Posted on February 20, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Joaquin Phoenix, Amazon Watch & Extinction Rebellion: ‘Guardians of Life’
We partnered with Oscar nominee Joaquin Phoenix, and Extinction Rebellion for a short film urging action on the climate and ecological emergency!
Phoenix is joined in the film, entitled Guardians of Life, by an array of Hollywood stars including Rosario Dawson, Matthew Modine, Q’orianka Kilcher, Oona Chaplin, Adria Arjona, and Albert Hammond Jr. of The Strokes.
Right now, indigenous peoples and their lands are increasingly under threat from vast economic exploitation across the Amazon — a rainforest vital for the health of our planet.
The Amazon removes about 5% of total emissions caused by human activity. Without the Amazon, the planet would be warming faster than scientists already observe.
But, the Amazon rainforest is at RISK.
Just last year, over 11.2 M hectares in the Brazilian and Bolivian Amazon burned. New analysis of extensive satellite imagery revealed that many of the fires were actually burning the remains of areas that were recently deforested.
In Brazil, the threats are escalating: Bolsonaro’s Administration recently announced plans to hand out indigenous lands to the very industries responsible for deforestation. In the Brazilian Amazon, those industries are land speculation, mining, and agribusiness, specifically soy and cattle.
Companies in these industries are bankrolled by global financial institutions like BlackRock,JP Morgan Chase, HBSC, BNP Paribas and Vanguard. They too, are responsible for the Amazon’s destruction.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. According to scientific studies, indigenous lands are “currently the most important barrier to Amazon deforestation.”
Indigenous peoples are the best protectors of the Amazon rainforest, so protecting indigenous rights is instrumental.
The Amazon Rainforest is known to be a home to millions of different species, from plants, to animals, to even some indigenous tribes. It’s been referred to as the Earth’s lungs, because it produces 20% of the oxygen in it’s atmosphere.
About half the size of the United States of America, the Amazon Rainforest has a huge impact on slowing down global warming, and the world as a whole.
But recently, wildfires have gotten so out of control, cities have been completely blacked out, with smoke from the fires covering their skies. It seems as of now, the Brazilian government and president Bolsonaro isn’t stepping in to slow down the fires, and up until quite recently, news stations weren’t covering the story either.
In hopes of raising awareness about how important the Amazon Rainforest really is, we decided to answer the question:
My Comment: While the fire in Amazonas destroyed the lives of animals and humans, Bolsonaro specifically advised all presidents not to interfere in the internal affairs of his country.
“My country, my forest,” he said demonstratively against his critics.
It is by no means “his forest”, not even that of his corrupt party.
There are also many people in Brazil who are interested in the conservation of the rainforest.
It is the forest of the Brazilians and above all of the aborigines and animals that have protected areas there and whose livelihood is being illegally destroyed in favor of some private profit bandits.
But above all isthe human forest, which is based on this “green lung” and thus ensures our survival.
There, animal and plant species are irrevocably eradicated. These are missing from now on and will never come back. Part of our common heritage is lost just because some powerful fascists want to enrich themselves.
The rainforest in the Amazon region has also been cleared in the past, but never to the same extent as under the fascist and traitor Bolsonaro.
Humanity has nothing more than adaptation anyway, and it is feared that we can no longer save anything from now on, it is simply too late.
We just have to try to live with the damage we have caused ourselves and that will make our lives and the lives of the next generations hell.
Following years of protest against one of Indonesia’s cruelest forms of “entertainment,” the country’s traveling dolphin circuses are officially banned via the Ministry of Environment and Forestry.
The mobile shows force wild dolphins to perform for the “pleasure” of the public by starving them and making the poor creatures carry out unnatural routines to earn small morsels of fish.
The dolphins perform these routines over and over again in tiny pools of water so highly chlorinated that the splashes can sting the eyes of audience members. With music blaring in the background, the frightened animals jump through hoops blazing with fire.
After the shows are over, the innocent dolphins are locked in what animal welfare group Dolphin Project describes as “coffin-like boxes” for days and transported in trucks from event to event throughout the country.
In a major victory for these beautiful creatures, on February 5, the ministry decided not to renew permits for any traveling dolphin circus shows, putting them out of business for good.
In a letter to CNN Indonesia, Indra Explotasia, the head of the engineering center of the ministry, wrote that permits for all dolphin shows taking place outside of “a conservation institution or in a traveling dolphin demonstration” had expired and would not be renewed.
Despite the monumental success achieved in shutting down these shows, there is still work to be done. Harmful dolphin performances remain legal at “conservation institutions,” including zoos and safari and animal parks.
Posted on February 20, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Dear Mark
Cheltenham Racecourse is one of Britain’s most deadly. It is home to the notorious Cheltenham Festival (10-13 March 2020). Three horses died at last year’s Festival, and seven the previous year.
It is imperative to let the public know how dangerous this event is for horses, so please order some of our new leaflets and distribute them (outside your local train station or in your town centre) ahead of the event.
Take action: Order leaflets to give to friends or colleagues who may bet on the Festival
Posted on February 19, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Vegan News from Mercy for Animals:
KFC Expands Beyond Fried Chicken Trial
Plant-based company Beyond Meat just announced plans to test an updated version of its Beyond Fried Chicken at about 66 Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants! Lucky locations include Charlotte, North Carolina; Nashville, Tennessee; and Kentucky. Get the details.
Yogurtland Launches Dairy-Free Flavor
Nationwide frozen treat company Yogurtland just added its first plant-based frozen yogurt flavor! Available for a limited time, the completely vegan Salted Chocolate Soufflé is made with coconut milk, cocoa powder, and salt. Get the scoop.
Silk Debuts Heavy Whipping Cream
Whipped into a delicious dessert topping, added to soups for creaminess, or even made into your own dairy-free ice cream or coffee creamer, this new product presents endless possibilities. Find it near you.
Posted on February 19, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
“At 4.00 pm Saturday 9th February,1991 Mike Hill became the first hunt saboteur to be killed whilst trying to protect wildlife. Mike was only 18 and for two years lived and breathed animal rights, not just dogs and cats but every living creature.
He was a vegan, worked at both Heavens Gate Sanctuary and Freshfields Animal Rescue Centre and was an active sab with Yeovil sabs and Merseyside sabs.
Mike was to nice a person for this world. There was no hurt nor malice in his soul. He thought good of everyone and everything. He was quite, unassuming, softly spoken and gentle.
He lived and died for his beliefs.
The facts
Hunt Saboteur, Mike Hill, was killed on the 9th of February 1991 at a meet of the Cheshire Beagles.
Towards the end of the day’s hunting, with no kill under his belt, the huntsman boxed up his hounds in a small blue trailer being towed by an open-top pick-up truck.
The kennel huntsman, Alan Summersgill, with another man, jumped into the pick-up and, on impulse, three sabs who were nearby, jumped onto the back of it to prevent them driving the pack to another location to continue hunting.
Summersgill drove off at high speeds down winding country roads for 5 miles with the terrified sabs clinging onto the back. It is thought that Mike, jumped from the pick-up as it slowed to take a bend.
He failed to clear the truck properly, and was caught between the truck and the trailer, which crushed him.
Mike died where he lay on the road.
Despite the thud, and the screams of the other sabs, Summersgill continued driving for a further mile. The truck only came to a halt when one of the sabs smashed the rear window of the cab.
The sab was hit with a whip as he tried to stop the truck. Once it had stopped one sab ran back to Mike’s prone body while the other ran to a nearby house to call for an ambulance.
Summersgill drove off.
He later handed himself in at a police station. No charges were brought against him and in a travesty of justice, a verdict of ‚Accidental Death‘ was brought at the inquest.
When the ban on hunting came in, Summersgill was still hunting hares.
No action was taken against 53-year-old hunter Tony Ball,the murderer of Tom Worby. Mike Hill’s killer,Alan Summersgill, was also acquitted. In both cases there was a ridiculous process, the verdict was: “Accidental death”!
When it comes to hunter crimes, the courts show shamelessly how cooperative they are with the hunter caste.
On the other hand, these two cases show that those who regularly shoot innocent animals lose their compassion and respect for people!
Hunting means systematic dehumanization and brutalization! Hunters are walking time bombs for humans and animals! This bloody pleasure for psychopaths must finally end!
Posted on February 18, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Received anonymously:
13th February in Kent south East UK
Little Oakhurst in Kent, UK, was visited once again. For a while we have been keeping an eye on the wellbeing of the dog used as a shepherd’s tool to exploit the sheep.
After hearing Tracey’s sentencing by the judge and not happy with the fact that she is still allowed to keep two dogs and a cat, we decided to pay a visit to her farm.
It was of no surprise to find the collie stuck in the mud, locked in a cage without any shelter, food or water.
Another of Tracy’s victims shoved in the barn in what we assume was an attempt to continue the abuse away from prying eyes.
Well Tracy, we have eyes everywhere. Even as you sit in prison and long after you come home we will still be watching you.
We want to see every single animal taken away from that place and go somewhere they will be respected and never neglected again.
They deserve their freedom with no threat of slaughterhouses or cold muddy cages.
Seeing as the justice system failed to help this animal, just like so many others, we decided that the dog should come with us and spend the rest of their life in a safe and comfortable environment.
Although it was obvious to us, it never fails to amaze that even with Tracey locked up in prison, the animals in the farm still suffer.
Luckily for that dog, they will never be used again as a tool to exploit other animals. They will never again have to endure life in a cage, mud up to their knees and no companionship.
They will be able to express the love they surprisingly still have for humans however they need and they will receive love back.
Sadly we were unable to locate the second dog and the cat that were also allowed by the judge to stay under Tracey’s precarious ‘care’. No one else should suffer because of the acts of that horrible human.
Banning the import and export of big game hunting trophies would recognise the destructive impact European powers have had on wildlife in former African and Asian colonies, Sir Ranulph Fiennes has said.
Speaking to the Guardian, the veteran British explorer said hunting endangered species such as rhinos, elephants and lions to keep their body parts as trophies should be viewed with the same scepticism as Chinese traditional medicine in terms of the damage it does to biodiversity.
The 75-year-old explorer, who spent a large part of his childhood in South Africa, has called for trophy hunting to be “stopped country by country” and said efforts to halt the extinction of wildlife around the world were hypocritical while big game hunting was still allowed.
Reflecting on his early years in Cape Town and the influence of the British empire on trophy hunting, Fiennes said: “Just as much as the Belgians in the Congo and the French elsewhere, they unleashed the plague of persecuting animals – not like the locals did to eat, but purely for the pleasure of killing. That started the devastating damage to many, many wonderful species.”
Comparing trophy hunting with the demand for ingredients such as powdered rhino horn in traditional medicine in Asia, he added: “It’s not medically proven in any way. And yes, it goes on. China is particularly guilty, as are South Korea and many other countries in that area.
“You’ve got the empire lot and the weird medical quack lot both going on to this current day and it’s got to be stopped country by country. We can stop it in the UK at least and thereby feel slightly less guilty because of our ancestors.”
Fiennes’s comments come during a consultation by the British government on applying controls to trophy hunting, including a proposal to ban imports, that was laid out in the Queen’s speech. In the wake of the death of Cecil the lion in 2015, France, Netherlands and Australia introduced bans on the import of lion trophies.
Last year, the Guardian revealed lion bones, leopard skulls and an ottoman chair’s elephant leather were among the 74 rare animal body parts legally brought into the UK in 2018.
Under international rules overseen by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), trophies can be moved around the world if they do not affect the survival of a species.
Fiennes said: “Bearing in mind that climate change is helping to remove animals and in 50 years time probably humans as well, now is the time for us to get into a position without being hypocritical.
“We are all hoping that Boris will see that cruelty is what we’re talking about – bullying bastards are involved and people who are vain sticking lovely dead animals on their walls.”
In America, Donald Trump has previously spoken out against big-game trophy hunting despite Donald Trump Jr being a keen hunter. A week-long “dream hunt” with the US president’s son was auctioned off earlier this month at an annual trophy hunting convention organised by Safari Club International (SCI), where it went for $150,000. Another lot offered the chance to shoot an elephant on a 14-day trip to Namibia.
Supporters of trophy hunting such as SCI argue that the practise supports conservation efforts for endangered wildlife. The organisation said it had written to the governments of Botswana, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe in relation to the proposed trophy hunting import ban in the UK.
When contacted by the Guardian about the trophy hunting consultation that ends on 25 February, a Defra spokesperson said: “Following the pre-election and Christmas periods, we are extending the trophy hunting consultation by one month to ensure all interested parties are able to have their say.”
Sir Ranulph Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes, 3rd Baronet, OBE (born 7 March 1944), commonly known as Ranulph Fiennes (/ˈrænʌlfˈfaɪnz/), and sometimes as Ran Fiennes, is a British explorer and holder of several endurance records. He is also a writer, poet and co-creator of Sir Ranulph Fiennes’ Great British Rum.
Fiennes served in the British Army for eight years, including a period on counter-insurgency service while attached to the Army of the Sultanate of Oman. He later undertook numerous expeditions and was the first person to visit both the North and South Poles by surface means and the first to completely cross Antarctica on foot. In May 2009, at the age of 65, he climbed to the summit of Mount Everest.
According to the Guinness Book of World Records in 1984, he was the world’s greatest living explorer. Fiennes has written numerous books about his army service and his expeditions as well as a book defending Robert Falcon Scott from modern revisionists.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off on UK: British Explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes labels trophy hunters ‘Bullying Bastards’ and calls for UK import ban.
Posted on February 18, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
After more than 150 years we have free wolves in the Federal Republic again! The wolf, which was exterminated in Germany and persecuted for centuries, was allowed to return.
If we leave the animals in peace, they will stay with us and will be of great benefit to us.
However, the hunters have a huge lobby, are represented in large numbers in the German Parliament and are best fraternized with the agricultural lobby. Both hunters and animal farm keepers demand that the wolf be shot. And they did it! Farmers and hunters were able to prevail again.
Last week, the Federal Council approved the law, with passed by the german parliament in December 2019 from the Environment Minister Svenja Schulze(SPD, Social Democratic Party).
According to this law, wolves can be shot in the future if “serious damage” has been caused to livestock farmers, and even if it is not found lets which wolf attacked or killed the “farm animal”.
The wolf should be included in hunting law.
