Fire kills primates

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

PHILADELPHIA––Fumes from
an electrical fire killed 23 residents of the
Philadelphia Zoo monkey house in their
sleep early on December 24, as alarms
failed to sound and security guards misattributed
the smell of smoke to railroad locomotives
idling nearby.
Ranging in age from 11 months to
30 years, the victims included a family of
six western lowland gorillas, three Bornean
orangutans, four white-handed gibbons,
two ruffed lemurs, two mongoose lemurs,
and six ringtailed lemurs. Ten primates
housed farther from the blaze survived.
Shocked keepers were offered
bereavement counseling.
Upon completing repairs, the zoo
is expected to rebuild its primate collection
by recalling animals it has out on loan to
other institutions––including another six
gorillas, one of whom, Chaka, 11, has
sired six offspring at the Cincinnati Zoo.
Begun in 1859, the Philadelphia
Zoo is the oldest in the U.S.

The memory of an elephant by Donna Robb

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

At least one of the estimated 600
elephant handlers in the U.S. has been killed
in each of the past 15 years by an elephant’s
foot, trunk, or tusk, or as part of an elephant
sandwich, making elephant training riskier,
in fatalities per thousand, than any other
occupation.
So who would want such a job? I
would. I was an elephant keeper for four
years at the Cleveland Metropark Zoo. I
worked with two female African elephants,
Simba and Tiani, who touched my life more
than anything else but the births of my three
daughters. I went through two of my pregnancies
while working as an elephant keeper,
and never received more than a squashed
wedding band and a few stitches in my forearm
to show for it. What would the statisticians
have done with a stomped 9-monthspregnant
keeper?

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Sanctuaries

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

Last July someone dumped four
six-week-old kittens at the Wildlife Images
Sanctuary in Grants Pass, Oregon.
Volunteers caught, neutered, and adopted
out three, but the fourth eluded them.
Starving, he eventually dashed into a pen
where Griz, a 560-pound male grizzly bear,
was eating a bucket of chicken. Because
male grizzlies are notoriously grouchy, Griz
had been kept alone since arriving in 1990,
after a train killed his mother and sister.
“The kitten was so hungry he walked up and
begged for food,” recalls Wildlife Images
founder Dave Siddon. “I thought, ‘Oh my
gosh, he’ll be killed.’ With all due deliberateness,
the bear pulled a piece of chicken
out and dropped it beside his forepaw, and
the cat walked up and ate it.” They now eat,
sleep, and play together––and the cat won’t
let humans near him unless Griz is close. He
whacks Griz on the nose if the play gets too
rough; Griz backs off.

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News from zoos

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

Improvements
Four months after giving the Los
Angeles Zoo one year to make improvements
necessary to keep accreditation,
American Zoo and Aquarium Association
representive Stephen McCusker credits interim
zoo administrator Manuel Mollinedo, 49,
with accomplishing many of the goals. “He’s
worked miracles,” adds Los Angeles city
council member Rita Walters, a member of
the Ad Hoc Committee on Zoo Improvement,
indicating that Mollinedo could soon be
given the top zoo job on a permanent basis.
A longtime Parks and Recreation official,
Mollinedo took the interim post with no
background in either zoo management or veterinary
science. His hand was strengthened
by a recent report to the Ad Hoc Committee
by Los Angeles chief legislative analyst Ron
Deaton and chief administrative officer Keith
Comrie, who argued that the zoo should
become an independent branch of the city
government, with greater authority over the
Greater Los Angeles Zoo Association, the
private fundraising organization that runs the
zoo concessions. Zoo attendance has fallen
since 1990, while the concessions lost
money in both 1993 and 1994.

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ANIMAL LINK KEEPS D.C. CONTRACT

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

WASHINGTON D.C. – – Former
Humane Society of the U.S. vice president for
investigations David Wills was apparently out
of the picture but still a presence when the
Washington D.C. Department of Human
Services extended the District of Columbia
Animal Control contract with Animal Link
Inc. for a second 50 days from December 20,
despite the complaint of the Washington
Humane Society, the service provider from
1980 to October 31, 1995, that “In a matter of
weeks the shelter became dirty and disorganized;
the number of animals taken in
declined by nearly 50%; and patrons are calling
WHS complaining of lack of response
from DCAC.”

