zondag 31 augustus 2008
Nederlandse dierenactivist nog zeker drie weken in politiecel Malmö (Zweden)
Schrijf Gup een kaartje!
31-08-2008 Animal Rights Media/Respect voor Dieren
Afgelopen week maandag is Gup, activist bij Respect voor Dieren, gearresteerd na een protest bij het farmaceutische bedrijf DuPont in Malmö. Bij zijn arrestatie (waarvan de reden nog steeds onduidelijk is) is een smeris gevallen en heeft zijn been gebroken.
De politie heeft toegegeven dat het een ongeluk betreft. Toch wordt Gup nu verdacht van geweld tegen een ambtenaar en hij moet 3 weken in voorarrest blijven.
Er is contact met hem geweest en hij maakt het goed. Stuur hem even een kaartje om de tijd in de bajes wat minder saai te maken.
Schrijf het volgende op de envelop:
Gerben Jan
Häktet Malmö
Box 3078
SE-200 22 Malmö
Sweden
(Bron: http://www.animalrights.nl/)
Twee zeldzame Zuidamerikaanse 'chaco' uilen gestolen uit uilencentrum Cumbria (Engeland)
Rare owls stolen from sanctuary
31-08-2008 BBC News, UK
Staff at a Cumbria owl centre have been left devastated after the theft of two rare chicks.
The young chaco owls, worth £400 each, were taken in a raid at the Furness Owl Centre in Barrow.
Owner Lynne Jones said additional security was being considered to better protect the centre's 100 birds.
A small amount of cash was also taken in the raid, which happened early on Thursday.
'Shopping list'
Mrs Jones believes the chicks were stolen to order and attempts may be made to get them out of the country.
She said: "One of the birds was actually taken from underneath its mother.
"We can't carry on like this. We are having to spend more and more money on security.
"I think they were part of a shopping list and were stolen to sell on.
"The birds were ringed and we will inform Defra and the International Bird Register in case they to take them out of the country."
The centre has about 100 rare birds from all over the world which are part of a conservation breeding programme.
Cumbria police are investigating.
Chaco owls are nocturnal birds usually found in the forests of Chile and south Argentina.
(Bron: http://news.bbc.co.uk/)
(Bron foto: http://www.flickr.com/photos/34248821@N00/758246806/in/set-72157600496425802/)
Koe met kop vast in gedumpte droogtrommel wasmachine in zuidwest Engeland
(Bron: http://news.yahoo.com/)
zaterdag 30 augustus 2008
Zware zeeleeuwen in Newport Beach, Californië (VS), laten boot zinken...
Weighty sea lions sink boat
30-08-2008 The Associated Press, The Mercury News, USA
NEWPORT BEACH, Calif.—Sea lions are turning into unwelcome guests in Newport Beach harbor where the animals like to use moored boats to sunbathe on. Trouble is, they're too heavy.
Thursday night, the weight of a pair of basking sea lions sunk a 24-foot wooden boat, forcing officials to haul the vessel back to the surface.
Chris Miller of the city harbor department says boat owners try to "sea lion proof" their vessels by installing netting fences but the animals bust right through.
The problem has been getting worse over the past three years with increasing numbers of sea lions venturing into the harbor during the summer season. They pile on docks and bayfront homeowners' properties.
(Bron: http://www.mercurynews.com/)
Aannemers Florida (VS) houden geen rekening met 'Gopher' schildpadden - Veel schildpadden vinden de dood in bouwwerkzaamheden
Builders resist tortoise rescue
Animal advocates want to relocate gopher tortoises before developments bury them.
30-08-2008 By Steve Patterson, The Times-Union, USA
For more than a year, groups concerned about the fate of Florida's threatened gopher tortoises have made an offer to developers whose projects would entomb the creatures in their burrows: Let us dig up the tortoises and remove them, and it will cost you nothing.
"They've just refused to deal with us for no apparent reason. ... It's frustrating when there isn't a real good reason," said Matthew Aresco, conservation director for Nokuse Plantation, a preserve in the Panhandle designed to receive tortoises from around the state.
A developer at a large Clay County project, Saratoga Springs, turned down a relocation offer, Aresco said. Another developer in Clay has talked with animal advocates for months with no agreement yet but says it's hopeful a deal will be worked out soon.
There have been successes locally. Wildlife workers removed 359 tortoises from a St. Johns County development last year. Before that, Jacksonville Beach-based developer HCM Construction was the first business in the state to allow relocation off its property.
Trying to expand awareness
Getting more acceptance in Northeast Florida is important because many projects that endanger tortoises are located here, said Jennifer Hobgood, Florida director for the Humane Society of the United States.
"Clay County is one of the counties that leads the state in number of tortoises permitted to be destroyed," she said. "They may suffer for months before dying of dehydration or starvation. ... It is a humane issue."
State-issued permits have authorized the deaths of about 7,500 tortoises in Clay County, and about 19,000 across Northeast Florida since the 1990s. There's no way to know how many have actually been killed.
Gopher tortoises live in dry, sandy soils that are ideal for construction. Demand for land has helped drive a sharp downturn in tortoises in Florida.
State agencies have added new rules protecting the animals. Developers who start projects now
are required to remove tortoises. But for 16 years, ending last year, the state collected a fee and issued permits to simply build on top of the tortoises' burrows. Critics nicknamed those "pay and bury" permits.That system authorized the deaths of about 104,000 tortoises. Many of the old permits haven't been used yet. Developers holding those are the ones the Humane Society wants to reach.
An ideal time to rescue
Hobgood argues this is a particularly good time for relocation: A slow housing market has created down time when developers aren't working on many sites, so the relocation won't affect construction schedules.
Even so, developers still have to jump through some hoops, said Marya Barlow, a spokeswoman for Ryland Homes, which is building Pine Ridge Plantation in Clay County.
Nokuse began asking permission this spring to take tortoises from the property, which state records estimate once housed 570 of the animals. Barlow said doing that will require changes to Ryland's state-issued permit, plus an agreement with Nokuse about when the rescue will be completed.
The developer also wants Nokuse to have liability insurance, so no one who's hurt removing the tortoises will have to sue the developer. That's something the company requires of anyone working on its property, Barlow said.
"We are very hopeful we are going to be able to save the turtles," Barlow said. "We just want anybody who comes onto our property to be protected."
Aresco said some environmental consultants have wrongly told developers they would lose their permits if they moved the tortoises off-site.
In some cases, the state's old rules gave developers little option except burying the animals, said Andy Howe, president of HCM Construction.
He said relocating tortoises is better for a company's public image and that he has promoted it to other developers.
"We didn't want to kill them in the first place," Howe said.
steve.patterson@jacksonville.com
(Bron: http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/)
(Bron foto's: The Times-Union)
600 Nertsen in Utah (VS) bevrijdt door dierenactivisten
Animal-rights activists free mink in Utah
30-08-2008 By Mike Stark, Associated Press, The Boston Globe, USA
SALT LAKE CITY - Animal rights activists broke into a mink farm and released hundreds of the animals from their pens, police said. Lindsey McMullin said "animal rights terrorists" hit his South Jordan farm, about 18 miles south of Salt Lake City, the morning of Aug. 19 and released about 600 mink.
Most of the mink were recovered, but several died after being hit by cars, or from stress after they were returned to the farm, McMullin said. Others were dehydrated and lethargic.
"I would like to have every one of those guys who attacked my farm go out with me to recover these animals and see the damage they've done," McMullin said.
(Bron: http://www.boston.com/)
In Friesland zullen geen grauwe ganzen worden vergast....
Na commotie en mislukte proef
Fryske Gea ziet af van vergassen grauwe gans
30-08-2008 Friesch Dagblad
Olterterp - It Fryske Gea gaat niet opnieuw proberen grauwe ganzen (skiere guozzen) in natuurgebieden te vangen en vergassen. Dat stelt directeur Ultsje Hosper. De natuurorganisatie ziet er na een mislukte proef en veel kritiek vanaf de methode toe te passen. Grauwe ganzen veroorzaken overlast voor boeren, omdat ze nabijgelegen weilanden kaalvreten.
De proef met het vangen en vergassen die It Fryske Gea in juni de Alde Feanen hield, wordt niet herhaald. Hosper zegt er ,,net sa rouwich” om te zijn dat die proef, uitgevoerd door ganzenvanger Duke Faunabeheer, mislukte. De bedoeling was driehonderd grauwe ganzen die in de rui zijn - en daardoor niet kunnen vliegen - met netten te vangen, om ze vervolgens te vergassen. De vogels zouden naar Duitsland worden gebracht, om daar tot paté verwerkt te worden.
,,Op himsels wie dat hielendal net in frjemd idee”, zegt Hosper. ,,It soe fansels goed biologysk fleis wêze.” De proef mislukte, omdat er nauwelijks vogels in de Alde Feanen waren toen de ganzenvanger arriveerde. Volgens Hosper had dat mogelijk te maken met het feit dat het relatief laat in het seizoen was: 16 juni. ,,Wy tochten earst dat it fangen nei it briedseizoen barre soe”, zegt Hosper. ,,Mar doe die bliken dat it tusken fyftjin maaie en fyftjin juny moast. Midden yn it briedseizoen. Doe hawwe wy besletten it dan mar sa let mooglik te dwaan.”
Negatieve klank
Behalve het tijdstip waarop het vangen en vergassen moet plaatsvinden, kreeg It Fryske Gea ook moeite met de negatieve klank van de term ‘vergassen’. De organisatie kreeg veel kritiek op het besluit om deze methode toe te passen. Leden van de organisatie stelden dat de beheerder geen dieren mag vergassen die alleen schade aanrichten buiten het natuurgebied.
Hosper benadrukt dat de overlast niet alleen een probleem van de boeren is. ,,Ik fyn dat de boeren in goeie fergoeding foar de skea hawwe moatte. It binne de guozzen fan ús allegear, net de guozzen fan de natoerbeskermers. Wy moatte ek allegear foar de skea stean.”
Alternatieven
In Fryslân broeden naar schatting vijfhonderd grauwe ganzen. Het fauna-overleg in Fryslân, waar It Fryske Gea in mee doet, gaat in de herfst bekijken of er alternatieven zijn voor het vergassen. Het probleem voor de boeren zal naar Hospers verwachting in de toekomst niet afnemen, als er niets aan gedaan wordt. ,,De guozzen hawwe it hjir in Fryslân nei it sin. Se hawwe hjir goed te iten. Wy krije hieltyd bettere gerssoarten.” Het vinden van een goed alternatief kan lastig worden, verwacht de directeur. Een goede optie vindt hij het opnieuw openstellen van de jacht op de ganzen.
,,De boeren meie wat ús oanbelanget sjitte. Dêr binne wy net perfoarst tsjin.” Een andere mogelijkheid is het beperken van het broeden, door eieren te schudden of door te prikken. Het nadeel daarvan is, zegt Hosper, dat je daarmee ook andere vogelsoorten bij het broeden stoort.
In De Deelen hield Staatsbosbeheer afgelopen voorjaar een proef met het plaatsen van een raster, waardoor jonge ganzen niet op het land bij de boeren kunnen komen. De resultaten daarvan zijn nog niet bekend.
(Bron: http://www.frieschdagblad.n/)
vrijdag 29 augustus 2008
Plannen voor tweewekelijkse veemarkt in Apeldoorn - Organisatie richt zich op internationale handel....
'Veel belangstelling voor veemarkt in Apeldoorn'
29-08-2008 Agrarisch Dagblad
Henk Mensink probeert samen met jurist Robbert Soetens een wekelijkse veemarkt in de omgeving van Apeldoorn te realiseren. "De eerste reacties zijn erg positief", vertelt Mensink. "Er is veel animo." Inmiddels is er een eerste vergadering met belangstellende veehandelaren en veehouders geweest.
Mensink was blij verrast door het enthousiasme waarmee de ongeveer dertig aanwezigen reageerden op zijn plannen. "Het was opvallend dat 60 procent van de aanwezigen uit jonge handelaren en boeren bestond", vertelt hij opgetogen. Op de nieuwe markt zouden naast koeien ook schapen en paarden worden verhandeld.
Mensink richt zijn pijlen op de internationale handel.
Dieren moeten volgens de veehandelaar net zo makkelijk vanuit landen als Duitsland, België en Frankrijk kunnen komen. Mensink wil minimaal vijfhonderd dieren per week bij elkaar krijgen, willen de plannen doorgang vinden.Op vrijdag 12 september moet tijdens een bijeenkomst in Apeldoorn duidelijk worden of er voldoende draagvlak voor de nieuwe veemarkt is. "Als de veehouders een vrije markt willen behouden moeten ze één blok vormen", vertelt Mensink. "Op deze manier voorkomen we dat we door een monopolist onder de voet worden gelopen."De veemarkt moet volgens Mensink ook een plek worden voor het behartigen van belangen van veehouders.
"Belangrijk hiervoor is een goed fundament. Of dit er komt zal op de aanstaande bijeenkomst duidelijk worden." Het zou volgens de initiatiefnemer van de veemarkt mooi zijn als veehouders in de toekomst bij problemen ’even Apeldoorn kunnen bellen’. Hij denkt dat er naast de bestaande belangenorganisaties ruimte is. "Als je de boer op gaat, merk je dat er onvrede is. De bestaande partijen ondernemen te weinig."
(Bron: http://www.agd.nl/)
(Bron foto: http://www.veetransport.nl/)
Weer brand in veestal - Kalveren gedood bij brand stal Bergeijk
Brand in stal Bergeijk kost kalveren het leven
29-08-2008 Omroep Brabant
BERGEIJK - Een grote brand in een stal in het Brabantse Bergeijk heeft vrijdagmiddag het leven gekost aan een aantal kalveren. Een aantal andere dieren raakte gewond. Dat heeft een woordvoerster van de brandweer gezegd.
In de stal verbleven ongeveer vijftig kalveren. De stal stond bij een boerderij, maar het vuur is niet overgeslagen naar de woning. Ook hebben zich geen persoonlijke ongelukken voorgedaan. Wel is er asbest vrijgekomen.
De brandweer bestreed het vuur met drie tankautospuiten.
(Bron: http://www.omroepbrabant.nl/)
Grote successen voor Anti Dierproeven Coalitie! - Nepal exporteert geen apen naar dierproefcentra - Tabakstesten Philip Morris België worden verboden
De Anti Dierproeven Coalitie boekt twee successen
voor de dieren!
29-08-2008 Anti Dierproeven Coalitie
Dat we met dit nieuws heel blij zijn, is wel duidelijk. De Anti Dierproeven Coalitie is er echter niet de organisatie naar om nu te stoppen met onze campagne tegen Philip Morris. Onze campagne zal alleen beëindigd worden als de gruwelijke testen in Leuven voorgoed gestopt zijn.
Een uitgebreid verslag over onze actie met berichten uit de media vind je hier :
http://www.stopdierproeven.org/archives2008/29aug08PMactie.html
Een paar weken geleden startten wij een internationale campagne om de eport van apen vanuit Nepal naar Westerse laboratoria tegen te houden.
Deze week vernamen we van de Nepalese autoriteiten dat ze onze eis inwilligen!
Dankzij onze actie, genaamd Gateway to Hell, zullen de Nepalese apen niet in Westerse laboratoria belanden.
Meer informatie (in het Engels) over deze campagne vind je hier :
http://www.gatewaytohell.net/
De Anti Dierproeven Coalitie is een vrijwilligersorganisatie die ijvert voor de afschaffing van dierproeven in België.
Meer informatie :
http://www.stopdierproeven.org/
(Bron: http://www.stopdierproeven.org/)
Gevangen Oostenrijkse dierenrechtenactivist Martin Balluch spreekt.....
Austrian animal rights political prisoner speaks out
28-08-2008 Barnacle, IndyMedia UK
Vienna, 26th August 2008
Message to the International Animal Rights Movement from Martin Balluch, imprisoned without charge for 100 days for legitimate animal rights campaigning.
3 months incarcerated – and no end in sight!
Mid-May, the largest police operation ever in Austria against a social justice movement saw dawn raids in 23 houses and offices of animal rights folk across the country. Masked officers pulled more than 30 people at gun point out of their beds and ransacked their places. Seven animal rights groups had all their stuff removed – till today. And equally till today, 10 activists are still being held on remand in prison cells without charge and without evidence.
Slowly during these last 3 months, ever more information has been revealed about this police operation. We now know that 17 people had their phones tapped and their emails read over one and a half years, 3 houses had their entrances filmed, 2 cars had tracking devices put on them and at least 7 homes and offices were bugged. In addition, 20 people had their bank accounts monitored and 17 people were watched and followed for months. Further, police agents infiltrated animal rights groups, among them VGT.
All this massive operation at taxpayers’ expense of way beyond 1 million Euros, i.e. much more than the damage by the crimes they were supposedly out to solve, lead NOWHERE. No evidence of any criminal offence. But we are still in prison. Instead of being suspected of some sort of concrete criminal offence, we supposedly form a big criminal organisation. For that, the prosecution says, there does not need to be any evidence for a criminal offence. The suspects do not even need to know each other. It is supposedly sufficient to keep running your animal rights campaign while at the same time accepting that other people unknown might act criminally for the same or a similar goal. Would you believe that you could be locked up for that?
I have just been interrogated for 20 hours by police. They have put all their “evidence“ before me to comment on.
This is what they claim:
* I encrypt emails
* VGT is meeting in private places without public access
* VGT is not openly planning actions on the phone
* Taken out of context, some 5 emails of those 5000 I wrote in the last 11 (!) years sound radical * I have international contacts
* I organise many conferences and meetings for recruiting new activists to the cause
* I write books and run radio and TV shows on animal rights, which use occasionally radical brochures and which occasionally mention the ALF.
That is it. That is the “evidence“ against me. There is nothing more to it. According to state prosecution and remand judges, this justifies locking me up for god knows how many months on remand, and possibly putting me on trial. For the prosecution and police, most activists in Austria abroad are part of a giant criminal organisation, which is responsible of all ALF actions ever made anywhere. Their interpretation of the term “organisation“ allows for that. It means “being of the same mind-set“. Anybody, who is animal rights minded, and who remains so, after someone somewhere with the same ideology committed an offence, belongs to this organisation. It is so ludicrous that I would laugh my head off, had somebody told me before.
Now, in prison, I do not laugh anymore. It has become serious. What is going on here? Well, I have a good guess. It is clear, I believe, that those in power, who formed the special police unit and started it all, had only one thing on their agenda: smash the animal rights movement, smash the VGT, and especially shut this bloke Balluch up. There is a lot of evidence that this is exactly what they were out for.
For example, we have a report of a meeting of the police special unit, solely debating how they could damage and destroy VGT. They debated a number of ways how to attack and arranged a next meeting with the same topic 5 days later. And that meeting took place 1 month into my incarceration. That proves that it is not criminal offences they want so solve. They are after blood. They want to destroy VGT and its successful networks and infrastructure. They just use the fact that there were criminal offences committed, albeit on a very low level, as an excuse to construct this “criminal organisation“ to justify large scale police operations and many months if not years in remand.
As time goes on, this unbelievable nightmare is becoming more and more a gigantic scandal of massive proportions! What an outrageous abuse of power! What a totalitarian attack on democracy and human rights! I hope you agree that we cannot let them get away with this. If such police state behaviour becomes the norm, who will dare to stand up and criticize the system? Who will continue animal rights campaigns? After all, NOTHING I have done that landed me in prison was out of the ordinary or in any way strange for animal rights activities. If I can be locked up for it, anybody can.
To campaign for animal rights in any form means being with one foot in prison already. I can only reiterate: Folks, we are at a historic moment in time. Animal rights has become an issue that seriously challenges the system. The powerful have decided to smash it with brute force. We have to stand together firm now and fight this decisive battle. We cannot let them get away with that. We must win this one. No further repression. No silencing of legitimate activism anymore. If we do not manage to stop this operation and hold those responsible accountable, we won’t be able to be active for animal rights any longer. No further retreat. This is about all or nothing. I count on you lot!
Martin Balluch, political prisoner,
JA-Josefstadt Vienna
Barnacle e-mail: paulastibbe@yahoo.com
Homepage: http://www.vgt.at/
(Bron: http://www.indymedia.org.uk/)
(Bron foto Martin: archief Kraaijer)
Cursus voor varkenshouders om biggen zelf voor castratie te verdoven met gas
Varkenshouders mogen biggen verdoven
29-08-2008 Omroep Brabant
DEN HAAG - Varkenshouders mogen voortaan zelf biggen verdoven, voordat de dieren worden gecastreerd. De varkenshouders moeten daarvoor wel eerst een cursus hebben gehad. Het gaat dan om het toedienen van een gasverdoving.
Minister Verburg van Landbouw wil dat er zo een einde komt aan het onverdoofd castreren. Vlees van
niet-gecastreerde biggen kan bij het bakken gaan stinken.De nieuwe regeling is vrijdag gepubliceerd in de Staatscourant.Het gaat om een tijdelijke regeling. In 2015 moet het helemaal gedaan zijn met het castreren van biggen. In onze provincie zitten vooral in Oost-Brabant veel varkenshouderijen.
(Bron: http://www.omroepbrabant.nl/)
(Bron foto: Omroep Brabant)
Anti Dierproeven Coalitie voert druk op op proefdierlab Philip Morris in Belgische Leuven....
Frank en Wap in actie tegen dierproeven
Philip Morris
29-08-2008 Het Nieuwsblad, Belgium
LEUVEN - Actievoerders vatten gisterochtend post voor de deuren van Philip Morris in Haasrode. Dat doen ze nu al een jaar lang elke maand, maar nu is de druk op het dierenproeflaboratorium wel heel groot. 'We winnen', klinkt het enthousiast bij de actievoerders.
'Wij sluiten geen compromissen wat dierenleed betreft. Wij willen dat het testen op dieren vandaag nog verboden wordt', stelt Danny Flies van de Anti Dierproeven Coalitie. Ze zijn er alvast een stap dichterbij. De actievoerders hadden gisteren nog een onderhoud met minister van Volksgezondheid Laurette Onkelinx (PS). Die wil een verbod op dierproeven voor tabaksproducten. Bovendien moet de bestendige deputatie van Vlaams-Brabant in oktober nog beslissen over de milieuvergunning. Het stadsbestuur Leuven weigerde eerder de vergunning van Philip Morris te vernieuwen wegens ethische redenen.
Pol Goossen
-'Frank' uit de één-reeks Thuis - was ook afgezakt naar Heverlee, samen met zijn hond Wap. 'Wat hier gebeurt kan toch niemand koud laten? Muizen moeten hier uren aan een stuk rook inhaleren. Mensen hebben de keuze om te roken of niet, dieren niet. Wat mij betreft mag dit laboratorium sluiten.'Paul Broeckx van Philip Morris België maakt zich sterk dat de bestendige deputatie zich in oktober positief uitspreekt over de milieuvergunning voor het labo in Haasrode. 'Omdat de weigering door het stadsbestuur niet steunt op een wettelijke grond', zegt hij. De plannen van de minister van Volksgezondheid baren het bedrijf meer zorgen. 'Als dat verbod er zou komen kunnen wij onze activiteiten in Haasrode niet verder zetten. Maar ik kan me niet inbeelden dat het de bedoeling is om een bedrijf te sluiten. Volgens mij bestaan er erg veel misverstanden en onwetendheid over de aard van ons onderzoek', vertelt Broeckx. Een eventuele sluiting van Philip Morris zou een economische opdoffer zijn. Bij het bedrijf werken zeventig mensen.
(bcz/stl)
(Bron: http://www.nieuwsblad.be/)
(Bron foto: Het Nieuwsblad)
Op klaarlichte dag 31 schapen gestolen uit weiland Eerde
Fokschapen uit weiland gestolen
29-08-2008 Brabants Dagblad
EERDE - Veehandelaar Johannes van den Boogaart verwacht niet dat hij zijn 31 gestolen schapen nog terug ziet. Woensdag werden de ooien gestolen uit zijn weiland aan de Veghelsedijk in Eerde. "Ik denk dat de schapen rechtstreeks naar de slachterij gaan."
"De dieven zijn kenners. Ze hebben er de beesten met de beste conditie uitgezocht. Die leveren het meest op.", zegt de aangeslagen veehandelaar. De brutaliteit en het tijdstip van de diefstal kan van den Boogaart niet bevatten. "Wie doet nu zoiets op klaarlichte dag. Vanaf de A50 kun je het weiland zien liggen en er komen de hele dag fietsers langs. Er moeten mensen zijn die iets gezien hebben, dat kan niet anders."