Even in the future, it will be permitted to shoot wolves in the affected area until attacks on herds or individual animals stop – even if an entire rudder thus eliminated.
Image: Brandenburg, Germany
“There is finally legal certainty for hunters who shoot a wolf from a problematic pack”, Dammann said.
However, he demands that the hunters remain anonymous (!!!) This is the only way to protect them from attacks by radical animal rights activists.
If a hunter killed a wolf, “then he will pack that wolf in a vehicle and place it on the verge of a busy road, where the wolf will be found relatively quickly.”
That would be a license for every hunter to shoot wolves.
That is the aim of the hunters, to shoot the wolves free … nothing else.
They are really criminal, insane killers.
In 2018, 2,067 “livestock” animals were torn from wolves. 1,656 sheep fell victim to the wolves due to poor pasture security.
In 2018, 771 million farm animals died in our slaughterhouses. 23,257 living beings were sheep and lambs.
“The greatest danger to lambs is not the wolf, but Easter”
Since sighting the first wolves in Germany, 1.1 million euros have been compensated for them.
In 2016 there was 682 million compensation for traffic accidents with game.
Is it still safe for us in our forests?
Approximately 40 deaths from hunting weapons in Germany each year.
The number of deads people by wolves in Germany is zero, since they returned in our forests.
There are no problem wolves, there are only problem people. Due to the massive increase in population expansion, the wolf’s natural habitat is being taken away.
(The “favorable state of conservation of the wolf” has not yet been reached – “EU Commissioner Vella”).
And now the killers are demanding anonymity when they kill animals!
Hunters first shout that the wolf needs to be hunted, and now they’re too cowardly to show they shot the wolf?
Then they can’t even boast if they shot a wolf and hang their heads on the wall as a trophy !!
Then why do they want to shoot wolves at all ?!
It’s not just murder, it’s a cowardly murder!
Dear politicians, legislators and other responsible parties! You have be send to your home, to mama or collect stamps, you are not good for more!
What disgrace is it for a nation and its inhabitans that allows the cruel picture of wolves, who are lying dead all around the street?
Poor wolfs: it’s an injustice that you don’t get the right to hunt hunters or similar people.
Animal trade in spotlight as China seeks source of coronavirus
Authorities believe new strain of coronavirus came from a market in Wuhan where wildlife was sold illegally
Officials in China are searching to uncover the origin of the coronavirus outbreak, amid heightened scrutiny of the country’s poorly regulated animal trade.
Authorities believe the new strain of coronavirus came from a seafood market in Wuhan where wildlife was sold illegally. The World Health Organization has stated that an animal appears most likely to be the primary source, with experts suggesting it may have been carried by bats, badgers, rats or snakes.
The virus is from the same family of viruses as Sars, which was passed to humans from bats by the masked pam civets, and Mers, which was carried from bats to humans by camels.
Ian Jones, professor of virology at Reading University, said it was likely that the Wuhan virus had also been transmitted in the same way – passed from bats to humans through an intermediate host. “Something in the local area will have picked up this virus and it’s this something that would have been on sale in the wet market,” said Jones.
Though the 2002-03 Sars outbreak, which killed nearly 800 people, prompted efforts to regulate the wildlife trade in China, the tradition of eating endangered wild animals, or using wildlife to produce medicines, remains popular. Conservationists and health experts warn that such animals are being sold in unhygienic and cramped markets, allowing viruses to thrive.
Media reports suggest that about 50 wild animals, including endangered pangolins, were on sale at the market in Wuhan before it was closed at the end of last year. Photographs taken before its closure show snakes, porcupines and foxes crammed into cages. The sister of a vendor infected by the virus told China Business Journal, a state-owned paper, that snakes, ducks and wild rabbits were common at the market.
“The animal welfare part of this is obvious, but much more hidden is this stashing and mixing of all these species together in a very small area, with secretions and urine mixed up together,” Christian Walzer, executive director of the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society, told Reuters.
The environment creates a perfect system to spread viruses, he said: “You couldn’t do it any better if you tried.”
Research published on Wednesday in the Journal of Medical Virology, which used analysis of the protein codes favoured by the new coronavirus, suggested it may have been snakes at the market that passed the virus to humans.
Some argue that the virus is more likely to have been passed on by a mammal. “In my view it’s very unlikely to be a snake because the jump from a reptile to a person is evolutionarily quite a long way,” said Jones, who added that while snake handling is common in the region, he is not aware of any individuals contracting this kind of virus after direct handling of snakes.
Identifying the origin of the virus would not only enable officials to prevent its circulation, but could also allow scientists to understand if the virus has further evolved after infecting people.
On Wednesday, China’s national health commission vice-minister Li Bin told reporters there was evidence of respiratory transmission of the virus from patient to patient. Among those infected are 15 medical staff.
Not only is vegan chocolate easy to find, the best brands offer truly exceptional quality. If you’re new to eating vegan foods, vegan chocolate won’t disappoint you.
The first thing you need to know about chocolate is that most of the good stuff is vegan. In fact, most chocolate connoisseurs consider milk chocolate to be an abomination. Dark chocolate is the real stuff.
That raises the question: is dark chocolate vegan? Most of the time it is. Unfortunately, several brands of dark chocolate, including Hershey and Ghirardelli, contain whey or other milk products. So always check the ingredients.
Vegan Chocolate Varieties
When it comes to chocolate, the spectrum of quality is as wide as that of wine. Every brand of dark chocolate that aspires to being taken seriously will list its percentage of cocoa mass on the package. The higher the percentage, the stronger the chocolate flavor, but this also bring more bitterness. Once you reach 80 percent you’re heading into the territory favored by chocolate connoisseurs. Lindt and some other brands even have 90% offerings, which is only for the seriously committed, and akin to drinking Wild Turkey 101 neat.
Dark chocolate might initially seem unpleasantly bitter. If you grew up devouring Hershey Kisses and Nestle Crunch Bars, it may take you some time to acquire a taste for 80+ percent chocolate. Perhaps the best way forward is to start with vegan chocolate in the 70 percent range, and then gradually work your way up to higher percentages.
But if what you’re really craving—chocolate snobs be damned—is the mild flavor of milk chocolate, fear not; three all-vegan companies offer what you’re seeking:
Much of the world’s chocolate—even expensive gourmet vegan dark chocolate—is produced by exploited or enslaved workers. Fortunately, many vegan chocolate brands carry a fair-trade label. The best resource to learn more about fair-trade chocolate is through this regularly-updated list published by the Food Empowerment Project.
Although Amazon.com has great prices on most products, they fall short when it comes to chocolate. Many of the vegan chocolates they carry are quite overpriced. But they do have a few good deals. Here are the vegan fair-trade chocolates Amazon generally keeps in stock:
There are plenty of companies that make both vegan chocolate and non-vegan varieties. But more than a dozen companies churn out only vegan products, and pretty much all of these companies are fair-trade as well. Here’s our list.
Sanctuary Sues Wisconsin City to End Cruel “Pioneer Day Chicken Toss”
Farm Bird Sanctuary is asking the town of Ridgeland to enforce existing animal cruelty laws to prevent Pioneer Day events that see hundreds of pigs and chickens abused for entertainment each year.
Wisconsin-based Farm Bird Sanctuary is moving forward with legal action to end the cruel “Chicken Toss and Greased Pig Wrestling events at the annual Ridgeland Pioneer Day in Ridgeland, WI.
Farm Bird Sanctuary founder Quincy Markowitz filed for an emergency injunction earlier this month in an effort to prevent this year’s events on February 15, asking the town of Ridgeland to enforce the law that states animal cruelty is a criminal offense.
Currently, multiple Wisconsin statutes refer to the handling and care of animals, with violations involving fines or imprisonment. The events, which have been happening in the town of 300 for nearly 40 years, involve a greased pig chase where frightened pigs are tackled by young children, and a “chicken toss” where as many as 200 terrified chickens are thrown into the frigid winter air, one or two at a time, from a rooftop into a crowd of people below.
“No one owes us their body, or their suffering, for human entertainment,” Markowitz told VegNews. “The chickens that live with us bear the emotional and physical scars from being thrown off of a roof in below-freezing temperatures.
We owe it not only to our chickens but to as many as possible to fight injustices against them as best as we are able.” The judge declined to apply the emergency injunction because of the short timeframe, however, Markowitz has been asked to refile the complaint within 30 days to continue the lawsuit.
Additionally, activists and animal rescuers will continue to protest, and nearly 150,000 people have also signed a petition to end the cruel events.
Now we move to Vietnam; animal welfare aside for a second, just look at the state of the container in which the live frogs are being kept; shit black dirt all up the sides; workers taking not one glimmer of any hygiene controls – clothing; gloves, anything. It all looks like a super recipe for Coronavirus Mk2 from where we stand – see the images from the Chinese markets in our links above – notice the commonality ?. Are the Asians attempting to kill off the entire planet or what ? – no; only killing off innocent animals which are being abused for their selfish food fetish needs.
“We also saw the mangled bodies of dead or dying frogs scattered across the market floor – frogs who managed to jump out of these tubs while being sorted ended up squashed under the feet of passers-by or under the wheels of motorbikes speeding down the hectic market corridors. It was shocking.”
‘France is the biggest consumer, eating 4,000 tons a year, but America has been catching up, and they are also popular in Asian cuisine’.
‘Research shows that the mass movement of frogs for human consumption – often unregulated or mislabelled – also plays a role in ecosystem collapse and spreading disease’.
Watch the disgusting video by clicking on either of the following:
Live frogs are being crammed together in tubs and sold in food markets in east Asia, destined for painful deaths, an investigation has found.
Thousands of the amphibians were filmed being poured into large buckets at street markets in Vietnam, where workers frantically rifle through them, then stuff them into bags for sale.
Animal-welfare experts say the trade is not just “agonising” but also increases the risk of the extinction of the species, as creatures are taken from the wild.
Studies show the practice also damages natural food chains. And scientists say piling up live frogs in such conditions risks spreading disease among the amphibians.
In a joint investigation by the Moving Animals group and The Independent, bins full of living frogs were found in the seafood section of Binh Dien market.
“They are taken from stacked delivery crates and poured into buckets, where workers frantically grab them by hand to sort them,” said one investigator. “The sorted frogs are then stuffed into a bag, ready for sale – all while still alive.
“We also saw the mangled bodies of dead or dying frogs scattered across the market floor – frogs who managed to jump out of these tubs while being sorted ended up squashed under the feet of passers-by or under the wheels of motorbikes speeding down the hectic market corridors. It was shocking.”
It is estimated more than three billion frogs are eaten worldwide each year, which are mostly caught from in the wild in Indonesia, but they are also farmed. France is the biggest consumer, eating 4,000 tons a year, but America has been catching up, and they are also popular in Asian cuisine.
Fears of falling populations have long been raised, leading France to ban farming and capturing frogs in the country in 1979.
However, the EU still imports the legs of tens of thousands of the amphibians from Asia each year, to the dismay of conservationists.
Activists claim frogs are often “forgotten” in welfare laws. They are “often skinned, and have their snouts and rear legs cut off with scissors or a blade while still alive. Their torsos are then tossed aside in a pile of other bleeding frogs and they endure a slow, agonising death,” according to the Washington-based Animal Welfare Institute.
A 2011 report, Canapés to Extinction, by international animal groups, said scientists had found frogs’ pain perception was similar to mammals’ and when their legs were cut off they struggled “until they reach complete exhaustion”.
Other witnesses have reported that in many cases only the hind legs are used for food, with the body thrown away.
Worldwide, amphibians are already suffering “catastrophic population declines” from interacting pathogens, scientists say. Fungal disease chytridiomycosis is thought to have caused the extinction of 90 species and marked declines of at least 491 others. Globalisation and the wildlife trade have been given most of the blame for the pandemic.
Research shows that the mass movement of frogs for human consumption – often unregulated or mislabelled – also plays a role in ecosystem collapse and spreading disease.
Wiping out frogs leaves snakes starving and allows disease-carrying mosquitoes to multiply, new research has found.
Until 1987, India was the world’s primary exporter of wild-caught frogs, leaving populations heavily depleted and farmers dependent on large quantities of pesticides to control pests and mosquitoes. Ecologists fear that Indonesia, now the source of more than two-thirds of frogs’ legs in supermarkets worldwide, is heading the same way.
And keeping frogs in such cramped conditions, without water, allows them to succumb to viruses.
Jonathan Ball, professor of molecular virology at Nottingham University, said although the risk to humans was probably very small, there was certainly the risk of spreading disease among frogs.
The 2011 report said: “Due to the mounting evidence that the chytrid fungus and ranaviruses are distributed through frogs traded live, in 2009 the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), specified conditions for handling processed and live frogs (eg health certificates and risk mitigation measures) in its Aquatic Animal Health Code.”
A spokeswoman for Peta Asia said: “Not only is this cruelty and suffering abhorrent, but eating animals – whether it’s frogs or chickens – fuels the demand for live animal markets. The typically filthy conditions of these markets are hotbeds for deadly viruses to multiply and spread. For the good of all living, feeling beings – including humans – they must all be shut down immediately.”
Posted on February 16, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Dear Mark,
We’re hearing that the Trump administration will soon issue its final rule to roll back lifesaving clean car standards — which, if left in place, would help save drivers billions at the pump and eliminate billions of tons of carbon emissions.
Americans overwhelmingly support stronger vehicle emissions standards. Yet, three major automakers — GM, Toyota, and Fiat Chrysler — recently sided with the Trump administration’s attacks on clean car standards.
NRDC and our allies are fighting back against these car companies’ attack on state safeguards — working hard to convince them to reverse course and support what’s best for our planet and our health, not their short-term profits.
NRDC’s attorneys are fighting this attempt to block state efforts — and stand ready to file a lawsuit against the broader rollback. Public pressure will help. The CEOs of GM, Toyota, and Fiat Chrysler need to hear from you that their actions are unacceptable.
Posted on February 16, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Animals neglected, abused, and killed at Colorado Pet Store. This is what you support when you buy animals.
And not just in Colorado, but all over the world!!
The demand for purebred puppies is causing people to misuse animals as parturients.
They are offered as puppies from a private source or from a loving breed, but in fact many of the animal babies advertised on the Internet come from dubious “breeding stations” from Eastern Europe and are brought and sold Europe-wide and also to Germany.
