Parrots, too

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

CARACAS––”Sustainable use”
as preached by the World Wildlife Fund and
endorsed by the Bill Clinton/Albert Gore
White House will hit Venezuelan parrots
from April 15 to July 15, when members of
the Guarao tribe and other eastern Managas
and Delta Amacuro states will be allowed to
capture up to 2,000 guaro parrots, 200 redbellied
macaws, 50 royal parrots, and 50
blue-and-gold macaws.
Venezuelan wildlife authorities
“say they can’t control the thousands of people
who hunt exotic birds and sell them on
the black market,” Bart Jones of Associated
Press reported, “so they’ve decided to let
them hunt some species in the hope that
they’ll leave alone the birds who are most
endangered.”

GUERILLA WARFARE HITS GORILLA TOURS

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

KAMPALA––An estimated 117 alleged members of
the displaced Hutu tribal militia Interhamwe on March 1 turned
from fighting the Tutsi-tribe-led coalition that has ruled
Rwanda since 1994 to strike a deadly blow at tourism in the
Bwindi Impenetrable National Park of western Uganda.
Four wildlife guards were killed in the March 1 dawn
assault, including community conservation chief warden Paul
Ross Wagaba, who was burned alive, and 32 park visitors
were abducted from tourist camp sites near Lake Katangira.
Five vehicles and trailers used as residences were
burned, along with the Ugandan headquarters of the
International Gorilla Conservation Project.
Chicago University gorilla researcher Elizabeth
Garland, 29, woke to gunfire but escaped physical harm by
slipping into the bush as other visitors fled their tents into open
view and were captured. She watched as the raiders segregated
the visitors by language and nationality, taking those who spoke
English with them.

The Easter Beaver

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

The beaver in this photo by
Sharon Brown of Beavers, Wetlands
& Wildlife actually has an apple, not
an egg. (The egg-laying aquatic
mammal is the platypus.)
“New York City decisionmakers
will soon decide whether to
ban trapping in city-owned watershed,”
Brown wrote in an accompanying note.
Approximately 2,000 square miles of upstate New York
will be affected.

WHOSE GAME ARE WILDLIFE AGENCIES PROTECTING?

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

ALBUQUERQUE, BOISE, SACRAMENTO,
SALT LAKE CITY–– The
Idaho Fish and Game Commission on March 5
voted 4-3 to fire state fish and game director
Steve Mealey, notorious for mooning a shoreline
statue from a boat last summer.
The New Mexico Game Commission
on January 26 cancelled a $2.8 million
black bear study, commissioned from the
Idaho-based Hornocker Wildlife Institute,
because Hornocker officials refused to meet
with them to discuss allegations by former
Hornocker biologist Jenny Cashman that she
was repeatedly drugged and raped in 1995-
1997 by co-worker Patrick F. Ryan.

Iceland to resume whaling

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

REYKJAVIK, SEATTLE––The parliament of
Iceland on March 10 instructed the government to begin
preparations for Icelandic whalers to resume commercial
whaling by no later than December 31, 2000––and to mount
a drive to sway world opinion in favor of whaling.
The vote came as a cold shower to whale lovers
who had hoped that the tourist-attracting presence of the orca
Keiko in an Icelandic sea pen would dissuade Iceland from
resuming hunting. Iceland last killed whales in 1989, after
three years of defying the International Whaling Commission
moratorium on commercial whaling in effect since 1986.
Iceland withdrew from the IWC in 1992
“The Makahs have already done the damage we
feared,” said Captain Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd
Conservation Society. “Thousand of whales are going to be
killed because of their claim of cultural necessity.” The
Makah argument is echoed by both Iceland and Norway,
which in November 1998 unilaterally set a 1999 quota for
itself of 671 minke whales. Similar rationales are expected to
be heard from other onetime whaling nations.

Predators, reintroductions, and harsh reality

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

DENVER, EUGENE––Three of
the first four Canadian lynx who were released
into the Rio Grande National Forest of southcentral
Colorado by the state Division of
Wildlife during the first days of February
starved to death by March 23.
C-DoW had confidently predicted
that the reintroduction would succeed, and
would keep lynx off the federal endangered
species list. C-DoW biologist Gene Byrne
even suggested that the department might reintroduce
wolverines, too, as early as next year.
By mid-March, however, C-DoW
had recaptured the last of the released lynx, to
avoid losing her to starvation, and was holding
eight more until later in the year, when
prey might be more abundant.

Seals save life, need help

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

ST. JOHN’S––Charlene Camburn,
30, of Cleethorpe’s, England, is one fish
processer who has only good words for seals.
Watching the colony of 400 grey
seals at the Donna’s Nook nature reserve on
February 1, Camburn became stranded by high
tide on a sand bar off the Lincolnshire coast,
along with her boyfriend, Chris Tomlinson,
36, and their son Brogan, seven. As night fell,
they decided Camburn, the strongest swimmer,
should strike for the mainland to seek help––but
the current swept her into the bitterly cold, fogshrouded
North Sea.
“I kept going under toward the end.
It seemed much easier to die than stay alive,”
Camburn told Steve Dennis of the London
Mirror. “I thought Chris and Brogan had died.
But I could feel the seals going under my feet.
They nudged my legs and feet and kept diving
beside me, and I kept bobbing back up.

Can mercenary management stop poaching in Africa?

April 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1999:

GENEVA, HARARE, JOHANNESBURG,
NAIROBI––The Convention on International Trade in
Endangered Species on February 10 authorized Namibia and
Zimbabwe to sell 34 metric tons of stockpiled elephant tusk
ivory to Japan, as agreed by CITES members at the June 1997
CITES triennial meeting in Harare, Zimbabwe.
CITES withheld permission for Botswana to sell up
to 25 metric tons of ivory, pending improvement of security
arrangements including protection of wild elephants from
poachers, but the government of Botswana was optimistic,
according to the Pan-African News Service, that it too would
soon get the go-ahead.
Namibia, Zimbabwe, and Botswana hope to collect
from $100,000 to $200,000 a ton for the ivory, which is used in
Japan for making ceremonial signature seals. Such seals are
customarily used in finalizing contracts.

Ontario bans spring bear hunt

March 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 1999:

TORONTO, VICTORIA–– Foes
of shooting groggy bears as they awake from
winter hibernation won a round in tough territory
on January 14 when Ontario natural
resources minister John Snobelen announced
a long-sought ban on spring bear hunting.
Snobelen acknowledged that killing
bears in spring had orphaned about 270 bear
cubs per year, few of whom survived.
“We’ve looked at various options
to make sure that bear cubs aren’t orphaned,”
Snobelen said. “The only answer we came
up with was to end the spring bear hunt. It’s
the only acceptable way.”

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