"Bovendien is het weiland met een auto al lastig te bereiken, laat staan met een jeep en een aanhanger. Ze zijn de wei in gereden, hebben de beste schapen uitgezocht en zijn vertrokken. Ze zijn zelfs nog vast komen te zitten in de modder. Dit is toch absurd."
Extra pijnlijk voor de handelaar is dat hij niet verzekerd is voor diefstal van dieren en dat hij eigenlijk komend weekeinde de ooien wilde laten dekken. De politie is bezig met het registreren van de UBN-nummers van de dieren. Daarmee kunnen de schapen in het slachthuis worden herkend. Van den Boogaart heeft zijn hoop daar niet op gevestigd.
"Waarschijnlijk wordt daar in de slachterij niet naar gekeken. Ik heb er een hard hoofd in dat ik ze ooit terug zie, maar als ik ze in de buurt tegen kom, herken ik ze meteen."
(Bron: http://www.brabantsdagblad.nl/)
Amerikaan gedood door beten 'fire ants'
Elderly Man Killed By Fire Ant Swarm
29-08-2008 The Ledger, Florida, USA
An elderly man was killed when a floating colony of fire ants washed into his home after Tropical Storm Fay and bit him multiple times.
Authorities said the man was bitten Tuesday and died at the hospital the next day. His name was not released.Seminole County officials said the man was allergic to the ant bites.
(Bron: http://www.theledger.com/)
(Bron foto: http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/johnston/homehort2/fire_ant/project.html)
Op Braziliaanse kust van staten Santa Catarina en Rio Grande do Sul al 2000 pinguïns gedood door olie
Al 2000 pinguïns dood door olie
29-08-2008 De Telegraaf
AMSTERDAM - Al minstens 2000 pinguïns zijn gestorven door een olie lekkend schip. Volgens Braziliaanse media spoelen sinds zondag kadavers van de dieren aan op de kusten van de zuidelijke staat Santa Catarina en Rio Grande do Sul. Honderden andere pinguïns overleefden de milieuramp en worden in een speciaal centrum voor wilde dieren verzorgd.
Momenteel is het onduidelijk van welk schip de olie afkomstig is, en waar het olietapijt precies ligt. Schepen en vliegtuigen van de Braziliaanse marine proberen de precieze ligging van de olievlek te bepalen.
Het opvangcentrum in Florianopolis zit overvol. Normaal behandelt het centrum deze tijd van het jaar gelijktijdig twee tot drie dieren. Sinds zondag komen er dagelijks dertig tot veertig pinguïns binnen. De meeste dieren verkeren in zeer slechte toestand.
(Bron: http://www.telegraaf.nl/)
donderdag 28 augustus 2008
Eigenaar grootste legbatterij in Groesbeek denkt niet aan stoppen ondanks uitspraak Raad van State
Kippenboer Groesbeek is niet van plan ermee te
stoppen
Nieuw verbouwingsplan voor legbatterij ligt alweer klaar
28-08-2008 Van onze correspondent, Trouw
Eigenaar Van Deurzen ontruimt zijn legbatterij met 300.000 kippen in Groesbeek op straffe van een dwangsom. Een nieuw plan ligt alweer ter inzage.
Huub van Deurzen geeft een duw en loopt naar de uitgang van zijn bedrijf. Hij wil niet praten met de pers. „Ik heb genoeg media-aandacht gehad. Ga die milieuclubs maar lastige vragen stellen.”
Van achter een muur klinkt geroezemoes van honderdduizenden kippen. In de hal met sorteermachine staan de treetjes eieren hoog opgetast. Buiten valt de stank wel mee.
Een vrachtwagen uit Polen staat voor de immense kippenschuur, de oplegger vol lege kratten. Over de smalle klinkerweg nadert een tweede truck, met Belgisch kenteken.
Een Belgische truck bij de ingang van de grote kippenschuur in Groesbeek, die maandag ontruimd moet worden. © FOTO KOEN VERHEIJDEN
Pluimveehouder Van Deurzen geeft gehoor aan de laatste uitspraak van de Raad van State: maandag 1 september moeten alle kippen weg zijn. „Ik heb geen keus, ik kan die dwangsom niet betalen”, zegt Van Deurzen.
De gemeente Groesbeek dreigt met een boete van 35.000 euro per week. Maandag is de eerste controle. Als de stallen de week erop niet leeg zijn, komt de eerste rekening.
Met de ontruiming van de legbatterij voor 300.000 kippen komt een voorlopig einde aan een jarenlange juridische strijd.
De Raad van State vernietigde begin dit jaar al de milieuvergunning van de kippenboer. Deze week oordeelde het hoogste rechtscollege dat de gemeente het bedrijf niet hoeft te gedogen.
Van Deurzen heeft weliswaar een nieuwe vergunning aangevraagd, maar de kans op legalisering is klein zolang niet vaststaat dat het nabijgelegen natuurgebied De Bruuk geen hinder zal ondervinden van de uitstoot van ammoniak. Toch staan de bezwaarmakers niet te juichen. „De zaak is nog lang niet afgelopen”, zegt Henny Brinkhof van de Werkgroep Milieubeheer Groesbeek.
De WMG, voetbalvereniging Achilles en de Vereniging van Eigenaren van Villapark Zevenheuvelen werden meermalen in het gelijk gesteld met hun bezwaren tegen stankoverlast. „Als je in het villapark naar binnen moet vluchten omdat de stank niet te harden is, kom je hier nooit meer terug voor je vakantie”, aldus Brinkhof.
Ook de Stichting Wakker Dier had succes bij de Raad van State. Om kippen langer aan de leg te houden paste de kippenboer in het verleden een in Nederland verboden methode toe: door de dieren enkele dagen geen eten en drinken te geven, raakten ze in de rui en gingen weer eieren leggen. Wakker Dier vindt dat de gemeente moet aansturen op een diervriendelijke bedrijfsvoering.
Maar Van Deurzen heeft in april een nieuwe aanvraag ingediend voor 232.000 kippen. De bijbehorende milieu-effectrapportage ligt sinds twee weken ter inzage op het gemeentehuis. Een ventilatiesysteem moet de lucht zodanig wegblazen dat de uitstoot van ammoniak binnen de normen van de Wet geurhinder blijft. De Groesbeekse welstandcommissie buigt zich volgende week over het verbouwingsplan voor de stallen.
„Als hij het volgens de wet doet, heeft Van Deurzen van ons verder geen last”, zegt Brinkhof. „Maar hij staat erom bekend dat hij de grenzen opzoekt.”
Jarenlang gedoogd
De gemeente Groesbeek is nu streng, maar was de afgelopen twaalf jaar geregeld heel coulant jegens Van Deurzen. Die koopt het kippenbedrijf in 1996, kort nadat de vergunning is opgehoogd van 75.000 tot 300.000 kippen. Pas vijf jaar later krijgt hij een bouwvergunning. Nadat de Raad van State in 2002 de milieuvergunning heeft vernietigd, besluit de gemeente het bedrijf te gedogen. De Raad verwerpt dat gedoogbeleid zowel in 2005 als in 2006 en vernietigt de vergunning begin dit jaar opnieuw. Groesbeek eist nu dat het bedrijf voor 1 mei leeg is, maar Van Deurzen krijgt tot 1 september.
(Bron: http://www.trouw.nl)
(Bron foto: Trouw)
37 Jaar oude Parijse chimpansee na 28 jaar weer in buitenlucht - St. AAP haalde aap in mei uit eenzame opsluiting
Chimp Fiffi na 28 jaar weer buiten
28-08-2008 Stichting AAP
Almere, Donderdag 28 augustus - Na een quarantaineperiode van ruim drie maanden bij Stichting AAP was het vandaag zo ver. Chimpansee Fiffi heeft vanochtend haar binnenverblijf verlaten en kwam voor het eerst sinds haar jonge jaren in de buitenlucht. Fiffi, een dame van inmiddels zo'n 37 jaar oud, bracht het grootste deel van haar leven door op de donkere zolder van een onbewoonbare woning op een landgoed nabij Parijs.
Het was spannend hoe Fiffi na 28 jaar eenzame opsluiting zou reageren op haar buitenverblijf. Zou ze wel dapper genoeg zijn om haar veilige binnenverblijf te verlaten? Fiffi blijkt moediger dan je zou kunnen verwachten; het buitenluik was nog niet open of Fiffi stapte rustig naar buiten om de boel eens rustig te verkennen. Bedaard, maar heel behendig klom ze het hele verblijf door. Af en toe keek ze nieuwsgierig naar de pers die zich had verzameld om deze gebeurtenis bij te wonen.
Fiffi klom al snel naar de nok
van haar buitenverblijf.
Ze reageerde ook veel op chimpansees Julio en Jim, die ze niet kon zien, maar die in het buitenverblijf naast Fiffi nu en dan veel kabaal maakten. Gelukkig maar, want het is de bedoeling dat Fiffi op korte termijn met deze twee herrieschoppers wordt samengevoegd.
Fiffi werd door de Franse autoriteiten in beslag genomen, ondanks het zeer agressieve gedrag van de eigenaar. Door de inzet van extra mankracht kon het dier, na twee eerder afgeblazen pogingen, in mei eindelijk met AAP mee naar Almere. De gebeurtenis veroorzaakte grote publieke verontwaardiging toen bleek dat het dier in complete eenzaamheid in een verblijf van slechts enkele vierkante meters in een dichtgelaste kooi had geleefd.
De afgelopen periode is er geleidelijk aan veel voor Fiffi veranderd. Ze kon in mei door haar enorme overgewicht nog amper lopen, maar ze is na een streng dieet al 12 kilo afgevallen en hierdoor een stuk beweeglijker geworden. Haar eetgewoontes van macaroni en andere voor de mens smakelijke, maar zeer ongezonde gerechten hebben plaatsgemaakt voor apenbrokken, groente en fruit. Fiffi blijkt idolaat van haar mannelijke verzorgers.
(Bron: http://www.aap.nl/)
(Bron foto: Stichting AAP)
Aan kust Groenland 48 gedode narwallen gevonden - Slagtanden verwijderd
Dozens of massacred narwhals found on Greenland
coast
28-08-2008 Agence France Presse
COPENHAGEN (AFP) — Dozens of massacred narwhals, an Arctic whale with a single long tusk, have been discovered on the east coast of Greenland in what local police said Thursday could be a case of poaching.
A sealer posing with a two-tusked narwhal -- the whale usually has just one.
"We received a complaint that there may have been a possible violation of the Greenlandic law regarding the protection of narwhals, after the discovery of cadavers in Illoqqortoormiut," the deputy chief of Greenland police Morten Nielsen told AFP.
A scientific expedition from New Zealand discovered the carcasses as they sailed along the coastline "about two weeks ago," Nielsen said.
According to Danish and Greenlandic media, 48 animals were killed, but police refused to confirm those reports.
People in Greenland, a semi-autonomous Danish territory, are authorised to hunt narwhals "but there are rules that say you can't shoot females and that you have to remove the body" after killing the animal, Nielsen said.
There were females and calves among the dead, Danish news agency Ritzau reported, adding that only the males' long tusks and some meat had been removed from the carcasses.
"We're now trying to investigate the incident and figure out what has happened and if the law has been broken," Nielsen said.
Narwhals can grow up to five metres (16 feet) in length and live primarily in the Arctic Ocean.
Males have a single long, twisted tusk that protrudes from the upper left side of the jaw and which can grow up to three metres (10 feet). It is sought after by poachers for its ivory.
Some females may also grow tusks, albeit much smaller.
The export of narwhal tusks is banned in Greenland, and imports are banned in the European Union, according to Ritzau.
(Bron: http://afp.google.com/)
(Bron foto: AFP)
Familie Britse soldaat in Essex (Engeland) uit huis verdreven door spin uit Afghanistan - Hond familie mogelijk door spin gedood...
Family in Afghan spider scare
28-08-2008 ITV, UK
A soldier's family have fled their home after finding a poisonous spider thought to have hitched a lift from Afghanistan. Lorraine Griffiths and her three children, aged 18, 16 and four, have moved out of their house in Colchester, Essex, the RSPCA said.
CAMEL SPIDER: Killed pooch Bella.
They are refusing to return until a large sandy-coloured creature, which they believe to be a camel spider, is captured.
Mrs Griffiths believes the spider hitched a ride into the UK in the personal belongings of her husband, Rodney, 32, when he returned home in June. He has since returned for a further tour of duty in Afghanistan.
The family believes the creature, whose bite can kill small animals, is responsible for the sudden death of their pet dog dog Cassie.
An RSPCA spokeswoman confirmed they attended Mrs Griffiths' home but were unable to locate the unwelcome visitor.
She said: "If it is the spider they believe it is, then normally they don't attack humans, but they could give a painful bite."
The family, who have temporarily moved in with Mrs Griffiths' mother, have laid traps to capture the spider without success.
She said the spider vanished after being seen in her bedroom by two of the children and an electrician who was working at their home. They identified it using the internet.
(Bron: http://www.itv.com/)
(Bron foto: http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/news/article18903.ece)
In Canada 6000 nertsen bevrijd uit nertsenfokkerij Aldergrove, British Columbia
Thousands of mink freed from B.C. farm
28-08-2008 CTVBC, Canada
Animal rights activists are claiming responsibility for freeing thousands of minks from a Fraser Valley farm over the weekend. About six-thousand black mink were freed from their pens on the Rippin Fur Farm in Aldergrove, B.C.
Most of the mink were caught, but around five hundred escaped.
In a written statement, farmer Randy Rippin defends his farm, saying "the importance of providing the best care and welfare for these animals is always our concern. The criminals who broke into our farm proved that they do not have any concern whatsoever for the mink."
Mink farms have been targeted by animal activists before. Similar releases have happened across North America -- including a large one near Clarenville, Newfoundland in September 2007.
A posting on a Florida-based website says an anonymous group freed the mink in Aldergrove and lists the addresses of other farms calling for them to be shut down.
(Bron: http://www.ctvbc.ctv.ca/)
Dierenactivisten voeren druk op proefdierlab Philip Morris in Belgische Leuven op
Weer actie tegen dierproeven bij Philip Morris
28-08-2008 RobNet, Belgium
Leuven De druk op het dierproeflaboratorium van Philip Morris in Heverlee neemt toe. Zonder milieuvergunning en met een minister die een verbod op dierproeven voor tabaksproducten wil invoeren, neemt de onrust toe. Voor het eerst reageerde de directie van Philip Morris voor de camera.
‘We zullen terug blijven komen Philip Morris, tot dit laboratorium gesloten is.’ Met die duidelijke boodschap stonden actievoerders voor het bedrijf. Sinds oktober vorig jaar staan ze er elke maand. Nu kregen ze de steun van een bekend gezicht: Pol Goossen.
Het bedrijf Philip Morris wacht nog steeds op een nieuwe milieuvergunning. De stad Leuven weigerde om ethische redenen, de provincie Vlaams-Brabant moet zich in oktober in beroep uitspreken. Minister Onckelinx werkt intussen aan een verbod op dierproeven voor tabaksproducten.
De druk op Philip Morris stijgt. Een sluiting betekent ook een economische opdoffer. Er werken zeventig mensen op de vestiging in Heverlee.
(Bron: http://www.robnet.be)
Dierenactivisten bevrijden voor 2e keer duizenden nertsen uit fokkerij Canada
4000 More Captive Mink Released
Animal Liberationists Raid Canadian Fur Farm for Second Time
28-08-2008 Animal Liberation Press Office, USA
5000 mink were released in November 1995 from the Rippin Fur Farm, which may be the same facility targeted this week; both are located in Aldergrove, BC.
The communique reads in part:
On Saturday Aug 23, activists entered a mink farm in Aldergrove BC CANADA and released approx 4000 mink. The farm is next to Aldergrove Lake Park which provides over 200 acres of water habitat for them to survive. Operation Biteback is in full force, let these arrows be our tears.......
Imprisoned in cages for life, fur-bearing animals are forced to endure intensive confinement compared to the miles of territory these animals would enjoy in the wild - their natural state. The natural instincts of these captive animals are completely frustrated; self-mutilation, sickness, infection, poor sanitation and the sheer stress of confinement leads animals to premature death. When they survive, animals of sufficient size are killed by anal electrocution or gassing. Whereas reports from the fur industry have surfaced that liberations were harmful to the animals, the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) and other organizations have a long history of successfully releasing animals into the wild from fur farms.
In addition to liberating the wild animals destined for a certain, painful and agonizing death, another goal of liberationists is to cause economic damage to fur farms; dozens of fur farming operations have seen economic ruin since "Operation Bite Back" began by the ALF in the 1990s.
“The fur industry wants the public to believe that most of the mink liberated are recaptured or killed after being freed, but this is not the case; and I would argue that even if some are recaptured, at least they have been given a chance at what everyone deserves, a chance to live free” stated Camille Hankins, a Press Officer with the Animal Liberation Press Office.
"Contrary to the rhetoric of those who profit from the imprisonment and killing of these beautiful, wild creatures, scientific studies have proven captive mink have the innate ability to survive in the wild, do not decimate other animal populations or the environment, and do not carry away small children or pets."
For more information, please visit http://www.animalliberationpressoffice.org/
(Bron: http://www.animalliberationpressoffice.org/)
woensdag 27 augustus 2008
Japanner gearresteerd in Tokyo voor houden van 51 slangen in huis
Man Arrested for Keeping 51 Snakes at Home
in Tokyo
Tokyo Police Find a Man's Illegal Snake Collection After He Complains About Bite
27-08-2008 By NORIKO NAMIKITOKYO, ABC News, Australia
Japanese police arrested a 41-year-old man in Tokyo on Wednesday on suspicion of illegal possession of 51 snakes, including several venomous ones. The situation came to light after the man, identified as Shinichi Kashiwagi, called for an ambulance, saying he had been bitten.
Police are not sure how the man got so many snakes. Japanese reporters and photographers flocked to a Tokyo hospital Wednesday afternoon to catch Kashiwagi, who had been arrested, leaving the hospital.
He was seen stepping into a police van without saying a word as photographers surrounded him. Kashiwagi reportedly told police he knew his activity was illegal, according to NHK news.
Police say Kashiwagi called for an ambulance on August 15, saying he had been bitten by a "habu," a poisonous Japanese snake from the southern island of Okinawa. But police say they later found out the snake that bit him was a nearly 6-foot-long "green mamba," a native of Africa.
(Bron: http://abcnews.go.com/)
Grootste legbatterij in het land - kippenboer Van Deurzen in Groesbeek - moet dicht van Raad van State
'Mega-legbatterij' moet deze week dicht
230.000 kippen voor 1 september ‘afgevoerd’ - Wakker Dier vreest dieronterende taferelen
27-08-2008 Wakker Dier
Amsterdam, 27 augustus 2008; Deze week nog moet de grootste legbatterij van Nederland dicht. Dat heeft de Raad van State bepaald in een spoedprocedure die de megalegbatterij had aangespannen tegen de gemeente. Het was een laatste wanhoopspoging van het omstreden bedrijf.
Wakker Dier won al eerder vele rechtszaken tegen de megastal, en is blij dat de legbatterij na vijf jaar illegaliteit nu eindelijk echt dicht moet. Tegelijkertijd vreest Wakker Dier dieronterende taferelen bij de haastige afvoer van de kippen. Het megabedrijf is duidelijk niet op zoek naar een diervriendelijke oplossing. Om nog een paar laatste extra dubbeltjes te verdienen, werden deze zomer al 40.000 kippen afgevoerd naar een goedkope slachterij in Polen. Eerder pleitte Wakker Dier voor een diervriendelijkere toekomst voor de kippen, bijvoorbeeld in een scharrelstal. Wakker Dier wil dat de inspectiedienst AID streng toezicht houdt.
De kippenboer heeft jarenlang geld verdiend aan zijn illegale legbatterij, dus een goede oplossing voor de kippen mag nu best wat kosten, vindt Wakker Dier. Ook de gemeente is verantwoordelijkheid voor een goede oplossing voor de kippen: zij heeft jarenlang de illegale stal gedoogd. De beide partijen hebben het laten aankomen op een haastige ontruiming. Naar schatting zijn er sinds 2003 meer dan 500 miljoen eieren gelegd in de grootste legbatterij van Nederland. Jarenlang zaten hier, zonder vergunning, bijna 300.000 kippen in kooien.
Deze zomer verlaagde de boer het aantal tot 230.000.Stichting Wakker Dier won, samen met omwonenden, al driemaal een rechtszaak tegen de in 2003 opgerichte legbatterij, omdat deze niet aan de milieunorm voldoet. De gemeente bleef de illegale legbatterij gedogen, tot 4 maart dit jaar. Toen werd gesteld dat het bedrijf vóór 1 mei leeg moest zijn, wat later door de Raad van State naar 1 september werd vertraagd.
In de rechtszaak van vandaag deed het megabedrijf nog een laatste poging om de termijn van 1 september van tafel te krijgen. Het megabedrijf heeft al aangekondigd om opnieuw een vergunning aan te vragen, maar dat zal dan voorlopig met een lege stal moeten.
Wakker Dier vindt dat de gemeente, samen met de boer, moet werken aan een omschakeling naar een diervriendelijker systeem en de legbatterij in de ban moet doen. In plaats daarvan werkt de boer aan een aangepast bedrijfsplan en MER-aanvraag, gebaseerd op een lager aantal van 230.000 kippen in legbatterijen.
(Bron: http://www.wakkerdier.nl/)
Tijdens actie internationale dierenactivisten maandag in Zweedse Malmö een Nederlander gearresteerd
Nederlandse dierenactivist nog in hechtenis
27-08-2008 — Animal Rights Media
Malmö - Op maandag werden er diverse acties gevoerd in Zweden tegen dierenleed. Zo werd in Stockholm een actie gevoerd waarbij zeker 15 activisten werden opgepakt, maar nog de zelfde dag werden vrij gelaten. Ook in Malmö waren dierenactivisten die actie voerden.
De eerste actie vond plaats bij Dupont in Malmö. De politie was in grote getalen uitgerukt en aanwezig bij het eerste bedrijf. Nadat de eerste demonstratie klaar was, en de activisten opweg waren naar de tweede demonstratie (bij Novartis) werden auto's met activisten klemgereden door de politie en werden activisten ter voet hardhandig tegen de muur gesmeten om hun identiteit vast te stellen. Hierbij werd één activist, een Nederlander, opgepakt. Volgens de politie in Malmö zou de activist in eerste instantie een agent hebben aangevallen. Echter bleek deze activist alleen weg te lopen voor de politie nadat een van de agenten naar hem wees.
Toen deze activist in de auto werd gezet heeft hij van tenminste drie agenten fikse klappen moeten incasseren. De aanklacht van het aanvallen van een agent werd later omgezet in het toebrengen van letsel. De activist uit Nederland zit al sinds afgelopen maandag vast op het politie-bureau in Malmö.
Zodra wij meer informatie hebben over deze activist zullen wij dat natuurlijk zo snel mogelijk op onze website publiceren. De activisten in Malmö voerde actie tegen dierproeven. Op brute wijze laten bedrijven als Dupont en Novartis dierproeven uitvoeren.
Update: De aanklacht van het toebrengen van letsel heeft de politie in Malmö laten vallen. De politie heeft toegegeven dat de agent die zijn been gebroken heeft, niet is veroorzaakt door de activist maar door eigen toe doen. Morgen zal de activist worden voorgeleid aan de rechter en zal bekeken worden of hij langer moet blijven zitten of niet. Zover bekend staat nu alleen nog de aanklacht van verzet bij arrestatie.
Email: info@animalrights.nl website: http://www.animalrights.nl/
(Bron: http://www.animalrights.nl/)
Nertsenfokker Verboom in Alphen gaat tot uiterste om bedrijf uit te breiden - Verboom exporteert naar o.a. China, Rusland, Amerika en Spanje
Nertsenfokker maakt bezwaar
27-08-2008 Door MARCO GERLING, Algemeen Dagblad
ALPHEN - Nertsenfokker Verboom heeft bezwaar ingediend tegen het besluit van Alphen om uitbreiding van zijn bedrijf te weigeren. Verboom hoopt alsnog toestemming te krijgen om het aantal dieren op zijn bedrijf op termijn te verdubbelen tot 20.000.
De ondernemer houdt nertsen voor hun vacht aan zowel de Steekterweg in Zwammerdam als aan de Achtermiddenweg in Aarlanderveen. Op deze laatste locatie wil Verboom zijn bedrijf uitbreiden. Het college van b en w probeert dit te voorkomen door het bestemmingsplan ter plekke zo aan te passen dat uitbreiding ook in de toekomst onmogelijk is.