Usually much cheaper than by “breeders”, but there are also exceptions and puppies are sold for a lot of money. The problem is that the puppies are snatched from their mother far too early.
The result is that the puppies are often behaviorally disturbed. What is also bad: the puppies are not sufficiently medically cared for and are often already sick when they are handed over to the buyer.
It is not uncommon for them to die after a short time.
Trunk puppies, puppy rooms, hobby breeders, reputable breeders … What for? The animal shelters are full of wonderful animals waiting for a new home❤
With so much information about this criminal trade with racy animals, there should be no excuse for anyone buying a pet from a pet shop or from breeders.
Some don’t care that the shelters are full because there are many who are convinced that shelter animals have diseases or are problematic.
They are the ones who want to get a“pure” product with the purchase.
And with their purchase they kill the hope of an other animal that hopes for years for love, its own house and freedom in a home with its own family.
Don’t buy! never buy living beings, you wouldn’t do it with a human being either, right? Adopt! save a life, make an animal happy and at the same time you act against the puppy mafia.
Posted on February 16, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
EU mafia: How crime bosses have abused the Brussels project to make billions!
THE European Union has allowed Mafia crime families to flourish by taking advantage of the bloc’s single market and lavish cash subsidies, an Italian MEP has claimed.
Sabrina Pignedoli,of the Five Star Movement, said crime bosses had capitalised on the EU’s expansion to Eastern Europe where they have invested vast sums of illicit cash in legitimate businesses.
Sabrina Pignedoli
During periods of economic crisis, Italian mafia-style groups – the Cosa Nostra, Camorra and Ndrangheta – have maintained a low profile in their home country while investing billions of euros into struggling firms across the Continent.
They use the legitimate business to launder cash from their large-scale drug trafficking, counterfeiting and toxic waste management enterprises.
Italian MEP Sabrina Pignedoli has called for a EU-wide approach to fighting Mafia activities (Image: GETTY)
Ms Pignedoli is calling for Brussels to adopt a bloc-wide approach to tackling the Mafia’s presence in Europe.
In Italy, specific laws have been introduced to tackle mobsters’ illicit and often violent activities after decades of crime syndicates profiting from lax rules.
The legislation clearly defines the activities of crime families – illegal or legal – and allows for their assets to be seized and confiscated.
It has allowed Italian authorities to target associates of organised crime gangs even if they have not broken the law themselves.
“This crackdown has led to the Mafia searching out new businesses opportunities elsewhere in Europe”, Ms Pignedoli said.
She added: “The fact that there are no barriers in Europe it makes it easier for the Mafia circulate goods and money.”
“The real problem is when they are money laundering they use banks, they use the legal economy, they buy restaurants and shopping malls – so they are invisible.
“They’re giving money to the economy and helping the economy but this money is being laundered from the profits of drug trafficking.”
Ms Pignedoli said the Mafia’s presence is often undetected, or even a blind eye turned to it, because of the growth in the struggling economies that are targeted by crime bosses.
The Ndrangheta, an Italian crime family from Calabria, was named in the investigation into the murder of Slovakian journalist Jan Kuciak in 2018.
He and his fiancee Martina Kusnirova, both 27, were found shot dead at close range at their home in the village of Vel’ka Macs outside the capital, Bratislava.
His story unearthed a series of Italian businesses, with ties to the Ndrangheta, that had obtained access to hefty EU subsidies from the bloc’s Common Agricultural Policy, amounting to around £58 million over a 14-year stretch between 2004 and 2018 !!!.
The Ndrangheta crime gang also has ties to the UK, with corrupt allies in the City of London helping them to launder their cash, accounting for a surge in growth in the illicit industry that the National Crime Agency, in 2017, said was worth “hundreds of billions” of pounds a year.
And with the EU’s proposed enlargement into North Macedonia and Albania, Ms Pignedoli believes now is the time for Brussels to find a “one definition for the Mafia and organised crime”.
She said: “Now is the right time to reinforce anti-Mafia legislation in Europe. We must have the law to fight the mafia and then we can open up towards other member states without problems”.
Express.co.uk has contacted the European Commission for comment.
My comment: As if we didn’t know! There’s no accounting for the money. Nobody knows what happens to it once we’ve paid it. It goes “into the system” and much of it vanishes without a trace via schemes and back handers and grants and loans etc. all lost in an accounting tangle that works like a bottomless pit, a scandal that has been going on for years.
Looks like the EU have become a Mafia as well, it’s become a partnership… ‘The Ndrangheta crime family was siphoning off billions in EU agricultural subsidies’!!
How could that happen without the EU knowing about it?
Or is that also part of the “family”?
The same old story – the EU chiefs have no interest in stopping this illegal activity because they are all on the payroll. Secondly, they are responsible for running the greatest protection racket that world has ever seen, all done in plain sight.
Posted on February 16, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Yesterday, 15/2 was World Pangolin Day.
Here we want to share a little more about these wonderful animals who, thanks to man; are either listed as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered.
World Pangolin Day is an opportunity for pangolin enthusiasts to join together in raising awareness about these unique mammals — and their plight. Pangolin numbers are rapidly declining in Asia and Africa.
The demand for pangolins comes mostly from China, where pangolin scales are unfortunately believed to be a cure-all of sorts and pangolin flesh is considered a delicacy. In Vietnam, pangolins are frequently offered at restaurants catering to wealthy patrons who want to eat rare and endangered wildlife. There is no evidence to support claims regarding medicinal properties of pangolin scales or any other part of the pangolin.
Pangolins or scaly anteaters[2] are mammals of the order Pholidota (from the Greek word φολῐ́ς, “horny scale”). The one extant family, Manidae, has three genera: Manis, which comprises four species living in Asia; Phataginus, which comprises two species living in Africa; and Smutsia, which comprises two species also living in Africa.[3] These species range in size from 30 to 100 cm (12 to 39 in). A number of extinct pangolin species are also known.
Pangolins have large, protective keratin scales covering their skin; they are the only known mammals with this feature. They live in hollow trees or burrows, depending on the species. Pangolins are nocturnal, and their diet consists of mainly ants and termites, which they capture using their long tongues. They tend to be solitary animals, meeting only to mate and produce a litter of one to three offspring, which are raised for about two years.
The physical appearance of a pangolin is marked by large hardened overlapping plate-like scales, which are soft on newborn pangolins, but harden as the animal matures. They are made of keratin, the same material from which human fingernails and tetrapodclaws are made, and are structurally and compositionally very different from the scales of reptiles. The pangolin’s scaled body is comparable in appearance to a pine cone. It can curl up into a ball when threatened, with its overlapping scales acting as armor, while it protects its face by tucking it under its tail. The scales are sharp, providing extra defense from predators.[17]
Pangolins can emit a noxious-smelling chemical from glands near the anus, similar to the spray of a skunk. They have short legs, with sharp claws which they use for burrowing into ant and termite mounds and for climbing.
The tongues of pangolins are extremely long and – like those of the giant anteater and the tube-lipped nectar bat – the root of the tongue is not attached to the hyoid bone, but is in the thorax between the sternum and the trachea. Large pangolins can extend their tongues as much as 40 cm (16 in), with a diameter of only 0.5 cm (0.20 inches.
Most pangolins are nocturnal animals which use their well-developed sense of smell to find insects. The long-tailed pangolin is also active by day, while other species of pangolins spend most of the daytime sleeping, curled up into a ball.
Arboreal pangolins live in hollow trees, whereas the ground-dwelling species dig tunnels to a depth of 3.5 m (11 ft).
Some pangolins walk with their front claws bent under the foot pad, although they use the entire foot pad on their rear limbs. Furthermore, some exhibit a bipedal stance for some behaviour and may walk a few steps bipedally. Pangolins are also good swimmers.
Pangolins are insectivorous. Most of their diet consists of various species of ants and termites and may be supplemented by other insects, especially larvae. They are somewhat particular and tend to consume only one or two species of insects, even when many species are available to them. A pangolin can consume 140 to 200 g (4.9 to 7.1 oz) of insects per day. Pangolins are an important regulator of termite populations in their natural habitats.
Pangolins have very poor vision, so they rely heavily on smell and hearing. Pangolins also lack teeth; therefore they have evolved other physical characteristics to help them eat ants and termites. Their skeletal structure is sturdy and they have strong front legs that are useful for tearing into termite mounds. They use their powerful front claws to dig into trees, ground, and vegetation to find prey, then proceed to use their long tongues to probe inside the insect tunnels and to retrieve their prey.
The structure of their tongue and stomach is key to aiding pangolins in obtaining and digesting insects. Their saliva is sticky, causing ants and termites to stick to their long tongues when they are hunting through insect tunnels. Without teeth, pangolins also lack the ability to chew; however, while foraging, they ingest small stones (gastroliths) which accumulate in their stomachs to help to grind up ants. This part of their stomach is called the gizzard, and it is also covered in keratinous spines. These spines further aid in the grinding up and digestion of the pangolin’s prey.
Some species, such as the tree pangolin, use their strong, prehensile tails to hang from tree branches and strip away bark from the trunk, exposing insect nests inside.
Threats to this wonderful little animal
Pangolins are in high demand for Chinese traditional medicine in southern China and Vietnam because their scales are Pangolins are in high demand for Chinese traditional medicine in southern China and Vietnam because their scales are believed to have medicinal properties. Their meat is also considered a delicacy. 100,000 are estimated to be trafficked a year to China and Vietnam, amounting to over one million over the past decade. This makes it the most trafficked animal in the world.[41][43] This, coupled with deforestation, has led to a large decrease in the numbers of pangolins. Some species, such as Manis pentadactyla have become commercially extinct in certain ranges as a result of overhunting In November 2010, pangolins were added to the Zoological Society of London‘s list of evolutionarily distinct and endangered mammals.[45] All eight species of pangolin are assessed as threatened by the IUCN, while three are classified as critically endangered.[5] All pangolin species are currently listed under Appendix I of CITES which prohibits international trade, except when the product is intended for non-commercial purposes and a permit has been granted.[1]
Pangolins are also hunted and eaten in many parts of Africa and are one of the more popular types of bush meat, while local healers use the pangolin as a source of traditional medicine.[46]
Though pangolins are protected by an international ban on their trade, populations have suffered from illegal trafficking due to beliefs in East Asia that their ground-up scales can stimulate lactation or cure cancer or asthma.[48] In the past decade, numerous seizures of illegally trafficked pangolin and pangolin meat have taken place in Asia.[49][50][51][52] In one such incident in April 2013, 10,000 kg (11 short tons) of pangolin meat were seized from a Chinese vessel that ran aground in the Philippines.[53][54] In another case in August 2016, an Indonesian man was arrested after police raided his home and found over 650 pangolins in freezers on his property.[55] The same threat is reported in many countries in Africa, especially Nigeria, where the animal is on the verge of extinction due to overexploitation.[56] The overexploitation comes from hunting pangolins for game meat and the reduction of their forest habitats due to deforestation caused by timber harvesting.[57] The pangolin are hunted as game meat for both medicinal purposes and food consumption.[57]
Man, as with everything; the ‘intelligent’ destroyer of everything that lives in this world !
As public opinion continues to shift, increasing numbers of people are falling out of love with dairy products.
Recent years have seen a significant shift in consumer attitude towards dairy, as more people understand the environmental, health and animal welfare issues associated with the industry. The UK is now drinking 50 per cent less milk than they were in 1974, according to a report by Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) released on Tuesday 6 February.
Viva! have investigated countless British dairy farms and exposed the brutal reality of the industry – helping many people make the switch to dairy-free.
An increasing number of dairy-alternatives are widely available including cheeses, yoghurts, milks and chocolates. Supermarket giants ASDA, Aldi, Tesco and Sainsbury’s now all have their own ranges of vegan food – proving these products are big business. Although the milk market is much bigger, valued at over £3bn, demand for cow’s milk is declining and plant-alternatives sales have surged 10 per cent over the past two years. It’s undeniable, dairy-free sales are booming and show no signs of slowing down. Considering these factors, it comes as no surprise that the dairy industry is desperately trying to claw its way back into public favour.
So what is Februdairy?
Februdairy is a social media campaign created by the dairy industry in a desperate attempt to boost sales and portray dairy in a more favourable light. This is the industry’s third annual campaign and is pitched as a direct response to Veganuary, a campaign which encourages consumers to try vegan for one month. This year Veganuary announced a record number of sign-ups with a whopping 400,000 people going vegan for a month. Milk producers, pro-dairy consumers and industry experts are encouraged to create and share pro-dairy content during the month of February on social media using the hashtag #Februdairy.
When the campaign launched in February 2017, the vegan community commandeered the hashtag to highlight the darker side of the dairy industry, where pain and suffering is an everyday occurrence. Social media has played an instrumental role in the rise of veganism and vegans are well versed in using it as a platform to educate and inform others. Animal rights advocates and groups including Viva!, Animal Equality and Animal Aid use Februdairy as an opportunity to expose the cold-hard facts surrounding dairy production – which doesn’t go down well with the dairy industry.
A surprising number of people are still unaware that cows must be made pregnant to produce milk. To do this they are artificially inseminated and give birth to a calf, which is taken away shortly after. – There is no time for maternal bonding when profits are priority. If the calf is female she will face the same fate as her mother, if he is male he will be raised for veal or more likely be shot shortly after birth as an unwanted by-product of the dairy industry. These are all facts that the dairy industry chooses not to shout about – not surprising is it?
In addition to these abhorrent practices, the livestock industry is having a detrimental effect on our planet and many people are choosing to go vegan as a result. Dairy is the second biggest greenhouse gas emitter in the food production industry due to the huge amounts of soya needed to feed dairy cows and the methane they release. According to a recent article in The Guardian, all plant-based milks are better for the environment (3), with oat and hemp milks having the smallest environmental impact.
A recent Farmer’s Weekly article interviews a dairy farmer and marketing consultant, Andy Venables, who called for an overhaul in the way milk is promoted – describing it as “a complete mess”. The article concludes ”The dairy industry could learn a lot from the vegan movement, which had attracted huge media coverage despite accounting for just 1.16% of the UK population”, said Mr Venables.
Although the industry admits it needs a re-brand, they seem to be in denial about why people are ditching dairy for plant-based alternatives. Until they understand this, it looks like we’ll be seeing a lot more Februdairy-style campaigns from the industry as veganism continues to grow globally.
