Category: North America

ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1999:

U.S. District Judge Wiley Daniel
on December 31, 1998 rejected a suit filed by
the Mountain States Legal Foundation,
Colorado Cattlemen’s Association,
Colorado Woolgrowers, and Colorado
Outfitters Association, which sought to keep
the Colorado Division of Wildlife from reintroducing
lynx by contending that the state is
improperly managing a federal species recovery
program. Mountain States Legal
Foundation attorney William Pendley said he
would take the case on to the 10th Circuit
Court of Appeals, and would seek an emergency
injunction against any lynx releases
while the matter remains in litigation.
Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt
continues to tout the so-called “no surprises”
Multiple Species Conservation Program his
office negotiated in 1994 with San Diego
developers as a model for endangered species
conservation on privately owned habitat, but
the California Native Plant Society, San
Diego Audubon Society, and San Diego
Herpetological Society in a December 27
lawsuit claim the Multiple Species
Conservation Program is not adequately protecting
habitat. They cite as case in point the
recent bulldozing of a wetland which included
about 60 vernal pools, home to endangered
San Diego fairy shrimp.

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Newfoundland asks to kill 2 million seals

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1999:

OTTAWA––With Canadian fisheries
minister David Anderson imminently
expected to announce the 1999 seal-killing
quota, Newfoundland fisheries minister John
Efford on January 5 recommended a “onetime
cull” of two million harp seals and grey
seals––almost half the total population, by
government estimates.
Should Anderson prove unwilling
to authorize such a slaughter, Effords said he
would favor increasing the annual sealing
quota to 400,000––68% more than were
legally killed in either 1997 or 1998.
Known for his furious assertions
that seals rather than overfishing are responsible
for the economically catastrophic depletion
of Atlantic Canadian cod, mackerel,
salmon, and skates, Efford buttressed his
recommendation with a 32-page report
authored by former Canadian Department of
Fisheries and Oceans head research scientist
George Winters.

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Even scavengers reject pelts

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1999:

NORTH BAY, Ontario; WASHINGTON
D.C.––Fur industry bravado about
making a comeback was cut short on December
14 at the North Bay Fur Harvesters auction in
North Bay, Ontario. The first major North
American pelt sale of the year offered the pelts
of 167,107 wild animals––but sold just 23%, a
record poor showing.
A day preceding public disclosure
that the Humane Society of the U.S. had caught
the Burlington Coat Factory chain selling garments
trimmed with dog fur, none of the
world’s major fur buyers felt confident enough
about the longterm prospects of the industry to
scoop up pelts that almost couldn’t be given
away, and warehouse them in speculation.
Even when fur sales were in free fall
during the late 1980s and early 1990s, North
Bay auctions usually sold 95%-100% of often
much larger consignments.

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“Born to be wild” tiger kills again, and is killed

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1998:

NEWBERRY, Florida– – Jupiter,
the three-year-old tiger who on October 8
killed trainer Charles Edward Lizza, 34, as
described on page one of the November ANIMAL
PEOPLE, struck again on November
13, killing co-owner Doris Guay, 58.
Guay and her husband Ron Guay,
61, exotic cat handlers for 40 years, were
unable to hold Jupiter back as he pounced and
savaged Lizza, who had raised the tiger
almost from birth. Neither was Ron Guay able
to save his wife, who reportedly rarely ventured
outside during the six weeks after
Lizza’s death.
The Guays had performed together
as Ron and Joy Holliday since he was 14 and
she was 11. Lizza joined them in 1992, after
they had shared billings for about four years
with the Tommy Hanneford Circus.

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Trapped in deep muck

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1998:

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. – – Margaret
Kolar, manager of the San Francisco Bay National
Wildlife Refuge at Redwood City, California, told
Marilee Enge of the San Jose Mercury-News i n
November that due to the November 3 passage of
the California Anti-Trapping Initiative, she has
indefinitely postponed a scheduled trapping program
which was supposed to protect endangered species at
the refuge––even though one of the framers of the
initiative question, Humane Society of the U.S. vice
president Wayne Pacelle, said the program wasn’t
affected.
“If [leghold trapping] is the only option, it
is appropriate for the protection of endangered
species,” Pacelle said.

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WHO GETS THE MONEY? –– NINTH ANNUAL EDITION

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1998:

This is our ninth annual report on the budgets, assets,
and salaries paid by the major U.S. animal-related charities,
listed on the following pages, together with a handful of local
activist groups and humane societies, and some prominent
organizations abroad, whose data we offer for comparative
purposes. Statistics from foreign organizations are stated in
U.S. dollars, at 1997 average exchange rates.
Most charities are identified in the second column by
apparent focus: A for advocacy, C for conservation of habitat
via acquisition, E for education, H for support of hunting
(either for “wildlife management” or recreation), L for litigation,
N for neutering, P for publication, R for animal rights, S
for shelter/sanctuary maintenance, V for focus on vivisection
issues, and W for animal welfare. The R and W designations
are used only if a group makes a point of being one or the other.

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Primarily feeling like Noah

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1998:

SAN ANTONIO– – What
happened to Primarily Primates during
the recent Texas flooding?
Secretary Stephen Rene
Tello’s first recollection was that so
many pipes were unearthed and broken
by a flash flood that the sanctuary
had no potable water for a day.
That meant Tello and
Primarily Primates president Wally
Swett had more than 800 thirsty monkeys,
great apes, lemurs, tropical
birds, a wallaby, and assorted other
creatures to haul buckets for.
“It sounds strange that the
animals had no water, when we had
just experienced a two-foot wave
rolling over half the sanctuary, but it
just came through so fast,” Tello
said. “Many of the monkey cages
were inundated with six inches of
packed mud and rocks. The chimp
enclosures nearest our flood control
dam,” which broke, “had a foot and
a half of rock and clay from the dam.

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1998 Initiative spending (Most recent reports received.)

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1998:

State Pro-animals Anti-animals
Alaska $ 185,600 $ 225,000
Arizona $ unavailable
California
Horses $ 500,000 unavailable
Trapping $ 899,409 $ 316,085
Minnesota $ 25,000 $ 200,000
Missouri $ Unavailable
Ohio $ 521,680 $ 2,400,000
South Dakota $ 67,315 $ 111,646
Utah $ 56,662 $ 596,646
TOTALS $ 2,037,609 $3 ,849,377

Former Animal Protective Association of
St. Louis County director Nancy Grove made personally
sure that the successful campaign to ban cockfighting
in Missouri was adequately funded by contributing
$57,000 to Missourians Against
Cockfighting, and loaning MAC $250,000 more.

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Will Louisiana join the civilized world?

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1998:

NEW ORLEANS––“While five states once
clung to the barbaric practice of legalized cockfighting,”
the New Orleans Times-Picayune editorialized on
November 23, saluting the referendum bans of cockfighting
passed on November 3 by the voters of Arizona
and Missouri, “now there are only three. Let New
Mexico and Oklahoma carry the stigma themselves,”
the writers continued. “It’s time for us to join the civilized
world.”
But, the Times-Picayune acknowledged,
“That’s obviously a challenge in a state where lawmakers
have defined parakeets and cocatiels as animals, but
have steadfastly refused to include chickens. That defiance
of common sense and biology prevents cockfighting
from falling under animal cruelty laws,” and
also––as the Times-Picayune did not mention––protects
factory farmers.

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