Posted on September 3, 2016 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Dear Mark,
Thanks to you and other generous wildlife lovers, we reached our match target of $175,000!
I am grateful beyond words.
Please be assured your generous donations, along with the match funds, are hard at work in the courts, in the field and here in Washington, D.C., ensuring that we leave future generations a world filled with wildlife.
The threats are great. The stakes are high. We can never ever give up.
But with friends like you, I am confident that we can save the imperiled animals we all love.
With deepest appreciation,
Jamie Rappaport Clark
President, Defenders of Wildlife
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Posted on September 3, 2016 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Somerset & Glos badger culls are unlicenced & illegal.
Information on the seven new areas and authorisation letters for all ten areas can be found on this link.
Whilst you will find the licences for the seven new areas on that gov website link, what you won’t see is the licences for W.Gloucestershire or W.Somerset, both were granted in 2012 Gloucestershires was granted on 17th September 2012 and was valid until 30th November 2015:
W.Somerset licence was issued the following month on 4th October 2012 with the same end date of 30th November 2015
Of course Natural England can extend the licence for an extra period of time to cover this year, but they have issued no such extension.
We must assume until Natural England issue an extension or a new licence that all culling is unlawful, if you find a cage set to trap anywhere in the county of Gloucestershire or Somerset you must assume it is set to illegally trap badgers.
Consider taking it into the police station and reporting the land owner. Better still, just trash it. The same goes for shooters, consider locking any gates with a shooter in the field and reporting immediately to the police.
Unlawful badger culling is a serious criminal offence.
Brian May’s Save Me Trust to Challenge Lawfulness of Badger Cull Licences
“Lawyers instructed by the Save Me Trust have today written to the Chief Executive and the Chief Legal Advisor of Natural England warning them that if any licences to cull badgers are either activated in Gloucestershire and Somerset or any new licences granted for this purpose anywhere, then the lawfulness of the decisions to do so will be challenged by a Judicial Review in the High Court.
BADGERS SET TO BE CRUCIFIED AS NATURAL ENGLAND WASH THEIR HANDS
Natural England have confirmed that they will not consider any new scientific evidence before rubber-stamping new authorizations to cull badgers.
In response to a detailed 12-point scientific challenge from 27 veterinary professionals, which had urged Natural England to examine the science, ethics and probity of badger culling before making the decision to roll out more culls, the acting Chief Executive of Natural England, Guy Thompson, replied:
“We would like to take this opportunity to underline Natural England’s role in the Government’s bTB eradication strategy, which is to support it through the issuing and administering of licences to cull and vaccinate badgers. In carrying out this licensing work we have regard to guidance from Government, which is derived from its bTB and badger control policy and supplementary evidence-based advice from Defra’s Chief Veterinary Officer and Chief Scientific Adviser.”
He added: “Enquiries relating to the Government’s policy, the efficacy of the cull and future roll- out should be directed to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.”
The first author of the letter from veterinary professionals, Dr Iain McGill, said: “Natural England are behaving like Pontius Pilate – washing their hands of their responsibilities whilst badgers are set to be crucified. NE have directed us towards Defra and the Chief Veterinary Officer for discussion of ‘evidence-based’ material, but we have repeatedly challenged the Chief Veterinary Officer and those vets within the profession who support badger culling, to a public debate. This offer still stands, but we quite understand the reluctance of opponents to debate with us in public, given the amount of scientific evidence now accumulating in our favour.”
“I am disappointed that Natural England have not answered any of our 12 concerns, and I have replied to Guy Thompson at Natural England in respect of one of my most serious concerns, requesting sight of the Disease Risk Analysis for the pilot badger culls, which should have been completed before the project commenced, as per recommendations by the OIE (World Organisation for Animal Health) and IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature). Our group will also contact Defra in order to further discuss our evidence-based concerns as he suggests.”
Iain McGill added: “In the absence of either a formal Disease Risk Analysis or an environmental impact assessment, it is hard to see how Natural England can legally issue badger cull licences at the current time. There are so many questions hanging over this policy, not only from our veterinary group, but also from the threat of legal action by Save Me, that the Government really would be better off cutting their losses and implementing alternatives. We stand ready to assist Government or other interested parties in formulating ethical, evidence-based and efficacious dairy policy, which would protect industry, cattle, wildlife and consumers.”
Caroline Lucas MP said: “It’s time for the Government to end the cruel, inhumane and wasteful badger cull. There needs to be investment in evidence-based strategies to tackle bovine TB – including vaccination and improved biosecurity. But instead of exploring these alternatives, and finding humane and effective solutions, millions of pounds have been wasted and we are no further forward in helping farmers. I hope this legal challenge brings an end to the cull and marks the start of serious exploration of better alternatives. ”
Comment:
If a government has interest to keep the farmer Mafia satisfied, then every government turns into animal killers. Because the farmer in England mean that the badgers are to blame for bovine tuberculosis, the government arranges a mass murder. The fact that the disease comes from the mass held cows and not from badgers, is not important for the farmer. He looks for years to the badger as the scapegoat. The government as well.