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Animal control & rescue

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

Michigan governor John Engler
on December 22 vetoed a bill to require
sterilization of pets adopted from animal
shelters. “I believe that mandates from state
government should come only in instances of
protection of the health and safety of the general
public. I am not persuaded that the sterilization
of adopted pets, while a meritorious
goal, meets this standard,” Engler said. He
also claimed that under the state’s Headlee tax
limitation amendment against the imposition
of unfunded mandates, the requirement of the
bill that shelters collect a $25 neutering
deposit and keep sterilization records could
oblige the state to pick up enforcement costs.
Judge Michael Kirby on
November 17 agreed with Legislation In
Support of Animals that Plaquemines
Parish, Louisiana, was violating a 1990 state
law by refusing to issue neutering contracts to
adopters of dogs and cats from the parish
pound. Apparently to spite LISA, parish
president Clyde Giordano announced that the
pound will no longer do adoptions; all animals
not reclaimed by their families will be
euthanized.
To spur dog license sales, the chief
dog wardens of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, are
using license applications as entries in a raffle
for three pairs of seats behind home plate at a
sold-out Indians game. For that, some guys
might license the whole neighborhood.
Veterinarian Robert Cortesi, of
Naperville, Illinois, recently bought the mortgage
on a piece of land for the animal rescue
group ADOPT, which is now fundraising to
repay him and build a shelter. Founded in
1989, ADOPT has placed 5,500 dogs and
cats in homes via a fostering program and a
cable TV show. Cortesi currently boards
some animals for the group in exchange for
help cleaning his cages and bathing pets.
Former British Veterinary
Association president Paul DeVile was on
December 1 appointed chief veterinary officer
for the National Canine Defence League, the
leading dog protection organization in the
United Kingdom.

Animal control officer Ralph E.
H o l m e s , 52, of Granville, New York,
resigned on December 7 and pleaded guilty to
one county of cruelty on December 8 for
drowning a cat in the Mettawee River on
November 11. Holmes has admitted drowning
more than 100 cats to save on vet bills.
Dog-shooting policies are under
fire in Clarksville, Tennessee, where police
officer Jay Skidmore shot an 8-pound
Chihuhua on December 11, claiming the dog
was vicious, and Xenia Township, Ohio,
where a local farmer and Greene County animal
control officer Scott Finley shot two dogs
on December 3 for allegedly chasing cattle.
Realizing the dog he shot survived, Finley
took him back to the animal control office and
notified the owner. Finley took the tags from
the other dog, but didn’t realize he was still
alive, too. That dog was finally rescued 17
hours later.