This Mother’s Day Viva! are organising a national Day of Action to raise awareness about the plight of dairy cows, Britain’s hardest working mothers, and encouraging them to go dairy-free. Visit https://scarydairy.org.uk/campaigns/mothers-day-action for more information.
For more information on the health, environmental, health and animal welfare issues caused by the dairy industry please visit www.scarydairy.org.uk .
Posted on February 15, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Many Australians are unaware of the disgraceful way in which wild pigs are being killed throughout New South Wales and Queensland.
Pig dogging is a shamefully cruel and barbaric practice in which dogs are forced to hunt wild pigs.
While hunters boast grotesquely of the adrenaline rush they experience, their treatment of the victims of this “sport” – both pigs and dogs – is deplorable.
The dogs are encouraged to chase and tire out the pigs and then hold them by the ears until a human arrives to kill them. Pigs who are chased, trapped, and killed in this way experience intense fear and distress.
Usually, hunters kill pigs by “sticking” them – stabbing them in the stomach or chest to puncture the heart – before leaving them to bleed out in a prolonged and painful death.
Because these hunts cover large areas and it’s difficult for hunters to maintain contact with their dogs, pigs are often mauled for long periods and even killed before the humans arrive on the scene.
In many cases, hunters actually encourage their dogs to maul the pigs.
The dogs are usually large mixed-breed ones who’ve been “blooded” to make them especially aggressive.
They may be beaten, starved, and psychologically abused in order to “train” them not to retreat from a pig 10 times their size.
After enduring this trauma, they’re then exposed to extreme danger during the hunt. Even though they may be “armoured” – wearing protective throat collars, breastplates, and vests – they’re often injured, mutilated, and killed.
Legislation relating to pig dogging differs from state to state, but it’s virtually impossible to take part in this blood sport without seriously compromising the intentions and regulations of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act 1979 and the Companion Animals Act 1998.
Write to the New South Wales and Queensland state governments and ask that they take action on this important issue.
Everything takes place with the support or tolerance of corrupt politicians.
From psychopaths who sit in important positions and decide about lucrative business with animals.
But it is not an argument not to publish any criminal acts because they happen everywhere.
Wherever they happen, we will publicize them and ask for help.
Because the animals have just us.
That these metal prisons are still allowed at all seems impossible in a country like Germany, which has – at least in theory – anchored animal welfare as a state goal in the Basic Law.
In the previous version of the Animal Welfare Livestock Ordinance (1), Section 5 states §24 (4) “Box stands must be designed in such a way that…
1) the pigs cannot injure themselves and
2) each pig can stand up freely, lie down and stretch its head and side limbs”
But now the Federal Government, together with Agriculture Minister Julia Klöckner (CDU), wants to simply delete the part of the regulation that stipulates that the sows in the crates should at least be able to stretch their limbs and head in the lying position.
Instead of ensuring that at least existing laws and corresponding legal judgments are complied with, the economic interest of farmers is increased and animal cruelty is legalized once again. Julia Klöcknerwants to extend the illegal boxes for another 17 years!!!
The issue was originally supposed to be decided on Friday (February 14th, 20)by the Federal Council – but was removed from the agenda at short notice. The ordinance said the topic could be discussed at a next meeting at the request of a state or the federal government.
Peta’s information is a bit different: Update February 2020
On February 14, 2020, the Federal Council actually wanted to vote on the draft ordinance from the Federal Minister of Agriculture,Julia Klöckner, to amend the animal welfare livestock ordinance and thus to subsequently legalize the cruel crates for animals!!!
Following an extensive investigation, Butler County police have arrested a man accused of deserting a three-year-old dog in a wire cage, leaving the poor animal to slowly die of starvation.
When a postal worker found the skeletal remains of the Cane Corso puppy in an abandoned motel parking lot in Liberty Township, Ohio, he instantly knew the dog had been severely neglected, leading to the innocent creature’s painful and needless death.
“From looking at the animal, you can literally see every bone in [his] body,” lead dog warden Kurt Merbs told WLWT.
Sheriff Richard K Jones says that a tip has now led to the apprehension of Clarence Thomas Jr., who has been charged with abandoning animals and prohibitions concerning companion animals. The accused is being held in the Butler County Jail.
“We posted this case on social media to get the word out that not only were we looking for the subject responsible for this heinous act,” Jones said in a release, “but to let offenders know, you can run, but you cannot hide.”
The arrest follows a Lady Freethinker petition urging authorities to find the suspect. Huge thanks to all of you who have signed — and thank you, law enforcement, for finding this dog’s killer. Now, we must keep speaking out to ensure this case ends in justice. If you haven’t, please sign to ensure the guilty party is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, including a life-long ban on having animals.
While others try to leave, our brave and selfless staff are rushing back to the danger zone. I couldn’t be prouder… please show them your support as they battle food and medication shortages… all to keep the bears healthy.
The impact of the coronavirus is already hitting hard here at our China bear sanctuary.
Medications, face masks and disinfectant are all getting harder to find… even deliveries of food and water are under threat. And prices are going up by the day.
The implications for the bears, and other animals who rely on us for help, are truly frightening. Please give what you can to our Crisis Action Fund and help us – and the animals – through this devastating time.
Your gift today will help us pay for urgent veterinary supplies… face masks, antiseptic soap, syringes, swabs, surgical gloves… and most importantly, the bears’ medicines.
The worst thing is the uncertainty. We just don’t know how long this deadly virus will last. But we do know the impact will last for months, not weeks. And we know that this crisis is worsening day by day.
To make a donation to support the bears and the AA team in this crisis; please go to:
Our greatest fear is that transport restrictions and panic buying will mean we can’t get enough basic food, water and medicines for both staff and bears. Even locally sourced supplies like fruit and vegetables are drying up.
Our hearts go out to those directly affected by this devastating virus. As I write this, tens of thousands of people are confirmed as positive and hundreds have died…
By the time you’re reading this, the situation will be even worse.
… most of these cases are in Wuhan, Hubei Province, the epicentre of the virus. And unfortunately, we’re almost next door. Sichuan province, the home of our China sanctuary, and our Nanning rescue site are close to Hubei. So we’re directly affected by the new regulations in place to contain the virus. Lockdowns and transport restrictions are taking a heavy toll.
But among this devastation are stories of courage and kindness that go to the core of what this big Animals Asia family means to us all.
Our embattled China team is giving all that they have to ensure our rescued bears (and other animals too) have the care that they need.
This is bravery in action. And I’ll share some of these
inspiring stories with you soon…
Like millions across China, our staff and volunteers are facing high prices and shortages of food, water and medical supplies, mostly because of panic buying and onerous (but necessary) transport restrictions. And of course there’s the constant danger of infection.
We’ve increased our already rigorous bio-security measures at our rescue sites. And we’re planning ahead for any contingency that could arise as the situation rapidly deteriorates.
But most of all we need your help. Will you support
the bravest bear team in China?
We’ve already started sending in basic vet equipment from afar to keep our staff and bears safe. But this is very expensive. Your kind gift today will help us secure much-needed supplies like face masks, surgical gloves, disinfectant soap, food and, crucially, medications for the bears.
The truth is that without you, we’re simply not going to get through this. Please, please… give what you can today.
With hope and gratitude,
Jill Robinson MBE, Dr med vet hc, Hon LLD
Founder and CEO, Animals Asia
PS Our mainland China and Hong Kong offices are closed and our community outreach activities are suspended throughout the country. But all our staff are working harder than ever from home or in the field.
We give a full and detailed overview of Serbian animal welfare legislation on our sister site – ‘Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)’. – click on: https://serbiananimalsvoice.com/about-serbian-animals/ – and so as you can also see from the ‘Archives’ on the left of the same site; we have had a lot of past experience with illegal stray animal abuse (in Serbia) in the past.
We thus (2020) invited Serbian activists to give us some updates of the current situation for stray animals (dogs but also cats) in Serbia now; so that we can publish on this site; WAV, and also SAV. And so here is the first of the reports we have from Slavica at ‘EPAR -OIPA Serbia / Alliance for Nature Protection, the rights of animals and people’.
We need to make it clear to readers that Serbia is currently not a member state of the EU, but is a ‘Candidate Country’. As such it is given EU financial support at present. But there is no EU strategy or legislation for stray animals within EU member states anyway; something which welfare groups have been pressing the EU about, with no result, for many years.
As with most issues; especially those relating to animals, the EU simply passes the buck back to individual member states, declaring that it is their individual responsibility to undertake controls. So why do EU politicians exist we ask if they just hand issues back to member states ?
Stray animals, unlike livestock which is traded and sadly transported all over the EU constantly, do not make money for the nations in which they exist; thus they are of no real concern for EU legislators who are solely financially driven. We say what a very sad situation; as to us, all animal lives matter, be they prize bulls or stray dogs struggling to survive on the streets.
Financial contributions to the OIE – or the ‘World Organisation for Animal Health’; are made by all national member states around the world; and this includes Serbia. Thus, we would expect compliance with; or very close to, OIE strategy by member states regarding strays; sadly, Serbia does NOT follow this; irrespective of what is said.
In the development of a dog population control programme it is recommended that the authorities establish an advisory group, which should include veterinarians, experts in dog ecology, dog behaviour and zoonotic diseases, and representatives of relevant stakeholders (local authorities, human health services/authorities, environmental control services/authorities, NGOs and the public). The main purpose of this advisory group would be to analyse and quantify the problem, identify the causes, obtain public opinion on dogs and propose the most effective approaches to use in the short and long term.
dogs that have been abandoned by their owner, including puppies resulting from uncontrolled breeding of owned dogs;
unowned dogs that reproduce successfully.
vaccination against rabies and other preventive measures against zoonotic diseases, as appropriate;
veterinary procedures (e.g. surgical procedures);
As we have always argued from our (SAV) founding in 2005; the capture and killing of stray dogs in Serbia; despite being illegal to kill health dogs; can be a very financially profitable business for some; whilst wrongfully misleading the public; tax paying citizens; that stray dog numbers are being controlled. It is called ‘corruption and deceipt’.
The reality is that the Serbian government and regional / local authorities do NOT want to undertake veterinary procedures as suggested in Article 7.7.5 (see above) such as sterilisations of strays, which would gradually reduce their numbers; as they (the authorities) desire a constant supply of ‘new’ stray animals to capture and kill; – thus, it is not financially profitable for them to reduce stray numbers; and thus reduce their financial gains to be made by the capture and killing of strays ! That is the reality of how the Serbian stray system works; animal abuse and suffering; leading to eventual death; solely for financial profit by those involved in the process.
As far as we are (still) aware, there is no ‘advisory group’ involving either the public or NGO’s in a population control programme anywhere within Serbia. In addition, the Serbian authorities; who appear to work on their own; using contractors, or ‘shinters’, have a simple policy of ‘kill and more kill’; whilst misleading the public that they have the situation under control. As such they do not follow any of the OIE suggested procedures mentioned above, such as ‘surgical procedures’ (sterilisation) in order to reduce stray animal population numbers over time. They simply continue to want an endless supply of strays; in order to kill endless numbers of strays; and make endless money from the process.
2020 – We are currently aware that 3 private shinter firms’ – companies hired by local authorities in Serbia to ‘control’ dog numbers using illegal practices which are non-compliant with existing national animal welfare legislation, include Avenija MB – they have probably have killed up to 10,000 dogs in more than 60 Serbian cities by the means of illegal contracts with various city authorities. If NGO’s and the public were represented in these OIE suggested ‘advisory groups’ throughout the country in accordance with OIE stray management guidelines; we very much doubt that such mass killings (as the 10,000) would ever be allowed to happen. We think not very much !
Also, (2020) it has been alleged that in just one day, in more than 40 cities throughout Serbia, illegal mass poisonings have been undertaken again; most probably by shinters working under the private control and public misleading of local authorities. We understand that the illegal killings may have been undertaken using the ‘Kreozan’ poison.
Killing with Nuvan and Kreozan poisons. These cause death by suffocation to the animal after the following prolonged effects – headache, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal cramps, excessive sweating, salivation, blurred vision, tightness in the chest, weakness, muscle twitching, and confusion. Also convulsions, severe respiratory depression, unconsciousness, and eventual death. http://www.actionagainstpoisoning.com/CRY%20FOR%20HELP/serbiaT61/crySerbiaT61.html
In our second post on Serbia you will find copies of the recent letters sent by Serbian activists to the OIE. We ask you to make of the letters to the OIE what you read – and several examples of non compliances by authorities with the current Serbian animal welfare laws are given.
Finally for this post; to become a member state of the EU. The enforcement of ‘the rule of law’ is a requirement for nations wishing to join. Serbia is NOT enforcing its own laws; and as such there is currently no reason why it should be allowed to join the EU. We think in the end the EU will conveniently ignore such things as animal welfare legislation and welcome Serbia into ‘the club’ regardless of its non compliances.
As for dogs hung from trees, we will be publishing a second part to this post to provide you with more about the situation in Serbia. For animals living on the streets; trying to survive at the best of times, they require initiatives that will help them; not have authorities who just want to make money by destroying them. This is currently the way in Serbia. Change will only come from within; when Serbian taxpayers recognise where their money is being wasted on a kill policy rather than a sterilisation policy to reduce numbers forever. Money that is wasted catching and killing dogs should be put into a policy of national long term sterilisation and welfare improvements for the animals – complying with the existing laws.
Changes sometimes take long times to happen; for animals in Serbia the change cannot come soon enough !
The empathy of “animals ” orangutans are usually scared of water due to the density of their fur . This image depicts one offering a helping hand despite the risk.
Posted on February 12, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Dr. Don Barnes experimented with animals at School for Aerospace Medicine for 13-14 years.
When he was an experimenter, they conditioned him AGAINST applying ethics to animals who weren’t human.
But Dr. Don Barnes knew that using animals as laboratory equipment was wrong. “We use the wrong models for our experiments,” he says.
He fundamentally changed his life and became an animal rights activist.
The United States got its very first vegan fried chicken restaurant! On November 22 last year (2019), pop-up shop and catering company Eat Love will finally open a brick-and-mortar restaurant.