They have killed badgers for many years now, but the disease is rampant even further.
Actually badgers are among the most popular wild animals in the UK. Most Britons have a heart for badgers from an early age. But just at the farmers out in the country he was never really popular.
As the “sonny boy” David Cameron with the Conservatives came to power in March 2010, he allowed the farmers direct shooting of badgers. Cameron was by tradition on the side of the farmers. The farmers have the costs, the government has taken command of the mass murder. For everyone involved, it was the cheapest way of killing.
Other EU countries such as Germany have defeated the bovine tuberculosis decades ago, without playing the executioner of suspected carriers. Instead, they made regular skin tests and consistent emergency slaughter. The hypocritical method to kill badgers, ostensibly to protect cattle from the pathogen is not new in England. Another new feature is the moral thinking in the UK population. New and strong. The authority has not expected that.
This time everything looks a bit different. New government, many protests, strong support from the wildlife scene.
We hold our breath and the hand of the British activists.
Venus
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Posted on September 3, 2016 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Indonesian military personnel spray water on a burned forest area at Rimbo Panjang Village, Kampar, Riau, Indonesia on Aug. 6. 2015.
SAV Comment – the greed of man for that thing called ‘money’ is once again destroying this planet. We care that the animals are being killed – consumed by the fires started illegally. Indonesia is now paying the price big time for its lack of controls of the trade and allowing this to happen for illegal Palm Oil production when it should have instead been encouraging tourism to its country for people to see and photograph beautiful animals; many of which are now dead due to Indonesian mans greed. We shed no tears for them – one could argue that they are now getting what they deserve. The animals – they do NOT deserve this. Around for millions of years; destroyed and killed in months because of greed.
Mark,
As we speak, Indonesia is burning out of control. Just two days ago, the country declared an emergency, as hundreds of forest fires swept across the land.
These fires are being illegally lit to make way for palm oil and other plantations, clearing out swathes of forest and carbon-rich peatlands. And with that, critically endangered orangutans, elephants, and tigers are swallowed up.
This palm oil ends up on our supermarket shelves and is in almost everything we consume.
It doesn’t have to be this way. We’ve already made serious inroads: big brands like Starbucks, McDonald’s, Kellogg’s, and a dozen of others have adopted responsible palm oil policies after campaigning by the SumOfUs community and our partners.
But there’s so much more work to do. If we’re going to help stop Indonesia burning, we need to force PepsiCo, Tyson Foods (maker of Sara Lee desserts), and other companies to clean up their palm oil supply chains now. And we can only do this with a commitment from you.
The fires in Indonesia are so bad that the government has ordered schools be shut. Pollution levels are hazardous. Indonesia, as well as its neighbours, Singapore and Malaysia, are now being blanketed in a toxic, thick smog.
Firefighters are working around the clock, and even the military has been brought in to put out the fires.
These fires are not new: they happened last year, and they were the worst on record. Thousands of people and countless animals died; cities across South East Asia were covered in smog for weeks; half a million people were hospitalised; and 1.7 billion tonnes of carbon — equivalent to what Brazil produces in a year — was released into the atmosphere.
We have the power to decide whether history will repeat itself year after year, or whether we put a stop to it now — if you can chip in now!
If you make a donation today, we can instantly ramp up the pressure on companies like PepsiCo and Tyson Foods, using strategic tactics like brand-jamming on social media, on-the-ground organising, and ad buys.
In a few weeks, we’ll be paying a visit to Pepsi’s headquarters in New York, representing the voices of hundreds of thousands of SumOfUs members like you. And if we can raise enough money, we’ll run radio ads in the area so it definitely can’t escape our demands.
When we stand together, we are powerful enough to take on the biggest, baddest corporations in the world. But all of this starts with members like you, making a small donation of whatever you can afford to make protecting Indonesia’s rainforests possible.
