previous studies done in

Portland and Minneapolis, which have found that

German shepherds make up about 14% of the canine popu-

lation but do about 27% of the biting, a Denver study of

178 first-time biters and 178 nonbiters issued June 9 by the

Centers for Disease Control found that German shepherds,

chows, and collies were the dogs most likely to attack; the

least likely were golden retrievers and poodles. Only one

pit bull terrier, a nonbiter, was included in the sample.

Despite the frequency of German shepherd bites, which

may reflect their frequent use as sentries, the ANIMAL

PEOPLE log of dog attacks causing death or serious injury

indicates that German shepherds are responsible for under

2% of the attacks in those categories, while pit bulls,

Rottweilers, and wolf hybrids together account for 79% of

the deaths and 92% of the maimings.

What “humane trap” standards share with military intelligence

June 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 1994:

The International Standards

Organization technical panel appointed to

define the “humane” trapping standards that

must be met by nations exporting furs into the

European Community met in Ottawa in mid-

February to ratify proposals that World

Society for the Protection of Animals cam-

paigns director Wim de Kok fears “will possi-

bly circumvent the hardfought regulation that

prohibits the use of the leghold trap in the EC

and the import of fur from countries that do

not have such a ban. Under the new General

Agreement on Trade and Tariffs,” de Kok

continued, “the ISO is the regulating body on

standardization. Many countries may be

forced to accept low animal welfare standards

or to allow the import of fur from countries

that do not ban leghold traps. Under the ISO

standards, traps which drown their victims

would be considered humane,” although no

major veterinary organization or humane

group considers drowning a humane method

of either euthanizing or slaughtering animals.

Killing wildlife for fun & profit

June 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1994:

Austrian scientist Dr. Martin

Balluch, now at Cambridge University,

reportedly may be deported from Britain

because he opposes fox hunting. Letters of

protest may be sent to the Right Honorable

Michael Howard, Home Secretary, Home

Office, 50 Queen Anne’s Gate, London

SW1H 9AT, United Kingdom.

The winter of 1993-1994 was

among the harshest on record, forcing deer

to yard up sooner and stay yarded longer––but

early field reports indicate that few deer

starved despite hunters’ claims of deer over-

population. Wild turkeys were hard-hit, how-

eve––and may decline, warns National Wild

Turkey Federation representative Tom Baptie

of Castleton, Vermont, because undigested

grain from cow manure is a staple of their

winter diet, but anti-pollution laws now

restrict where and when manure can be spread.

Gorilla case was frame-up ––McGreal

June 1, 1994 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1994:

MIAMI, Florida––Victor Bernal, 57,

director of zoos and parks for Mexico state,

Mexico, was convicted on May 18 of trying to

bootleg a gorilla from Florida who was actually a

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agent in disguise.

Bernal paid $97,500 for the “gorilla,” in one of

two stings set up by convicted primate trafficker

Matthew Block of Worldwide Primates as part of

an attempted plea bargain. The other sting

nabbed alleged bird’s egg smuggler Clement

Solano.

Bernal is to be sentenced on July 18. In

the most recent similar case, a Texas exotic bird

dealer who was convicted of smuggling parrots

was on April 28 fined $10,000 and sentenced to

five years in prison.

« 1 … 57 58 59 60 61 … 69 »