Eat Love’s founder, Lynn Torres, chose a location in Orange County, California, just a mile away from where she grew up. Hungry customers will have their pick of seitan-based fried chicken sandwiches and bucket meals akin to Kentucky Fried Chicken’s and Chick-fil-A’s, along with delicious desserts, like chocolate-dipped ice cream sandwiches and fudge brownies. Lynn told VegNews:
We are better than KFC and Chick-fil-A because we want to share amazing and delicious food without harming animals and without harming our health. We actually really care about animals, the environment, social issues, your health, and the world.
Back in 2015, Lynn and her husband, Enrique, weighed a combined 610 pounds. Once they started eating plant-based, Enrique was able to reverse his Type 2 diabetes, and Lynn lost over 150 pounds! This inspired them to open Eat Love and bring delicious vegan food to their friends, their neighbours, and the world. Lynn said:
I believe that the way we can create change is by spreading love, and to me food is love. I hope that people take our food and share it with their loved ones and that this action brings up a conversation about veganism.
Plant-based fried chicken is certainly a growing trend. In August 2019, Kentucky Fried Chicken tested vegan fried chicken that combined Beyond Meat with their signature secret spices. Customers lined up around the building at the Atlanta restaurant that served the plant-based chicken. KFC is considering moving forward on either broader testing or a nationwide rollout. U.S. president and chief concept officer Kevin Hochman stated:
“KFC Beyond Fried Chicken is so delicious, our customers will find it difficult to tell that it’s plant-based. I think we’ve all heard “it tastes like chicken”—well our customers are going to be amazed and say, “it tastes like Kentucky Fried Chicken!”
The answers to questions like these are essential in determining out of the 70-90 emergency calls we receive each day which rescues are top priorities. Even with four rescue vehicles on the road, every day is a rush to get to the next animal as fast as possible. Thousands of callers have stayed by the side of an injured or ill animal keeping them safe until our ambulance arrives. To you wonderful friends, near and far, without whom countless animals would have perished, Happy Valentine’s Day. We just love you.
She looked like an ancient one, shriveled, gnarly and fading away. But this angel was succumbing to advanced mange, which had thrust her into the grip of intense itchiness, and crusted skin which broke apart in massive cracks. Like most mange dogs she had likely run herself ragged trying to escape the maddening itchiness. Now, she was deflated and perhaps preparing to let go of life itself. She faced her regimen of medicated baths with trembling fear, but within a few days came to understand that touch did not have to mean pain; touching now meant comfort. Watch this young lady’s astounding transformation. We named her Shimmer, like dancing sunshine.
For those who have so much life left to live,please donate.
The puppy’s heart was still beating. Otherwise, he would have been mistaken for dead. Neighbors were horrified when they saw a passing car run him over, and his head injury was so severe that he didn’t really wake up for another 48 hours. When he did, he couldn’t eat or walk. But one of the first things he did after regaining consciousness was to wag his innocent, adorable tail, and he managed to communicate worlds with those first bursts of joy–joy to be alive. Meet Dil and watch him re-discover his Self: a boy who is charming, subtle, and beams with love.
Rakesh Meghwal is a gentle leader in charge of large animal nursing care, introducing new staff who have never before worked with animals to a new world of service to the most vulnerable. From turning a cow on a mattress who cannot stand, or keeping a bull still while his splint gets changed, Rakesh is a teacher, not just a boss. He “leads by example” and we’re grateful to him for his example being so gentle, bright and caring.
Every day, 20-40 animals in Udaipur are rescued and treated. Some are admitted into Animal Aid’s hospital and some are treated in their own neighborhoods. Every bandage, every injection, every meal, every cozy tub had a donation behind it.
We’re serving animals like Sophia because of YOU. Sophia’s paw was badly wounded and to see her now, it’s hard to believe this extraordinarily cheerful girl was lost in pain a few weeks ago. Every time a transformation like this takes place, kindness scores a little victory.
Posted on February 11, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
A court in Turkey has sentenced three men to ten years in prison for poisoning street dogs.
Ankara – A Turkish court has sentenced three men to ten years in prison for poisoning street dogs.
Ankara Grand Criminal Chamber No. 5 also fined each defendant 15,000 Turkish lira. The decision was welcomed by animal activists who followed the process.
According to the Anadolunews agency, referring to the indictment, the accused had fed chicken dipped in pesticides to street dogs in Ankara, causing their gruesome death.
Cat massacre with poison, Kos Island-Greece
Movies that show the dogs in agony when residents hurried to the scene of the crime triggered public outrage. Animal activists have long been committed to defining that violence against animals is a crime, not an offense. Existing laws only provide fines for crimes against animals.
Under increasing pressure from the public, the Turkish government had hurriedly announced a new ministerial law on animal rights.
The new law is intended to enable the courts to sentence up to four and a half years in prison for the killing and torture of pets and street animals.
poison bait
According to the changes, people found guilty of killing and torturing animals are sentenced to prison terms between four months and three years. If suspects have injured more than one animal, the sentence can be increased to four and a half years.
People who have forced animals to fight are given a draft of two to three years.
On the subject
– Turkey –
Animal welfare: Turkish police set up new cyber team against animal abusers!
The Turkish Police’s Cybercrime Department now has 11 new teams available. One of these teams will track animal violence online.
The new team is responsible for identifying users on social networks who share and distribute images of violence against animals.The actual perpetrators of the crimes would also be identified, the police said.
And I mean…Although Turkey is not an EU country and no one believes that Turkey will ever enter the EU, one has to say that these penalties are almost unknown in many EU countries.
10 years for the murder of an animal is a punishment that can have a big impact.
Germany claims it has one of the best animal welfare laws in Europe, but such a punishment for murdering an animal has not yet been posted here!
We very much welcome the judgment and hope that other countries belonging to the “civilized” EU will soon follow this example.
Posted on February 11, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Mice baked to death after a heating system failure, or left to die from hunger and thirst when researchers forgot to put food or water in their cages for a week — and nobody noticed.
Primates kept in a room where the lights were on 24-hours-a-day for nearly five months because a facility manager was said to be overworked.
A vet who failed to provide any care to a female owl monkey used for breeding after she became seriously ill and lost a fifth of her bodyweight, eventually succumbing to heart failure, fluid in the chest and abdominal hemorrhage.
AFP / RAUL ARBOLEDA Owl monkeys at a zoo in Columbia; documents from a US government lab show a vet failed to provide care to a seriously ill female owl monkey kept for breeding purposes
These are among a litany of animal welfare failures that took place across a 22-month period from January 2018 to October 2019 at the laboratories of the National Institutes of Health(NIH), the taxpayer-funded steward of medical and behavioral research of the United States.
A total of 31 internally reported incidents have come to light thanks to a freedom of information request made by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and shared exclusively with AFPAgence France-Presse (France Media Agency).
They took place at a variety of centers performing research in areas including diabetes, child health, mental health and more — mostly out of Bethesda, Maryland but some at a facility in Hamilton, Montana.
In a statement, the NIH said it took all “noncompliance” incidents seriously and all of them had been thoroughly investigated by its Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare(OLAW), while changes to procedures had been made as a result.
But animal rights groups, including those that, unlike PETA, are not ideologically opposed to all animal testing, blasted the violations as egregious.
“The laws and regulations exist to minimize animal suffering, pain, stress, and when even those minimal standards are not being addressed or not being followed, then you have significant suffering,” said Eric Kleiman, a researcher at the Animal Welfare Institute.
“Training, veterinary care, food, water: this is the most basic of basics. If you can’t do this kind of thing right you have no business doing anything with animals, it’s as simple as that,” he added, calling the findings “shocking.”
-Repeated failures –
AFP / Eric BARADAT A total of 31 internally reported incidents have come to light thanks to a freedom of information request made by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and shared exclusively with AFP
From historic breakthroughs like the discovery of insulin through experiments on dogs, to the development last year of an Ebola treatment via work on genetically-modified mice, and cutting-edge cancer therapies, many scientists believe animal research is crucial to medical progress.
But the testing is supposed to take place under strict laws and policies spelling out its conditions, including the size of cages, room temperatures and the animals’ social needs, as well as vet visits and the need for hygienic surgery and post-operative care.
Federal research facilities are subject to the Public Health Service(PHS)Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals, which in turns mandates compliance with the Animal Welfare Act, a landmark law signed by former president Lyndon Johnson 1966.
Unlike labs in universities and private facilities, they are not subject to site inspections by the US Department of Agriculture and are meant to regulate themselves.
“Yet the repeated violations of policy show that this system is inherently flawed”, said Alka Chandna, PETA’s vice president of laboratory investigations cases.
On no fewer than five occasions, mice starved or dehydrated to death because employees forgot to give them food or water. “The problem was not noted during the daily health checks,” said one report from June 2018.
– ‘What went right?’ –
AFP/File / Anthony WALLACE An experimenter at a US government laboratory injected 18 zebrafish with a salt solution, even though this procedure had not been approved; 11 died and seven were euthanized
Other examples spoke to serial incompetence, said Chandna, including one where a dog sustained skin burns from an electric blanket used because the procedure room was too cold, but staff failed to monitor its use.On another occasion, 13 mice baked to death after a heating system failure left them in 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 Celsius) overnight.
In July 2018, an experimenter injected 15 zebrafish with a salt solution, even though this procedure had not been approved. Four of the zebrafish died immediately.
Three weeks later, the procedure was repeated in 18 fish — even though the protocol had still not been approved. Eleven of these fish were euthanized and seven were found dead.
Few incidents led to serious repercussions: A facility manager who allowed primates to remain in a room with the lights on for five months was “counseled” and directed to monitor the lights daily, a report said in March 2018.
The vet who failed to attend to the owl monkey after having been notified by a vet technician that the animal was very sick was replaced, but it was not clear if they were fired or re-assigned.
Commenting on multiple surgeries that took place without regard to aseptic procedure or post-operative care — including on a primate — Kleiman said the question was not so much what had gone wrong as “what went right?”
-Small percentage? –
AFP/File / Saul LOEB Activists with PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) demonstrate during a protest against the US military treatment of animals in Washington, DC in 2012
Animal testing has broad backing from the scientific community even as some advocate for a transition to other forms of research, including computer modeling and test tube based studies in line with the so-called three R’s: Replacement, Reduction and Refinement.
Paula Clifford, the executive director of Americans for Medical Progress that campaigns for animal research, said it was critical to place the new revelations in context.
“Given the size of the NIH and the very large number of animals it cares for, these incidents are actually quite rare and involve a very small percentage of the tens of thousands of animals involved in health research,” she said.
In its statement to AFP, the NIH said: “The incidents you have cited were thoroughly investigated by OLAW. The NIH intramural facilities have implemented numerous changes to prevent a recurrence.”
“There are cases where something (!!!) goes wrong (as in any enterprise) but it is identified, corrected, and evaluated by OLAW to ensure that the correction is appropriate for the problem,” it added.
And I mean...It’s always the same: crime and torture take place in laboratories around the world with tolerance from the state and veterinarians. And financed with tax money.
As soon as someone detects it, the explanation comes: “It can happen that “something” goes wrong, it never comes again, we have taken measures”!!
And with “something” the laboratory actors mean living beings who are tortured, massacred, murdered.
If they weren’t exposed, these crimes would still go on with “something” wrong.
PETA and AFP should find the addresses and names of those responsible and post them on Facebook! that is possible and has even been practiced, namely: by Camille Marino, who published research material from the University of Florida on social media in 2012.
All taxpayers have the right to know who their money is going to.
And then … let’s see if such crimes happen again.
Most of the following dates back to 2014/15; and so the KaiBao Pharmaceutical ‘five year plan’ to develop and alternative to extracting bear bile should be reaching its end of its term now – 2020.
This is an old article from The Guardian newspaper in London; relating to bear bile farming.
KaiBao Pharmaceutical is a major outlet for industrial bear bile farms. But as public opinion has turned against the practice of bear bile farming, the company has developed a five-year plan to support alternatives and has even gained support from China’s Ministry of Science and Technology. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2014-08/13/content_18302146.htm
We have been looking into the 5 year plan to end bear bile farming and have not found much in the way of news. But this does not mean that things are not moving forward. The younger generation in the Far East areas where the bile is produced are without doubt, becoming more animal welfare conscious; which is great news as they will eventually stop this barbarity. Over the last year or so, here n England, we have been working with Animals Asia UK regarding alternatives to bear bile. We know that Jill has many of the ‘alternative plants’ located at the bear sanctuaries that AA operate. Much can now be reproduced using herbs and plants; so if people decide that they still need something of this type, cruelty free replacements are being researched all the time.
Positive results to help animal suffering often do not happen overnight – and so the fight goes on to stop this barbaric torment of beautiful bears.
Regards WAV.
————————————————————
Is the end of ‘house of horror’ bear bile factories in sight?
After decades of activism against bear bile farms, a Chinese pharmaceutical company has announced it is developing a synthetic alternative
If we grant bears any modicum of intelligence or emotional experience, if we grant them the capacity to suffer pain or mental anguish, then bear bile farming – which houses bears in tiny cages for the breadth of their life in order to repeatedly extract their bile – poses a whole slew of ethical questions.
Indeed, for decades activists have been campaigning to stop the trade, which extracts bear bile for use in Chinese medicine.
But now, the industry that profits from it may succeed in doing it for them. Last year, Kaibao Pharmaceuticals, which supplies around half of the bear bile consumed in China, said it plans to develop a synthetic alternative to the popular curative using government funding.
“If the largest producer of bear bile is now looking into a synthetic alternative to their product, this can only be a good thing for the bears on the farms,” said Jill Robinson, the head of Animals Asia, a group that has been fighting bear farming in Asia for more than 15 years.
In a brief statement, Kaibao announced it was using poultry bile and “biotransformation technology” to create a substance chemically similar to bear bile, but without the bear in it. It intends to spend 12m yuan (£1.3m)of its own cash on developing the substance. In addition, Kaibao won a 5.3m yuan (£570,000) subsidy from China’s government and another 6 million yuan (£650,000) from the regional government. If successful, Kaibao would own the intellectual rights to the new poultry-based, but bear-like, bile.
“This is an opportunity for practitioners and consumers to make a shift from using threatened species, to legal and sustainable alternatives, illustrating the [Traditional Chinese Medicine’s] community’s commitment to conservation of wildlife and legal trade,” said Chris Shepherd, a bear bile trade expert and the conservation group, Traffic’s regional director of Southeast Asia.
“The shift, however, must come from within this community,” he added.