Fort Wayne, Indiana, nationally
noted for progressive and effective animal
control enforcement based on conflict resolution,
recently elected a city council committed
to privatization––and that has residents
nervous that the animal control unit may be
disbanded in favor of the lowest bidder.
Animal control officers in
Virginia Beach, Virginia, are reportedly
unhappy with a new regulation requiring them
to leave firearms locked up at headquarters
when off duty––a common police policy, usually
implemented to prevent city liability for
accidents involving service-issue weapons.
CAPER, Last Chance For
Animals, and Animal Aid Inc. have posted a
$1,500 reward for information leading to the
arrest and conviction of the person or persons
responsible for recent pet thefts in Linn,
Benton, Marion, and Douglas counties,
Oregon, using a white pickup truck decked
out to look like an animal control vehicle.
Lake Mills, Wisconsin, has
repealed an ordinance limiting residents to
just two pets, in favor of enforcing a nuisance
ordinance against people whose animals
become neighborhood problems.
Oklahoma City on December 12
approved a $2 million bond issue to outfit the
new city animal shelter, 19,997 to 8,524.
The Massachusetts SPCA produced
Preparing Fido For Your Child’s
Arrival, a 30-minute video, upon discovering
that 75 pets were surrendered at just one of the
eight MSPCA shelters in a six-month period
due to the arrival of a new child in the
home––even though none of the pets had actually
injured a child. Info: 1-800-711-6877.
Contrary to widely circulated
rumor, says the Sheriff’s Department in
Adams County, Ohio, 200 dogs did not
starve to death just before Christmas at
Peebles Pet Haven, a private shelter. Instead,
the elderly proprietor went into the hospital,
and local dog wardens, sheriff’s deputies, and
the HSUS regional office teamed up to find
new homes for 55 dogs. No dogs died, and
the proprietor still has her personal pets.
Pat Klimo, of Ringwood, Illinois,
was fined $50 plus court costs on December
19 for continuing to operate her Pets In Need
no-kill shelter from her residential property,
18 months after she was initially notified of
being in violation of zoning. Ironically,
Klimo could legally operate a breeding kennel,
she told ANIMAL PEOPLE midway through
her protracted fight to avoid closure, as “agricultural”
enterprises are allowed.
Morocco killed one million stray
dogs between 1986 and 1994 to fight rabies,
says the Health Ministry, including a peak of
260,000 in 1989, but only 62,986 in 1993 and
65,579 in 1994.
Shanghai, China, reportedly
picked up more than 5,000 unlicensed dogs
in a November anti-rabies sweep. Shanghai
has had 13 human rabies fatalities since 1989,
and had 40,000 known dog bites just last year.

Marine Animals

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

Cetaceans

Captain Paul Watson honors
Captain James Waddell, commander of the
Confederate warship Shenandoah, in the
3rd/4th Quarter 1995 edition of The Sea
Shepherd Log. Waddell in 1865 sank 38 of
the 85 Yankee whalers in the North
Pacific––fighting on for seven months after
the Confederacy surrendered––without either
taking or losing a human life. His official
goal was doing economic harm to the Union,
but crewman Joshua Minor told one whaling
captain, “We have entered into a treaty
offensive and defensive with the whales. We
are up here by special agreement to disperse
their mortal enemies.” Watson credits
Waddell and crew with preventing the extinction
of bowheads and grey whales.

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Dolphin-safe may be on borrowed time

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

WASHINGTON D.C.––Motion to implement
the October 4 Declaration of Panama, rolling back U.S.
dolphin-safe tuna standards, commenced with the
November 29 introduction of S 1420, the International
Dolphin Conservation Program Act, by Senators Ted
Stevens and Frank Murkowski (both R-Alaska) and John
Breaux (D-Louisiana).
Favored by the Clinton administration, S 1420
would replace the U.S. ban on imports of tuna netted on
dolphin with a rule allowing the import of tuna caught on
dolphin if no dolphin deaths were seen during the operation,
and would allow the incidental deaths of 5,000 dolphins
a year. The Declaration was signed by all the major
Pacific tuna-fishing nations, and was endorsed by the
Center for Marine Conservation, Environmental Defense
Fund, Greenpeace, the National Wildlife Federation, and
the World Wildlife Fund, all of which favor “sustainable
use” wildlife management.

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Marine mammals in captivity

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996:

A year after ANIMAL PEOPLE reader Janice
Garnett, of Venice, Florida, asked us to look into the
plight of two dispirited Pacific whitesided dolphins at the
Steinhart Aquarium in San Francisco, the dolphins were
flown to Sea World San Antonio in November to join the
biggest pod of their species in captivity, at the facility considered
the state-of-the-art for keeping whales and dolphins.
ANIMAL PEOPLE passed Garnett’s letter to San Francisco
SPCA ethical studies coordinator Pam Rockwell, who
learned that the dolphins, named Amphrite and Thetis, had
been in a tank only 25% of the legal minimum size since
1975 and 1978, respectively, sharing the space with four
harbor seals whom local stranding rescuers judged unsuitable
for return to the wild. The California Academy of the
Sciences, operators of the Steinhart, had special dispensation
from the National Marine Fisheries Service and USDA to
keep the dolphins, in part because they had remained healthy
for longer than any other whitesided dolphins ever captured.

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