“Well-meaning” wildlife traffic? CITES weighs Taiping gorilla case

December 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 2002:

TAIPING, Malaysia; SANTIAGO, Chile–Few points on earth
are farther apart, with more open sea and sky between them, than
Taiping, Malaysia, home of the struggling Taiping Zoo, and
Santiago, Chile, the host city for the 12th Convention on
International Trade in Endangered Species Conference of the Parties,
called CITES-COP 2002 for short.
Yet the Taiping Zoo and CITES-COP 2002 had an awkward issue
to deal with in mid-November, having to do with the zoo illegally
buying baby gorillas in the name of conservation. The facts were
less in dispute than the intentions behind the January 2002
transaction–and the closest resemblance to common ground between the
positions of Taiping and the CITES Secretariat, across 6,000 miles
of Pacific Ocean, might have been the rolling deck of a Japanese
whaling ship.

O.J. Simpson among alleged threats to manatees

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

ORLANDO–Florida speedboaters smashed their 1999 record of
killing 82 manatees in one year on September 26, as the 83rd manatee
to be fatally injured in 2002 died under emergency care at Sea World
Orlando.
With three full months of 2002 remaining, manatee experts
expect that the total for this year may exceed 100, after three
years in a row of counts between 78 and 82. The average toll for the
fourth quarter over the past four years was 15.
The number of manatees killed by speedboats has risen ever
since records were first kept in 1974, but did not top 50 in a year
until 1989. Since then, the toll has soared –along with the number
of boats in the water.

Poaching & Zimbabwe turmoil may halt CITES bid to sell ivory

November 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2002:

SANTIAGO, BONN–The ivory and whaling industries will go
into the 12th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Convention
on International Trade in Endangered Species on November 3 as
determined as ever to reopen legal global commerce in the body parts
of elephants and whales.
The ivory merchants and whalers are not considered likely to
get what they want.

Free Willy/Keiko swims to Norway

October 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2002:

OSLO–Swimming up to 100 miles a day with pods of 40 to 80
wild orcas, spending 41 consecutive days at sea, Keiko in August
2002 seemed to be a free whale at last –or so said the Humane
Society of the U.S., which took over his care in June 2002, about
six months after the top funder of the former Free Willy/Keiko
Foundation quit the project.
Then Keiko on September 1 swam into Skaalvik Fjord, Norway,
250 miles northwest of Oslo.
“The orca surprised and delighted Norwegians, who petted and
swam with him, and climbed on his back,” reported Doug Mellgren of
Associated Press.

Look at what sea otters & dogs eat

September 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2002:

SAN FRANCISCO, LONDON– Cats were accused of spreading
toxoplasmosis to California sea otters and dogs were accused of
spreading campylobacter bacteria throughout Britain in new studies
released in early July 2002–but while the allegations were quickly
amplified by mainstream news media and picked up by anti-feral cat
and anti-street dog activists, the research behind each study
overlooked key dietary factors in the transmission of the diseases.
Marine biologist Melissa Miller and colleagues with the
Wildlife Health Center at the Davis campus of the University of
California claimed in the July edition of the International Journal
for Parasitology to have traced an ongoing seven-year decline in the
population of endangered California sea otters to the fecal parasite
Toxoplasma gondi. They found the microscopic parasite in 66 of the
107 sea otter carcasses they examined.

One orca freed, ten to be caught and sold

September 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2002:

VANCOUVER, B.C.; SEA OF OKHOTSK–The orphaned orca A-73,
who followed the Seattle/Vachon Island ferry boats throughout the
spring in southern Puget Sound, was captured, treated for minor
ailments, taken back to the A-pod home waters in the Johnstone
Strait, and reunited with the pod in mid-July 2002, at total cost
of $800,000.
The greatest part of the expense was borne by the Nichols
Brothers boatyard in Freeland, Washington, whose jet catamaran did
the hauling.

Will wild orca capture and Makah whaling resume on Puget Sound?

June 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2002:

SEATTLE, SHIMONSEKI– Decisions announced on May 24, 2002
by the National Marine Fisheries Service in Washington D.C. and the
International Whaling Commission in Shimonseki, Japan, hint that
the next big battles over both whale captivity and whale-hunting
might be fought on Puget Sound, Washington state.
But again, maybe not, as the issues of captivity and
“cultural subsistence” whaling that sparked high-profile protest in
the mid-1990s have all but dropped from public view.

Wrestling with WWF

June 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2002:

LONDON–Outweighed by the World Wildlife Fund in two British
trademark court decisions, the World Wrestling Federation on May 7
reintroduced itself as World Wrestling Entertainment, leaving the
other WWF to wrestle with itself, after WWF-Japan representative
Shigeki Komori reportedly told news media on the eve of the
International Whaling Commission meeting (see page one) that if
various conditions were met, “we can no longer deny the logic that
regulated commercial whaling can resume.”
“WWF does not support commercial whaling in any
circumstances. We will sort out our office in Japan if they are
saying anything different,” said WWF endangered species program
director Susan Lieberman.

Canadians may kill most seals since 1951

June 1, 2002 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2002:

OTTAWA–Admitting that Atlantic Canadian sealers had already
killed 295,000 harp seals this spring when the original 2002 quota
was 275,000 and the “total allowable catch” was only 257,000, the
Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans on May 2 raised the quota
to 320,000 and extended the sealing season to May 15.
Then on May 15 the DFO further extended the season, to the end of May.
The “total allowable catch” is the number of seals who can be
killed without causing a population decline. It is likely that the
Atlantic Canada seal population will now crash, as ice failed to
form or melted early in much of the Gulf of St. Lawrence this year,
almost wiping out the whelping season west of Newfoundland.

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