The most important component of bear bile is ursodeoxycholic acid, which has been shown in research to be effective against some ailments, such as select liver diseases. Yet, traditional practitioners prescribe bear bile for much more, including everything from a sore throat to epilepsy.
There are two ways to acquire the bile today: either kill a bear in the wild and cut out its gall bladder or in the case of the so-called bear bile farms (though factories may be a more apt word) repeatedly drain the gall bladders of captive animals.
Inside the bear bile factory
Robinson, who has visited a number of bear bile facilities, describes them as a house of horrors.
“[Bears] are constantly thirsty and hungry, get little or no veterinary care and essentially are tortured their whole lives,” she said. “Today… thousands of moon bears lie in constant pain and anguish in cages that are no bigger than coffins. A number of crude and brutal methods are used to extract their bile – rusting catheters, barbaric full-metal jackets with neck spikes, medicinal pumps and open, infected holes drilled into their bellies.”
The conditions are indeed alarming, according to many who follow the trade. Bears are kept in “crush cages,” which are deliberately too small for animals to stand or move much. In order to extract the bile – often daily – workers make permanent holes or fistula into the bear’s gall bladder. The bile is extracted, or ‘milked’ in the industry nomenclature, via metal tubes or other methods. Conditions are often so unsanitary, and bears so sick, that experts have raised public health concern about consuming bile from these places.
“Some bears are put into cages as cubs and never released,” said Robinson adding that “most farmed bears are starved, dehydrated and suffer from multiple diseases and malignant tumours that ultimately kill them.”
If the bears live long enough – and life-spans are short here – they can be bile milked for decades. However, usually after 10 to 20 years, bears stop producing enough to pay for their room and board. They are then commonly killed and their body parts sold.
Animal rights activists contend that these conditions cause massive psychological harm to the bears. In one rumored incident, a mother bear reportedly broke out of her cage while her cub was being milked. Reaching the cub, the mother suffocated it to death. Then the mother bear bashed her head against a wall until she perished. Some animal rights activists called it a murder-suicide, though the incident has never been substantiated.
A worker extracts bile from a bear at a bear farm owned by Guizhentang Pharmaceutical in Huian. Photograph: Imaginechina/Corbis
Other observers have reported bears refusing to eat until they simply wasted away and died.
Still, not everyone views bear bile farming as cruel.
“The process of extracting bear bile is like turning on a tap: natural, easy and without pain. After they’re done, the bears can even play happily outside. I don’t think there’s anything out of the ordinary! It might even be a very comfortable process!” said Fang Shuting the head of the Chinese Association of Traditional Chinese Medicine in 2012.
Shuting’s comments were in defence of another bear bile company’s, Guizhentang Pharmaceutical, plans to go public on the Hong Kong stock exchange. By going public, Guizhentang hoped to triple its number of captive bears from 400 to 1,200.
But the company’s proposal was met with a passionate, grassroots campaign by Chinese activists that eventually derailed the listing, while Shuting’s comments were derided in social media and condemned by bear bile experts.
In all, experts estimate that there are at least 12,000 bears in bear bile facilities today. The bulk of the bears are housed in China, though Vietnam, Laos, Burma, South Korea also sport facilities. While there is significant demand for bear bile in China, it is also sold across Southeast Asia as far south as Malaysian Borneo.
Conservation concerns
Despite what it has become, the origins of bear farming was, at least rhetorically, in part to save wild bears. The Chinese have been consuming bear bile for over a thousand years. But before the rise of these farms, practitioners simply went into the woods, killed a bear, and then removed its gall bladder with the lucrative bile inside.
Over the centuries, not surprisingly, bears began to vanish. It’s a similar story to many other animals targeted by the Chinese medicine trade, such as tigers, pangolins, Sumatran and Javan rhinos, Asian turtles, and more. Like bears, these have all faced relentless hunting for purported curatives. This over-hunting, combined with massive habitat loss, has led to the complete destruction of some populations and declines in others.
The main target of the bear bile trade – the Asian black bear (Ursus thibetanus) also known as the moon bear – is today listed as vulnerable by the IUCN Red List. Little is known about its total population, although as few as 25,000 may survive in the wild and it has certainly vanished from much of its former range and is in decline where it persists. The trade, however, has also targeted the sun bear (Helarctos malayanus) – also vulnerable – and various subspecies of brown bear.
But solely from a conservation perspective – setting aside ethical concerns – the start of bear bile farms in the 1980s was initially hoped to relieve some pressure on wild bears. The idea was if bear farms raised a self-sustaining population of productive animals than poachers would have little impetus to capture or kill bears in the wild.
But experts say that hasn’t happened and there are a number of reasons why. For one thing, breeding bears isn’t cheap, and in most cases it’s probably still less expensive and easier to steal bears from the wild to repopulate farms with high turnover. For another, experts believe that more bear bile on the market has pushed practitioners to prescribe the substance more freely and for a broader array of ailments, many not connected to traditional use. Finally, there are those consumers that appear to prefer bear bile from wild animals, either viewing it as more authentic or concerned about the sanitary conditions – or lack thereof – on bear farms.
Illegal metal jacket had just been taken off by the farmer in Weihai in eastern Chinese province of Shandong, and flung into a corner at a bear bile farm in Weihai city, east Chinas Shandong province. Photograph: Imaginechina/Corbis
Robinson says the proof that bear farms are still stealing animals from the wild is as easy as looking at their mangled charges.
“Approximately 30% of rescued bears at our sanctuary in Chengdu are missing limbs or have obvious snare or trap wounds indicating that they were wild caught,” she said, adding that wild-caught bears are often more aggressive as well.
Yet, the paucity of oversight from the government – and the fact that much of the trade occurs underground – means it’s up to NGOs to make guesses.
“We almost have to take on a detective role, working through the injuries and wounds on the bears’ bodies and piecing the evidence together to continue the case against the industry,” Robinson added.
She said some bear facilities certainly do breed animals – and parade the cubs around to prove it – but “we believe that their breeding is not as successful as they would maintain, and it is clearly easier and cheaper to bring in wild caught bears than spend funds on denning pens and the extra food the females require during the breeding season.”
The fact that bear farms have not mitigated threats in the wild is outlined by a 2012 International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) resolution calling for a phasing out of bear farms, including shuttering any illegal facilities and not establishing new ones. The motion said evidence was “lacking” that bear farms had lessened killing of wild bears.
Given this, a paper in Oryx last year suggested that we rename bear farms – which gives the sense of domesticated bears breeding freely – to “bile extraction facilities”.
Still, the Chinese government has recently challenged the IUCN resolution, according to Shepherd, claiming that the industry is capable of providing bear bile without resorting to wild bear capture or poaching.
This is a view echoed by Fang Shunting, “bear farming is the best way to protect wild bears. Given the market demand, how could we prevent wild bear hunting?”
Will traditional doctors get on board?
Now, let’s assume Kaibao Pharmaceuticals is successful in developing a synthetic alternative to bear bile, using poultry. Let’s also assume the company – which brings in more than $50m a year in net sales – aggressively pushes the alternative. The big question, according to Traffic’s Shepherd, is will traditional doctors accept that synthetic bear bile – made from poultry – is just as good as the real thing?
Convincing practitioners may prove quite difficult. For one thing, there are already a slew of alternatives available, yet bear bile remains in high demand. Indeed, ursodeoxycholic acid – the most important component of bear bile – has already been synthetically reproduced in the US and prescribed for very specific diseases.
“There are more than 50 herbal [and] legal alternatives that we would also strongly encourage practitioners and retailers to recommend to consumers,” said Shepherd. “If practitioners moves towards these alternatives, consumers would follow.”
So why would Kaibao’s synthetic alternative make any difference? Experts are cautiously hopeful because this version would come from one of the biggest sellers of bear bile today. Unlike Western synthetic versions, it would also be home grown. According to Shepherd, though, the most important thing for Kaibao is to convince traditional doctors.
“The key is the practitioners… people listen to, and trust, their doctor,” he said.
To this end, Animals Asia has long been asking practitioners to stop prescribing bear bile in a campaign they call Healing Without Harm.
“To date thousands of doctors have joined us in pledging never to use or prescribe bear bile,” noted Robinson.
What do animals experience
Of course, one of the ironies of Kaibao’s announcement is that their synthetic bear bile would still come from an animal. Although the company did not respond to repeated inquiries, it appears from their statement that they would likely be sourced from already-farmed poultry.
“This remains an ethical dilemma and the debate surrounding the use of all animal products continues and remains entirely worthwhile,” said Robinson. But, she added, “from the point of view of ending bear bile farming, and drastically reducing suffering of animals caged and mutilated for anything up to 30 years of their lives, this is a huge step.”
Bear torture?
In the meantime, more than 10,000 bears remain in these facilities where Robinson says they “suffer terribly”. But that brings us back to our first question. What do animals experience? Can we really know if the bears in these facilities suffer or are they “without pain” as Shuting argues?
“Bears, like us, are warm bloodied mammals with a central nervous system and pain receptors, indicating that they deserve the benefit of doubt, and indeed feel pain,” said Robinson.
Indeed, recent research has found that more animals experience suffering – or negative stimuli – than long believed. For centuries, scientists and philosophers have debated whether animals are generally automatons – driven solely by instinct and lacking thought or emotion – rather than distinct individuals with personalities and a rich emotional life. But the famous discoveries that chimps use tools, whales sing, and crows solve problems has largely crushed the automaton argument.
Recent research has even revealed that invertebrates – let alone mammals, birds, reptiles, etc – undergo suffering and have some level of what we call intelligence. For example, scientists have found that crustaceans – such as lobsters – feel pain and may even experience anxiety; wasps maintain long-term memory; bees are capable of counting; and even cockroaches have personalities.
Unlike these invertebrates, though, people have historically viewed bears as particularly clever and sensitive animals. For centuries, people have trained bears as entertainment. Now largely viewed as cruel, such training proved that these big mammals could learn new tasks quickly. Despite such displays of cleverness – and the fact that bears sport the largest brains relative to body size of any carnivore (bigger than your pet dog) – there has been surprisingly little research on bear intelligence.
One of the few studies came out last year when researchers found that bears could “count”. Researchers trained American black bears to select groupings of dots based on which was bigger or smaller. The bears performed as well in the study as primates. In 2012, another researcher documented a wild brown bear carefully selecting barnacle-covered rocks to scratch itself, possible evidence of tool use.
“[Bear] intelligence is often said to be equal to that of a dolphin or a three-year-old child. But I feel that this description really doesn’t do justice to their individuality, and intelligence that we have yet to properly define,” said Robinson, who points to her years of experience working with hundreds of rescued bears at Animals Asia facilities.
“They learn very quickly and work things through. They have pre-emptive and anticipatory behaviour that allows them to improve or benefit their own lives,” she said, noting that bears are particularly choosy about making comfortable beds – maybe Goldilocks was based on real observation – and that her rescued bears quickly learn to sleep during employees’ lunch break because “this is a quiet time at the sanctuaries and that little happens… just before our team return to work, the bears will start to rouse too.”
Robinson also said that rescued bears’ behaviour clearly changes over time. In the beginning, the bears shrink away as people approach and even moan aloud – anticipating that they will be harmed, according to Robinson, as they were in the bile factories – or become aggressive. But after months in the sanctuary, bears become more relaxed, more social, and maybe even, as one could describe it, psychologically sane.
“Bears that previously exploded in anger at the mere presence of a human are calm and trusting, and slowly they comprehend that the approach of our staff is a positive addition to their lives,” Robinson said, adding they are “no longer violently stereotypic, or aggressive”.
Animals Asia’s two sanctuaries – one in China and one in Vietnam – now houses around 500 bears, all rescued from bear bile facilities. If Kaibao synthetic alternative works, though, Animals Asia may have to take on the care of many more bears, though it doesn’t seem they would mind.
“[Rescued bears] ultimately prove to be fun-loving, trusting and forgiving of the species that caused them indescribable pain,” noted Robinson.
But can bears forgive? Are they capable of granting absolution – and even if they are would they really choose to forgive us? Perhaps we may never know, but either way it may well be that we need it.
Posted on February 10, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
After China’s top expert for infectious diseases warned that “pets” needed to be quarantined if they had contact with coronavirus patients, people started buying masks for the animals they live with.
But shortly after, the concerns amongst people reportedly gave way to some gruesome measures.
Officials and companies in various provinces, villages and municipalities across China were ordered by their superiors to issue the strict instructions for locals to tackle the epidemic. One village in Hebei urged all households to “deal with” their pets within five days, otherwise officials would “handle” them, reports the site www.express.co.uk.
The World Health Organization (WHO), however, claimed that there is no evidence of the virus being passed onto cats or dogs.
Sadly, the panic is too great to heed any advice from the WHO and humans have always put themselves and their concerns over the lives of the rest of the animals.
There’s still the anthropocentric view that at the slightest threat to human health, we, as a species, can dispose of the fundamental rights of the rest.
That’s why we will not stop saying it until the reality tells us otherwise: non-humans are THE MOST OPPRESSED group of individuals on the planet and that is why we focus on defending their rights and changing our collective perception of them.
Posted on February 10, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
As a child, I was told that rats transmit diseases, they are ugly and disgusting, and I was taught that these animals are particularly responsible for the transmission of life-threatening diseases.
There has never been a peaceful coexistence with rats in my house, aggression and family panic have always existed, and cruel measures have been taken to eliminate them, wich was very easy because they are the weakest and most vulnerable.
I’m glad today that I found this video.
And post it for everyone who has taken fear, phobias or even disgust at certain animals from his home.
The sooner the right education about animals begins, the sooner you learn to respect all animals, to respect their rights and existence, the more likely it is that later, in your adult life, you will belong to the civilized.
Posted on February 10, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
The full text of Phoenix’s passionate acceptance speech, as he wins the best actor Academy Award for Joker.
I’m full of so much gratitude now. I do not feel elevated above any of my fellow nominees or anyone in this room, because we share the same love – that’s the love of film.
And this form of expression has given me the most extraordinary life. I don’t know where I’d be without it.
But I think the greatest gift that it’s given me, and many people in [this industry] is the opportunity to use our voice for the voiceless. I’ve been thinking about some of the distressing issues that we’ve been facing collectively.
I think at times we feel or are made to feel that we champion different causes. But for me, I see commonality.