Dierenwethouder Blom heeft verboom half juni laten weten niet akkoord te gaan met zijn uitbreidingsverzoek. Deze beslissing is genomen op basis van het welzijn van de dieren. ,,Hier zijn het college en de maatschappij zo op tegen, dat we het verzoek afwijzen,’’ stelde Blom, nadat eerder de gemeenteraad zich al eensgezind had uitgesproken tegen uitbreiding.,,Blom heeft zo zijn eigen ideeën over het fokken van nertsen, maar daar denken wij anders over,’’ zegt de echtgenote van Verboom. ,,Op ons bedrijf zijn al meerdere steekproeven genomen om te kijken of we goed voor de dieren zorgen, daarbij is nog nooit een overtreding gebleken. Er is nu eenmaal een stroming die alles zielig vindt, maar waar stopt dat?’’ Verder willen de eigenaren van het bedrijf niet ingaan op de stand van zaken. ,,Wij wachten op de uitkomst van de bezwaarcommissie. Het is nu aan hen om te bepalen of ons protest gegrond is of niet.’’
De dieren worden gehouden voor de export. Met name in Amerika, China, Rusland, Duitsland, Italië en Spanje zet de familie Verboom de pelzen af. In Nederland bestaat vrijwel geen afzetmarkt.
Wethouder Lyczak is op de hoogte van het ingediende bezwaar. Hij stelt dat de bezwaarcommissie eind september uitspraak doet in de zaak. ,,Het is een interessante casus,’’ stelt Lyczak. ,,De raad is duidelijk geweest. Als de bezwaarcommissie ons adviseert de afwijzing te heroverwegen, dan besluiten we opnieuw. Bevalt die beslissing Verboom niet, dan kan hij nog naar de rechter stappen.’’
(Bron: http://www.ad.nl/)
(Bron foto: archief Kraaijer)
Workshop 'Train-een-Tijger' bij roofdierenopvang Pantera........
Train een tijger tijdens een bedrijfsuitje
27-08-2008 De Pers
Je kunt als bedrijf met z'n allen op survival gaan, boetseren of een dagje gaan zeilen om de collega's een beetje beter te laten kennen. Maar vanaf september is het ook mogelijk om bij Roofdierenopvang Pantera in het Friese Nijeberkoop de workshop 'Train-een-Tijger!' te volgen.
In Pantera worden grote katachtigen opgevangen. De dieren komen bij circussen en dierentuinen vandaan of zijn in beslag genomen bij particulieren. In principe probeert Pantera de dieren te herplaatsen, maar als dat niet lukt mogen ze hun oude dag slijten in Nijeberkoop. Op dit moment leven er tachtig dieren in de Friese roofdierenopvang.
Pantera traint de dieren om verveling tegen te gaan en om te voorkomen dat ze tijdens medische behandelingen moeten worden verdoofd, legt Westerhof uit. ,,Mijn bureau heeft als doel om mensen dichter bij wilde dieren te brengen. Ik breng een blad uit en organiseer reizen om wilde dieren te bekijken. Dit past ook binnen ons concept.''
Niet alleen bedrijven, maar ook particulieren kunnen de workshop volgen. De minimumleeftijd om mee te kunnen doen is zestien jaar. Het programma duurt vijf uur en is te boeken voor 90 euro per persoon.
(Bron: http://www.depers.nl/)
Chinese student in Nieuw-Zeeland stompt kleine terrier dood....- Vier maanden huisarrest voor doden hond
Chinese student stomped dog to death
27-08-2008 The Press, New Zealand
A Chinese student has got four months' home detention for punching and stomping a little black terrier dog to death. Dingshan Xiao killed the terrier belonging to a woman flatmate at a flat in Deans Avenue, Christchurch.
Christchurch District Court Judge Phillip Moran said today he did not accept that cultural factors could explain the attack, which left the dog cowering under a table where it died.
He described the attack as callous and cruel. "This animal must have suffered considerably before it died.''
Xiao, 25, is a student who is doing well at the New Zealand College of Business, and works at a hamburger restaurant chain.
He will serve his home detention at an address in Linwood, and Judge Moran ordered him to pay $482 to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), for the cost of the post mortem examination of the terrier.
He also ordered Xiao to pay $1000 for emotional harm to the flatmate who owned the dog, and he made an order that he is not allowed to own a dog or exercise authority over one for five years.
Xiao had pleaded guilty earlier but disputed some of the details of the attack and a disputed facts hearing was meant to be held today. The police wanted to call evidence from an eye-witness who saw the attack from a neighbouring property.
But Judge Moran blocked the hearing, saying it was not necessary because the evidence would not affect the sentencing on the charge of wilfully ill-treating the animal.
Xiao had been left caring for four dogs by the flatmates. The dogs had repeatedly soiled the flat, and did it again on the night of the attack, April 4.
Defence counsel Vicki Walsh said he let them outside but the terrier refused to come back in.
When he caught it, he punched it several times and while it was down he stomped on it.
The police said the stomping was with both feet; Xiao said it was with one.
She said Xiao later accepted he went too far. He had been distressed and tearful when the truth of what he had done had dawned on him.
"He said that disciplining of a dog by way of a beating is not abnormal or seen as abusive in his country,'' she told the court.
Xiao had no previous convictions in New Zealand or China. She asked the judge to step back from a prison term. At the end of his sentence, Xiao's student permit would be reviewed by the Immigration Department to decide whether he could remain in New Zealand.
Walsh also said the dog had belonged to a flatmate to whom Xiao had loaned $9000, which was due to be repaid at the time of the incident.
Judge Moran told Xiao his country was an ancient civilisation. ``I would be amazed if Chinese people thought it was culturally proper to beat dogs. I give you no credit for that, because I don't accept it's a fact.''
In any case, Xiao must abide by New Zealand law while he was in the country. The maximum penalty for this crime in New Zealand was three years' prison, or a $50,000 fine, or both.
Beating the dog for making a mess inside showed he had no insight into animal behaviour.
"The only consequence for beating a dog is that it will hide to make a mess. Dogs don't learn from beatings,'' Judge Moran said.
(Bron: http://www.press.co.nz/)
Populatie olifanten in Namibië stijgt - Sinds 2004 4000 olifanten meer tot 20.000 nu
‘Elephants Under No Threat’
27-08-2008 By Wezi Tjaronda, New Era, Namibia
WINDHOEK The Ministry of Environment and Tourism says Namibia has more elephants now than at any other time in the last 100 years. Growing at a rate of 3.3 percent per year, the country’s elephant population is more than 20 000, up from 16 000 in 2004.
Minister of Environment and Tourism, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, said on Monday the entire population especially that of the Kunene Region was healthy and growing, with the levels of consumptive off takes being very conservative and being below the sustainable off takes.
Nandi-Ndaitwah was reacting to an article that appeared in a local English daily recently about three elephants that were allocated for trophy hunting. The article said there were fears that the action could reduce the number of already endangered rare desert bulls. She said the north-west including Etosha National Park has 4 000, while the north-east has a population of more than 16 000, with the increase attributable to immigration from northern Botswana and north-west Zimbabwe.
Nandi-Ndaitwah said the conservation status of elephants in Namibia was more than satisfactory because their numbers exceed what is considered desirable on the available habitats. She said although elephants are classified as specially protected game under Namibian law, they have also been identified as a possible threat to other rare and valuable species, which Namibia is trying to conserve.
Since the country enacted legislation to allow the formation of communal area conservancies, Kunene alone has 18 registered conservancies with trophy hunting quotas. The three elephants are part of game utilisation quotas for three conservancies in the Khorixas district, namely Torra and ≠Khoadi //Hôas, Huab and Doro !Nawas and Sorris Sorris and Otjimboyo conservancies.
The ministry decided to award the three elephants for trophy hunting based on the approved elephant management plan, existing policies and legislation and the game census conducted in June last year, she said. The quotas include problem animals involved in human- wildlife conflict, which has increased over the years.
In 2006 alone, 5 637 incidents of human-wildlife conflict were reported to the ministry, while elephants killed seven people last year. Director of Parks and Wildlife Management, Ben Beytell, said there are 360 elephants in the areas where the three were allocated for trophy hunting and the three were seen as elephants that need to be removed for the sake of peace in the area. The elephant allocated for Torra and ≠Khoadi //Hôas was already shot, with the community benefiting N$115 000.
According to Namibia Nature Foundation Executive Director, Dr Chris Brown, the quotas pose no threat to the elephant population in the Kunene Region. But he said: “Countering this quota does pose a threat to Community Based Natural Resource Management, CBNRM, to rural farmers being tolerant of elephants and other wildlife on their land and thus to long-term conservation in Namibia.” Brown said the people living with the elephants in Kunene were local farmers who have the right to decide which wild animals they are prepared to tolerate and which they are not. “One cannot force farmers to co-exist with wild animals if they choose not to. The views of urban people and tour operators become irrelevant. Farmers will only be prepared to live with wildlife if their value exceeds their costs,” he said. In the interest of conservation,
Brown said, farmers should get maximum sustainable returns from wildlife and experience minimal costs. Brown added that a package of wildlife use that includes tourism, trophy hunting, game meat production, own use, live capture and sale that optimises sustainable use and economic returns was essential to make wildlife management an economically viable and competitive form of land use. Failure to achieve this will make farmers to not tolerate wildlife on their land, particularly species that come at a high cost, such as elephants, he said.
While the cause of loss of wildlife over the past century was from competing land uses as farming displaced wildlife, farmers are starting to earn more money from wildlife and tourism, which has reversed and wildlife is recolonising vast areas where it was locally extinct, said Brown.
(Bron: http://www.newera.com.na/)
Uitzettingen in wild van hamster, bever, pimpernelblauwtje ooievaar en raaf succesvol verlopen
Uitzetten van diersoorten herstelt vaak populatie
27-08-2008 anp Trouw
Het uitzetten van diersoorten die geheel of voor een deel uit Nederland waren verdwenen, is voor de meeste soorten succesvol verlopen. Van negentien soorten dieren zijn de afgelopen dertig jaar exemplaren in het wild uitgezet om de populaties te herstellen. Ongeveer de helft van de herintroducties had succes.
Dat meldt het Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek (CBS) woensdag. Bij de bever, de hamster, de raaf, de ooievaar en het pimpernelblauwtje zijn deze uitzettingen succesvol verlopen.
Minder succesvol waren de herintroducties van het donker pimpernelblauwtje en de zilveren maan. Het uitzetten van de vlagzalm en de bosparelmoervlinder is helemaal mislukt. Voor een aantal soorten is het nog te vroeg om te kunnen beoordelen of de herintroductie een succes is.
(Bron: http://www.trouw.nl/)
Inflatie zorgt in Cambodja en Vietnam voor stijging vraag naar rattenvlees
Rat meat in demand in Cambodia as inflation bites
27-08-2008 The Boston Globe, USA
PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - The price of rat meat has quadrupled in Cambodia this year as inflation has put other meat beyond the reach of poor people, officials said on Wednesday. With consumer price inflation at 37 percent according to the latest central bank estimate, demand has pushed a kilogram of rat meat up to around 5,000 riel ($1.28) from 1,200 riel last year.
Spicy field rat dishes with garlic thrown in have become particularly popular at a time when beef costs 20,000 riel a kg.
Officials said rats were fleeing to higher ground from flooded areas of the lower Mekong Delta, making it easier for villagers to catch them.
"Many children are happy making some money from selling the animals to the markets, but they keep some for their family," Ly Marong, an agriculture official, said by telephone from the Koh Thom district on the border with Vietnam.
"Not only are our poor eating it, but there is also demand from Vietnamese living on the border with us."
He estimated that Cambodia supplied more than a tonne of live rats a day to Vietnam.
Rats are also eaten widely in Thailand, while a state government in eastern India this month encouraged its people to eat rats in an effort to battle soaring food prices and save grain stocks.
($1 = 3,900 riel)
(Reporting by Ek Madra; Editing by Alan Raybould and Paul Tait)
(Bron: http://www.boston.com/)
dinsdag 26 augustus 2008
Bontwinkel Stockholm (Zweden) belaagd door dierenactivisten
Stockholm fur shop ransacked by activists
26-08-2008 stockholm activist Animal Liberation, IndyMedia UK
Fur flew when activists found real fur coats, hats and scarves in a stockholm shop...
One afternoon in stockholm, a fur shop was visited by several activists. The automatic-locking door was secured open by one volunteer while around 7 others piled into the shop, megaphones blaring.
Mannequins, scarves, hats, rugs and full length fur coats were soon flying across the room as the owner frantically looked on, completely stunned as his skinned alive items of torture were flung from every railing and shelf.
He later lied to the media, claiming windows had been smashed and coats had been slashed. Fingers crossed for next time then!
(Bron: http://www.indymedia.org.uk/)
8600 Nertsen bij Deense Frederikshaven ontsnapt uit fokkerij.....
Nertsenchaos in Denemarken
26-08-2008 Trouw
FREDERIKSHAVN (ANP) - Een vrachtwagenchauffeur wist niet wat hij zag toen midden in de nacht plotsklaps duizenden nertsen de weg nabij het Deense Frederikshavn overstaken. De dieren ontsnapten uit een nertsenkwekerij, schrijft de Deense krant BT dinsdag.
Nertsenboerderijen zijn wel vaker slachtoffer van acties van dierenactivisten. Zij bevrijden de diertjes, die worden gehouden voor hun vacht. De politie zoekt in die hoek ook naar de daders, hoewel vandalisme niet wordt uitgesloten.De politie adviseert
het verkeer voorlopig voorzichtig te rijden. Veel nertsen lopen nog rond in de omgeving.
(Bron foto's: http://www.bt.dk/)
Nepal verbiedt export apen naar proefdiercentra - Onduidelijkheid over toekomst apen in Nepalees fokcentrum
Campaign welcomes government decision to halt
monkey export
26-08-2008 Stop Monkey Business, Nepal
The Stop Monkey Business Campaign welcomes the government decision to halt the export of rhesyus monkeys for biomedical research.
According to a letter
received by Swiss animal rights groups Nepal on June 20, 2008 officially cancelled its plans to export monkeys for biomedical research. The letter from the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation states that the Wildlife Breeding Policy 2003 does 'not include any clause for allowing export of rhesus monkeys for medical research'.
European groups demonstrated throughout the Summer in front of Nepal embassies and UN Headquarters.
The Stop Monkey Business Campaign started in 2004 after the Nepal government issued licenses to local breeding centres connected to US primate research centres. In 2008 the campaign was intensified in Europe and the United States, where demonstrations and other protests were held on a monhly base. The campaigners welcome Nepal's decision but wonder if the licenses provided to the two breeding centres have been officially withdrawn.
The campaigners concerned about the fate of the rhesus monkeys which are presently held in the Lele breeding centre.
The campaigners request the Nepal government to rehabilitate the monkeys in a professional and caring manner. The monkeys should not be used for any other purpose, killed or randomly released. The older generation deserves to be rehabilitated back into the communities they have been taken from while the generation born in captivity should be placed in a well managed rehabilitation centre where the monkeys are possibly prepared for a life back in the wild. We will continue to pressurize the government untill the last monkey is out of its cage.(Bron: http://www.stopmonkeybusiness.org/)
(Bron foto's: Stop Monkey Business)
Internationale dierenactivisten trachten dierproeflaboratorium Stockholm binnen te komen
Animal rights activists sabotage infectious disease
centre
25-08-2008 The Local, Sweden
A group of 50 animal rights activists forced a gate at the entrance to the Swedish Institute for Infectious Disease Control(SMI) in Stockholm on Monday morning. Institute staff were able to prevent the activists from entering the main buildings.
The activists damaged a gate and then tried to force their way into the main building of the institute at Karolinska University Hospital in Solna at around 8.30am on Monday.
"Staff managed to lock the main entrance so that the activists were unable to enter the building," said police spokesman Björn Engström to newspaper Dagens Nyheter.The activists then made their way to St. Eriksplan metro station. Police followed the activists and identified the offenders who are suspected of criminal trespass on a protected site and criminal damage.
Metro services were temporarily interrupted at the St.Eriksplan station to prevent the activists' escape.
TT/Peter Vinthagen Simpson (news@thelocal.se)
(Bron: http://www.thelocal.se/)
Politie massaal aanwezig bij vreedzame protesten internationale dierenactivisten in Zweden..
Polis grep djurrättsaktivister
25-08-2008 Svenska Dagbladet, Sweden
Djurrättsaktivister försökte ta sig in på Smittskyddsinstitutet i Stockholm på måndagen men stoppades när personalen låste huvudingången. Senare vandaliserades en pälsbutik på Östermalm.
I Malmö samlades ett 50-tal personer utanför medicinföretaget Q Pharma. När demonstrationen skullle upplösas blev det bråk enligt polisen.
På flera håll i Stockholm, och även i Skåne, hölls oanmälda demonstrationer för djurens rätt på måndagen. Klockan halv nio på morgonen samlades ett 50-tal personer utanför Smittskyddsinstitutet i Solna med megafoner och plakat. För att ta sig in på området slog demonstranterna sönder motorn till en väggrind.
–Personalen låste dörrarna, så de kom inte in i huvudbyggnaden, säger Björn Engström, pressansvarig på länskommunikationscentralen.
Aktivisterna stoppades av polisen vid S:t Eriksplans tunnelbanestation som spärrats av, men alla släpptes efter att ha identifierats. Strax efter halv tolv hölls en ny demonstration utanför ett läkemedelsföretag i Täby.På eftermiddagen greps två unga män, 17 och 18 år, misstänkta för skadegörelse i en pälsbutik på Artillerigatan på Östermalm.
I Skåne reste 20–30 djurrättsaktivister mellan Malmö, Helsingborg och Landskrona och demonstrerade utanför olika läkemedelsföretag. I Malmö skadades en polis vid ett bråk som uppstod när han gjorde en kontroll av en bil som tillhörde en av demonstranterna. En person greps misstänkt för våld mot tjänsteman.
Jenny Kallin
08-13 57 36
jenny.kallin@svd.se
(Bron: http://www.svd.se/nyheter/inrikes/artikel_1615913.svd)
(Bron foto: Svenska Dagbladet)
Internationale dierenactivisten demonstreren in Zweden
Polis skadad i bråk med djurrättsaktivister
25-08-2008 Av Yvonne Johansson och TT Först
En polis fick föras till Umas med benskador efter att ha drabbat samman med djurrättsaktivister på Agneslundsvägen i Malmö. Ett 30-tal aktivister demonstrerade utanför ett läkemedelsföretag Agneslundsvägen i Malmö då polis kom till platsen. Det blev bråk mellan polis och demonstranter och vid tumultet skadades en polis i benet och fick föras till sjukhus. En av aktivisterna greps misstänkt för våld mot tjänsteman.
Även i Stockholm pågick djurrättsaktioner på måndagsmorgonen. Djurrättsaktivister forcerade en grind och försökte att tränga in genom huvudentrén på Smittskyddsinstitutet (SMI) i Solna på måndagsförmiddagen. Men personal låste entrén och 50-talet aktivister gav sig i stället iväg till näraliggande t-banestationen S:t Eriksplan i Stockholm. Dit kom också poliser som identifierade personerna som nu misstänks för intrång i skyddsobjekt och skadegörelse.
T-banetrafiken stoppades tillfälligt i samband med att poliserna arbetade med att identifiera aktivisterna.(Bron: http://sydsvenskan.se/malmo/article360791/Polis-skadad-i-brak-med-djurrattsaktivister.html)
(Bron foto's: Sydsvenskan)
Acties dierenactivisten in diverse steden Zweden
Police injured in battle with animal rights activists
25-08-2008 Skanskan, Malmo, Sweden
MALMÖ Around 40 animal rights activists began at half past eight a demonstration outside the pharmaceutical company QPharma on Agneslundsvägen in Malmo. In clashes with the police a policeman got wounded in the leg. The policeman was injured when he would carry out an inspection of an demonstrators. The person was arrested when suspected of violence against an official.
The wounded policeman broke a leg and was taken by colleagues to hospital for treatment. According to the TT the police had about 15 people on the ground and made some roadblocks. According to police information officer Lars Mahler activists had divided themselves into smaller groups and started to move around the city.
Action against SMI TT reported that fifty animal rights activists had tried to break into the Infectious Disease Control in Solna, outside Stockholm. Staff at the SMI managed to lock the doors and the activists managed not to violate them. The acticists then went to a nearby subway station where police stopped them. Activists were identified and several suspects were arrested for criminal damage and breaches of protection of.
Peter Olsson
peter.olsson@skd.se
(Bron: http://www.skd.se/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080825/NYHETER/601820337/1004)
dinsdag 19 augustus 2008
Twee mannen uit Heemstede dumpen vier katjes in duinen Vogelenzang
Mannen dumpen kittens in duinen
19 -08-2008 WebRegio.nl
VOGELENZANG - Twee mannen van 35 en 62 uit Heemstede zijn maandag bekeurd voor het onverzorgd achterlaten van vier jonge katjes. Na een melding van een getuige die hen dat had zien doen konden politieagenten het duo op de Vogelenzangseduinweg in Vogelenzang aanhouden.
Van de vier achtergelaten katjes kon er één worden teruggevonden. Die is ondergebracht in een asiel.
De 35-jarige eigenaar verklaarde dat door hun geboorte het aantal katten te veel was geworden en de mannen besloten de dieren in een natuurlijke omgeving achter te laten. Een andere oplossing was niet bij hen opgekomen.
Tegen de mannen wordt proces-verbaal opgemaakt. Beiden hadden veel spijt van hun optreden.
(Bron: http://www.webregio.nl/)
Maak kennis met Yoda, de kat met vier oren in Chicago (VS)
Meet Yoda the cat with FOUR ears
19-08-2008 By Daily Mail Reporter, Daily Mail, UK
When Valerie and Ted Rock came across a kitten with four-ears, they couldn't believe their eyes. But the endearing feline was so adorable they decided he was destined to be a part of their family.
The couple were in a Chicago bar two years ago when they noticed a little grey bundle of fur being passed around to the amazement of fellow drinkers - and their parental instincts kicked in.
The couple immediately fell for the freaky feline and asked the owner if they could adopt him. He agreed and the couple named the cat Yoda, after the pointy-eared Jedi knight in Star Wars.
Valerie, 65, said: 'We were at a pub on the south side of Chicago with a group of friends when we noticed a small cage sitting on the bar and people passing around a kitten.
'He had been
part of a large litter and the owners were looking to find a home for him.'Ted and I had just lost a cat that was our pet for over 20 years, and we were sure we were done with cats.
'When he was passed around he reached for Ted, crawled up into the crook of his neck and fell asleep - Ted was a goner.
'It was a done deal when the kitten made himself at home on Ted's shoulder.
'We decided to name him Yoda. I understand the Star Wars character was based on George Lucas' cat.'
After adopting the eight-week-old kitten into their Illinois home, Valerie decided to have Yoda checked out with the local vet.
But the vet was mystified by his unique appearance.
'The vet had never seen anything like it before,' explains Valerie. 'He immediately went to the internet and found the four-eared cat in Germany.
'We have spoken with other vets in our acquaintance, and they likewise had never encountered anything like this.
'We began to realise that we had something very special.
'As a result, he has been an indoor cat and has a chip installed in case he gets lost. Yoda is so different that we were concerned that he might be catnapped.'
Yoda's extra 'flaps' are separate to the base of his skull, with one placed slightly behind the other. Yet despite his unusual looks, Valerie is sure Yoda's behaviour - and hearing - are quite normal.
'Yoda's hearing is normal as far as we know,' says Valerie. 'People do a double take when they see him or his picture. It is great fun showing him off.
'We have actually had people ask if we had his ears cut to look this way.
'But he is a perfectly normal affectionate, curious cat and is a joy to have around.
'He is not afraid of anything and is very sociable unlike some of the other cats I have owned.
'But he does have an interesting obsession with bread - I can't leave bread on the counter for a moment.
'And when he purrs, it is not audible. The only way I know that he is purring is to put my finger on his throat to feel the vibration.
'He also is not very vocal. He meows, but only softly, and not very often which is a good thing.'
(Bron: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/)
(Bron foto: Daily Mail)
Op terrein Naturalis (Leiden) nieuw springstaartje ontdekt
Nieuw bodemdiertje ontdekt op terrein Naturalis
19-08-2008 anp, Trouw
Een bijzondere vondst op het terrein van museum Naturalis in Leiden. Daar vonden onderzoekers een springstaart (een insect) die nooit eerder in Nederland is aangetroffen.
