Horses

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

Wyeth-Ayerst spent $9.2 million to push the estro-
gen supplement Premarin in 1992, according to Advertising
Age, while Ciba-Geigy spent $4.7 million promoting Estrace,
the leading rival product. Both drugs are sold to treat symp-
toms of menopause. Premarin is based on urine from pregnant
mares, who spend winters strapped to collection apparatus
under conditions similar to those of dairy cattle. More than
80% of the foals are sold to the horsemeat trade. Estrace is by
contrast a synthetic product. The estrogen supplement market
is expected to grow fast: only 7.4 million women take them
now, of an estimated potential U.S. market of 26.2 million.
The American SPCA, a leading foe of the New
York City carriage horse trade, now has its own carriage,
a replica of the horsedrawn ambulance it used in rescue work
circa 1895, built by former board member LeRoy Swindell.
The carriage is to debut at the Steuben Day Parade in October .

Alaska mandates predator control: CONCERNED ABOUT KILLER RATS

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

JUNEAU, Alaska––Alaska gov-
ernor Walter Hickel on April 15 signed into
law a bill that forces the Alaska Board of
Game and Department of Fish and Game to
kill predators before either reducing bag
limits or curtailing hunting seasons to pro-
tect game populations. The new law for-
malizes as state policy the approach taken
in Game Management Unit 20-A, where
131 wolves were massacred this past win-
ter so that human hunters could shoot more
moose and caribou. It also takes the deci-
sion-making authority away from the
Board of Game, which hunting interests
feared might be too susceptible to pressure
from environmentalists and animal rights
groups––much to the surprise of the envi-
ronmentalists and animal rights groups who
have tried to deal with the Board of Game
over the wolf issue since November 1992.
Said Alaska senate majority
leader Robin Taylor, “You don’t manage
game by sitting back and saying you wish
the wolf wouldn’t eat the caribou. It’s like
shooting rats in a dump. They’re a predator
you have to control.”

Ex-tourism head vindicated as Alaska loses suit vs. FoA

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

SEATTLE, Washington– Why
was Connell Murray fired as Director of
Alaska tourism?
“I don’t know and I didn’t ask,”
Murray told ANIMAL PEOPLE on April
11, from his boat in Puget Sound, “because I
didn’t much care. I was retired when I was
appointed by the governor, I said I’d stay for
two years, I was there for two years and
three months, and I’m retired again.”
Murray was dismissed effective
January 1, while on a trip to Asia, shortly
after he testified in a deposition that the
tourism boycott called by Friends of Animals
in November 1992 to protest the Alaska
Board of Game’s plan to kill wolves south-
west of Fairbanks had not demonstrably done
any economic harm. The boycott was lifted
when the wolf-killing plan was suspended in
late December 1992, and not reimposed until
after the Board of Game adopted the current
wolf-killing strategy in late June 1993.

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Alaska kills one wolf per 1,218 tries

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

FAIRBANKS, Alaska– The
Alaska Department of Fish and Game on
April 7 ended the first phase of its wolf-
killing campaign in Game Management Unit
20-A, the sector southwest of Fairbanks.
State killers bagged 94 wolves, 80 in snares,
two in leghold traps, and 12 with rifles.
Private hunters and trappers killed 37 more.
The state declared the total of 131 met the
winter quota of 150.
The “predator management” pro-
gram, ostensibly undertaken to protect moose
and caribou, also killed by accident 12
moose, of 23 caught; two caribou, of eight
caught; six coyotes; 13 foxes; a protected
golden eagle; an endangered wolverine; and
a snowshoe hare. Two grizzly bears were
aught, but escaped alive. In all, 36% of
the victims were non-target species.

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ANIMAL HEALTH

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

Zoonosis
The politics of rabies took a twist
on April 1 when in all seriousness Patricia
Munoz, public health director for
Washington County, New York, told the
county public health committee that she need-
ed an infectious disease control nurse on her
staff to handle the growing rabies-related
caseload. The Washington County public
health department handled about 500 more
cases of all types during the first three months
of 1994, including 16 cases of possible expo-
sure to rabid animals. Munoz got the com-
mittee to recommend the hiring, then dis-
closed that the nurse would also handle
hepatitis and salmonella cases, both of which
are far more numerous.

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Animal control & rescue

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

A DISMAL TUNE FROM DOWN BY THE BANKS OF THE OHIO
MANSFIELD, Ohio––A recent
survey of Ohio county animal control depart-
ments done by neutering advocate Diana
Nolen found that 64% consider their shelters
to be overcrowded, 58% see parvovirus as
their greatest health problem (a disease associ-
ated with overcrowding), and only 27%
expect to be able to expand or improve their
facilities soon. Two-thirds of the departments
depend wholly upon dog licensing, fines, and
redemption fees for their income.
Nolen’s survey forms were returned
by the animal control departments in 33 of the
88 Ohio counties, containing 47% of the
human population. The findings indicate that
Ohio animal control agencies took in about
197,000 dogs and cats in 1993; euthanized
135,000, or 69%; adopted out 37,000 (19%);
and returned 25,000 (13%) to their owners.
Thirty percent reported declining intake and
euthanasia figures, 42% reported no change,
and 24% reported increases.

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The shelter is an art gallery

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

OAKLAND, California–
Joining a national trend toward airy,
attractive buildings intended to compete
for traffic with shopping mall pet shops,
the Oakland SPCA on March 22
unveiled an extensively remodeled shel-
ter and the PeopleSoft Adoption and
Education Center, named for the
Walnut Creek software firm that provid-
ed $500,000 of the $1.9 million cost.
“The facility contains a central
atrium-style public area featuring adop-
tion areas for dogs and cats, educational
displays by exhibit designer Jane
Glickman, classrooms, an extensive
resource library, and original art works
by famed designer Laurel Burch depict-
ing the special relationships possible
between people and animals,” said
spokesperson Beverly Scottland.

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OBITUARIES

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

Actor Bill Travers, 72, who played
Kenyan game warden George Adamson in the 1966
film Born Free, died March 31 in Dorking,
England. Travers and Virginia McKenna, his wife of
37 years, endowed the Born Free Foundation, which
works to improve the care of captive wildlife.
Travers and McKenna also served as celebrity board
members for the Elsa Wild Animal Appeal, named
after the lioness featured in Born Free. “The animals
have lost a true friend,” said Elsa-USA president
Don Rolla.

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Software review: the ARK system

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 1994:

The ARK System, from Ohio
Business Computers (POB 855,
Findlay, OH 45839). Introduced in
1987; now at version 4:01. Price:
$1,495 and up.
Handling circa 3,000 animals a
year, the Wyandot County Humane
Society has used ARK System for track-
ing shelter activity since 1992. Entering
seven years’ worth of records took our
part-time volunteers most of the first
year. The system proved relatively easy
for first-time computer users to learn.

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