Category: Wild Animals

Assam bomb kills birds

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:
Guwahati, Assam– Harmlessly botched, according to most
reports, a February 4, 2007 bombing attributed to the United
Liberation Front of Assam killed “dozens of egrets, crows, and
other birds” in central Guwahati, e-mailed news videographer Azam
Siddique, who hoped to alert rescuers.
“The bomb was placed in a car near a temple,” Siddique said.
“As the car was left in a no parking zone, it was towed to the
police station and parked below tall trees which are used by birds as
shelter.” Apparently meant to detonate at 3:00 p.m., the bomb
instead exploded at 3:00 a.m.

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Poaching in Afghanistan

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:
Poaching, never well-controlled in Afghanistan, appears to
be more blatant than ever, freelance correspondent Jeff Hodson
reported for the Seattle Times in mid-January 2007.
“The skins of wolves and wild cats hang in fur shops in
Kabul,” Hodson wrote, “along with rabbit-skin rugs and full-length
fox coats, despite a nationwide ban on hunting and international
laws prohibiting their trade. Foreign soldiers and aid workers are
the main buyers, according to conservationists.”
Wildlife Conservation Society director of Afghanistan
programs Alex Deghan told Hodson that “he knows of one aid worker who
had a comforter made from two or three snow-leopard skins.”

Civet traffic falls in China

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:

 

Guangzhou–Repeated health inspections of specialty meat
markets across Guangdong province hint that masked palm civets may at
last be getting some respite from Guangdong exotic meat buyers.
In January 2007, the Xinhua News Service reported, 7,000
health inspectors checked for civets at 10,000 restaurants, finding
one live civet and several frozen civet carcasses. A restaurant in
Foshan was fined for buying civets, and 18 restaurants were fined
for unspecified reasons. The contraband was markedly less than was
found in a November 2006 raid on an underground warehouse and nearby
meat shop that found 45 masked palm civets, 98 ferret badgers, and
31 other wild animals who are barred from sale for consumption.

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Colorado blizzards hit wildlife, sanctuaries, cattle, & pigs

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:
DENVER–The Colorado Wildlife Commission on February 13,
2007 authorized spending up to $160,000 on emergency feed rations for
as many as 2,000 mule deer and pronghorn antelope who remained
stranded nearly two months after a trio of blizzards paralyzed parts
of the west from the Rocky Mountains to Kansas.
“An aerial survey found distressed animals in small clusters
of 50 to 100 in a belt stretching from Burlington south to Lamar and
west to Trinidad,” Associated Press reported.
“Initially we were using food to lure animals away from
highways, train tracks and haystacks,” Colorado Division of Wildlife
southeast regional manager Dan Prenzlow said. “Now we are feeding
some of those same animals,” just to help them survive.

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Scottish Natural Heritage halts Hebrides hedgehog cull –agrees to relocate instead

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:

 

INVERNESS–The Scottish Natural Heritage
board of directors on February 20 “approved a
trial translocation of hedgehogs from the Western
Isles to the mainland,” the government-backed
trust announced.
“The move followed consideration of new
advice received from the Scottish SPCA that a
trial translocation should be conducted rather
than a cull,” Scottish Natural Heritage
admitted–without admitting that this is exactly
what the Uist Hedgehog Rescue coalition
recommended all along.
The coalition includes Advocates for
Animals, the British Hedgehog Preservation
Society, Hessilhead Wildlife Rescue Trust, and
International Animal Rescue.

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Kenyan reporter flushes out USAid effort to repeal national ban on hunting

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:
NAIROBI–“Killing wildlife for fun may be re-introduced in
Kenya if the government implements a new wildlife policy believed to
have been influenced by the U.S.,” wrote John Mbaria in the February
24 edition of The Nation, the leading Kenyan newspaper.
“The draft policy calls for lifting the 1977 ban on hunting,
and asks the government to allow game ranchers and communities in
wildlife areas to crop, cull, and sell animals and their products,”
Mbaria said.
“These recommendations are a radical deviation from what
communities in 18 of the 21 wildlife regions in the country proposed
during a nationwide views gathering exercise carried out by the
National Wildlife Steering Committee,” Mbaria continued.
Affirmed Akamba Council of Elders representative Benedict
Mwendwa Muli. “We overwhelmingly said no to sport hunting. We
requested the government to restock wildlife so that we can start
receiving tourists.”

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EU rules for moles

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:
BRUSSELS–The European Commission in February 2007 upheld a
ruling by the European Union Health & Safety Executive that
strychnine may no longer be used to kill moles. The verdict means
all burrowing mammals should now be safer from poisoning, either as
targeted or accidental victims.
“Last September a new EU law regulated a wide range of
poisons, including strychnine, to ensure they were safe and had no
harmful effect on the environment,” explained Charles Clover of the
Daily Telegraph. “Manufacturers failed to offer evidence that proved
strychnine does not harm the environment, so the British government
appealed to the EU on behalf of the 3,000 licensed users of the
poison who kill moles on grassland or golf courses. ”
The appeal was denied.

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Nylon twine ensnares Montana ospreys, too

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:
MISSOULA–Nylon baling twine similar to the kite strings that
wreak havoc among the birds of India and Pakistan also kills ospreys
in Montana, say Ken Wolff of the Grounded Eagle Found-ation, in
Condon, and Rob Domenech, executive director of the Raptor View
Research Institute, in Missoula.
Nylon baling twine isn’t coated with crushed glass, and the
ospreys are not flying into it by accident, but the
non-bio-degradable twine is none-theless deadly, Wolff and Domenech
in February 2007 told Perry Backus of the Missoulian.
“Ospreys seem to go out of their way to pick it up for their
nests,” Dom-enech observed. “It’s so strong that once they get
tangled up in it, they’re doomed.”

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BOOKS: Fox & Cat

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2007:

Fox, by Martin Wallen, & Cat, by Katherine M. Rogers
Reaktion Books Ltd. (33 Great Sutton St., London
EC1M 3JU, U.K.), 2006. 206 pages each,
paperback. $19.95.

Fox and Cat are the most recent editions
to a Reaktion Books series now including 21
titles.
Martin Wallen, an English professor at
Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, presents
not a book about fox behavior by an expert on
animals, but rather a study of the relationship
between fox and human as gleaned from books,
history, and film. Although Wallen offers a
taxonomical look at the fox family tree, he
mostly deals with myths, folk tales, and
allegories.

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