Dat liet het Nationaal Natuurhistorisch Museum dinsdag weten.
De springstaart is een bodemdiertje waarvan ongeveer tweehonderd soorten bekend zijn. „Deze kleine bodemdiertjes zijn in ons land nog relatief slecht onderzocht, maar om een nieuwe soort voor de fauna te ontdekken in zo'n stedelijk stukje natuur is wel erg bijzonder”, aldus Naturalis.
Vanaf januari is het museum met allerlei specialisten het terrein rondom Naturalis onder de loep aan het nemen, op zoek naar soorten. Inmiddels zijn er al 880 soorten geïnventariseerd, van dieren, planten tot paddenstoelen. De springstaart is het eerste nieuwe diertje dat is ontdekt.
(Bron: http://www.trouw.nl/)
Vakkundige slachting schaap in weiland Emmeloord...
Schaap in weiland geslacht '
19-08-2008 De Telegraaf
EMMELOORD - Onbekenden hebben in de nacht van maandag op dinsdag in een weiland in Emmeloord illegaal een schaap geslacht. Volgens de politie is het dier vakkundig ontdaan van onder meer zijn poten en zijn kop.
„De ledematen zijn zorgvuldig weggesneden. Dat is door mensen gedaan die er ervaring mee hebben”, zegt een woordvoerder.
De eigenaar van het schaap trof de overblijfselen van het dier dinsdagochtend aan.
(Bron: http://www.telegraaf.nl/)
VVD en PVV vinden vrijlaten dieren door activisten maar niets.....
Politiek kibbelt: Waar ligt grens van actievoeren?
Ook verdeeldheid binnen SP
19-08-2008 Cyntha van Gorp, redactie politiek, Trouw
Acties moeten geweldloos zijn, meent de politiek. Maar de rekbaarheid van de wet verschilt per fractie, blijkt uit een rondgang in Den Haag.
Het actieverleden van Wijnand Duyvendak en het daaraan gerelateerde vertrek van hem uit de GroenLinks-fractie heeft voor veel discussie gezorgd in politiek Den Haag. Waar ligt de grens van buitenparlementaire actie? Wat kan wel en wat kan niet?
Het aantal voormalig activisten op het Binnenhof is dun gezaaid. En van degenen die er zijn, waren gisteren de meeste onbereikbaar voor commentaar. Zoals Marianne Thieme, de fractievoorzitter van de Partij voor de Dieren, die vorig jaar in een interview met Intermediair nog stelde een dierenactivist ín de Tweede Kamer te zijn. Of PvdA-Kamerlid Diederik Samson, die zich als Greenpeace-actievoerder inzette voor het milieu. Of SP-Kamerlid Krista van Velzen, die zo nu en dan na afloop van een actie een nachtje in een cel slaapt. Begin vorig jaar werd de SP’er samen met zes Britse parlementariërs gearresteerd tijdens een blokkadeactie voor de Schotse marinebasis Faslane.
In een interview op de SP-site zegt Van Velzen dat acties ’in zijn algemeenheid’ geweldloos moeten blijven. „Als je iets wilt veranderen, moet je natuurlijk zelf het goede voorbeeld geven. Bovendien moet je goed kunnen uitleggen waarom je zo’n actie voert. Wat mij betreft kun je heel ver gaan, zolang je niemand in gevaar brengt of angst aanjaagt.”
Ook voor SP-collega en voormalig activist Remi Poppe ligt daar een grens. Zijn stelregel is: Altijd de mensen om wie het gaat erbij betrekken en nooit anoniem actievoeren. Liefst ook binnen de wet, alhoewel? „Ik ben wel eens voorbij het bordje verboden toegang gelopen”, bekent hij. „En ik ben ook wel eens via de achterpoort in plaats van via de voordeur naar binnen gegaan, zoals bij de asbestfabriek Eternit in Goor. En we hebben een keer gifafval gestort op de stoep van het stadhuis. Dat kan natuurlijk niet, maar onze boodschap was: ’Zorg niet alleen voor je eigen straatje maar voor de hele samenleving’.”
Voor fractiegenoot Bashir, het jongste lid van de Kamer, is de wet minder buigzaam. „De wet is de grens”, zegt hij stellig. „Het is geen goed idee eigen rechter te spelen.”
De verdeeldheid binnen de SP doet denken aan de discussie binnen GroenLinks. Daar was het fractieleider Femke Halsema die vorige week stelde dat acties die de democratie ondermijnen, nooit door GroenLinks gesteund of geaccepteerd zullen worden. Partijvoorzitter Henk Nijhof reageerde daarop dat „actievoerders wel degelijk buiten de wet mogen treden”.
Het goedpraten van criminaliteit door GroenLinks-politici is PVV-Kamerlid Brinkman in het verkeerde keelgat geschoten. „In de jaren tachtig ging burgerlijke ongehoorzaamheid om vragen als: Mag je zonder vergunning betogen? Mag je wegen blokkeren? Nu lijkt het ook te gaan over overtredingen waar een straf op staat, dat is te gek.”
Acties als stelen, proefdieren vrijlaten en je vastketenen aan platforms op zee, zijn volgens Brinkman niet eens discussiewaardig. „Wat wel bespreekbaar is? Nou, officieel mogen ambtenaren niet zomaar staken, maar daar valt over te praten.”
VVD’er Aptroot is nog strenger voor actievoerders. „Kraken, bezetten en bedreigen zijn dingen die niet kunnen. En als je vindt dat iemand niet goed omgaat met zijn dieren dan schrijf je die persoon een brief of je stapt naar de rechter. Desnoods organiseer je de dag van het gezonde varken, maar je gaat ze niet vrijlaten.”
(Bron: http://www.trouw.nl/)
Dierenopvanggroep in Vietnam redt levens door stropers verwonde dieren
Animal rescue group nurses wild creatures harmed
by poachers
19-08-2008 Thanh Nien News, Vietnam
Many rare animals have found a home in central Quang Binh Province where they receive care and protection at a research and rescue center after being injured by hunters. Six employees of Phong Nha – Ke Bang National Park, all of whom are young locals from the province, keep a close watch on the animals and help them to recover.
The six individuals make up a wild animal rescue group that was formed in 2004 under the national park’s research and rescue center.
Tran Thi Le, a member of Phong Nha – Ke Bang National Park’s
wild animal rescue group, says group members have to stay up
all night to monitor the injured wild animals in their keep.
Most recently, the group has received a pangolin that nearby wardens seized from gunmen.
“We would stay up all night to take care of the animal,” said group member Tran Thi Le.
The group will keep an injured animal in its custody for around a week before releasing it back to the national park’s protection zone when it has regained its strength.
So far, the group has rehabilitated 405 animals, including species of bears, civets and monkeys trapped and shot in the forests.
The six workers live in a house outside of the national park and keep the animals in a special area surrounded by a mat dipped in antibacterial chemicals to prevent germ transmission.
Many of the injured animals even undergo surgery before coming into their keep.
A bear has stayed with the group for nine months and grown from four kilograms to 20 kilograms.
“It is fed mostly rice and fruits,” Le said.
Tran Ngoc Anh, another group member, said his team has to take turns staying awake to make sure that two members are always monitoring the animals.
“We receive no additional monetary allowance [on top of the normal salary] for working with dangerous animals and chemicals every day,” Anh said.
Following the founding of the rescue group, the involved youths have also created several wild animal protection clubs to reduce animal hunting in the area and help in alerting rescue workers of any animals caught by poachers.
(Bron: http://www.thanhniennews.com/)
(Bron foto: Thanh Nien News)
Ruim 40 dode katten in vrieskist woning Montreal...
Quebec. Animals removed from apartment
19-08-2008 Canwest News Service, Ottawa Citizen, Canada
Residents of a Montreal street watched in revulsion yesterday as dozens of cats, some clinging to life and others dead, were removed from a smelly, cluttered apartment.
Neighbours said inspectors from the SPCA in Montreal removed 19 live cats, 15 dead cats and 10 pigeons in cages.
A freezer said to be containing 40 to 50 more dead cats was left in the home. A man who lived in the apartment with the animals was given medical assistance.
(Bron: http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen)
Jager (40) uit Ermelo door rechter Zutphen veroordeeld tot 1000 euro boete voor jacht op wilde zwijnen
Boete en vrijspraak inzake Veluwse zwijnen
19-08-2008 Van onze correspondent, Reformatorisch Dagblad
ZUTPHEN - Voor „stropersactiviteiten” is de 40-jarige E. F. van der W. uit Ermelo maandag veroordeeld tot een boete van 1000 euro. De economische politierechter in Zutphen vond bewezen dat Van der W. op 16 december had geprobeerd wilde zwijnen af te schieten.
De man werd op heterdaad betrapt toen hij die avond op een landgoed van Natuurmonumenten in Ermelo bezig was bij de door hem ingerichte voederplaats een hoogzit te monteren, zodat hij de dieren kon doodschieten. Hij had een kogelgeweer paraat. Ondanks het bezit van een jachtakte was hij op dat moment niet gerechtigd tot het dragen daarvan.
De officier van justitie meende dat dit niet in een opwelling was gebeurd. Het inrichten van een voederplaats en het verbergen daarvan met boomstammetjes zou veel voorbereiding hebben gevergd. „Planmatig en berekend”, noemde hij de daad, waarvoor hij 750 euro boete en twee weken voorwaardelijk eiste. Hierbij werd rekening gehouden met het feit dat Van der W. nadat hij betrapt was aan de politie zijn excuses had aangeboden en zijn jachtakte vrijwillig had ingeleverd.
De 48-jarige J. van N. uit Vierhouten werd vrijgesproken. Hij zou in september vorig jaar op zijn landgoed de rust- en verblijfplaats van zwijnen hebben verstoord door een bosperceel met fijnmazig gaas te omrasteren. Artikel 11 van de Flora- en faunawet verbied dit, omdat wild op de Veluwe de vrije doorgang moet hebben.
Van N. stelde dat het al honderd jaar bestaande landgoed altijd omrasterd is geweest; alleen vertoonde die oude omrastering gaten die door jagers zouden zijn gemaakt om er voer voor de zwijnen te kunnen gooien, om ze daarna af te schieten. Van N. had het niet op de jagers en wilde geen zwijnen op zijn landgoed, vanwege de vernieling van rododendrons en heidevelden.
Een ecoloog had op verzoek van de Vierhouter onderzoek gedaan en was tot de conclusie gekomen dat er op het bosperceel vrijwel geen onderbegroeiing aanwezig was, zodat zwijnen daar geen beschutting zouden vinden. Mede vanwege dit deskundigenoordeel werd Van N. vrijgesproken, nadat de officier 1000 euro boete had geëist.
(Bron: http://www.refdag.nl/)
(Bron foto: Reformatorisch Dagblad)
Britse politie zeer geïnteresseerd in manifestatie tegen Sequani proefdierlab Ledbury
Police want the Carnival Against Vivisection
organisers
18-08-2008 Contributed by: Anonymous, Infoshop News
The police state are requesting organisers of an anti-vivisection march and rally in Ledbury to contact them in the interests of locking up the responsible activists, similar to how the previous Sequani organiser was imprisoned for four and a half years under dubious conspiracy laws, SOCPA.
PRESS RELEASE: Police want to lock up the organisers
For Immediate Release
Date: August 18th 2008
By: "The Promoters"
===STARTS===
The police state are requesting organisers of an anti-vivisection march and rally in Ledbury to contact them in the interests of locking up the responsible activists, similar to how the previous Sequani organiser was imprisoned for four and a half years under dubious conspiracy laws, SOCPA.
Hereford Police have recently become aware of the Carnival Against Vivisection, which is being promoted to take place in Ledbury on Saturday, September 6, meeting at the grass verge near the train station 12noon. The event is in solidarity with political prisoner Sean Kirtley, who was previously jailed for legally organising.
Despite making a number of enquiries, they have been unable to identify the organisers behind the day of action. Promoters doubt the authorities will ever find an activist responsible. Others believe that Hereford Police should be held accountable for their actions as part of the Carnival Media Team.
In support of the event, a militant anti-speciesist said in response to the article:
"The reason there isn't any organisers is because the last person who put their name on the piece of paper (Sean Kirtley) got 4.5 years in prison for it."
===ENDS===
In repy to: 'Police want to hear from animal protestors', Ledbury Reporter
Related article: 'Hereford Police - Carnival Against Vivisection', NETCU Watch
Homepage: Carnival Against Vivisection
(Bron: http://news.infoshop.org/)
(Bron foto: Carnival Against Vivisection)
Winning olie uit oliezand bij Fort McMurray (Canada) leidt tot misvorming onder dieren....- Kids vangen vis met twee bekken - Bewoners slaan alarm
Mutated fish alarms delegates at northern Alta.
water gathering
18-08-2008 CBC News, Canada
Days before a conference on water quality began in Fort Chipewyan, Alta., last week, residents say a strange fish with two mouths was found at the nearby lake. The deformed fish, which residents say children had caught off the dock at Lake Athabasca, has since been turned over to park wardens at Wood Buffalo National Park.
Residents in Fort Chipewyan, Alta., say they saw this fish, seen in this Aug. 15 photo, caught from Lake Athabasca last week. (Photo courtesy Ling Wang)
Some residents, including officials from the Mikisew Cree First Nation, took photographs of the fish over the weekend.
It was found just days before the Keepers of the Water conference began Friday in Fort Chipewyan. The conference wrapped up on Sunday.
The event brought together western and northern Canadian aboriginal leaders and environmental activists, all of whom expressed concern with the quality of water in the Athabasca River, downstream from oilsands development in Fort McMurray.
"It's already mutating the animals, the pollution that they're causing. We need to do something quickly," Shaylene Wiley, a 16-year-old Mikisew Cree delegate, told CBC News during the weekend gathering.
"It's scary when you think about it," delegate Lionel Lepine added.
"For me, personally, it does piss me off, you know, knowing that it's not under my control right now. It's the government of Canada that has the control over it; they have monopoly over our land. But industry … somehow they got the licence to pollute."
(Bron: http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2008/08/18/chip-fish.html)
(Bron foto: CBC News)
60 Jonge zeeschildpadjes in Calabria (Zuid Italië) zijn weg kwijt - Beestjes lopen niet de zee in, maar duiken op op terras restaurant
Confused sea turtles march into Italian restaurant
18-08-2008 Reuters
ROME (Reuters) - About 60 newly hatched sea turtles lost their way during their ritual passage to the sea and marched into an Italian restaurant instead, a conservation worker said on Monday.
The baby turtles -- which ended up under the tables of startled diners at the beachside restaurant -- were probably thrown off track and lured by the eatery's bright lights, said Antonio Colucci, who was called to help rescue the group.
"They saw the artificial lights and took the wrong route," said Colucci, who works on a turtle monitoring project for the conservation group WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature).
"The diners were at first quite curious and then someone alerted the coastal authorities."
The stranded turtles, which had hatched on a beach in the southern Italian region of Calabria, were released into the sea.
Female sea turtles nest on beaches and their offspring instinctively head to the sea after hatching from their eggs.
(Bron: http://www.reuters.com/)
Brooklyn, New York, (VS) zoekt een tweekoppige schildpad....
Missing Turtle Report: Watch for the Two Heads
18-08-2008 By JENNIFER 8. LEE, New York Times, USA
When Sean Casey called the police on Sunday to report that a nameless two-headed turtle had been kidnapped, the officer had him repeat the complaint two or three times. “It comes off that I am a prankster,” said Mr. Casey, who runs the Hamilton Dog House, an animal shelter and pet supply store on East Third Street in Brooklyn. “Most people have never heard of a two-headed turtle,” he explained, much less a missing one.
Brooklyn police say they have no suspects in the case of a missing two-headed turtle.
But the turtle was indeed two-headed, and it was missing. The police finally took Mr. Casey seriously: “They said, ‘We’ll send somebody.’ And they did.”
The police arrived several hours later and took a stolen property report. The turtle, popular among the neighborhood children, had been kept by the window. Sometime on Sunday, between 11 a.m., when the store opened, and noon, when a child asked Mr. Casey where the turtle had gone, it disappeared.
“It looks like they searched the entire store and they could not find the turtle,” said a police spokesman. “I guess this qualifies as a missing turtle report, but I don’t think we’re out there looking for it.” There were no suspects in the case.
Two-headed turtles are rare, but they do have a chance of surviving in captivity, Mr. Casey said. “In the wild, they would have zero chance. In captivity, most die within a few days of birth.”
Mr. Casey said he obtained the turtle a few months ago from a man in Florida who had been struggling to take care of it. “They were trying the best they could, but the turtle was just starting to waste away. It wasn’t feeding properly.”
Sean Casey said his missing turtle lived in a tank in the window
of the Hamilton Dog House in Brooklyn. It was not for sale.
In 1999, an even rarer three-headed turtle was reported to have been found in Taiwan.
Two-headed turtles have to be watched carefully. “There is always a drowning risk,” Mr. Casey said. “They don’t have the ability to dive and swim the way a normal turtle will. If they are put into deep water, they will actually drown.”
Such turtles have maneuverability problems, he said. “They will flip themselves over and they can’t right themselves because one head is going one way while the other head is going the other way.” Feeding is also a problem. Turtle pellets must be broken into two pieces or the two heads will fight over the food, he said.
Mr. Casey said he suspected that the turtle had been taken by a neighborhood child, rather than a thief intent on selling it. He said he believed the turtle was worth between $2,000 and $5,000, based on what museums and zoos might be willing to pay. The store is offering a reward of at least $1,000, partially financed by donations.
The turtle was nameless. Mr. Casey said that was partly because he avoids naming animals, lest he get too attached to them. He said he had been planning to have a naming contest through The Daily News, which published an article on the turtle.
There was no rush, he said. “It’s not like a doggy needs a name. He won’t come when you call him.”
(Bron: http://www.nytimes.com/)
(Bron foto's: New York Times)
maandag 18 augustus 2008
Afrikaanse wilde honden belanden 'ter vermaak' in Chinese dierentuinen - Dieren zijn bedreigd, maar niet beschermd....
China en de wilde honden
18-08-2008 Netwerk TV
Chinese dierentuinen kopen massaal Afrikaanse wilde honden in Zuid-Afrika om hun kooien te vullen. Netwerk bezocht deze dierentuinen en constateerde dat het met het dierenwelzijn droevig gesteld is.
Preview van de uitzending
Het woord circus is beter op zijn plaats om de taferelen in deze dierentuinen te beschrijven. De wilde honden kwijnen weg in kleine kooien en worden door het Chinese publiek belaagd.
In Netwerk een undercoverreportage over dierenhandelaren in Zuid-Afrika en China, die vertellen dat vooral dieren uit het wild erg in trek zijn. En dat gaat ten koste van de wilde populatie die in heel Afrika nog maar zo'n 3000 stuks telt.
(Bron: http://www.netwerk.tv/#)
(Voor meer informatie:
http://www.wilddog.nl/web-content/nl/index.html)
Gehandicapte schildpad in dierentuin Jeruzalem (Israel) kan paren met behulp van bijzondere 'rolstoel'
Disabled turtle uses new wheels to find love
A disabled turtle has started mating after being fitted with a set of wheels to help her get around.
18-08-2008 The Telegraph, UK
Arava, a ten-year-old spurred turtle, lost mobility after her hind legs became paralysed. Weighing 55-pounds (25-kilogram), she could not move herself forward with her front legs alone.
Arava the turtle pictured with her new wheels Photo: REUTERS
So, staff at Jerusalem Biblical Zoo built her a metal board with two wheels that can be easily strapped to her stomach, creating a unique type of wheelchair.
Once the wheels were in place, the zookeepers got more than they bargained for.
Arava has started atttracting the attentions of an amourous male turtle, and the pair are now mating.
Zoo curator Shmulik Yedvad said the metal contraption obviously appealed to the lusty 10-year-old male turtle.
Arava arrived in Jerusalem a few months ago from a petting zoo in southern Israel with the unexplained handicap. She had not found love before the wheels were fitted.
(Bron: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/)
(Bron foto: Telegraph)
Twee bewoners Kalf (Zaanstad) redden meer dan 1000 vissen van dood - Redders boos op handelwijze waterschap
Kalvers redden honderden vissen
18-08-2008 Noordhollands Dagblad
Zaandam - Oscar Munts en Kevin Beers uit het Kalf hebben vanmiddag vele honderden vissen het leven gered. Morgen komen er nieuwe sluisdeuren aan beide kanten van Ramsbeek, vandaag werd de sluis alvast leeggepompt en werden de vissen aan hun lot overgelaten. Munts zag het gebeuren.
,,Een man van het waterschap liep er even doorheen, hield een netje boven het water en zei, ach allemaal jong spul. En ze gingen weg.'' De Zaandammer keek ze stomverbaasd na en kwam toen zelf in actie. Anderhalf uur later schat hij dat hij meer dan duizend vissen uit het water heeft geschept.,,In het begin had je met elke haal een net vol. Misschien wel vijftig vissen tegelijk. Nu vangen we bijna niks meer. Er zit niet veel meer en wat er zit zien we niet meer. Het is te modderig.'' Terwijl hij het zegt haalt Beers een vette aal uit het water.
Munts: ,,Er staat een laagje water van tien centimeter, dat bewoog overal, zo vol vis zat het. Al zijn het kleine visjes, die mogen toch ook leven? Maar het was ook niet eens waar, er zaten ook grote vissen in van twintig, dertig centimeter. Sommigen waren al dood. Zo'n grote vis heeft veel zuurstof nodig. Er waren er die van ellende tegen de kant opsprongen. Als ze gewacht hadden tot de morgenochtend (dinsdag) was alles dood geweest. Dat was lekker makkelijk geweest, dan zwemmen ze niet meer weg.''
(Bron: http://www.nhd.nl/)
(Bron foto's: archief Kraaijer)
Britse deskundigen willen einde gebruik dieren voor pijnproeven - Menselijke pijn is niet vergelijkbaar met pijn die dieren lijden
Panel suggests alternatives to animal models in
pain research
18-08-2008 SNM SmartBrief
U.K. experts suggested the use of neuroimaging techniques based on functional MRI, PET and other scanning systems, combined with new approaches, such as genome-wide association and tissue research, as alternatives to using animal models in pain research.
In addition to raising ethical questions, the use of animals in pain research provides limited value because they are unable to replicate the human pain process, the experts said.
Medical News Today (08/15)
(Bron: http://www.smartbrief.com/)
(You may also read: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7561061.stm)
Jacht op leeuwen in Botswana nog een jaar verboden...
Ban On Lion Hunting Still In Force
18-08-2008 By Monkagedi Gaotlhobogwe, Staff Writer Mmegi, Botswana
Lion hunting in Botswana remains prohibited 12 months after government decided to stop awarding hunting licenses last year. Dr Trevor Mmopelwa, the Director of Wildlife in the Ministry of Environment, Wildlife and Tourism did not say when the ban will be lifted.
"The lifting of the ban on hunting cannot be predetermined. It will depend on the rate of build up of the lion population," he said.
"Research to date
, indicates that while the lion population in Botswana remains fairly satisfactory, in certain areas near protected areas, notably Khutse Game Reserve, Central Kgalagadi Game Reserve and the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, conflict between humans and predators is on the rise.It is in these areas that the number of lions being killed has caused concern. Several mitigation measures, including fencing, are being considered to reduce the conflict," Mmopelwa explained.
He said the suspension of lion hunting has allowed his Department an opportunity to focus its resources on the challenge of the loss of lions in defence of livestock.
"Lions continue to be killed as problem animals in certain hotspot areas. Research being undertaken in these areas suggests that comprehensive strategies are needed to address this problem.
The department is currently finalising the Predator Management Strategy, which will holistically address predator conservation and management throughout Botswana. The issue of utilisation of large carnivores including lions will be addressed in the context of the strategy," Mmopelwa said.
(Bron: http://www.mmegi.bw/)
(Bron foto: Mmegi)
Jonge bultrugwalvis ziet jacht voor Australische kust aan voor zijn moeder....
Lost Baby Whale Bonds With Yacht
A baby whale lost off the coast of Australia has bonded with a makeshift mum - a 36ft-long yacht.
18-08-2008 Sky News, UK
The humpback calf, which is no more than two months old, has even tried to suckle the vessel. Rescuers say the whale was spotted off Sydney's northern beaches over the weekend and soon came across the boat.
When it would not detach itself, the yacht was towed into deeper waters and the calf eventually let go, although it continued to swim nearby.