I think, whether we’re talking about gender inequality or racism or queer rights or indigenous rights or animal rights, we’re talking about the fight against injustice.
We’re talking about the fight against the belief that one nation, one people, one race, one gender, one species, has the right to dominate, use and control another with impunity.
I think we’ve become very disconnected from the natural world. Many of us are guilty of an egocentric world view, and we believe that we’re the centre of the universe. We go into the natural world and we plunder it for its resources. We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and steal her baby, even though her cries of anguish are unmistakeable. Then we take her milk that’s intended for her calf and we put it in our coffee and our cereal.
We fear the idea of personal change, because we think we need to sacrifice something; to give something up. But human beings at our best are so creative and inventive, and we can create, develop and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and the environment.
I have been a scoundrel all my life, I’ve been selfish. I’ve been cruel at times, hard to work with, and I’m grateful that so many of you in this room have given me a second chance. I think that’s when we’re at our best: when we support each other. Not when we cancel each other out for our past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow. When we educate each other; when we guide each other to redemption.
When he was 17, my brother [River] wrote this lyric. He said: “run to the rescue with love and peace will follow.”
Posted on February 10, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
As a pastime, hunters in Germany kill up to half a million foxes in the most gruesome way – many of the animals are “only” shot or literally crushed and mutilated. Foxes serve as a living target for hunters; there is no reason for the mass hunt of the predators either from a wild biological or health point of view.
Politics must finally act and put an end to the senseless killing of the useful animals.
Foxes are an important part of our nature and need our protection.
The red fox (Vulpes vulpes) belongs to the order of the predators (Carnivora) and is a representative of the dog family (Canidae). Due to the extraordinary ability to adapt to the most varied living conditions, it lives in a variety of habitats – from remote forests to cultural landscapes and into the cities.
The red fox is also not picky when it comes to its food and eats, for example, small mammals, birds and earthworms, but also carrion or fruit.
Foxes live both as loners and in social family groups. In such a family association, only the dominant pair of foxes have offspring – some foxes even stay together for a lifetime.
The mating season is between December and February.
After about 52 days, four to five fox pups are born.
In a fox family, both parents take care of the children. The older daughters also often stay with the parents and lovingly help raise their siblings.
Foxes do everything for their family: In May 2009, the British Daily Mail reported a fox puppy caught in a snare trap. The little fox survived only because his mother probably gave him food for two weeks until he was saved.
“Smart like a fox”
The red fox is the most common prey on earth. It lives in the icy cold in the Arctic Circle, but also in hot North Africa and in the dry steppes of Asia. Thanks to his high level of intelligence, he can adapt to a wide variety of living conditions and is a real survivor.
“Foxes learn quickly, grasp relationships and can then translate their knowledge into sophisticated strategies that ensure their survival in many situations. […] There are foxes, for example, who pretend to be dead to attract crows, who then snatch them at the right moment. ” (Prof. Dr. Dr. Herzog, Technical University Dresden)
Violation of the animal protection law
According to the Animal Welfare Act § 17, it is forbidden to kill or harm an animal without good reason. Nothing else happens in the fox hunt.
Animal welfare has been anchored in the Basic Law since 2002 and must be viewed as a legally binding good. The state protection goal of animal protection has basic rights status – but not hunting. Thus, the right to hunt is subordinate to animal welfare.
Unfortunately, the hunter lobby, which is well networked in the authorities and politics, was able to assert itself again and again on the political level.
In Luxembourg, on the other hand, the government was not impressed by the hunters’ slogans and in April 2015 enforced a ban on fox hunting that continues to this day. The result: “No major problems”!
The Luxembourg hunting association “Fédération Saint-Hubert” nevertheless tried to take legal action against the ban on hunting – without success. In 2016 the administrative court upheld the ban on fox hunting and the judges’ weak arguments were clearly rejected by the judges:
“On the one hand, the hunters cannot prove to the legislature that there is a clear mistake in assessing the situation. On the other hand, hunters cannot clearly demonstrate that the number of foxes is limited by hunting. “
The animal agonies during fox hunting are caused by:
– Missed shots: only half of the animals are killed by firing with guns: Most are seriously injured and die an agonizing death after days.
-Construction hunt: the foxes are driven and shot by hunters with dogs from their protective structure.
-Homicide traps: In practice, these traps often injure animals severely, and many of them die a slow and painful death from severed limbs, broken fragments, or crushed body parts.
-Live traps: the animals are caught with these traps and then executed with a head shot.
The special wire mesh traps are attached to the exits of the burrow, so that the fox pups step in on their next tour of discovery. In this way, hunters wipe out entire fox families.
Sign our petition: The senseless fox hunt in Germany must finally be prohibited!
Please ask together with us the responsible ministries of all federal states as well as the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture to remove foxes from the list of huntable species or at least to introduce a year-round closed season.
My comment: From the Facebook page “Total Hunt”, February 8, 2020: Successful fox hunt 🦊
On the morning stalk, this fox laced lengthways across the field and I can get a precise shot with my specialized fox rifle in caliber 22-250 Rem. With the V-Max 55 grs from Hornady, the woman is in a blast. The caliber makes shooting extremely pleasant and precise.The recoil is minimal with a silencer. The perfect combination for the fox hunt 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
Image: Jagd Total
This is how psychopaths talk.
Hunting opens up a “space” for crime to murder.
Hunting without murder is a term that cancels itself.
Killing can have a power component and hunting is the stage on which power is also lived.
Animals are the victims that are readily available.
The animal species plays only a subordinate role here: game, pets, “farm animals”.
The main thing is to kill.
And they try to enforce their murder ideology through love of nature, ecological balance, regulation of populations … a silly justification for their crimes that no educated and civilized person would accept.
Posted on February 9, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Posted by Glass Walls, Israel
December 9, 2018, a documentary by Nir Galim, Central District, Israel
Glass walls…
Follow-up of the Israeli dairy industry for years resulted in most shocking discoveries that every person in Israel should know and see.
A lubricated commercial mechanism that labels the white liquid as a superfood and be promoted through physicians, nutritionists and academia and left since decades little room for doubting how usefull it is really for us.
But today we already have enough information to reveal a completely different reality that took about 55 minutes in the movie.
The documentary “Blood Ridged Milk” that refutes almost every possible myth that has been told us about the milk dairy products.
Watch and distribute to family and friends these life-saving information.
My comment: We ourselves, or most of us, cannot torture animals. That’s why we let others do it.
With a few deviations in the cruelty level, the cruel procedure of industrial milk production remains the same in (almost) every country:
1. Load seeds into the gun
2. Fix subject
3. Insert the gun into the vagina
4. Give birth to a calf
5. Separate the calf from the mother with mental pain
6. Yields
7. Destruction in a bestial way
Without this dreadful procedure of the dairy industry, this “subject” – which is a thinking and feeling being – doesn’t give milk.
Human animal is the only animal that still drinks foreign milk in adult life.
Apart from the second-hand torture that every meat and milk consumer practices, they cooperate and support a corrupt and fascist system that is responsible for the destruction of the habitat and the existence of millions of human animals. And for the destruction of our planet too!
Either way, eating animals is not a personal choice, it is a crime.
Posted on February 9, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
In Spain, the Party against animal abuse (PACMA)has published a video that shows a horse “collapsing from exhaustion” after being forced to drag a car loaded with sacks along a sand track during a shooting and drag test held in August 2019 in the Valencian town of Riba-roja de Túria, east of the country.
According to this match, the images represent “another sign that animal abuse in shooting and drag is the norm, not the exception.”
THIS is what the Generalitat Valenciana supports, year after year, a government that claims to be progressive. How long will they allow this terrible and continued abuse?
Heavy blows on the snout, belly, testicles … PACMA has just denounced and made public another cruel practice with animals: the shooting and drag competitions that are held in several municipalities of Valencia.
The Partido Animalista Contra el Maltrato Animal(PACMA) has filed several complaints with the Generalitat Valenciana and the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports for the “systematized abuse” to which horses are subjected to the shooting and drag shows.
PACMA has once again documented the mistreatment of horses used in draft and drag. PACMA activists recorded on Sunday August 11, 2019 in the Valencian population of Riba-roja de Túria how a horse collapsed from exhaustion after being forced to drag a car loaded with sacks along a sand track.
This video is another sign that animal abuse in shooting and drag is the norm, not the exception. We have been almost a year without going to document any shooting and drag championship, and in the first one we have been after all this time we have witnessed images that blood the heart of anyone who has a minimum of empathy and respect for animals.
Two years ago, some very hard images were recorded in several shooting and drag championships in different Valencian towns, which collected punches in the head of the horses, blows in the testicles, kicks, insults …
When asked about it, the Mayor of Valencia,Joan Ribó, said that there are “culture-based” practices that the authorities do not want to “prohibit”.
However, he said that his community is trying to “gradually suppress all elements associated with animal aggression becauseit is in line with people’s new ways of thinking,” the La Vanguardianewspaper said.
Since then, the world of shooting and pulling has tried to defend itself against the criticism of public opinion, arguing that animal abuse and use of the tail to “motivate” horses are no longer allowed.
However, all of this is nothing more than a mere excuse, because pulling in itself is animal abuse.
Even if the animal is not beaten during the test, it is violent if the horse is forced to pull a car on a dirt track that weighs three times more than its weight and at a temperature of 40 degrees.
Today the controversy continues about this cruelty which the Valencian authorities consider to be a sport and which is subsidized by public funds.
PACMA will continue denouncing this practice and claiming before the Generalitat Valenciana the end of the use of horses for the fun of a few psychopaths.
And I mean: The worst shame of mankind is the preservation of a tradition when it is associated with the torture or even the death of an animal. In most countries it is considered as “necessary” and “justified” torturing and killing an animal in the name of tradition, but today are only the economic interests that keep a tradition alive.
Especially in Spain, only the subsidized coffers of this bankrupt country would look pretty poor, if Spain abolished all of its traditional animal torture fiestas.
Posted on February 9, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
WAV Comment – A very interesting article from the excellent National Geographic.
”The scale of the live wild animal trade in China is unclear, experts say. Many animals are poached, imported, and exported illegally—for food, medicine, trophies, and pets. The Chinese traditional medicine industry, which heavily relies on ancient belief in the healing powers of animal parts, is a massive driver of the trade”.
Maybe now it really is time that China looked at itself; and especially its antiquated beliefs that support healthy living by eating live animals is good for you (has it done anything to stop the virus ?) – and now makes all the necessary changes to get into Century 21 and stop being labelled as the international disease spreader by its unhygienic approaches to the treatment of sentient beings.
For Cordelia, the 18-year-old university student from Guangzhou, life is at a standstill. School is closed, and she can’t visit her family. Reflecting on the biological crisis that emerged from a cultural practice she can’t relate to, she says, “I believe nature gives back to us what we give to it.”
Maybe that time has now arrived – time for change !
More Chinese push to end wildlife markets as WHO declares coronavirus emergency
Media coverage of China’s wildlife markets sends the message that they’re hugely popular. In reality, many Chinese can’t relate.
At a wildlife market in Shenzhen, vendors display live reptiles and mammals for sale. In China, 54 species can be traded legally for human consumption. The coronavirus outbreak has thrust the live wildlife trade into the international spotlight.
On a farm near Beijing last September, a group of conservationists put in a call to police: They’d found thousands of live birds being stored in a barn. Police seized and released the birds—about 10,000 in all—which had been caught illegally with traps and were destined for restaurants and markets in southern China. Among them were yellow-breasted buntings, critically endangered songbirds whose numbers have been in freefall, largely because people in parts of China want to eat them.
The spread of a deadly strain of coronavirus, sourced to a wildlife market in Wuhan and now a global health emergency, according to the World Health Organization, has thrust China’s live wild animal trade into the spotlight. On January 26, China announced a ban on its wild animal trade until the crisis is over. Images of sick, suffering animals in markets, and videos of bats boiling alive in bowls of soup have circulated in media, sparking outrage globally and creating the impression that buying live wild animals for eating is a megascale phenomenon in China.
The reality is more nuanced. In Guangzhou, a city of 14 million in the southeast and a frequent destination for yellow-breasted buntings, eating wildlife appears exceedingly common. In Beijing, it’s exceedingly rare.
In reality, to many Chinese, consuming wild animals is a cultural outlier. State-controlled media outlets such as China Daily have published scathing editorials denouncing the practice and calling for a permanent wildlife trade ban. These calls in turn are amplified by thousands of Chinese citizens on state-censored social media networks such as Weibo, indicating that the government seems to be letting the momentum build.
The scale of the live wild animal trade in China is unclear, experts say. Many animals are poached, imported, and exported illegally—for food, medicine, trophies, and pets. The Chinese traditional medicine industry, which heavily relies on ancient belief in the healing powers of animal parts, is a massive driver of the trade.
The government allows 54 wild species to be bred on farms and sold for consumption, including minks, ostriches, hamsters, snapping turtles, and Siamese crocodiles. Many wild animals, such as snakes and birds of prey, are poached and brought to state-licensed farms, says Zhou Jinfeng, secretary-general of the China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation, an NGO in Beijing that helped with the bird rescue in September. Zhou says some farmers claim that their animals were bred legally in captivity for conservation but then sell them to markets or collectors.
It’s unknown how many live wildlife markets exist in China, but experts estimate they could number in the hundreds. Some department and big-box stores also sell wild meat and live amphibians for consumption. For market buyers, frogs are a common and inexpensive wildlife dish, says Peter Li, China policy specialist at Humane Society International and professor in East Asian politics at the University of Houston-Downtown. On the high end, Li says, only the rich can afford soup made with palm civet (a cat-size mammal native to jungles throughout Southeast Asia), fried cobra, or braised bear paw.
Such food was not part of Li’s experience growing up. “My parents never cooked wild animals, and [we’ve] never eaten them. I’ve never had snake—much less cobra.”
Rebecca Wong, assistant professor of sociology and behavioral sciences at the City University of Hong Kong, argues in her 2019 book about the illegal wildlife trade in China that consuming wildlife “is a common phenomenon in mainland China.” But Wong cautions against stereotyping this practice, arguing that the idea of the “Asian superconsumer” is a myth and that complex motivations are at play, including peer pressure, societal pressure, and the impulse to chase status.
