From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2004:

Pit bull terriers

I agree that a ban on the breeding of pit bull terriers and
Rottweilers is unfortunately the right thing to do. I am currently
the owner of two American Staffordshire terriers and I have been
volunteering to rescue pit bulls and Rotties for a few years now. I
love the breeds and find them to be very loving companions. I have
had a pit or amstaff in my family for about 15 years.
However, I recognize that these days I am not the typical
pitbull owner. This is where your editorial “Bring Breeders of
high-risk dogs to heel” will fail to garner the needed support. In
giving statistics about the numbers of attacks involving these
breeds, your article implies that these are by nature bad dogs.
However, most owners of these breeds are fighting them, treating
them inhumanely, training and working with them to increase their
aggressive nature, or are just flat out irresponsible. You talk
about how the current attitude of the insurance industry is unfair to
other breeds, but you fail to recognize that this attitude is also
unfair to responsible owners of these maligned breeds.
For those who love these breeds, the real question is does
our opposition of a breed ban help or harm the dogs?

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2004:

Appeals

Thank you for once again publishing “Who gets the money?” and
the ANIMAL PEOPLE Standards for Ethical Charities and Fundraisers.
I have survived involvement in animal advocacy as an
employee, volunteer, and donor for four decades. As a donor, I
would like to share a few preliminary screening points. Perhaps
other ANIMAL PEOPLE readers have additional comments. If the
following aggravations are evident, I don’t have to look up features
like administration/program ratios, because the appeal for
membership or a donation is already in the waste basket.
1) Salaries. The first thing I do when I get an appeal is
look up the organziation’s IRS Form 990 at <www.guidestar.org>. An
organization that can afford to pay an employee or board member
$100,000 per year does not need my money. The potential donor must
look closely because the section of the Form 990 that reports board
members’ salaries is usually somewhat removed from the section that
reports salaries of employees who make more than $50,000 a year.
Also, occasionally the chief executive has a moderate salary while a
subordinate is cleaning up.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 2003:

Tail-docking

I noticed that the November 2003 full page ad from Animal
Rights International asking the American Veterinary Medical
Association to adhere to ethical animal treatment did not mention the
AVMA position on tail-docking. Their policy is very “fudgy,” and
AVMA members dock tails wherever state law allows it.
The new American Assoc-iation of Equine Practioners policy
on tail docking, adopted in July 2003, protects horses against
cosmetic tail amputation, but not against all amputation. The AAEP
position reads:
Tail docking in horses should only be performed when it is a
medical necessity or when it is vital to ensuring the horse’s safety
in a work environment. Tail docking should not be performed for
cosmetic reasons. To protect the health and welfare of the horse,
tail docking should be performed by a licensed veterinarian to ensure
adequate pain management, sterile technique and appropriate
aftercare. Tail docking should always be done in compliance with
individual state laws.
If European horse users can put full-tailed horses into
multiple hitches without endangering anyone or anything, how come we
cannot? You and I know what will happen: The person with a horse
who wants to be like his “peers” will plead safety issues and get the
tail lopped off.
Draft horse judge John Blaisdell, P.E.I. tells me that if
there are two teams competing in the ring with identical scores, he
has to chose the team with the shortest tails as winners. Where are
the winners here? The judge is weak, the horses are mutilated,
the handler remains uneducated. A dock-tailed horse proclaims the
ignorance of his handler and trainer. Blaisdell also cites many
cases in his experience where this totally unnecessary operation led
to infection and worse in the horses.
The new president of the AAEP is Thomas D. Brokken of Ft.
Lauderdale. He works exclusively with thoroughbred racehorses. He
has served on the AAEP ethics committee and educational programs.
The headquarters for the AAEP is 4075 Iron Works Parkway, Lexington,
KY 40511; 1-800-443-0177; or fax 1-859-233-0147. Email:
<aaepoffice@aaep.org>.
–Sharon Cregier
Montague
Prince Edward Island
Canada
<scregier@pei.sympatico.ca>
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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2003:

Kitten in Beijing

I want to tell you how much I enjoyed reading your October cover
feature, “Four shelters serve Beijing.” The vignette at the end
about your son holding a kitten on a Beijing street and attracting
attention was very sweet. Wolf was using his act of holding that
little life to send messages to those who came around him. Wasn’t
that the most beautiful scene on the streets of Beijing?
–Peter Li
Houston, Texas
<LiPj@uhd.edu>

Ukrainian animals get newspaper

We are glad to inform you that our Centre is starting a
monthly newspaper on animal rights called Time to Protect Animals.
This will be the first such publication in the Ukraine and the former
Soviet Union. The project will be realized with financial support
from the World Society for the Protection of Animals. The pilot
edition of 5,000 copies will be distributed during the first week of
November 2003. The famous Ukrainian newspaper Vremja (Time), which
publishes 80,000 copies three times a week, is asking their readers
who would like to receive a free copy, and those who ask will get
our newspaper.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2003:

Chimp rescue

Thank you for “Chimp sanctuaries save
evidence of human origin,” in your July/August
edition.
The last sentence, explaining that Bala
Amarasekaran and the Tacugama Chimp Sanctuary
survived in Liberia because the sanctuary was
“viewed as an authentically valuable community
institution,” is the crunch: without local
backing, we are wasting our time.
With this in mind we in Gambia are
becoming more and more involved in peripheral
work which might seem to have no bearing on the
chimp project. For example, we now operate a
small medical clinic. We provide assistance with
schooling, including financial aid for the
students and for maintaining the school building
with volunteer staff. Currently there are only
two teachers for 300+ kids. We also help to look
after draft animals (for which purpose the
Gambian Horse & Donkey Trust is now up and
running). We are emphasizing the entrepreneurial
opportunities arising from a visitor camp,
including for suppliers of fresh food from local
sources.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2003:

Pigeons

Thank you very much for the mention of PICAS USA in your
July/August 2003 edition.
PICAS USA has already evolved considerably since I provided
the information published then. Our first official consultation has
been for an architectural firm in Chicago that is renovating the
landmark Ambassador Hotel. We are also doing an exploratory study for
the city of Duluth, Minnesota, and are assisting private citizens
who have contacted us hoping to start PICAS projects in New York
City, Philadelphia, and Pompano Beach, Florida, among other
cities.
I have also uncovered some misconceptions about the European
method of pigeon control:
1) Ever-unassuming, PICAS’ director Guy Merchant only
recently revealed to us that he had implemented the nestbox/egg
removal approach nearly a decade before the Swiss study that made it
famous.
2) Some of the greatest successes come from the U.K. and
other locations besides Switzerland.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  July/August 2003:

Stress,  distancing,  vivisection,  and A primate’s memoir

Reading your review of Robert M.
Sapolsky’s A Primate’s Memoir:  A
Neuroscientist’s Unconventional Life among the
Baboons in the June 2003 edition of ANIMAL
PEOPLE,  I was reminded of an all-day conference
I attended years ago on the physical and
psychological effects of stress.
The only speaker was Robert Sapolsky,  a
lively,  humorous,  and engaging man who spent
the morning describing the many and varied ways
that stress is experienced,  the painful nature
of the experience,  and the personal toll that
stress had taken on people’s lives,  including
his own.
Somewhere in the middle of the afternoon,
after the audience had been charmed and seduced
by Sapolsky’s warmth and wit,  he announced to
this group of caretakers–nurses,  psychologists,
and social workers such as myself–“I am a
vivisector.”

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