The whale, which is being monitored, appears to be exhausted and rescuers hope it will swim further out to sea in search of its mum or another pod.
The whale pictured with its new 'mum'.
National Parks and Wildlife regional manager Chris McIntosh told ABC radio: "The outlook is not good, but we are giving the calf its only option.
"It can't be fed, and in fact we wouldn't know what to feed it."
The annual whale migration is under way off Australia's coast and several have been spotted off Sydney beaches in recent days.
Humpbacks breed every one to three years, with a gestation period lasting up to 12 months.
Scientists believe the mammals can live up to 80 years.
(Bron: http://news.sky.com/)
(Bron foto: Sky News)
Op de N210 tussen Lopik en IJsselstein wordt ontsnapte koe door politieauto aangereden....
Koe aangereden door politieauto
18-08-2008 Politie Utrecht
BENSCHOP - Maandagmorgen 18 augustus is een politieauto tegen een koe aangereden. Omstreeks 02.55 uur kreeg de politie de melding dat op de M.A. Reinaldaweg tussen Lopik en IJsselstein koeien op de weg zouden lopen.
Agenten die de melding aannamen, zagen twee twee pinken op de Provinciale weg N210 bij de rotonde N204 en N210 lopen. De agenten probeerden de dieren een weiland in te drijven, maar dit ging niet van een leien dakje. Plotseling doken de pinken in volle galop op uit het donker. De politieauto stond stil en schuin op de rijbaan. Eén koe klapte links op de auto waardoor de spiegel losschoot.
De andere koe klapte in volle vaart van achteren tegen auto. De auto liep forse schade op, maar de koeien renden verder. Uiteindelijk hebben de agenten met behulp van wat vrachtwagenchauffeurs de beesten weer terug naar Benschop laten lopen. Op de N204 richting Montfoort zijn de pinken een weiland in gelopen.
De politie weet niet van wie de koeien, noch het weiland waar ze nu staan, zijn.
(Bron: http://www.nieuwsbank.nl/)
Japan wil internationaal arrestatiebevel drie Sea Shepherd activisten
Japan seeks international arrest of anti-whaling
activists
18-08-2008 Agence France Presse
TOKYO (AFP) — Japan said Monday it was seeking international arrest warrants for three Western anti-whaling activists who tried to disrupt a controversial whaling expedition in the Antarctic Ocean.
"It's natural to seek arrest warrants if it has been judged that a crime took place," Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura said.
"Whatever opinions they have over whaling, it is impermissible for them to take such violent measures which risk the lives of the people involved."
Japanese whaling boat Yushin Maru is watched by Sea Shepherd members in a speed boat.
Police declined to give details, but Jiji Press said the three people were members of the Sea Shepherd group suspected of hurling warning flares into a Japanese whaling vessel in February last year.
It said that Japan would give to Interpol the names of three suspects -- two US citizens aged 41 and 30, and a 28-year-old Briton.
Interpol has the authority to send out a "red notice" which alerts all nations to be on the lookout for a suspect.
Interpol can refuse to send an alert if it is seen as politically motivated, according to the global police agency's website.
The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, whose headquarters is in the US state of Washington, has vowed to stop Japan's whaling, by force if necessary. It is currently fighting aggressively against Canada's slaughter of baby seals.
An Australian customs vessel returning two anti-whaling
activists to the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society's ship.
Japan in June arrested two members of the more moderate environmental group Greenpeace on allegations of theft after they took whale meat in a bid to show corruption in the government-funded programme.
The Japanese government, which says whaling is part of the national culture, plans to kill around 1,000 whales a year using a loophole in a 1986 international moratorium that allows "lethal research" on whales.
But Japan's Antarctic catch came to little more than half of that number last season due to harassment by activists.
In the latest season, Sea Shepherd activists hurled stinging acid at the whalers, lightly injuring three of them, and also hopped onto a Japanese ship, setting off a high-seas standoff.
Japan has previously demanded that Australia, where Sea Shepherd had docked, take action against the activists.
Australia and most other Western nations have opposed Japan's whaling, arguing that it is inhumane and endangers a growing whale-watching industry.
(Bron: http://afp.google.com/)
(Bron foto's: AFP)
Australië voert nieuwe richtlijnen in voor dierproeven - Pijn en lijden proefdieren moet geminimaliseerd worden
Animal testing guidelines change
18-08-2008 The West, Australia
New guidelines designed to minimise pain and suffering of lab animals used in scientific testing have been hailed a step forward by Australia's animal rights groups. But the animal advocates argue more than a document is needed to drastically curb the practice of experimenting on and training an estimated five million mice, monkeys, pigs and other animals every year.
The guidelines, released today by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), list the latest acceptable methods for minimising pain for animals during experimentation and euthanasia.
It replaces an outdated document released 10 years ago.
NHMRC chief executive Professor Warwick Anderson said the document had attracted international attention due to its world-first focus on animal wellbeing.
“The guidelines are designed to minimise the use of animals in scientific research through focusing on the three Rs - the replacement of animal research with other types of research when possible, reduction of the number of animals used in research and refinement of research techniques to minimise pain and distress,“ Prof Anderson said.
“When it is necessary to study animals in medical research, all involved have an obligation to care for the animals in the best ways possible.”
Glenys Oogjes, executive director of Animals Australia, which campaigns against animal testing, said the new guidelines were much needed to update the pain relieving methods and enrichment strategies research organisations should be using.
“But the issue remains though that while we have these great documents, there is still no compulsory training for new and existing researchers on the laws and the best ways to reduce pain and distress,” Ms Oogjes said.
“And they are not trained in the many excellent alternatives, like computer modelling for example, that can do just as good a job in testing without involving animals.”
She said the ethics committees involved in research approvals were the safety net for ensuring animal testing was absolutely justified, but members were under time pressure and had limited information about suitable alternatives.
“At the moment, there is a feeling there is far too much animal testing going on because of a lack of knowledge in many quarters ... and, unfortunately, a document, while encouraging, is not going to change that,” Ms Oogjes said.
Statistics collated by the Australian Association of Humane Research suggest five million animals, including fish, were used in research in 2005.
NSW and Victoria were responsible for 2.3 million and 1.5 million, respectively.
Included are more than 20 types of animals from the most common, like mice, fish, chickens and sheep, to those used less frequently, like cats, dogs, horses and monkeys.
(Bron: http://www.thewest.com.au/)
(By clicking on this link you will get a pdf-file of the guidelines: http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/publications/synopses/_files/ea18.pdf)
25 Koeien zoeken bij Stavoren verkoeling in IJsselmeer - Dieren zwommen richting Enkhuizen....
Pinken zwemmen in het IJsselmeer
18-08-2008 Leeuwarder Courant
STAVOREN - Bij het Hooglandgemaal in Stavoren zijn zaterdag in alle vroegte 25 pinken het IJsselmeer in gelopen om verkoeling te zoeken. Een watersporter had de dieren al dicht bij waterkant gezien en alarm geslagen.
De politie heeft nog getracht met een lint de weg naar het water voor de beesten te blokkeren, maar een uur later bleken zij die hindernis toch te hebben genomen en richting Enkhuizen te zwemmen.
Dezelfde watersporter zag vervolgens kans de koers van de kudde te wijzigen en ze de jachthaven van Stavoren in te drijven. Daar zijn ze met behulp van de uitgerukte brandweer en reddingsmaatschappij weer op de kant geklauterd.
(Bron: http://www.leeuwardercourant.nl/)
Twee huiden van luipaarden inbeslaggenomen in Dehradun (India)
Two leopard skins seized in Dehradun
18-08-2008 By ANI, Fresh News, India
The Wildlife Department in Dehradun has seized three leopard skins and arrested two people in this connection. Acting on a tip off, a Special Task Force arrested Lakshmi Chandra and Harjinder Singh and recovered leopard skins from them.
“We got information that some people were coming with leopard skins. The people were arrested on the Shimla bypass and the leopard skins were recovered from them. These are all skins of leopards killed in the past one and a half to two months,” said Kailash Pawar, Inspector, Special Task Force, Uttarakhand.
Both the accused have been arrested and put in the police lock up for further action.
“They lured me and I got carried away. They said they would pay me two-three thousand rupees. This is the first mistake of my life. I never did anything like this before. I don”t kill animals,” said Lakshmi Chandra, accused.
Country’s leopards are under threat, with increasing number of the wild cats being poached for their body parts and villagers killing them for straying into human settlements.
With tiger population dwindling in recent years as a result of poaching, wildlife officials say hunters have increasingly set their sights on leopards, killing them for their skins as well as bones, claws and penises for use in traditional Asian medicines.
Depletion of their habitat has also threatened the leopards, forcing them to stray into human settlements — attacking people and cattle — and often getting killed in return.
India had about 7,300 leopards according to a 1997 census, but conservationists say the number is now likely to be much lower. (ANI)
(Bron: http://www.freshnews.in/)
Autoriteiten VS nauwelijks in staat dierenactivisten op te pakken....
UCSC firebombings are reminder of how hard it is
to catch animal-rights, environmental extremists
NO ARRESTS IN UCSC BOMBS, OTHERS
18-08-2008 By Dana Hull, Mercury News, USA
It's been more than two weeks since a pair of firebombs rattled the university community in Santa Cruz. The attacks against two University of California researchers are believed to be the work of radical animal-rights activists opposed to vivisection. But despite an Aug. 7 raid on a Santa Cruz home on Riverside Avenue, nobody has been arrested.
The case is a stark reminder of how hard it is to catch animal-rights and environmental extremists, who are suspected of committing more than 1,200 criminal acts nationwide since 1990. Because of the activists' strict code of discipline that prohibits "snitching" or cooperating with investigators, many cases remain unsolved.
In recent years, the FBI has made a number of high-profile arrests in domestic terrorism cases. In 2006, a federal jury in New Jersey convicted six members of a militant animal-rights group for their roles in a campaign to terrorize employees and shareholders of a company that used animals for laboratory research. But hundreds of other cases haven't been cleared.
"It's very frustrating," said Nina Delgadillo, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. "Various groups network with one another with a degree of anonymity that makes it very difficult for us. They put information on the Internet about how to evade law enforcement."
Like some international terrorist groups, the radical animal-rights community is loosely organized but its "cells" are tightly knit. Many activists know one another from demonstrations, conferences and, occasionally, jail cells.
Arrests lead to instant outpourings of support and fundraising. Jailed activists are considered "political prisoners," while those who cooperate with investigators are cast out as snitches.
"In the more than 25 years of the Animal Liberation Front, relatively few people have been arrested and an even smaller number have been convicted," said a recent article in No Compromise, an online animal-liberation publication. "Why have so few been caught? According to most A.L.F. activists, preparation and reconnaissance is the key to staying safe."
On Aug. 2, the home of a UC-Santa Cruz molecular biologist was firebombed, forcing the scientist, his wife and two young children to flee their smoke-filled house from a second-story ladder. About the same time, another researcher's parked car was firebombed.
Unsolved cases
It's not unusual for domestic terrorism cases to remain active for years.
Five years ago, animal rights activist Daniel Andreas San Diego emerged as the prime suspect in the bombings of two East Bay companies connected to animal testing. Government agents had him under 24-hour surveillance, watching the house that the young vegan was renting in Sonoma County.
But San Diego, a Bay Area native, proved amazingly elusive. One day, he abandoned his car in downtown San Francisco, evading agents who were tailing him.
Activists like San Diego often operate alone or in small cells. They act independently of others in the loosely organized movement. Law enforcement officials say that makes it difficult to determine who is involved.
"Typically, these groups do not conform to traditional, hierarchical, organizational structures," said FBI spokesman Brian Hale.
Other experts say the anonymity of the cell structure is by design.
"Even if you catch someone, they don't have information on the others," said Michael Conn, associate director of the Oregon National Primate Research Center and author of "The Animal Research War." "A lot of times they don't even know who the others are."
Extreme animal rights activists are so sophisticated that private companies and trade groups increasingly keep extensive dossiers on known activists and their activities, regularly sharing what they learn with law enforcement.
The Fur Commission USA, which represents nearly 400 mink-farming families, maintains a database on animal rights activists. Its files include more than two dozen in Santa Cruz County alone.
"These people are very secretive, and they are really good criminals," said Teresa Platt, the commission's executive director. "They are a real challenge to the FBI. They train each other in security: not to talk on the phone, how to send secure e-mail messages. They are very good at technology."
Mink suspect arrested
Still, some wanted extremists are eventually caught.
In 2005, Peter Young - wanted on a series of break-ins at Midwestern mink farms - was arrested in San Jose on suspicion of shoplifting CDs at a Starbucks. He had been on the run for seven years.
Young spent two years in federal prison and was released in 2007. Now living in Santa Cruz, he regularly speaks about animal rights at conferences across the country.
As for San Diego, who is suspected of bombing Chiron in Emeryville and the Pleasanton offices of Shaklee:
"We believe he's in Costa Rica," said agent Joseph Schadler of the FBI's San Francisco office, who wouldn't elaborate on how San Diego got to Central America. "It's been five years. But we'll get him."
(Bron: http://www.mercurynews.com/)
(Read also this: http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-trull18-2008aug18,0,1625747.story)
Bijzondere kikker in Engeland krijgt speciale wettelijke bescherming vanaf 1 oktober
Legal Protection For Northern Frog
18-08-2008 Sky News, UK
A rare species of frog that croaks with a "northern accent" is to receive special legal protection after being reintroduced to Britain.
The pool frog with will receive legal protection.
Minister for Wildlife, Joan Ruddock, announced that the pool frog will be safeguarded against being killed, taken, injured, disturbed, owned or sold or having its resting or breeding places destroyed.
The frog has a distinctive croak, similar to a regional accent. Genetic studies and analysis of its mating calls have established that the species was part of a special northern group along with animals from Norway and Sweden.
The last native frog died in the 1990s after the population dwindled to just one site in Norfolk. Archaeological investigations have revealed a long history in Britain - remains of the frog dating back to 1000AD have been found at Saxon sites in Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire.
Under the UK Biodiversity Action Plan a range of organisations, including Natural England and the Herpetological Conservation Trust, imported the frogs from Sweden with special permission and introduced them to a secret site in Norfolk three years ago.
The wildlife minister said: "Working in harmony with nature is becoming more and more important as increasing demands are made on our environment.
"The UK's native species need our support, and I hope today's announcement will help give the pool frog a secure future."
Habitat restoration at the site has created ideal conditions for the frog, which breeds in medium-sized ponds in open areas, close to woodland. But experts said it was vital to introduce legal protection for the amphibian before reintroducing it elsewhere in East Anglia.
Natural England's amphibian specialist Jim Foster said: "It is vitally important to have this kind of protection in place for the pool frog before we could consider reintroducing them to new ponds in other parts of East Anglia.
"Early signs are encouraging that the pool frogs are settling in to the current release site.
"However it will be several year before we can confidently assess the success of this reintroduction."
From October 1 the pool frog, along with the lesser whirlpool ram's-horn snail and the Fisher's estuarine moth, will be covered by the 1994 EU Habitats Regulations.
(Bron: http://news.sky.com/)
(Bron foto: Sky News)
zondag 17 augustus 2008
Vakantie vierende vrouw in Werkendam laat zeven huisdieren onverzorgd achter - Dieren uitgedroogd in huis vol uitwerpselen...
Politie haalt verwaarloosde dieren uit huis
17-08-2008 BN/De Stem
WERKENDAM - In de Werkendamse A. van Drielstraat heeft de politie zaterdagmiddag zeven verwaarloosde dieren uit huis gehaald. Het gaat om vier katten, twee honden en een konijn. De dieren waren ondervoed en uitgedroogd.
De agenten waren een kijkje gaan nemen nadat er verschillende meldingen over mogelijke verwaarlozing waren binnengekomen. Ter plaatse bleek dat de bewoonster al een week op vakantie was en ook niet van plan was snel terug te keren.
Ze had wel eerder die dag gebeld naar een buurvrouw om te vragen of die de dieren te eten kon geven. Daardoor bleek dat de dieren al een week in het huis zaten opgesloten. Volgens de politie stonk de hele woning naar uitwerpselen.
Tegen de vrouw wordt proces-verbaal opgemaakt, de dieren zijn overgebracht naar het asiel.
(Bron: http://www.bndestem.nl/)
Acties Amerikaanse dierenactivisten maken debat over proefdierindustrie actueel
David Martksko: Animal-rights firebombing should
be condemned
17-08-2008 Santa Cruz Sentinel, USA
The recent attack on a UC Santa Cruz molecular biologist has brought nationwide attention back to the debate over the use of animals in medical and scientific research.
To make the point that animals' lives are more important than scientific knowledge -- the kind of knowledge that will lead to cures for cancer, Parkinson's disease and epilepsy -- animal rights extremists attempted to burn a scientist to death. His family, including two young children, had to escape their smoke-filled home through a second-story window. Less than a mile away, a fellow researcher's car was also firebombed.
For anyone who has followed the animal rights movement closely, none of this premeditated, homicidal behavior is the slightest bit surprising.
The animal rights philosophy is by its nature an extreme religion. Its disciples believe deep down that animals are "people." Their call to faith is that their movement is heir to the struggles of civil rights and women's suffrage. They fervently believe the rights of "non-human animals" are equal to the rights of humans. Without exception.
So it makes perfect sense that there is no limit to the violence they will propagate. They claim, "If you saw your own children in cages, what would stop you from freeing them?" Bloody wars have been waged over less. For the animal rights fringe, there is no moral or philosophical line separating my 4-year-old daughter and a chimpanzee. Or even a mouse.
Knowing that animals are being used for research -- or raised for food, exhibited in zoos, or snared on the end of a fishing hook -- stirs up turbulent feelings among such activists that most of us reserve for concern about our own species.
Not even the so-called mainstream of the animal protection movement is immune. "Blowing stuff up and smashing windows [is] a great way to bring about animal liberation," People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals PETA vice president Bruce Friedrich told a convention in 2001. "Hallelujah to the people who are willing to do it."
And Jerry Vlasak, then a spokesman for the wing-nuts at the PETA-affiliated Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, advocated the "political assassination" of animal researchers in 2003. "For 5 lives, 10 lives, 15 human lives," Vlasak intoned, "we could save a million, 2 million, 10 million non-human lives."
Luckily, no one perished in Santa Cruz. But chalk that up to luck, not design.
Most people do not confuse a lab rat and a child. They understand if a viable alternative to animal-based research existed, scientists would have abandoned the use of animals long ago to avoid the expense and endless regulations to say nothing of the personal attacks from animal rights activists. But such alternatives are decades away. Pretending otherwise penalizes humankind for no reason other than satisfying activists' conceit.
This conceit found a foothold six weeks ago in Europe, when Spain's parliament extended legal rights to apes. Chimps, gorillas and orangutans will soon be off-limits on television shows, in circuses and in research labs. The socialist government there denies that it's granting "human" rights to apes, but the leap between the two is no longer very far.
American animal activists have always been a few steps behind their European counterparts, but they're catching up. Over $4 million has poured into California this year from groups intent on giving new rights to egg-laying hens. Should their ballot initiative pass, the price of eggs will skyrocket -- and livestock will likely be worse off. Chickens may have more freedom, but diseased animals will suddenly be able to mingle with healthy ones. Some improvement.
Whether they're pondering the lot of farm animals or lab animals, people plotting to liberate lesser creatures have a perverted sense of justice.
Two weeks ago their moral compass led them to detonate what police called "a molotov cocktail on steroids." Tomorrow, their weapon of choice may only be propaganda in the service of eventual vegetarianism, but it's equally misguided.
There's a sad dysfunction in animal activists professing indifference toward our ability to cure deadly diseases yet presuming to dictate what we eat, what we wear and whether our weekend plans include a trip to the zoo. But sadder still is the unavoidable conclusion that animals are animals. It's impossible to raise them to the level of humans. As we're seeing all too clearly, it's only possible to lower ourselves to the level of beasts.
David Martosko is a national expert on the politics of the animal protection movement and serves as research director at the Center for Consumer Freedom, a nonprofit activist watchdog group.
(Bron: http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/)
(Voor informatie over David Martosko:
http://dc.indymedia.org/newswire/display/138207/index.php
http://www.consumerfreedom.com/pressRelease_detail.cfm/release/176
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=David_Martosko)
Voor het eerst zeldzame nevelpanter gezien op Midden Kalimantan (Indonesië)
Zeldzame nevelpanter gespot in veenbossen
Kalimantan
17-08-2008 Door HILDE JANSSEN, Algemeen Dagblad
JAKARTA - Automatische camera’s hebben een nevelpanter gefotografeerd in het Indonesische Sebangau Park in Midden Kalimanten, een gebied waar nooit eerder zo’n panter is gesignaleerd. ‘We zijn zeer enthousiast over dit bewijs,’ meldt professor David McDonald, die betrokken is bij het Sebangau onderzoeksproject. Voor hen is de nevelpanter een ‘top prioriteit’.
Nevelpanters zijn heel moeilijk te spotten, omdat het nachtdieren zijn die zich graag afzonderen. Het zijn goede boomklimmers, een vaardigheid die ze goed van pas komt bij het jagen op apen, vogels en wilde varkens. De nevelpanter verdankt zijn naam aan het unieke wolkenpatroon op zijn vel. Sinds vorig jaar staat het dier als een aparte subsoort genoteerd op basis van uitgebreid DNA onderzoek.
Diverse milieuorganisaties pleiten voor uitbreiding van de beschermde bosgebieden in Borneo, zodat de panters en andere zeldzame dieren voldoende leefruimte hebben om te kunnen overleven. De veenbossen in het Sebangau Park worden bedreigd door aanhoudende bosbranden en illegale houtkap.
(Bron: http://www.ad.nl/)
(Bron foto: http://www.tourismindonesia.com/2007/08/rare-borneo-leopard-identified-as-new.html?widgetType=BlogArchive&widgetId=BlogArchive1&action=toggle&dir=close&toggle=YEARLY-1199174400000&toggleopen=MONTHLY-1204358400000)
Actrice Gwyneth Paltrow haalt woede Britse dierenvrienden op de hals - Paltrow maakt reclame voor Italiaans modehuis Tod's
Fur flies as Gwyneth Paltrow offends her
animal-rights friends
The actress courts controversy in an ad campaign and puts her relationship with Stella McCartney on the line
17-08-2008 By Jonathan Owen, The Independent, UK
She is almost as famous for her green, holistic lifestyle as she is for her film roles, but Gwyneth Paltrow has become the focus of angry animal rights campaigners. The actress is fronting the autumn collection of fur-lined boots and bags from the Italian company Tod's – which also uses ostrich and snakeskin in its products.
Photographs of the Hollywood star
draped in fox fur feature in the company's latest advertising campaign. Activists have branded the 35-year-old – who is married to the Coldplay singer and prominent vegetarian Chris Martin – as stupid and say that she should be ashamed of herself.People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) went as far as to criticise her parenting, saying: "Gwyneth Paltrow won't be the apple of her daughter's eye if she continues to flaunt fur.
"It's a terrible example to set for a young child, promoting an industry that electrocutes animals, snaps their necks and skins them alive."
Tony Wardle, associate director of the vegetarian charity Viva!, said: "There is nothing feminine about inserting an electrode into the anus of a terrified and struggling fox and then electrocuting it. Ms Paltrow is an actress – and seemingly a particularly stupid one at that."
Mark Glover, director of Respect for Animals, said: "Gwyneth Paltrow should be ashamed to promote something so steeped in animal suffering. I can only assume that Paltrow either is ignorant of the facts or lacks human decency and compassion."
The row is ironic, as Ms Paltrow enjoys a close friendship with the designer Stella McCartney. Following in the footsteps of her staunchly vegetarian mother, Linda, Ms McCartney refuses to use fur – in direct contrast to the views of her friend, who has in the past described it as being "feminine and very elegant".
Ms McCartney, smarting from a recent run-in with the furrier Hockley for showing one of her bras under a mink coat it was advertising in Vogue, is said to be furious with the actress. This is unlikely to persuade Ms Paltrow to forsake fur, however.
"We've written to her many times, and sent her videos showing how animals suffer for fur, but have never received a response."Apparently her beauty really is only skin deep," said a spokesman.
The British Fur Trade Association said: "Animal rights groups are entitled to their opinion but many people do not share this opinion and it is certainly not reflected in the rising global demand for fur.
"Regrettably, not everyone understands the difference between animal welfare, which has the full commitment of our sector, and animal rights, which seeks to ban every animal use by man, whether for food, medical or scientific research, clothing or companionship."
No comment was available from Ms Paltrow or Mr Martin last night.