Thanks for all that you do,
Paul and the team at SumOfUs
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Posted on September 1, 2016 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, September 1, 2016
CONTACTS:
Camilla Fox, Executive Director, Project Coyote – 415.690.0338; cfox@projectcoyote.org
Adrian Treves, Science Advisor, Project Coyote 608.890.1450;
treves@wisc.edu
Research Review Finds that Weak Science has Bolstered the U.S. Government’s Predator-Control Practices
Peer Reviewed Journal Article Vindicates Wildlife Advocates’ Claims against Lethal Predator Management
MILL VALLEY, Calif. Sept. 1, 2016 – From their review of the prevailing research into lethal and non-lethal predator control practices in North America and Europe, an international trio of environmental scientists has determined that the science behind the reviewed research is not very scientific. In fact, the authors of the review- titled “Predator Control Should Not be a Shot in the Dark”- call for a moratorium on lethal predator control policies until researchers adopt higher testing standards. The new findings are being hailed by wildlife conservation groups like Project Coyote, which have questioned traditional predator management policies and practices as carried out by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services program.
The authors of the peer-reviewed article, which appears in today’s edition of Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, a journal published by the Ecological Society of America, are Dr. Adrian Treves, a Harvard-trained associate professor at the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison; Dr. Miha Krofel, a assistant professor & wildlife researcher in the Department of Forestry at the University of Ljubljana in Ljubljana, Slovenia; and Jeannine McManus, a graduate student at the School of Animal Plants and Sciences at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa.
With little rigorous, scientific testing available, farmers and ranchers have historically relied upon taxpayer subsidized lethal predator control programs to protect their livestock. The authors’ research findings show that scientific studies that have proliferated since the 1970s have disproportionately supported lethal methods of predator management. In an effort to systematically evaluate the totality of the scientific research on lethal versus non-lethal predator management, the reviewers screened all of the relevant research – 500 discrete projects in all. Of those, only two experiments met the gold standard for reliability, as defined by the authors of the review. For their assessment, the reviewers adopted the gold standard currently in force for biomedical research, which requires random assignment to treatment and to control groups. This provides a guarantee against bias and increases the opportunity for strong inference – an essential component of good science.
“We expect backlash from those agencies and individuals who benefit from the status quo,” said Adrian Treves, Project Coyote Science Advisory Board Member and lead co-author of the paper. “Independent scientists serve the broad public interest when they scrutinize the science used to promote government policies.”
The authors point out that it is the research they rejected for non-random assignment, poor methods and other design flaws that has been used by government agencies to make lethal management policy. In 2014, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services (USDA WS) program exterminated 796 bobcats, 322 wolves, 580 black bears, 305 cougars, 1,186 red foxes, and 61,702 coyotes. Wildlife Services reports that across the United States, it spent about $127 million in fiscal year 2014 to kill 2.7 million animals, including 322 wolves. For decades, wildlife conservationists and scientists have condemned the indiscriminate and lethal approach to predator management as carried out by state wildlife agencies and the USDA WS. However, the agencies have justified their actions by claiming that science supports the killing of hundreds of thousands of predators each year, largely at the behest of ranchers and agribusiness.
“This review shows that state and federal agencies are relying on bad science and bad research to justify their use of lethal predator control programs,” said Camilla Fox, Founder and Executive Director of Project Coyote, a national non-profit organization that aims to reform predator management and promote coexistence between people and native carnivores. “We have just received another piece of evidence that killing predators is unjustified ethically, economically and certainly ecologically.”
Read the journal article here.
Watch a video about the article findings here.
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Posted on September 1, 2016 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Dear Mark,
Above – Torkal on arrival at Soi.
Torkal is just one example of the animals you can read about on our Facebook page.
At the age of about 6 years old, he was found blind and living on the streets.
Who knows how he managed to get by for so long?
Click here to be taken to our Facebook Page and join the millions of supporters who help animals like him every day.
Because of people like you, we were able to take Torkal in.
He is now learning to trust after living for years in fear.
He is adjusting to his new life and getting used to the smells of his surroundings. By liking our Facebook page, you can read about more animals like him and help those who need you the most.
Now settling in to his new home and constant care
We also share the stories of many of the cats helped by people like you, such as Cirrus, who was found with a horrendous wound on his eye. It was seriously infected and it was clear that Cirrus was in severe agony when we found him. Sadly, it was too late to save his eye and it had to be removed.
Cirrus was featured on our Facebook page, and thanks to people like you, he has now been adopted and will leave shortly for his new home.
By simply clicking ‘like’ on our page, you will hear about many of the rescue cases here at the shelter and will be kept up to date with how your support is saving the lives of vulnerable animals across Thailand. Simply click here to join us on Facebook now.
Thank you for everything you have already done to help the dogs and cats of Thailand.
Kind Regards,
John Dalley
Co-Founder,
Soi Dog Foundation
Filed under: Animals Requiring Adoption or Homes - Worldwide, CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional, PHOTOGRAPHS - **WARNING** (Animal Suffering), SHELTER - Information, The "Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) ALLIANCE | Leave a comment »
Posted on August 31, 2016 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Update 1/9/16.
Please visit the website of Badger Action Network to find out how you can help badgers in the cull zones.