A 2014 study that surveyed more than a thousand people in five Chinese cities found radically different practices in different parts of the country. In Guangzhou, 83 percent of people interviewed had eaten wildlife in the previous year. In Shanghai, 14 percent had, and in Beijing, just 5 percent. Nationwide, more than half the respondents said wild animals shouldn’t be eaten at all.
Same city, different cultural experiences
Charles, 22, and Cordelia, 18, are university students from the Guangzhou area, where wild animal consumption is purportedly high. I spoke with each through Instagram, where they use English names. (Both asked National Geographic not to use their last names—Instagram is banned in China, but like many young people, they use VPNs to access it.)
Charles says eating wild animals is very common in his community, but his family doesn’t partake much, and he eats only occasionally and out of curiosity. “Nowadays, older people buy them more than younger,” he says. He thinks it’s because of education.
Cordelia, who lives in downtown Guangzhou, says the practice isn’t at all common in her family or community. “My friends and family don’t really like eating wild animals, and we think it’s disgusting.” She explains that she sees it as “disrespectful and a strong violation to mother nature.” She believes the ongoing epidemic may move others to see it that way too. “I think after this terrible spread of coronavirus, citizens will realize that the belief that eating wild animals is beneficial is not reliable.”
Cordelia and Charles both support making the ban on the wild animal trade permanent, and they say they’ve seen an outpouring of support for it on Weibo.
Cordelia’s mention that belief in health benefits help drive consumption is reflected on market floors. Live animals sell for a higher price—often two to three times more—than dead ones. “People think food is more nutritious if it’s live and fresh,” Li says. “An animal may be dying, but it’s alive.”
A “cauldron of contagion”
In markets, animals “are dying, they are thirsty, they are in rusty cages and totally dirty,” Li says. They may be missing limbs or have open wounds from their capture in the wild or injuries sustained during transport. “The traders don’t handle them gently—they smash the cages down to the floor when unloading and loading. The animals suffer a lot.”
The chaos of the trade enables the spread of zoonotic diseases—those that spread from animals to humans—says Christian Walzer, chief global veterinarian at the U.S.-based Wildlife Conservation Society. Wild animals, he explains, can carry viruses that “in a normal world, would not come into contact with humans.” These carriers aren’t sick—they’re simply “silent reservoirs.” But as we encroach into animals’ habitats, we increase our exposure.
Seventy percent of zoonotic diseases come from wildlife, says Erin Sorrell, an assistant research professor in the department of microbiology and immunology at Georgetown University, in Washington, D.C. The diseases can be notoriously devastating: HIV, Ebola, and SARS are among those that have made the leap from wildlife to humans, spawning international outbreaks.
In wildlife markets in China and Southeast Asia, there may be 40 species—birds, mammals, reptiles—“stacked on top of each other,” Walzer says. The mixing of air and bodily secretions allows viruses to exchange, potentially creating new strains. Walzer sums it up as a “cauldron of contagion.”
Evidence points to bats as the source of the Wuhan coronavirus. It’s unclear which species then transmitted the disease to humans, but in an assessment of the Wuhan market, the coronavirus was detected in the live wild animal section.
Preventing déjà vu
Many conservationists I spoke to believe that China’s temporary ban of the wildlife trade—which applies to all markets, grocery stores, and online sales and includes a quarantine on all breeding facilities—is likely to be largely successful. The government has set up a hotline for people to report violations. “This is an emergency situation,” Peter Li says. “Everyone is watching. Any trader who violates the ban will be reported.” On top of that, fear of coronavirus likely reduces demand—even if sellers are willing to offer live animals illegally, people may not want to buy them.
China has resorted to a ban before. In 2003, at the height of SARS epidemic, which is believed to have originated in civets, the government issued a temporary ban on the wildlife trade. Six months later, it lifted the ban, allowing breeding facilities to resume business. Li says it’s difficult to say whether the overall live wildlife trade has grown during the past two decades, but he believes that more of the transactions have gone underground to evade law enforcement.
There’s always the risk that this could happen again, Sorrell notes. “There’s been a 15-to-16-year gap [since SARS], but who’s to say it’s going to be another 16 years before we see the next disease emerge from a live animal market?”
To make the temporary ban permanent, there would need to be clarification on what it actually encompasses. Some of its terms are vague, leaving them open to interpretation at the local law enforcement level. For example, does the ban include dried wildlife parts, such as bone and scales? It should, several experts tell me, but as written, it’s unclear.
A permanent ban would face strong opposition from business interests, Li says. The State Forestry and Grassland Administration, which is responsible for issuing licenses to wildlife breeders, “has long been a spokesperson for the wildlife interest,” he says. (A Forestry Administration official had not responded to a request for comment before publication.)
Sorrell emphasizes the need for caution in the pursuit of a permanent ban.
“I would love to see wildlife be removed from markets, full stop,” she says. But if a ban is rushed without careful consideration, the entire wildlife trade could move underground, making it “even more dangerous for [a product] to be consumed because we’re not seeing where it’s being consumed or where it’s coming from.”
“For any ban to be effective, it will be important to get buy-in from citizens,” adds Caroline Dingle, an evolutionary biologist in the conservation forensics lab at Hong Kong University, who studies wildlife crime. “People need to believe that consuming wild animals is bad for them personally for any ban to work long-term.”
If a permanent ban is adopted, Li says, it would be important for the government to buy out or compensate farmers to make it possible for them to pursue a different livelihood.
Meanwhile, for yellow-breasted buntings, verging on extinction because of recent rapid consumption, something more has to give. It’s already against the law to catch the birds, but that hasn’t slowed their trade.
For Cordelia, the 18-year-old university student from Guangzhou, life is at a standstill. School is closed, and she can’t visit her family. Reflecting on the biological crisis that emerged from a cultural practice she can’t relate to, she says, “I believe nature gives back to us what we give to it.”
But she draws my attention to the unity she’s seen in the wake of the crisis and the outcry on Weibo and in Chinese newspapers. “I think,” she types over Instagram, “revolutionary change is highly possible.”
Posted on February 9, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Australian summers can be tough for people and animals…
And while many of us can endure the hottest days with the help of air conditioning and plenty of fluids to keep us hydrated, our wildlife friends can suffer terribly during extreme heat, and even die. Here are 6 ways you can help make the difference between life and death for wildlife during increasingly hot and dry Aussie summers:
Click on this link to read the 6 ways that you can make the difference between life and death for Australian wildlife:
Posted on February 8, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Police officer shot a free-running dog on the Highway 29 with a submachine gun. Previously, ten officers (!!!) tried to capture the animal.
A free-running stray dog temporarily blocked traffic on Highway29 near Rastede near Oldenburg (Germany) and caused a lot of work for the police. The animal did not want to be caught on Thursday (February 6, 2020) and switched from one lane to the other.
The highway was temporarily blocked (25 Minutes).
Attempts to sedate the animal from a rifle with stun arrows failed, the police said after the operation. “The arrows hit, but had no effect,”said a spokesman. That was probably due to the dog’s high adrenaline level. Ultimately, an officer shot the animal with a submachine gun.
After the targeted killing of these free-running dog the police explained their procedure in a Facebook post.
The officials responded to massive criticism on social networks. The decision to kill the animal was based on the considerable risk to the affected road users on the A29.
Before the fatal shot, police said ten officers tried to capture the animal. “There were no alternatives, unfortunately nothing else was possible,” said the spokesman. “The use of firearms is always the last option here”, the Facebook post emphasizes.
“Despite the closure of the motorway, it could not be ruled out that the animal could have caused a serious accident. Please understand. No police officer likes to do this, and we’re really sorry for the dog”(police statement on Facebook)
The dog was neither aggressive nor had behaved incorrectly.
A submachine gun is of course always a quick fix so that car traffic is not held up too long.
Blocked for 25 minutes the highway? Really?? For every shit construction work is blocked the Highway forever!
but for a dog only 25 minutes?
10 officers failed to catch a medium-sized stray dog ???! Not even with a blanket or something like the police do in America?
Then we should rather have doubts about what the police can do, if it can’t even catch a dog in an open area without killing him.
The traffic was already shut down, so no driver was at risk, and the dog had obviously managed to get through the highway fence into the forest (where he was then shot).
He would never have run back on the highway.
And yet, someone shoots him.
With shooting they are always quick, they always shoot down immediately. And always the wrong or the weak ones!
If you want to become a police officer in Germany, it is enough if you have a fascist conviction and criminal energy. It was murder.
Where does your local high street café get their pork from? 5 of the 6 high street café chains we surveyed get their pork from factory farms. Pester Pig takes revenge on a heartless couple who order factory-farmed bacon sarnies! You can help free pigs from chains by liking and sharing this video.
Tell DEFRA to ban low welfare imports
We’re calling on the UK government to ban the importation of pork produced in conditions that would be illegal in the UK. Sign the petition today:
UK supermarkets & high street chains source from the very cheapest pork producers across the EU and perhaps in future from the USA, forcing our farmers out of the industry or to get bigger with ever more intensive and cruel conditions. Pigs reared in UK factory farms (an intensive farming system that is permitted under the Red Tractor labelling scheme) have to endure permanent indoor confinement in barren, overcrowded pens for their entire lives. Mother pigs are kept in narrow metal cages so small they cannot even turn around for five weeks in each pregnancy.
The Solution
To enable our farmers to improve their pig standards and survive, the government needs to ban the importation of pork produced in cruel conditions that are illegal in the UK. This would stop supermarkets & food chains competing to source the cheapest pork raised in the lowest standards of welfare and give UK farmers the freedom to increase their welfare conditions in accordance with UK consumers’ demands.
Pork labelled RSPCA Assured, Free Range and Organic has been raised in significantly better standards than the UK Red Tractor labelling scheme and minimum UK,EU and US standards. Pigs on high welfare farms, either outdoors or indoors with plenty of straw, are less stressed so more contented and healthy . They have enough room to roam and express natural instinctive behaviours such as rooting, nesting and playing.
The Pig Welfare Survey
Three-quarters of the 60 high street supermarkets & food chains surveyed by Farms Not Factories sell pork from factory farms. The vast majority of these don’t offer a single high welfare alternative.
Please sign our petition telling DEFRA MPs to enable our farmers to improve their pig standards and survive.
We’ve prepared an email for you, however it’s much more powerful to write in your own words. A personalised salutation (Dear + MPs name) and a sign-off (Sincerely, + your name) are automatically added.
Posted on February 7, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Painful mutilation, such as dehorning, is common practice in the dairy industry. The horn systems of the calves, which are only a few weeks old, are burned out – mostly without anesthesia.
At least two burns are inflicted on the animals with full pain sensation. Burns, we know from personal experience, are still painful even after days. That is why we can speak of cruelty to animals here.
Dehorning is a practice that is carried out in the meat and dairy industry and can be very traumatic for small calves due to the immense pain it causes.
This process is usually carried out with a hot iron rod.
There are two kinds:
One is powered by the rod, which is heated with electricity (240 volts), and the other is heated by a gas burner.
Each of them destroys the horn that creates the skin at its base and completely denatures the animal.
The farmer uses disposable gloves when performing this gruesome exercise, keeping the calf’s ear out of the reach of the stick, but heating the stick to unscrew the animal until it gets scorching hot.
Then they put the burner tip under pressure on the horn.
When the burnt hair starts to smoke, then they twist the bar with a twist of their wrist. The application of heat continues, the heat can be transmitted through the thin bones of the skull and the calfs of the calves are damaged.
The worst? Many farmers are not “experts” and practice this practice without experience, especially in villages.
The dehorning process ends when the farmer sees a copper-colored ring around the base of the horn.
The pictures in the video show how cows are fixed with their heads between bars and their horns are cut off with huge pliers. Blood runs over their head.
My comment: The Animal Protection Law in Germany actually provides for a ban on amputations, including a ban on dehorning, but of course there are “exceptions”.
If it is stated that dehorning is necessary to avoid the risk of accidents or injury, the farmer “must” intervene.
There are already breeds that are born genetically without horns.
Nice!! you might think, but in the end it is absurd that humans breed animals so that they are efficient, square, practical and good.
Because the milk and meat mafia wants it that way.
It has nothing to do with nature anymore.
Pigs should all be the same size so that the bolt gun can be put on better and chickens should be of a uniform size so that they can be better placed in the holders upside down and their heads can be separated at the same place.
The animals are adapted to factory farming instead of accepting that animals were created to be free and not to serve us as captives.
If we don’t want to eat and have everything, we wouldn’t have to solve the problems we create ourselves. Our perverse, criminal relationship to animals proves every day of the new how underdeveloped we, human animals are on our moral.
Posted on February 7, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
The Argentinian Esperanza base in Antarctica – seen in March 2014 – recorded its hottest day on record on Thursday. Photograph: Vanderlei Almeida/AFP via Getty Images
Antarctica logs hottest temperature on record with a reading of 18.3C
A new record set so soon after the previous record of 17.5C in March 2015 is a sign warming in Antarctica is happening much faster than global average
Antarctica has logged its hottest temperature on record, with an Argentinian research station thermometer reading 18.3C, beating the previous record by 0.8C.
The reading, taken at Esperanza on the northern tip of the continent’s peninsula, beats Antarctica’s previous record of 17.5C, set in March 2015.
A tweet from Argentina’s meteorological agency on Friday revealed the record. The station’s data goes back to 1961.
Image: Brandenburg, Germany
“The greatest danger to lambs is not the wolf, but Easter”
Sabrina Pignedoli
Italian MEP Sabrina Pignedoli has called for a EU-wide approach to fighting Mafia activities (Image: GETTY)
Image: Animal Equality / Petition handed over to pig crates
Cat massacre with poison, Kos Island-Greece
poison bait
AFP / RAUL ARBOLEDA Owl monkeys at a zoo in Columbia; documents from a US government lab show a vet failed to provide care to a seriously ill female owl monkey kept for breeding purposes
AFP / Eric BARADAT A total of 31 internally reported incidents have come to light thanks to a freedom of information request made by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and shared exclusively with AFP 
AFP/File / Anthony WALLACE An experimenter at a US government laboratory injected 18 zebrafish with a salt solution, even though this procedure had not been approved; 11 died and seven were euthanized
AFP/File / Saul LOEB Activists with PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) demonstrate during a protest against the US military treatment of animals in Washington, DC in 2012
Image: Jagd Total
Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