(Bron: http://www.independent.co.uk/)
(Bron foto Paltrow: The Independent / Bron foto Tod's: archief Kraaijer)
Amerikaans meisje (7) stapt in muskusrattenklem - Ouders willen verbod op alle muskusrattenklemmen in bewoonde gebieden
Child caught in trap
Family would like to see all muskrat traps outlawed in residential areas
17-08-2008 By Elisabeth Kilpatrick ekilpatrick@scn1.com, The Beacon News, USA
When Mark Wells and his family get together at his dad's home in the Lakes of Bliss Woods subdivision in Sugar Grove, the adults like to relax on the patio while the kids go running off to the nearby pond to hunt for frogs.
But last Sunday, Wells' niece and nephew turned up more than just green amphibians. As they walked back to the house, Wells was flabbergasted to see his niece carrying a metal muskrat trap with her blue Croc shoe lodged firmly inside. The 7-year-old told the family she had stepped on the trap on the pond's shore.
"It took three adults to get the shoe out of the trap," Wells said. "I don't know how it didn't hurt her."
What's a muskrat?
These furry, dark-brown rodents make their homes in lakes, ponds, marshes or other bodies of water. Adults typically weigh in at 2-1/2 pounds and can grow to 16 to 25 inches long, including their black, scaly tails. They live all over Illinois, but are most prevalent in the northern part. They often burrow and cause erosion on water banks, so the state allows trapping from November to January or with a nuisance permit.
The family immediately snapped photos of the shoe caught in the trap, then headed down to the pond. There, Wells found two more traps wedged in the mud near the shore.
"It was such an obvious danger that I didn't think twice about removing (them)," he said.
But when Wells' stepmom and dad, who declined to be named for this story, sent an e-mail to a few neighbors about the traps, the subdivision's Homeowners Association board of directors e-mailed back, saying they weren't responsible for traps along the shore.
"Some of you have been notified about an incident with a child's shoe caught in a muskrat trap," the board wrote. "However, there is more to the story."
The neighborhood's trapper places muskrat traps six feet away from the shore and at least four feet under water, the board explained.
"He informed us that there is no way the traps could be on the shoreline unless they were pulled out of the pond ... the board has information that the muskrat traps were INTENTIONALLY pulled out," the board wrote.
When Wells took the traps to the Sugar Grove Police Department last week, police told him that technically he could be charged with theft for removing the traps.
"They were nice about it," Wells said. "Even if that were to happen, I still feel like I did the right thing."
A little girl's shoe became ensnared in a trap for muskrats.
Traps lacking permits?
Wells isn't the only one who could potentially be in hot water. Muskrat trapping season runs from November to January, and trappers must obtain a nuisance permit to trap during the rest of the year. Trappers are also required to have an ID on each trap, which Police Chief Brad Sauer and Wells both said they didn't see on the three traps Wells turned in to the police.
Police are working with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, which regulates trapping in the state, Sauer said.
"We're trying to ascertain if they properly retained permits to trap this time of year," he said. "We sure don't want any kids being able to step on traps."
Chris McCloud, spokesman for IDNR, said that he did not know whether the trapper obtained the proper permits. The Illinois Conservation Police, the IDNR's law enforcement branch, may open an investigation to determine if any rules were broken, he said. If so, the trapper could face a possible fine or even have his license revoked.
"It does throw up a red flag if there's no ID on the trap," McCloud said.
Designed to kill
Homeowners Association board members referred all questions to Denise Nemanich, representative for the neighborhood's management company. Nemanich declined to comment on whether there had been other incidents where children had encountered traps in the neighborhood, and said that no additional information was available beyond the board's e-mail.
According to board meeting minutes available online, Lakes of Bliss Woods retained two muskrat trappers at no charge beginning in October 2007 because muskrats were causing erosion at the subdivision's three ponds and near several homes. The May 2008 board minutes say that the trappers switched to live traps that were buried underwater to keep kids from getting caught in them.
However, the trap that Wells' niece stepped on is a conibear trap, designed to kill animals, leaving Wells even more confused.
"I don't understand ... (why) didn't their board mention that the trap in the photo isn't the kind they approved?" he asked.
Regardless of the type, Wells would like to see all traps outlawed in residential areas to keep the same thing from happening to other children.
"The board didn't even ask if (my niece) was OK," he said. "I can't believe that (those traps) are legal."
(Bron: http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/)
(Bron foto: The Beacon News)
Achtergronden van transport over zee levend vee van Australië naar Midden-Oosten - In 2007 36.408 dode dieren aan boord schepen
Live Exports – Another 36 408 animals dead on
ships yet the trade goes on
17-08-2008 by Jenny Hume, Webdiary, Australia
It is commonly assumed that the live export trade in sheep and cattle to the Middle East is necessary and economically vital. Necessary because Islamic (halal) slaughter demands it, and vital because of the export income it brings to Australia. Although it is certainly in the immediate interests of those involved in the live export trade, none of the rest is true as I think this article will show.
For those interested my two earlier pieces on the live animal export trade give a background to the history and issues of the trade – Live animal exports in heavy seas and Live animal exports – defending the indefensible.
A coalition of importing and exporting companies have just taken the Federal Government to court after AQIS (Australian Quarantine Inspection Service) ordered in May this year that 10-15% extra space be given to sheep on open two tier deck ships to lessen the impact of heat stress, crowding and so on. Heat stress has been a major cause of deaths in sheep and cattle on ships.
The companies claim that this regulation will lose them millions of dollars in that they will have to ship less sheep on each voyage as a result. Comfort of the sheep is clearly not their primary concern. So they want the ruling overturned in Court. The dispute is about to go to mediation. Will the Rudd Government bow to the pressure? Probably.
Kevin Rudd has already bowed to pressure to re-open the live cattle trade to Egypt after John Howard suspended it on grounds of the cruelty, following exposure by Animals Australia in its footage in the Bassatin meatworks where hundreds of thousands of our cattle had been shipped and slaughtered for many years. The industry would have known about Bassatin, but it was not the industry that told us what was going on there. Nor did the government. We had to rely on concerned members of the public both here and in Egypt to reveal the full horror of that place.
Then in 2007 the WA Labor Government intervened to effectively prevent a live export company from being convicted of cruelty after the court case against it was proven. This was the case that Animals Australia initiated over the deaths of 1,000 sheep on one of that company’s ships, the Al Kuwait.
It is a fact, and an accepted fact by industry and the government, that for every 100,000 sheep loaded on a ship an average of 1,000 will likely be dead on board before they arrive, losses that apparently the companies are prepared to wear. For them it seems it is better to carry the loss of a thousand dead sheep, but not the loss of shipping less sheep in order to give the animals more comfort and try and ensure fewer of them die.
In the period 2000-2007 almost 400,000 animals, mostly sheep and cattle, died on the voyage to various countries, the majority destined for the Middle East (ME). Hundreds of thousands more died in years prior to the year 2000. They died for several main reasons: heat stress and exhaustion, inanition (a euphemism for failure to eat during the two week journey), injury on slippery decks, disease outbreak, and/or disaster at sea. Around 200,000 were burnt to death on ships abandoned at sea when they caught fire.
Storms at sea create untold horror for the animals as the stockman's report on the Kalymnian Express graphically described when a third of its cargo of 900 cattle died or had to be put down due to injury. It was clearly a scene from hell. [Ed: Interested readers should go to the Australian Maritime Safety Authority's website and search for Kalymnian Express, as the link to the relevant attachment is very long and does dreadful things to the line length of this article.]Opposing the industry are the animal welfare organizations. In the forefront of the fight is Animals Australia (AA), a federation of some forty animal societies formed some thirty years ago through the efforts of Animal Liberation founder Christine Townend and philosopher Professor Peter Singer. Concerned not only about the suffering on the voyages, AA carried out five investigations in seven ME countries over five years to highlight the terrible plight of the animals after they arrive in the ME where there are no animal protection laws. The footages, if you can stomach them, can be found on its website.
So why has the trade not been phased out as recommended over 25 years ago following a government inquiry into the industry chaired by the late Labor Senator George Georges?
Why do successive governments allow this trade to continue unabated?
Industry arguments in favour of the live trade
The Australian Government and the live export companies argue that the trade is of vital economic importance to this country; that the importing countries require animals to be killed in accordance with Islamic law; that lack of refrigeration and a desire for fresh killed meat drives demand for live animals in the importing countries; and that if Australia did not provide the live animals other countries would – this latter an old argument in favour of just about anything obnoxious, including the slave trade.
These arguments have become increasingly weak. The chilled meat trade far outstrips the live trade to the ME in value, and is growing every year.
When Australia suspended trade to certain countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, and more recently Egypt following the Animals Australia revelations of cruelty there, imported chilled meat soon filled the gap.
Saudi Arabia has considerable notoriety when it comes to the live sheep trade with frequent suspensions. Most will recall the Cormo Express affair that led to 5,000 or more of its cargo dying after the Saudis rejected it on arrival. The ship plied the ME for 8 weeks as its cargo died en masse and the Australian government searched in vain for a country that would take the sheep. In the end the animals were given to Eritrea, and the Australian taxpayers paid out $3 million in costs and for fodder to help feed them there.
Why do successive governments allow this trade to continue unabated?
Industry arguments in favour of the live trade
The Australian Government and the live export companies argue that the trade is of vital economic importance to this country; that the importing countries require animals to be killed in accordance with Islamic law; that lack of refrigeration and a desire for fresh killed meat drives demand for live animals in the importing countries; and that if Australia did not provide the live animals other countries would – this latter an old argument in favour of just about anything obnoxious, including the slave trade.
These arguments have become increasingly weak. The chilled meat trade far outstrips the live trade to the ME in value, and is growing every year.
When Australia suspended trade to certain countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, and more recently Egypt following the Animals Australia revelations of cruelty there, imported chilled meat soon filled the gap.
Saudi Arabia has considerable notoriety when it comes to the live sheep trade with frequent suspensions. Most will recall the Cormo Express affair that led to 5,000 or more of its cargo dying after the Saudis rejected it on arrival. The ship plied the ME for 8 weeks as its cargo died en masse and the Australian government searched in vain for a country that would take the sheep. In the end the animals were given to Eritrea, and the Australian taxpayers paid out $3 million in costs and for fodder to help feed them there.
But the Saudis are happy anyway to take chilled meat. There was a 67% increase in mutton exports to Saudi Arabia in the 12 months to January 2007. MLA (Meat and Livestock Australia) has also reported a record of 2,909 tonnes of Australian mutton shipped to Saudi Arabia in January 2007, the largest single month in almost 4 years due to strong demand for the Hajj festival. Saudi Arabia is the primary ME destination for Australian mutton, importing 24,301 tonnes in 2006.
MLA has also just reported an increase in the last fiscal year of 18% in the meat trade to the ME. Development in the ME countries has seen supermarket style outlets set up along similar lines in the West handling this rapidly growing chilled meat trade.
So any argument that the ME countries only want and can only handle live animals is simply not true.
The Halal Issue
This is a total furphy. There are 40 Halal accredited meat works in Australia to meet the halal accredited meat trade. Chilled meat trade to the ME far outweighs the live trade as figures below will show. The animals simply do not have to be shipped live. In Australia, halal-killed animals are stunned (rendered unconscious) prior to slaughter but not in the ME. It does not take much imagination to see the scene where a grown bullock has its throat cut while fully conscious, an illegal practice in Australia under humane slaughter rules. Halal accreditation is administered under the Australian Government Supervised Muslim Slaughter Programme.
MLA has also just reported an increase in the last fiscal year of 18% in the meat trade to the ME. Development in the ME countries has seen supermarket style outlets set up along similar lines in the West handling this rapidly growing chilled meat trade.
So any argument that the ME countries only want and can only handle live animals is simply not true.
The Halal Issue
This is a total furphy. There are 40 Halal accredited meat works in Australia to meet the halal accredited meat trade. Chilled meat trade to the ME far outweighs the live trade as figures below will show. The animals simply do not have to be shipped live. In Australia, halal-killed animals are stunned (rendered unconscious) prior to slaughter but not in the ME. It does not take much imagination to see the scene where a grown bullock has its throat cut while fully conscious, an illegal practice in Australia under humane slaughter rules. Halal accreditation is administered under the Australian Government Supervised Muslim Slaughter Programme.
What is halal slaughter? Are animals halal-slaughtered in the Middle East?
Key requirements of halal killing, according to the Koran and Islamic leaders, include:
not killing animals in the presence of other animals
the animals are not to be bound
the slaughterman makes a dedication of the animal to Allah
the animal being slaughtered must face Mecca
the animal should be killed with a single cut to the throat with a long sharp blade, and
the animal must not suffer prior to slaughter.
Investigations by AA in the Middle East found that the halal requirements (as listed above) are routinely ignored in each of Egypt, Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar.
Volume of halal accredited sheep meat to the ME
Australia’s trade in chilled and frozen halal accredited sheep meat to the Middle East is increasing significantly each year. For example, mutton exports reached 52,175 tonnes for the 2006/2007 fiscal year, a 42% increase on the previous year, and lamb exports to the Middle East topped 20,000 tonnes for the first time, a 24% increase on the previous year (source: MLA).
Together this level of sheep meat export is equivalent to 3.4 million live sheep (based on a “live sheep equivalent” of 21kg/carcase) so 3.4 million sheep were spared the trauma of those ships and the cruel handing and slaughter practices on arrival.
So what is the live trade worth in comparison to the meat trade?
The ABS figures for 2004-5 alone tell their own story.
The combined export value of meat exports (lamb, mutton and beef) was $ 6 billion.
The combined value of live sheep and cattle exports was a tenth of that: $ 0.674 billion.
Live export of cattle: $464 million (FOB value*) (623,579 live cattle)
Beef exports: $4.9 billion (947,866 tonnes)
Sheep
Live export of Sheep: $210 million (FOB* value) (3,236,415 live sheep)
Lamb meat exports $701 million (123,060 tonnes)
Mutton meat exports $418 million (136,718 tonnes)
Total value of chilled meat exports: $1.119 billion
*Free On Board – the value of the animals before loading in Australia
The Economics of the Live Trade Vs Meat Trade – Exports to Egypt
The value of chilled/frozen sheep meat to Egypt in the 11 month period from Jan-Nov 2006 was $3.5 million.
The value of live sheep exported to Egypt during 2006 was approx. $2.8 million.
The value of chilled/frozen beef to Egypt in the 11 month period Jan-Nov 2006 was $100 million.
The value of live cattle FOB in 2005 (none in 2006 due to suspension of trade) was $3.5-7 million (variable reports).
This demonstrates that there is no barrier to Egypt accepting chilled meat in lieu of live animals. When the Howard government could no longer ignore the Animals Australia footage taken in Egypt the trade in live cattle was suspended in 2006
So why has the Rudd Government decided to recommence the shipment of live cattle into Egypt knowing the stress and suffering it entails for the animals concerned?
The Saudis are quite happy to take the meat when Australia suspends the live trade to that country. So why does Kevin Rudd not permanently suspend the live trade to that country?
To these questions the Rudd government, like those before it, simply has no valid response.
How does the live export trade compare economically with killing the same animals in Australia?
The S G Heilbron Pty Ltd Report (commissioned by the Australian Meat Processor Corporation Limited, April 2000) entitled Impact of the Live Animal Export Sector on the Australian Meat Processing Industry included the following key points:
The live export trade could be costing Australia around $1.5 billion in lost GDP, around $270 million in household income, and around 10,500 lost jobs.
The primary factor driving the profitability of the live export trade is market distortions in favor of live animals. If it were not for these factors, the rising demand for meat in importing countries would have been met by exports of chilled and frozen meat.
The Australian Meat Industry Employee Union (AMIEU) opposes the live export trade, and estimates the live export industry has cost 12,000 meat worker’s jobs and continues to undermine the sustainability of the abattoir industry.
Where to now?
This vile trade has no justification whatsoever, other than to fill the coffers of the few who financially benefit from it, many of them some of Australia’s wealthiest. We will continue to fight against it for as long as it takes. Animals Australia has now joined with RSPCA Australia and two international organizations, The World Society for Protection of Animals and Compassion in World Farming to form a new coalition Handle With Care to expose the cruel nature of this trade to the world. That the trade is cruel has now been proven in Court with the ruling in the WA court against a live export company.
As with the successful international campaigns against mulesing where boycotts of Australian wool overseas soon brought results, this trade may have to be similarly challenged.
Some posters on Webdiary seem to be of the view that those who concern themselves with this obnoxious trade care more about animal suffering than that of their fellow human beings, implying that they should divert their energies and their resources to what they see as more worthy causes. With that I could never agree.
As Ghandi once said, "The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated." One only has to visit some of those countries with a poor human rights record and then look at how they treat their animals to know the truth of that. But are we any better when for profit we ship millions of animals to those countries in the way we do while being fully aware of cruelty to animals in those countries? I say no, we are not.
Anyone interested in helping in the fight against it can go to: Animals Australia or to the new coalition website of Handle With Care.
Warning: You may find the images and the videos on the sites very disturbing.
(Bron: http://webdiary.com.au/)
(Bron foto's: archief Kraaijer)
zaterdag 16 augustus 2008
Bewoners dorpen in tijgerreservaten India worden door staat betaald om te vertrekken...
India pays villages to leave tiger reserves
16-08-2008 ABC News, Australia
India has offered money to villagers to vacate wildlife reserves in a bid to save the country's tigers from extinction, officials said. The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), set up by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, said it was releasing 520 million rupees ($US1.3 million) out of a total of six billion rupees to be disbursed over the next five years.
Each family that volunteers to move out from tiger habitats and state sanctuaries is due to get one million rupees under the scheme. It was not known immediately how many families would receive funds.
The largest sum of 190 million rupees has been set aside to clear out two villages from inside Sariska park near New Delhi where the entire population of 19 tigers was found missing in 2006, presumed slaughtered by poachers.
The move is aimed at "ensuring inviolate areas for the big cats as well as for other wildlife," a NTCA spokesman said.
"This will help decrease man-animals conflict and create inviolate zones for tigers," the spokesman added.
The federal agency swung into action just months after authorities said last year that India's rare Royal Bengal Tiger population had plunged to 1,411, far lower than the 3,700 estimated to be alive five years earlier.
Rajesh Gopal, who heads Project Tiger, a national conservation program, has blamed "poaching, loss of quality habitat and prey" as key reasons for the decline.
Conservationists have long complained that many Indian forestry posts lie vacant and that the small number of staff employed are no match for poachers.
India and China have been under fire from international experts for failing to halt tiger poaching, with conservationists blaming collusion between poachers, government officials and buyers.
Tigers are hunted for their pelts, claws and bones, which are prized in traditional Chinese medicine.
More than 40,000 tigers are believed to have roamed the Indian wild before the subcontinent's independence from British colonial rule.
(Bron: http://www.abc.net.au/)
Dieren Bevrijdings Front Italië bevrijdt konijnen uit beruchte fokboerderij in Abano Terme
Anonymous communique received by La Nemesi magazine:
"The night between the 28th and 29th of july we entered the rabbit farm of Lino Fasolato in Via Appia 98 in Abano Terme (PD). This man has been supplying vivisectors all over Italy for many years and in 1991 he was caught in another dirty business: he was catching stray dogs without license and selling them to labs.
For those who see this farm from the outside it is a shed like many others, for those working in it a job like many others.For the animals concentrated in this hell it is neverending torture. Closed and crowded one on the other in small cages, where they cannot even stand on their feet, stretch the legs or move like every living body needs to do, the rabbits lay here without knowing the reason of such a wasted life: killed 
by boredom, from physical pain, stress and depression, later on by ignorance and cruelty of researchers in labs.
We cannot stop thinking about them: from the first time we entered, during a reconnaissance, their eyes and the conditions have been in our minds: dozens of small babies fallen from the cages into the waste pits, dying in faeces; other crushed by the weight of their brothers or with horrible malformations.
No to torture! No vivisection!
Dedicated to all those rabbits we couldn’t bring out of that hell.
Dedicated to Paola, Daniele and Francesco behind bars in Italian prisons.
Dedicated to Austrian activists… this is also for you!
Fronte di Liberazione Animale"
(Bron: http://directaction.info/)
(Bron foto's: http://directaction.info/images2/Italy_rabbits_Jul08/FrameSet.htm)
(Zie ook:
http://www.mattinopadova.repubblica.it/dettaglio/Blitz-animalista-liberati-4000-conigli/1499256?edizione=EdRegionale
http://www.promiseland.it/view.php?id=2528
http://giornaleanimalista.splinder.com/post/18091822)
Cape Coral, Florida (VS), wil overlast iguana's beperken - Eigenaren moeten vergunning krijgen om groene leguaan te houden
Cape Council to address iguana ‘nuisance’
16-08-2008 By GRAY ROHRER, grohrer@breezenewspapers.com, Cape Coral Daily Breeze, USA
The Cape Coral City Council is set to vote Monday on a resolution asking the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission for help in regulating the Cape’s iguana population.“Such large numbers of iguanas have caused damage to property and created sanitary nuisances within the city,” the resolution reads, in part.
Councilman Bill Deile, who sponsored the resolution, said he hopes it will not only prompt the state to act on the issue, but raise local awareness on how to properly deal with the animals kept as pets.“It’s more or less an awareness thing to get the state to do something about it,” Deile said.
“The city was tracking lizards but in 2003 they stopped because there were so many of them,” Deile said. According to the FWC Web site, http://www.myfwc.com/, the green iguana is a nonnative species to Florida and first appeared in Lee County in the 1990s.
“This species (the green iguana) is extremely popular in the pet trade and is frequently released or escapes, but specimens typically do not survive the winter except in southern Florida,” the Web site reads, in part.The FWC is vague about the iguana’s potential harm to native wildlife. It defines invasive species as those that are “nonnative to the ecosystem under consideration and whose introduction causes or is likely to cause economic or environmental harm or harm to human health,” but lists the iguana’s potential threat to native species as “unknown.”In neighboring Boca Grande, escaped or released iguanas are trapped and killed.
(Bron: http://www.cape-coral-daily-breeze.com/)
(Bron foto: http://www.capecoral.net/)
Kom in actie tegen jacht op haaien voor hun vinnen.....
Please support the cause to stop the finning of these animals that we need so much to survive. Human beings as well as the world alike depend on these animals to keep the oceans ecosystem in check.
Visit
http://www.savingsharks.com/Visit
http://www.sharkwater.com/
or search "help save sharks" on facebook to help out.
They have survived for 450 million years. They control 2/3 of the planet. They are the world's top predator. But they are not our enemy. They're our greatest hope...Why save sharks? What makes them so important?
Species evolving in the oceans over the last 400 million years, have been shaped by their predators, the sharks, giving rise to schooling behavior, camoflage, speed, size and communication. They have survived five major extinctions and now they are being fished out.
Many countries have no sharks left because they are being illegally harvested for their fins and poachers are now fishing sharks from other countries, countries that depend on sharks for food. But no one wants to save sharks, people are afraid of them. Sharks play a critical role in ocean ecosystems. This practice wastes 95-99% of the animal and makes proper management extremely difficult.
The fossil record of sharks extends back over 450 million years - before land vertebrates existed and before many plants had colonised the continents.
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) is considering including two shark species on their protected list. This month, 171 member counties will meet to consider new proposals for restricting trade in threatened species. However, Canada, the United States and New Zealand are among the countries that may oppose the proposal. The meetings occur only once every two years, so if these sharks aren't included on the list now, we may not get the chance to save them again. These countries were three of the first four to ban shark finning, and sharks need their help, again. Both shark species are in danger because they grow slowly, mature late (meaning they only start reproducing between the age of 10-15 years old and only have 1-2 babies a year) so overfishing them is quickly reducing their numbers to incredibly low rates. 100 million sharks are killed each year.
Sharks are caught for their fins. Poachers cut off the fins and dump the bodies overboard. The fins are sold for shark fin soup and though many countries have banned shark-finning, millions of sharks are illegally harvested each year.Sharkfinning is illegal in Costa Rica but shark fins are showing up all over Asia that came from Costa Rica.
Rob Stewart and his crew believe there is a connection between the Taiwanese mafia and all the shark fins turning up in Asia. They started checking it out and this guy had a few places where he knew they would find fins. They started investigating and there were fins everywhere. There were miles of fin operations with thousands of fins drying on rooftops, people bringing in fins. They quickly figured out there was an enormous amount of money coming into the country and there was this whole underground multi-billion dollar industry.