The Badger Action Network can put you in touch with various wounded badger patrols in the cull zones and also offer help to new groups setting up their own procedures including police liaison, how to sett survey, how to establish wounded badger patrols, what to do if you find a wounded badger, how to raise public awareness, how to fund raise, what badger persecution is and how to report it and other information about the badger cull.
————————————————————————
Badger cull targets for 2016
Devon: Minimum 3,358, maximum 4,558
Cornwall: Minimum 2,173, maximum 2,950
Gloucestershire: Minimum 1,691, maximum 2,628
Dorset: Minimum 1,672, maximum 2,350
Herefordshire: Minimum 872, maximum 1,183
Somerset: Minimum 75, maximum 544
Source: Natural England
2015 round of badger culling
Licensed culls in West Somerset, West Gloucestershire and Dorset
1,467
badgers culled in 2015
£1,779,000
total “badger control costs” for the year
“The scale of the rollout is huge,” Prof Woodroffe told BBC News. “Farmers will be required to kill almost 10,000 badgers at a minimum before the end of November – and yet the government has released no evidence that farmer-led culling is helping to control cattle TB.
Action
The person who has no objectives or proof of anything.
Send e mails of complete and utter disgust to ‘Useless’ George Eustice – george.eustice.mp@parliament.uk
Or phone his Westminster office on 020 7219 7032
Petitions / Actions
Things have only just got under way, but here are currents as of 31/8/16
Current petitions / actions:
What is Team Badger
Team Badger is a coalition of national, local and grassroots animal and wildlife welfare organisations representing millions of compassionate citizens. We reject the government’s policy of badger culling as unsound, unscientific and unacceptable.
We believe the most effective and legitimate way to oppose the shooting of badgers is through peaceful and legal protest supported by a reasoned argument, scientific facts and legal challenge. We are convinced that the long-term control of tuberculosis in cattle can be achieved by the comprehensive application of a range of measures without resorting to the culling of wildlife.
End the badger cull instead of expanding to new areas
Since 2013, thousands of badgers have been killed in a Government cull attempting to control bovine TB. Against scientific advice & before a 4 year trial has completed, the government is now expanding the cull to new counties – tens of thousands of healthy badgers could be killed.
Experts in disease control and animal welfare agree that pilot badger culls have proven both ineffective and inhumane. Shooting badgers is also expensive, costing tax-payers some £5,000 per animal. Bovine TB is a serious problem but killing badgers is not the solution, and could actually make the situation worse. It is a costly distraction from an effective solution incorporating vaccination, increased cattle movement control measures and improved testing.
Simon King OBE
Deadline: 25 February 2017All petitions run for 6 months
Thank You !
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Posted on August 30, 2016 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
SAV Comment – Trigger Happy USA is at it again as always.
Dear Mark
More grim news out of Washington state: Snipers have killed four more wolves — three adults and a female pup. The Profanity Peak wolf pack family has been shattered, reduced to just one adult struggling to care for the four surviving four-month-old pups.
The killing of this pack — which, once it’s done, will have wiped out 12 percent of the wild wolves in the state — has been authorized by Washington’s wildlife agency despite evidence that a rancher
placed his cattle right over the pack’s den. Robert Weilgus, director of the Large Carnivore Conservation Lab at Washington State University, told reporters that “This livestock operator elected to put his livestock directly on top of their den site; we have pictures of cows swamping it.” We can’t allow this kind of provocation to keep leading to state-sanctioned wolf slaughter.
It’s time for the gloves to come off — we’re in a bareknuckle fight for these animals’ survival. But time is not on our side, so please help now. Make a donation today to the Center’s Wolf Defense Fund.
Wolves desperately need our help. Not only are the state bureaucrats in Washington hoping to finish off the Profanity Peak pack, local Ferry County officials also swear they’ll take matters into their own hands. They’ve said they’re eager to send their sheriff to finish the job by killing any remaining pack members.
This would be a gross violation of the law and set a terrible precedent — a local posse bent on killing is brutal and primitive. When and if Ferry County tries this tactic, the Center’s ready to go to court to stop it.
Please help us in this war on wolves with a donation to the Wolf Defense Fund.
The Center is leading the counterattack against the wolf haters. From Washington, D.C. to Washington state, our lawyers, scientists and activists are fighting anti-wolf extremists who would destroy the progress we’ve made over the past quarter-century. We’ve saved the lives of countless wolves across America, shutting down those trying to turn their habitat into feedlots, timber farms and open-pit mines.
I know you believe in a future where wolves still live wild. Please help us make that future real with a gift to the
Wolf Defense Fund today.
For the wild,
Kierán Suckling
Executive Director
Center for Biological Diversity
@KieranSuckling
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Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) 