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All in Animal Welfare
Last week the Centers for Disease Control released some startling information about the bird flu virus, namely that it can be spread between cats and humans. The data appeared briefly online, then vanished.
It’s that time of year again. This weekend animal shelters and zoos around the world are fundraising by encouraging people to perform symbolic acts of vengeance against their exes. The “anti-love” campaigns can take many forms.
A grieving dog who waited for months outside a convenience store in Thailand after his owner died has been adopted – by a Thai princess. The dog, named Moo Daeng, hung around his usual spot outside a 7-Eleven in Nakhon Ratchasima every day after his owner — who was homeless — died in November.
A rare winter storm last week hit Florida’s panhandle, catching many humans unprepared. Also unaccustomed to the frigid temps were hundreds of endangered sea turtles, whose metabolism shut down when their habitat gets too frosty.
In April 2023, Elodie Cappé found an abandoned boar piglet near the rubbish bins on her horse farm in Chaource, France. She tried to release the piglet back into the wild, unsuccessfully, so she named it – Rillette, after the local dish of shredded pork – gave it a pen, and had the boar sterilised and vaccinated.
The US Fish and Wildlife Service under the Biden Administration concocted a plan to save spotted owls in the West by killing off hundreds of thousands of barred owls that have invaded the smaller species’ habitat. Now four lawmakers from rural Oregon are asking the new administration to stop the cull before it can begin.
Molly Elwood runs “Elwood’s Dog Meat,” a company that raises dogs the way grass-fed beef farms raise cattle: ethically and humanely, so that the meat is delicious and consumers can feel good about eating it.
As fires rage in southern California, hundreds of animals – dogs, cats, horses, pigs, parrots, the works – are in desperate need of food and shelter. Local shelters are stretched thin to take in animals as the wildfires have forced human residents to flee to safety.
In Arlington, Virginia, a wild barred owl flew into a home through the chimney and shocked the family inside, first by flying around the living room, then by perching atop the Christmas tree.
This week the Los Angeles Zoo announced the birth of two baby perentie lizards, the first of the species to be bred there.
Lawmakers have passed a bill to formally designate the bald eagle as the national bird of the United States. When President Biden signs off on the bill – which breezed through the Senate and House – it will be official.
The day will come when the albatross named Wisdom, the oldest wild bird in the world (by a staggering amount) no longer completes her annual migration to Midway Atoll, never again takes a mate, builds a nest, or starts a family. Today is not that day.
Humane Society International is celebrating a south-of-the-border success this week, as Mexico announces it has enshrined animal protection as a fundamental value in its constitution.
US zoos have paid millions to China for the privilege of housing pandas, with the expectation that China invests the money in panda conservation. A New York Times investigation reveals that the funding has been spent on projects unrelated to pandas, while American zookeepers look the other way.
Five years ago a bottlenose dolphin strayed far from his usual habitat and ended up in the chilly waters off the Danish coast. He hung around, the locals named him Delle, and marine biologists at the University of Southern Denmark began studying the 17-year-old loner.
This week the US Fish and Wildlife Service proposed listing four species of giraffes under the Endangered Species Act. Giraffes live in Africa of course, but under the ESA it would be illegal to import any part of a giraffe into the US; the protections would also boost conservation funding for animals in the wild.
Your turkey did not die well, according to philosopher Peter Singer, and its life was no great shakes either. That’s the gist of Singer’s new book, Consider the Turkey, a short account of the bird’s miserable existence.
A baby red panda named Roxie died last week at the Edinburgh Zoo, apparently from stress induced by fireworks on Bonfire Night. Veterinarians at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland say the three-month-old panda choked on her own vomit while pyrotechnics boomed across the city.
During the holiday season, wine consumption spikes (in some households it skyrockets). But those extra glasses or two don’t have to be mere empty calories, not when you’re drinking Rescue Dog Wines from California.