Long-line fishing is a commercial fishing technique that uses hundreds or even thousands of baited hooks hanging from a single line. The length of the line ranges from 1.6km (1 mile) to as long as 100km (62 miles). The lines are set adrift from vessels for a period of 12 to 24 hours. Lines generally run over 2500 hand-baited hooks on a single line. Think about how many sea creatures such as sea turtles, tuna, and dozen other endangered ocean creatures are caught by this method.
Humans kill approximately 26 to 73 million sharks every year, while shark attacks result in approximately five human deaths each year. Many shark deaths are the result of the harvesting of fins for shark fin soup, but large numbers of sharks are also caught accidentally by commercial fisheries. Contrary to popular belief, only a few sharks are dangerous to humans. Major declines in shark stocks have been recorded in recent years - some species have been depleted by over 90% over the past 20-30 years with a population decline of 70% not being unusual.
Jenny middelpunt in VS van twist tussen Dallas Zoo en dierenvrienden...Jenny moet naar nieuwe locatie, maar er is onenigheid over nieuw verblijf
What to Do With Traumatized Elephant Stirs
Up Dallas
15-08-2008 By JAMES C. McKINLEY JR, The New York Times, USA
DALLAS — Jenny has had a hard life, even by elephant standards. She was orphaned at a tender age, stolen from Africa, shipped to America and sold to a circus, where a trainer notorious for his cruelty beat her to coerce her to perform.
The African Safari Park in Puebla plans a new enclosure of five acres for Jenny, but now has about an acre for Asian elephants.
Jenny, a troubled elephant at the Dallas Zoo, being cooled by Reanna Streater and fed treats by Gavin Eastep. The zoo wants to send her to Mexico.
When the Dallas Zoo took her in 22 years ago, she was a mess. For years, she suffered from depression and something like post-traumatic stress disorder, mutilating herself with her tusks, snapping steel cables, slamming her head into walls and requiring heavy medication.
Now, Jenny has become the focus of a boisterous debate about what to do with an aging elephant with a troubled mind. In May, after her latest companion died of heart failure, the zoo quietly made arrangements to send her to the Africam Safari Park in Puebla, Mexico, where she would be placed in a new five-acre exhibit with another female elephant.
But that decision sparked a firestorm in Dallas. Local protesters, world-renowned elephant experts and national animal rights groups are crusading to have her sent to a 2,700-acre sanctuary in Tennessee where 17 other traumatized elephants are kept in seclusion.
“Jenny is a special-needs elephant,” said Margaret Morin, a Dallas nurse who leads Concerned Citizens for Jenny. “She’s unique; she’s afflicted with crippling depression. The elephant sanctuary is the right choice.”
A protest group in Dallas wants to send Jenny to a sanctuary
in Tennessee rather than to a wildlife park in Puebla, Mexico.
Beyond the debate about what to do with Jenny lies a national struggle between zoos and animal rights groups who, frankly, would rather see a world without elephant exhibits. The fight pits a loose coalition of elephant experts and animal rights advocates against the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, a powerful private group based in Maryland that accredits zoos in North America.
Animal rights advocates have long argued that elephants in most zoos lack enough space and, as a consequence, suffer from foot ailments, arthritis and psychological problems.
For its part, the zoo association has clung to its traditions, saying the size of an enclosure matters less than the care elephants receive from zookeepers. It has also tried to keep the 300 elephants in its network of more than 78 zoos from being sent to sanctuaries, where the zoos could no longer use them for breeding.
All of a sudden, Jenny is at the center of this conflict.
The citizens’ group that Ms. Morin leads was formed this summer to hold protests in Dallas against sending Jenny to Mexico. Elephant experts across the country and national animal rights groups have also weighed in, urging that she be sent to the sanctuary. The City Council and The Dallas Morning News have been inundated with letters.
The uproar has put the Dallas Zoo on the defensive. The director, Gregg Hudson, had said in June that sending Jenny to Mexico was a done deal, but now zoo officials are backpedaling.
Mayor Thomas C. Leppert, who could cancel the plan, has artfully ridden the fence. “There is really not a position to take yet,” Mr. Leppert said.
But a spokesman for the zoo, Sean Greene, said Africam Safari Park remained the zoo director’s top choice. Founded in 1972, the Mexican animal park uses the same hands-off, gentle handling techniques that the Dallas Zoo adopted in 1996, after one of Jenny’s worst periods. Indeed, keepers from Dallas helped train the Africam staff several years ago.
The Mexican zoo also plans to acquire another African elephant, to live with Jenny, as well as a bull elephant in the future.
But some Dallas residents say the zoo’s arguments do not hold up. The Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tenn., has 300 acres just for African elephants, and Jenny, who is 32, would be the fourth to arrive, said the founder, Carol Buckley. No one except the staff visits the animals, who range freely.
“Why would we want her last years to be in a drive-through zoo in Mexico when she could have 300 acres in the lush Tennessee countryside?” said Councilwoman Angela Hunt, who has visited both destinations.
The Africam Safari Park in Puebla plans a new enclosure of five acres for Jenny, but now has about an acre for Asian elephants.
Experts in the field say zoo directors are cliquish and tend to move animals to other zoos in their association rather than considering the benefits of a sanctuary, which many zoo officials see as part of an anti-zoo movement. The association can also make or break a zoo director’s career
“If we stripped everything away and say what is in the best interest of Jenny, the sanctuary would win hands down,” said Les Schobert, a retired curator of animals at the Los Angeles Zoo. “But then you have to add in all the politics.”
Amy Camacho, general director of Africam, said the transfer seemed to make sense. Her park, which was recently accredited, was seeking African elephants to strengthen its collection, and the Dallas Zoo had a troubled elephant.
Mike Keele, a curator at the Oregon Zoo who is also chairman of the zoo association’s elephant “species survival program,” signed off on the deal. “I like keeping these elephants within the A.Z.A. where they meet our standards,” Mr. Keele said. “Space is just a catchphrase. It’s what you do with that space.”
Nonsense, say animal rights advocates. No zoo or drive-through safari park can match the peace of the Tennessee countryside.
On a recent sunny afternoon, Jenny stripped branches tossed to her by one of her keepers, Gavin Eastep, who said that Jenny’s mental health had improved in recent years.
“Most of the time she’s pretty calm, pretty relaxed,” Mr. Eastep said.
On a bench facing the steel-cable enclosure, David and Heidi McGuire sat with their two children and marveled at Jenny’s size and the graceful swing of her slow gait. “I would rather her stay in the United States,” Heidi McGuire said. “You just never know what’s going to happen to them down in Mexico.”
Mr. McGuire, a grocer, said, “I hope they are going to get someone to replace her.”
(Bron: http://www.nytimes.com/)
(Bron foto's: New York Times)
Queens (New York, VS) heeft een paars geschilderde duif - Vogel door verf niet in staat te vliegen....
Fowl play: Sicko painst pigeon purple in Queens
15-08-2008 By LISA L. COLANGELO, DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER, New York, USA
We heard it through the grape vine - Queens has a purple pigeon.
The royal-hued bird wasn't born that way, though. Someone with a sick sense of humor - or a problem with pigeons - painted him purple.
"It was terrible," said Joe Mora, an animal lover who rescued the bird Thursday from a Long Island City playground, where onlookers were gawking at the oddly-colored columbine.
"It looks like this was done intentionally ... it could have been blinded," Mora said.
He tried coaxing the lethargic bird to eat while asking anyone and everyone for advice on how to clean paint from feathers and a beak.
Friday, city Animal Care and Control officials transferred the pigeon to Bobby Horvath, a licensed wildlife rehabilitator in Nassau County who has extensive experience caring for injured birds.
"I have never seen anything like it," said Horvath, who is also a New York City firefighter.
"He's flightless at this point. His feathers are completely rigid," he said. The bird can still walk and eat.
Horvath said he hoped the paint didn't seep through the skin. "His beak and mouth and eyes are clear of paint," Horvath said. "That's a positive thing."
Mora said he hopes someone in the neighborhood will come forward with information about the bird. He said he has heard stories about a man in nearby Roosevelt Island who dyed his dog's fur purple.
"If this was intentionally done to the bird, it certainly is animal cruelty," said ASPCA assistant director Joseph Pentangelo.
(Bron: http://www.nydailynews.com/)
Provincie Groningen sluit grenzen voor intensieve veehouderijen - 'Supergrote stallen aantasting landschap. Dieren zijn geen stukken ijzer of steen.'
Provincie Groningen gaat op slot voor intensief
veebedrijf
15-08-2008 Dagblad van het Noorden
Oldehove - Groningen is de eerste provincie in Nederland waar geen nieuwe intensieve veehouderijen meer worden toegelaten. Gedeputeerde staten weren 'megalomane bedrijven die de menselijke maat ver te boven gaan'. Alleen bestaande varkenshouderijen en kippenmesterijen mogen binnen bepaalde grenzen uitbreiden.
"Wij staan niet toe dat familiebedrijven worden weggeblazen door kapitaalkrachtige ondernemers uit Brabant die bezig zijn de bedrijfstak verregaand te industrialiseren", aldus gedeputeerde Marc Calon.
"Dieren zijn geen stukken ijzer of steen", vervolgt hij. "Wat ons betreft, is het geen vrijheid blijheid. Wij stellen grenzen aan de groei en vinden die supergrote stallen een aantasting van het landschap. Daarbij zitten we niet te wachten op plattelandswegen die door extra transport kapot worden gereden", aldus Calon.
Gedeputeerde staten willen niet dat mest- en varkensquota worden overgeheveld naar megabedrijven die al enige tijd op het vinkentouw zitten. De agrarische belangenorganisatie LTO Nederland is eveneens beducht voor de teloorgang van familiebedrijven. Ook is ze bang voor imagoschade als intensieve veehouderij wordt gezien als een industriële activiteit.
Het college maakte het verbod op nieuwe intensieve veehouderijen gisteren bekend bij de presentatie van het nieuwe Provinciaal Omgevingsplan 2009-2013. Het POP gaat over beheer, kwaliteit en invulling van de openbare ruimte.
Om het platteland te behoeden voor verrommeling en verstening, kondigde het college nog andere verregaande maatregelen aan. Het zet de rem op de aanleg van nieuwe bedrijventerreinen. Calon: "Huidige afspraken komen we na maar met uitzondering van de Eemsdelta komt er geen meter bij. Tegen gemeenten zeggen we: ruim eerst de oude rotzooi op, voordat je weilanden opoffert. Knap de huidige bedrijfsterreinen op."
De slagboom gaat ook naar beneden voor aanhangers van een moderne kustverdediging. Met de zeespiegelrijzing in het verschiet, kiezen gedeputeerde staten heel traditioneel voor verhoging en verbreding van bestaande zeedijken. Voorstellen om het water vanuit de zee in te laten en op te bergen, schuift het college terzijde. Mogelijk dat ook de oude slaperdijken als extra slot op de deur in ere worden hersteld.
(Bron: http://www.dvhn.nl/)
vrijdag 15 augustus 2008
Britse bulldog slikt golfbal in in park Bournemouth - Bal operatief verwijderd
Dog swallows golf ball
15-08-2008 Lancashire Evening Post, UK
A Victorian bulldog had to undergo surgery after it swallowed a golf ball in mid-flight.
Owner Marie Dibben took the one-year-old dog Louis to the People's dispensary for Sick Animals (PDSA) centre in Bournemouth, Dorset, after he caught the ball during a walk in a park.
Veterinary surgeon Paul Cossey x-rayed Louis' stomach which showed the ball and that an operation was required to remove it.
(Bron: http://www.lep.co.uk/)
Grote groepen walvishaaien in de Golf van Mexico voor kust Mississippi en Louisiana (VS)
Huge gatherings of whale sharks discovered in
Gulf of Mexico
Scientists as many as 100 whale sharks regularly gather
15-08-2008 By JIM THARPE, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, USA
Scientists have become increasingly convinced that huge gatherings of giant whale sharks occur with clockwork regularity in the northern Gulf of Mexico off the coasts of Mississippi and Louisiana. Scientist Eric Hoffmayer, who is trying to unravel the mysterious “aggregations,” said that as many as 100 of the bus-sized sharks have been spotted feeding in clusters at three separate areas about 40 to 100 miles offshore.
A massive, 40-foot-long whale shark swims off Mississippi coast, near an area where the big fish are believed to congregate in huge numbers to feed on fish eggs.
“We have lots of reports of 30 or 50 animals in one place,” said Hoffmayer, a scientist with the University of Southern Mississippi’s Gulf Coast Research Laboratory in Ocean Springs, Miss. “They are obviously gathering for a reason. But right now we are not sure what that is, or how they know to show up at these spots.”
Whale sharks, a key attraction at the Georgia Aquarium, are the planet’s biggest shark and can grow to more than 45 feet long. They are generally solitary, ocean-roaming creatures. Nobody knows how many exist. But there are a handful of locations around the globe where the polka-dotted, filter-feeding sharks congregate in large numbers to feast on plankton or fish eggs.
The northern Gulf aggregations, which occur from June through September, would be a major new discovery if scientists can confirm that they are occurring at regular, predictable intervals.
Hoffmayer recently discussed his findings with Georgia Aquarium researchers at the Second International Whale Shark Conference on Isla Holbox, Mexico. The downtown Atlanta aquarium is funding whale shark research in the plankton-rich waters off Holbox, a narrow strip of land alongside the Yucatan Peninsula north of Cancun that attracts hundreds of whale sharks each summer in one of the world’s largest aggregations.
Hoffmayer recently discussed his findings with Georgia Aquarium researchers at the Second International Whale Shark Conference on Isla Holbox, Mexico. The downtown Atlanta aquarium is funding whale shark research in the plankton-rich waters off Holbox, a narrow strip of land alongside the Yucatan Peninsula north of Cancun that attracts hundreds of whale sharks each summer in one of the world’s largest aggregations.
Bruce Carlson, the aquarium’s chief science officer, said aquarium researchers are just beginning to talk with Hoffmayer and his associates about their findings. The aquarium is the only fish tank outside Asia to house whale sharks.
“There is already collaboration in terms of information sharing, and there will probably be more in the future,” Carlson said.
“There is already collaboration in terms of information sharing, and there will probably be more in the future,” Carlson said.
Confirming the aggregations is a difficult task. Scientists are confronted with a species that can wander across oceans solo, then suddenly appear in large groups to feed.
Hoffmayer enlists the help of fishermen, oil rig workers and pilots. He asks them to report the time, date and duration of whale sharks sightings, recording the sharks’ GPS coordinates and the number and size of sharks they see.
His group has created its own whale shark Web page, connected to his lab’s Web site, where whale shark observers can record their sightings. Hoffmayer’s group also has tagged a few whale sharks with satellite transmission devices.
Florida-based shark scientist Robert Hueter, whose Holbox research is partially funded by the aquarium, said he is intrigued by the northern Gulf aggregations and thinks they could somehow be related to the sharks he has observed off Holbox.
Hueter and his assistants, John Tyminski and Mexico-based biologist Rafael de la Parra, have placed about 700 visual tags on whale sharks off the Yucatan over the last few years. Those plastic identification tags let scientists know where the sharks were first spotted and — if they are resighted — where they travel to.
Hueter and his assistants, John Tyminski and Mexico-based biologist Rafael de la Parra, have placed about 700 visual tags on whale sharks off the Yucatan over the last few years. Those plastic identification tags let scientists know where the sharks were first spotted and — if they are resighted — where they travel to.
“None of the tags have been resighted in the northern Gulf,” Hueter said. “That doesn’t mean none of the sharks have traveled there. The tags could have been shed or they might not have been seen. But after tagging 700, you think they’d have spotted something up there.”
Hueter said one whale shark tagged off Holbox with a satellite transmitting device did move northwest from the Yucatan to an area off the Texas Coast. Hueter, director of the Center for Shark Research at Sarasota’s Mote Marine Laboratory, said he envisions future collaboration with Hoffmayer on his findings.
“When you talk about a species that travels thousands of miles and knows no political boundaries, collaboration between scientists is essential,” Hueter said.
Hoffmayer’s work has been mostly a labor of love, since he does not have a consistent funding source for his whale shark research. “It’s piecemeal,” he said.
He theorizes the big sharks get together in the northern Gulf to dine on massive concentrations of fish eggs; bonita, skipjack and tuna spawn in the area. Like Hueter, he believes the northern Gulf gatherings could somehow be connected to whale shark aggregations near Holbox, which occur at roughly the same time of year.
The Holbox whale sharks have spawned a booming ecotourism business for the small island, where fisherman have learned how to turn a buck hauling tourists offshore to snorkel with the gentle giants. Whale shark aggregations also have created ecotourism businesses in Australia, the Philippines, Belize and a few other locales.
So far, however, the northern Gulf whale shark gatherings are known only to a few scientists, pilots, charter boat captains and oil rig workers who have glimpsed the natural phenomenon far from the sight of land.
A boat approaching one of the aggregations on a calm day would probably first see the dorsal fins and huge tails of the sharks sticking out of the water. The sharks swim slowly and quietly near the surface, their huge mouths agape to take in tons of seawater from which they collect the tiny marine organisms and fish eggs they eat.
Occasionally, the sharks feed vertically, which means they stop in one spot and angle their bodies at 45-degrees, sucking in water near the surface and hoovering in their tiny prey.
Hoffmayer said that until recently scientists believed whale shark encounters in the northern Gulf were rare. In 2002, he said, scientists discovered two whale sharks in a school of yellowfin, blackfin and skipjack tuna.
“We wanted to know what the whale sharks were doing in a school of tuna,” he said.
Hoffmayer asked some local offshore fishermen if they had ever encountered whale sharks. Their answer stunned him.
“They said, ‘We see whale sharks all the time,”’ he recalled. “These guys see a lot of stuff out there, and they never think to contact us, and we had not been contacting them.”
Hoffmayer published a 2005 paper on the initial sightings and has continued to gather evidence to support his theory, enlisting fishermen and helicopter pilots who serve the Gulf’s 3,500 oil rigs.
Hoffmayer said that in 2006 a tuna fishing boat returned with video of 100 or so whale sharks it happened upon in the northern Gulf. That was two weeks after Hoffmayer and his researchers encountered a group of 16 whale sharks in the same area.
“A third of our sightings are of groups of animals,” he said. “We had a sighting of 30 or so a few weeks ago off the coast of Texas.”
One theory, Hoffmayer said, is that the whale sharks are initially widely dispersed in the northern Gulf, lazily feeding on plankton.
But, he said, they might somehow know when to congregate in fish spawning areas, where they would be able to gorge on nutrient-rich eggs.
Many fish species spawn on certain phases of the moon’s cycle, Hoffmayer said.
Perhaps the big sharks are guided by the lunar phases. But like many things about whale sharks, no one really knows.
But, he said, they might somehow know when to congregate in fish spawning areas, where they would be able to gorge on nutrient-rich eggs.
Many fish species spawn on certain phases of the moon’s cycle, Hoffmayer said.
Perhaps the big sharks are guided by the lunar phases. But like many things about whale sharks, no one really knows.
“How do 30 animals know to show up for what is a 12-hour [spawning] event?” he asked. “Now that’s a wonderful mystery. It’s what we’re trying to figure out.”
(Bron: http://www.ajc.com/)
(Bron foto: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
Hondenfokker in Heemskerk krijgt forse geldboete voor erbarmelijke huisvesting honden
Fikse geldboete voor verwaarlozing honden
15-08-2008 Noordhollands Dagblad
HAARLEM - Vanwege de slechte huisvesting en verzorging van zijn dieren heeft een Heemskerkse (ex-) hondenfokker een geldboete gekregen van 20.000 euro. Een kwart hiervan is voorwaardelijk.
De economische politierechter E. Grosheide liet de geëiste voorwaardelijke gevangenisstraf (zes weken) achterwege. De feiten achtte zij niettemin bewezen. Ook oordeelde zij dat de kennel in strijd met het bestemmingsplan was.
De bevindingen van de getuigen-deskundigen waren niet mals. De hokken waren koud en vies. Het stonk naar urine. Veel van de tachtig aanwezige honden waren besmeurd met uitwerpselen. Een aantal dieren had infectie.
De verdachte bestreed alle aanklachten. Een andere dierenarts had hem verteld dat het wel meeviel. Zijn conclusie: hij moest gewoon hangen. Hij gaat zo goed als zeker in hoger beroep.
(Bron: http://www.noordhollandsdagblad.nl/)
Goed nieuws over aantal bultrugwalvissen mag geen reden zijn om jacht te hervatten
We must defend the whaling ban
Good news about the humpback whale isn't an excuse to resume the killing of it and other, more vulnerable, species
All comments (3)
15-08-2008 Robbie Marsland guardian.co.uk,
At last, a conservation success story. This week the world welcomed news that humpback whales have made a remarkable recovery, following four decades of protection from commercial whaling. But is this really a turning of the tide in the battle to save the world's magnificent whales from extinction?
The Guardian reported earlier this week that the population of adult humpbacks is now estimated to be around 40,000, prompting the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to reclassify the humpback whale from "vulnerable" to "of least concern" in its "red list" of endangered species.
But could this new-found status be of dubious benefit – allowing Japan and other whaling nations to argue it is time once again to turn their harpoons on this species?The threat is real: just last year Japan threatened to kill 50 humpbacks (in addition to over 900 minke whales and 50 endangered fin whales) in the Southern Ocean sanctuary in the waters around Antarctica – defying both the global moratorium on commercial whaling and the existence of an internationally recognised whale sanctuary.
This announcement caused huge outcry as people around the world condemned plans to kill humpbacks – icons of the conservation movement. Famed for their haunting songs and highly visible, energetic leaping displays, they have become one of the mainstays of the fast-growing whale-watching industry.
Following global condemnation, Japan didn't follow through with its threats to slaughter humpbacks last year, although other threatened species were still pursued and hunted down, dying painfully at the end of an explosive harpoon. Whaling is inherently cruel, with many animals taking up to half an hour to die.
In addition to hunting the fin whale, Japan also regularly kills endangered sei whales. Iceland has also hunted fin whales as recently as 2006 and is currently attempting to defy the ban on international trade in whale products. Historically targeted in huge numbers by the world's whaling industry, both species are still at very low levels compared to their pre-whaling era abundance.
The red list should serve as a reminder of the challenges facing all the whale species still struggling to recover from more than three centuries of commercial whaling. The largest animal ever to have lived, the blue whale, is still so rare that it remains on the list as "critically endangered", the highest category of threat.
Today, our planet's great whales face more threats than at any time in history. In addition to commercial whaling, which is cruel and unnecessary, whales and dolphins are threatened by ocean noise pollution, ship strikes, entanglement in fishing gear and climate change.
With all these threats, the ban on commercial whaling needs to be defended. Only then do we stand a chance of a future where whales are once again abundant. Responsible whale-watching – currently a billion dollar industry – is the way forward and commercial whaling should be consigned to a watery grave.
(Bron: http://www.guardian.co.uk/)
(Bron foto: archief Kraaijer)
Boetes voor dieremishandeling fors omhoog
Forse boete bij dierenmishandeling
15-08-2008 Door: DAG
Deze boetes zijn voornamelijk bedoeld om veetransporten te verbeteren. Bedrijven die dieren mishandelen, bijvoorbeeld tijdens veetransporten, kunnen binnenkort maximaal 670 duizend euro boete krijgen.
Voor particulieren komt het maximale bedrag op 67 duizend euro. Dat heeft het kabinet vrijdag besloten. De boetes worden uitgedeeld door inspecteurs van de Voedsel- en Warenautoriteit.
Het gaat om zogeheten bestuurlijke boetes, waarbij politie en justitie niet in actie komen. Tot nu toe moet het Openbaar Ministerie beslissen of vervolging wordt ingesteld in gevallen van dierenmishandeling.
Minister van Landbouw Gerda Verburg (CDA) had de maatregel voorgesteld naar aanleiding van diverse onderzoeken waaruit bleek dat zich bij veetransporten geregeld misstanden voordoen. Dit voorjaar verscherpte ze al de controles op veetransporten.
(Bron: http://www.dag.nl/)
Toekomst Indonesische komodo varaan heel onzeker
Vanishing Dragons
15-08-2008 Sinchew, Malaysia
The Komodo dragon, or varanus komodoensis, the largest of all known lizards, now only survives in the wild on the western side of Flores Island, having become extinct on Padar Island in 2000.
"The Komodo dragon, which once survived on Padar Island, has become totally extinct," Padar Island Komodo National Park Centre supervision head Ramang Isaka told the Jakarta Post in a telephone conversation recently.
Padar Island was teeming with Komodo dragons in the 1980s, but bush fires sparked by poachers have gradually restricted their habitat and foraging areas and might have burned dozens of them alive, he said.
Poachers utilising forest fires have seriously threatened the existence of the species over the last few years, he added.
"The number of Komodo dragons is estimated at 2,500, scattered on Komodo, Rinca and Gili Motang islands," Ramang said, adding that the animals could only survive in areas of dense foliage that had adequate food and water supplies.
"The populations of wild boars and deer have gradually depleted on Padar Island and most of its forested areas have been damaged by fires," he said.
The demise of the Komodo dragon on Padar Island has prompted park authorities to increase their efforts to protect the animal.
"We are still determining the main cause of its extinction on Padar Island.
"According to our plan, we will conduct a survey to ascertain the natural conditions on Padar Island and at the same time make an inventory of their prey in the area," Ramang said.
The park has recorded a marked increase in the number of domestic and foreign visitors over the past few years. As of the end of this year's first semester, the number of visitors stood at 2,800, of which 1,700 were foreign tourists and 1,100 domestic.
The majority of the visitors said the national park was their main tourist destination. Most of the foreign visitors come from the United States, Australia and European countries, including Germany, the Netherlands, France and England. (By YEMRIS FOINTUNA/ The Jakarta Post/ ANN)
(Bron: http://www.mysinchew.com/)
(Bron foto: archief Kraaijer)
Amerikaanse zwarte beer in noorden Mexico bedreigd door woningbouw rond Monterrey
Mexican developers threaten bears
15-08-2008 TVNZ, New Zealand
Housewife Aurora Cela was getting ready for bed one night this summer when her neighbor shouted "Bear, bear!" and a big black animal scampered through her back garden, around her house and down the street. More than 30 American black bears have been sighted in and around the city of Monterrey in northern Mexico since April, some in gardens trying to drink from swimming pools and others in schools and on building sites as they seek food and water.
A housing boom in Monterrey, Mexico's richest city 225 km from Texas, risks destroying the officially endangered bears'
habitats in the surrounding forested mountains. It is also accelerating Mexico's loss of primary forest that are disappearing at one of the world's fastest rates, environmentalists say."When I saw the bear, I felt like he was invading our land, but then I realized that it is us who are invading theirs," said Cela outside her new house, perched on a built-up hilltop, which until a few years ago was home to native oak and pine trees.
Hunting reduced the local black bear population by 80% until the mid-1980s, when they became an endangered species in northern Mexico. Laws passed in the 1990s made it a criminal offense to kill a black bear in Mexico, helping populations recover.
A construction worker was arrested in June for capturing a bear that later died of respiratory arrest caused by stress. The government has handed out leaflets across the city warning people not to feed or harm the animals.
Dwindling population
Despite such laws and actions, the housing boom in an arid region threatens the bears once again, as Monterrey, one of Latin America's top business cities, benefits from close links to the world's biggest economy and US manufacturers locate to the Mexico border due to lower labour costs.
Despite the US housing and credit crisis, Mexican banks have almost no exposure to the slump and are instead enjoying a credit boom on the back of unprecedented economic stability.
"The appearance of the bears in such large numbers in the city is a sign we are cutting up their biological corridors. Groups cannot reach one another and mate, forcing interbreeding and a genetic breakdown," said Angel Tovalin, an environmental consultant to the federal governmental in northern Mexico.
Known as Ursus americanus and native to North America, there are some 600,000 black bears across Canada, the United States and Mexico, but the large populations of northern Mexico are dwindling to a only a few thousand as deforestation and cities destroy their habitats.
The bears, with black fur and brown muzzles, stand often over 6.5 feet (2 meters) tall, live off plants, fruits and nuts, as well as carrion. But deforestation and droughts in northern Mexico can force many bears to seek food in rubbish dumps on the edge of cities such as Monterrey.
Attacks on humans are extremely rare.
President Felipe Calderon has made ending Mexico's acute housing shortage a central focus of this presidency, vowing to build 1 million homes a year.
Nuevo Leon state and its capital Monterrey make up about 7% of that target, or about 70,000 news homes a year.
With excavators gouging out chunks of mountainside and pushing into the national parks that surround Monterrey, activists say corrupt politicians are allowing developers to build in protected areas.
State officials deny any wrongdoing and real estate promoters say they are meeting infrastructure and housing demands in a growing city with the necessary permits.
"We have been demonized as developers but we are working within the law. If building in mountains was such a terrible thing, Switzerland wouldn't exist," said Everardo Garza, head of Nuevo Leon's real estate chamber.
(Bron: http://tvnz.co.nz/)
(Bron foto: TVNZ)
Na drie jaar accepteert Taiwan twee panda's van China voor dierentuin Taipei
Taiwan finally accepts China's goodwill pandas
15-08-2008 Jane Macartney in Beijing, The Times, UK
For once the complex relations between China and the breakaway island of Taiwan will be black and white. Taiwan’s new government has announced it is ready to accept a gift of a pair of pandas that were offered by Beijing as a goodwell gesture nearly three years ago.
The decision to receive the “unification” giant pandas is the latest sign in a warming of relations since President Ma Ying-jeou, of the Nationalist Party that favours reunification with China, took office in May after a strong election victory.
Tuantuan and Yuanyuan, the ’reunification pandas will soon be sent to Taiwan.
The Forestry Bureau, which had held out on the grounds Taiwan did not have the facilities to take care of two of China’s national treasures, gave the all-clear for the Taipei city zoo to provide a home to the bears. The endangered animals had become a political football with Taiwan’s previous government clearly unwilling to accept the furry young pair lest it be seen as edging away from its policy of greater independence for the self-ruled island.
But now Tuantuan and Yuanyuan – whose names together mean “reunion” – will be welcome. China first offered the pair – a male and a female and both cubs at the time -- in 2005 as a gesture of goodwill to push its unification agenda in Taiwan, which Bejing considers its territory.
Related Links
China offers 'cuddly' pandas to Taiwan
Chinese pandas set free for walk on wild side
Former President Chen Shui-bian, who wanted more distance, rejected the bears. His successor, Ma Ying-jeou, has said he welcomes them since taking office on a pro-China platform. Lee Tao-sheng, deputy director general with the Taiwan Forestry Bureau, said: "This is very positive news. Our survey showed that over half the population wants to see the pandas."
China has claimed sovereignty over Taiwan since the Chinese civil war ended in 1949, and Beijing has threatened to use force if the island formally declares statehood. Taipei's city zoo has spent 200 million Taiwan dollars ($3.43m) on equipment and a 765-square-metre panda facility. Its medical facilities and staff training have passed the forestry bureau's checks.
The two pandas, their names chosen in a nationwide competition in China, have lived in their own separate pen at the Wolong reserve in southwestern Sichuan province. Keepers told The Times that they were separated from their peers and kept together to ensure they developed a close relationship in readiness for their life in Taiwan. They were moved to a nearby reserve after the devastating earthquake in May severely damaged the centre, where both were born in China’s successful panda breeding programme.
China now says it has some 1,590 pandas, most living in the mountains and bamboo forest of the rugged southwest.
(Bron: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/)
(Bron foto: The Times)
Nep (houten) coyote's in Hammond (Indiana, VS) om eenden en ganzen af te schrikken - Houten coyote's blijken echter automobilisten af te schrikken....
Fake coyotes fooling the motorists, not the geese
15-08-2008 The Modesto Bee, California, USA
HAMMOND, Ind. — Phony coyotes set up to discourage ducks and geese from gobbling up seeds and fresh shoots from wetlands plants didn't fool the fowl, but humans were another matter. Hammond Port Authority Director Milan Kruszynski said his office has fielded several calls from passing motorists who mistook the two-dimensional cutouts on islands in Wolf Lake for dogs.
"We've been getting calls from neighbors and people driving by, 'There's a dog trapped on the island!'" Kruszynski said.
A hand-made coyote decoy stands among a gaggle of geese at Forsythe Park in Hammond, Ind., Monday Aug. 11, 2008. A number of the decoys have been used in the area, hoping to keep the hungry geese away from grass and other plants.
AP Photo
AP Photo
Kruszynski said he has also been contacted by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and a city official who was taken out by boat to inspect the decoys. He didn't identify the official.
The decoys were placed on the islands beginning about two years ago by an Army Corps of Engineers contractor to help scare off ducks and geese that otherwise might harm wetlands plantings. The geese generally uncover the ruse within a few weeks, the Post-Tribune of Merrillville reported Tuesday in a story on its Web site.
"The geese are very wary of them, then eventually they figure it out," said Jon Dittmar, a spokesman for contractor J.F. New. "They're very striking when you first come upon them. I could see how it would be for someone driving by at 70 miles per hour."
Meanwhile, the wetlands plants on the islands have reached the point where they can thrive without the decoys' protection, so the coyotes soon will be removed, Dittmar said.
"They don't seem to be doing any good anymore and it appears they are upsetting some people," he said.
(Bron: http://www.modbee.com/)
(Bron foto: The Modesto Bee)
Update gevangen Britse SHAC-activist Dan Amos...
SHAC-UK Prisoner Dan Amos - August Update
14-08-2008 Infoshop News
Dan has had the news that hopefully in 5 weeks he will be moved to HMP Winchester for the start of the trial (which is not essential that he goes to). He will then stay at HMP Winchester for the remainder of his prison sentence, which is brilliant considering HMP Exeter is at least 150 miles from any of his friends and family.
(He also said he has a brilliant supply of envelopes, paper and stamps, so no more is needed at the moment). Although he would like some Notecards, particually ones with cute animals on - As his close friend Natasha Avery has some and he's jealous =P
Remember you can also send donations to Dan by either as a postal order, made payable to "The Govenor" and write "Daniel Amos (VN7818)" on the back and send to Dan's main prison address. Or as a cheque, made payable to "The Govenor" with "Daniel Amos (VN7818) on the back.
We are also currently setting up a paypal account which supporters can use to donate money to help out Dan while he is in prison, we will tell you when it's up and running :)
Thank you all so much for your overwhelming support.
Support Dan MySpace
(Bron: http://news.infoshop.org/)
donderdag 14 augustus 2008
Internationale dierenactivisten Anti Dierproeven Coalitie nemen GlaxoSmithKline en Philip Morris in België onder vuur
Des activistes anti-vivisection protestent devant GSK
14-08-2008 RTL, Belgium
Une quinzaine de manifestants de la Coalition anti-vivisection (CAV) manifestent jeudi matin devant les installations du groupe pharmaceutique GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) à Rixensart (Brabant wallon). Ils réclament la fin des expérimentations animales dans les laboratoires de la société.
Cette action à Rixensart est la première étape d'une matinée qui s'achèvera par une manifestation devant le ministère fédéral de la Santé, à Bruxelles, de 11H30 à 12H30. Là, les membres de la CAV réclameront une loi pour interdire les tests sur les animaux, notamment dans l'industrie du tabac. Encadrés par la police locale, les manifestants qui se sont installés face au siège de GSK à Rixensart brandissent des photos d'animaux de laboratoire et conspuent les travailleurs et livreurs qui se rendent ou sortent de l'entreprise.
"Assassins !", "Shame on you !" (honte à vous), "Animal killers !" (tueurs d'animaux), crient-ils dans des parlophones lorsque les voitures et les camions entrent dans l'enceinte gardée de l'entreprise. La manifestation est bruyante, mais se déroule sans incident.
Selon les manifestants de la CAV (http://www.contrevivisection.org/), GSK est l'une des plus importantes entreprises en Belgique qui teste ses produits sur des animaux, notamment des singes, des chiens et des lapins. Ces tests se déroulent précisément dans les laboratoires installés à Rixensart. La CAV affirme aussi que GSK est aussi un client important du plus grand laboratoire de vivisection d'Europe, Huntingdon Life Sciences.
Parlant de "torture animale", les membres de la CAV estiment que des alternatives existent mais que l'industrie pharmaceutique ne les met pas en oeuvre pour des raisons de coût. "Les scientifiques ont le savoir nécessaire pour mettre en oeuvre d'autres solutions, mais les entreprises considèrent que les tests sur des animaux vivants donnent des résultats plus rapides. Et comme pour elles, le temps, c'est de l'argent, ces sociétés préfèrent continuer ces tests", indique sur place Danny Flies, au nom de la CAV.
La manifestation se poursuivra à Rixensart jusqu'aux environs de 10 heures. Les manifestants se rendront ensuite à Bruxelles, rue du Commerce, pour protester devant le cabinet de la ministre de la Santé publique, Laurette Onkelinx. Ils devraient y manifester de 11H30 à 12H30.
Selon les manifestants de la CAV (http://www.contrevivisection.org/), GSK est l'une des plus importantes entreprises en Belgique qui teste ses produits sur des animaux, notamment des singes, des chiens et des lapins. Ces tests se déroulent précisément dans les laboratoires installés à Rixensart. La CAV affirme aussi que GSK est aussi un client important du plus grand laboratoire de vivisection d'Europe, Huntingdon Life Sciences.
Parlant de "torture animale", les membres de la CAV estiment que des alternatives existent mais que l'industrie pharmaceutique ne les met pas en oeuvre pour des raisons de coût. "Les scientifiques ont le savoir nécessaire pour mettre en oeuvre d'autres solutions, mais les entreprises considèrent que les tests sur des animaux vivants donnent des résultats plus rapides. Et comme pour elles, le temps, c'est de l'argent, ces sociétés préfèrent continuer ces tests", indique sur place Danny Flies, au nom de la CAV.
La manifestation se poursuivra à Rixensart jusqu'aux environs de 10 heures. Les manifestants se rendront ensuite à Bruxelles, rue du Commerce, pour protester devant le cabinet de la ministre de la Santé publique, Laurette Onkelinx. Ils devraient y manifester de 11H30 à 12H30.
Ils ont pris note il y a quelque temps de la position de la ministre fédérale, qui a parlé d'interdire les tests sur les animaux pour l'industrie du tabac, ce que la CAV considère comme une victoire dans le cadre de sa campagne menée contre l'entreprise Philip Morris, qui pratique ce genre de tests à Louvain. Mais ne voyant pas encore l'engagement de la ministre traduit dans une loi, les activistes de la cause animale iront réclamer qu'un texte légal soit élaboré au plus vite.
(Bron: http://www.rtlinfo.be/)
(Bron: http://www.rtlinfo.be/)
(Bron foto's: ADC, eigen foto's)
GlaxoSmithKline dierproefcentrum in Rixensart (België) krijgt bezoek dierenactivisten Anti Dierproeven Coalitie
Protest tegen dierenproeven bij farmabedrijf GSK
14-08-2008 De Morgen, Belgium
Een vijftiental manifestanten van de Anti Dierproeven Coalitie hebben deze voormiddag geprotesteerd bij de vestiging van farmabedrijf GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) in het Waals-Brabantse Rixensart. De manifestanten eisten de stopzetting van de proeven en tests op dieren in de laboratoria van het bedrijf.
Apen en honden
Volgens de Anti Dierproeven Coalitie is GSK een van de belangrijkste bedrijven in België die tests uitvoeren op dieren. In de vestiging in Rixensart worden tests uitgevoerd op apen, honden en konijnen. Volgens de coalitie is GSK ook een van de belangrijkste klanten van Huntingdon Life Sciences, het grootste dierproevenlaboratorium in Europa.
Onkelinx
Na de actie in Rixensart hebben de dierenrechtenactivisten van 11.30 uur tot 12.30 uur verzamelen geblazen aan het kabinet van minister van Volksgezondheid Laurette Onkelinx aan de Brusselse Wetstraat. Daar pleiten de manifestanten voor een wettelijk verbod op testen op dieren.
De coalitie is wel tevreden dat Onkelinx voordien al een ballonnetje opliet om dergelijke testen in de tabaksindustrie te verbieden. Zo voerde de organisatie eerder al acties tegen tabaksproducent Philip Morris, die dergelijke testen uitvoert in Leuven. (belga/svm)
(Bron: http://www.demorgen.be/)
(Bron: http://www.demorgen.be/)
(Bron foto's: ADC, eigen foto's)
Belgische kamerleden willen dierproeven tot minimum in aantal beperken - Bekendmaking op actiedag Anti Dierproeven Coalitie
Open Vld wil aantal dierproeven tot minimum
beperken
14-08-2008 De Morgen, Belgium
Open Vld-kamerleden Katia delle Faille en Hilde Vautmans hebben een resolutie ingediend die de transparantie bij dierproeven moet verhogen. Met het voorstel wil Open Vld het aantal dierproeven tot een strikt minimum beperken en alles duidelijk wettelijk kaderen.
Katia delle Faille.
De Anti Dierproeven Coalitie protesteert vandaag tegen dierproeven bij het farmabedrijf GSK (GlaxoSmithKline) en bij het kabinet van minister van Volksgezondheid Laurette Onkelinx. De manifestanten eisten de stopzetting van de proeven en tests op dieren in de laboratoria van het bedrijf.
Ethische commissie
Met een voorstel van resolutie wil de Open Vld de transparantie rond dierproeven verhogen. Een ethische commissie ziet toe op alle proeven die in laboratoria gebeuren op gewervelde dieren. "De resolutie vraagt dat deze commissie in de toekomst wordt versterkt met twee externe en onafhankelijke leden en dat de transparantie over de genomen beslissingen verhoogd wordt. Zo kunnen bezorgde burgers en dierenrechtenorganisaties hiervan kennis nemen", aldus nog Vautmans.
In 2006 werden 756.715 dieren gebruikt voor dierproeven in Belgische laboratoria, waarvan 3.500 door de tabaksindustrie. Dit is een stijging met 5,2 procent ten opzichte van 2005. (belga/svm)
(Bron: http://www.demorgen.be/)
(Bron foto: De Morgen)
woensdag 13 augustus 2008
Treinen in India rijden met regelmaat wilde dieren als luipaarden en olifanten dood...
Train kills leopard in North Bengal
13-08-2008 Merinews, India
A leopard was killed by a speeding train late on Monday night in North Bengal. Not for the first time. Here animals die on the tracks with alarming regularity. The state government though, is not alarmed and ignores the loss of precious wildlife.
WHEN POACHERS fail to make a kill, the Indian Railways steps in and does a perfect job. Late on Monday night (August 11) the Down Alipurduar-Jhajha Express ran over and killed a leopard. It happened in the Shongachi tea estate area in Malbazaar in North Bengal. The battered body of what was once a handsome, full grown six-year-old male leopard was discovered lying on the tracks by track-men on duty.
“The dead animal
was handed over to the forest department, it is not clear if the train had killed it,” DRM of Alipurduar, Anandkishore Jha is quoted in the media as saying. Although he admits that trains do move at high speed in the area despite instructions to slow down.The forest department is less ambiguous. “The leopard was killed by a train,” divisional forest officer, Tapas Das, unequivocally states.
Leopards move fast. It would not be killed unless the train was moving fast. This was quite obviously not the work of a poacher. Poachers carry away the skin, nails and teeth. In this case, according to forest officials, none of the body parts of the dead animal was missing.
This is not the first time such a tragedy has occurred. In North Bengal wild animals are regularly hit and killed by trains at night. Last year alone, seven elephants, one Bengal Tiger and two leopards were killed by trains speeding through the region.
Indian Railways can claim a perfect score of 29 animals they have mowed down since 2003. That year, railway tracks running through Mahananda, Chapramari, Jaldapara and Buxa forests in North Bengal were converted into broad gauge. The railway tracks cross animal corridors within the forest area. Conversion meant trains would move at high speed, which could be fatal to the local wildlife.
Environmentalists and wildlife organisations protested against the conversion. But to no avail. The conversion went ahead. The Indian Railways was urged to instruct train drivers to slow down while crossing the forest. The request fell on deaf ears and trains continue rushing headlong through forest land killing tigers, elephants, leopards and pythons.
Driving a train slowly over a specific stretch is not a herculean task. Mustering the political will to do so is, especially if it is the government of West Bengal. This will is lacking both on part of the Indian Railways and the state government. Other states have managed to ensure trains move slowly through forests and have even managed to reduce the number of animal deaths by trains. In these states government authorities have opened talks and negotiations and managed to convince the Indian Railways. The government of West Bengal is yet to wake up to these concepts.
At a time when the issues of ecology, wildlife and environment top the list of priorities of administrations across the globe, such blatant callousness on the part of the Indian Railways and the government of West Bengal is a sure pointer to their levels of backwardness and foresight. It is a pity, what was once a progressive government has chosen to regress in matters of wildlife and environment.
Meanwhile, leopards will continue to frequent the area, cross and re-cross tracks for the odd chickens or ducks they can snatch from tea estate workers housing quarters lining the railway lines. And every time they do that, they will be exposed to the risk of death by a speeding train.
(Bron: http://india.merinews.com/)
(Bron foto: Merinews)
Brit moet mogelijk cel in voor verwaarlozing 18 konijnen in tuinschuur Herne Bay
Man could be jailed after rabbits found in squalor
13-08-2008 Kent Online, UK
Rabbits were kept in such squalid conditions that most had to be put down after being rescued by the RSPCA. The man who had the 18 animals in a garden shed has been warned he could be sent to prison. Cantebury magistrates were told that most of the animals owned by 63-year-old David Tutt were suffering from a variety of conditions, including skin and eye infections.
They were found at his home in Mickleburgh Avenue, Herne Bay, during an RSPCA inspection last September.
But the court also heard that he had been issued with a formal warning by the charity following a visit the previous year.
Tutt admitted 11 offences of causing the rabbits unecessary suffering by neglecting them and failing to get veterinary care.
He also pleaded guilty to keeping 18 rabbits in unsuitable conditions.
Andrew Clarke, prosecuting for the RSPCA, said the charges were brought under the new provisions of the Animal Welfare Act.
He said: “The RSPCA first became concerned about the conditions the rabbits were being kept in November, 2006, when an inspector attended. Mr Tutt was issued with a warning and signed an agreement agreeing to improve their living conditions.
“The inspector returned in early in 2007 but Mr Tutt was verbally abusive and refused her entry.”
He added: “A vet who attended in September found there was poor air quality in the shed and no evidence the rabbits, which were kept in hutches, had access to fresh air.
“As a result of their condition, most of them had to be put down.”
Mr Clarke said that when interviewed, Tutt said he fed and stroked the rabbits every day and thought their living conditions were “basically sound”.
But he later admitted they were being kept in an unsuitable environment and he had been discouraged from taking them to a vet because of the cost.
Mr Clarke said the RSPCA would be seeking a court order banning Tutt from owning animals in the future.
David Nelson, defending, called for a probation report before magistrates considered sentence.
The bench agreed but said it should consider custody as an option because of the severity of the case.
The hearing was adjourned until September 3.
(Bron: http://www.kentonline.co.uk/)
(Bron foto: Kent Online)
Bijtschildpad gevonden langs A2 in Sittard
Grote bijtschildpad gevonden in Sittard
13-08-2008 L1
In Sittard is dinsdag een zogenaamde bijtschildpad gevonden. Het gaat om een gevaarlijk beest van ruim 70 centimeter groot. De schildpad kan met gemak een vinger afbijten en eet ook vlees. Vooral voor kinderen is het dier zeer gevaarlijk.
Het beest werd gevonden op een weg langs de A2. Oorspronkelijk komen de dieren voor in Midden- en Noord-Amerika.
In ons land worden ze vaak door mensen aangeschaft als huisdier. Het beest is opgevangen door het Dierenhulpcentrum Sittard. Daar zal het minstens twee weken blijven.
Bij het Dierenhulpcentrum gaan ze er vanuit dat het dier is gedumpt door de eigenaar. Het kan ook zijn dat de bijtschildpad is ontsnapt.
(Bron: http://www.l1.nl/)
Oostenrijkse dierenactivist Chris na twee maanden vrij!
One Animal protectionist Released from Remand!
13-08-2008 VGT, Austria
Is the nebulous construction of a “criminal organisation” beginning to fall apart? Following a successful appeal from his lawyer, the wrongly imprisoned animal protectionist artist from Tirol was released today from remand in Wr. Neustadt.
Chris Moser suffered extreme anxiety and depression due to the separation from his wife and three children. The remand judge lifted the remand as the “risk of reoffendeing“ was no longer present.
However, the public prosecutor has already appealed against the judge’s decision in an attempt to futher separate Chris from his family. A decision is expected in two weeks. Meanwhile, at least, Chris and his family are reunited!
The other nine innocent animal protectionists remain in custody.
"This is the first indication that the house of cards construed as a “criminal organisation“ is beginning to fall apart“ said Harald Balluch of the VGT.
(Bron: http://www.vgt.at/presse/news/2008/news20080814_en.php)