Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)

Some great news from China!

The following report from Shanghaiist today (http://shanghaiist.com/2011/09/20/animal_activists_call_for_boycott_o.php) represents a tremendous victory for our Chinese colleagues and a clear indication of how they are gradually bringing about change in their society’s sickening attitude to animal welfare. We congratulate them unreservedly!

Animal activists shut down the Jinhua Dog Meat Festival

Animal activists have scored an unusually swift victory in an online campaign to stop the Zhejiang Jinhua Dog Meat Festival from happening on October 18.

This was to have been the eighth such festival and if allowed to take place, approximately ten thousand dogs would have ended up on the dinner table over a period of three days. People who have been to the festival in the past say it is a gruesome sight — dogs are kept in cages, and then butchered out on the streets when a customer comes along. The pitiful sounds of dogs yelping fills the air throughout the duration of the festival.

Campaigners have slammed the event as an unnecessary “massacre” of dogs, and argued that the dogs have not been through any health checks by regulatory bodies. They say many of the dogs were illegally culled, and some of them would still be seen wearing their identification tags just before the slaughtering.

The general public was urged to repost information from the campaigners through their blogs and microblogs, as well as to call up the press to voice their displeasure.

On Sina Weibo alone, the campaign tweet was reposted a whopping 55,000 times in less than a day. Within hours, news of the decision by the authorities in Jinhua to cancel the festival was announced by the local paper, Jinhua Daily.

Dog eating in Jinhua and the region around it goes all the way back to the Ming Dynasty. Legend has it that one general who was planning to invade Jinhua was constantly getting his troops barked away by dogs in the city. It wasn’t until they killed all the dogs that the army managed to conquer the city. To celebrate the success, they feasted over dog meat for days

Dog meat is also a popular delicacy in South Korea. Activists in Seoul scored a similar victory in June this year with the cancellation of a dog meat festival organised by the Korea Dog Farmers’ Association, which represents some 600 dog farms all across South Korea.

For more information on the suffering of dogs and cats in China, please visit our site at www.siriusgao.org.

Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional | Leave a comment »

Lots of latest news and info from Jennifer – please read on.

All data reproduced with permission from Jennifer.

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Save Fraser Island Dingoes Inc.

                                                      Media Release.                        13 Sept. 2011

Dingo Strategy has no bite...

Recent reports obtained through freedom of information suggest that the government has been misleading the public regarding the cause of aggression by the Fraser Island Dingo.

These reports, dating back to 1994 and Commissioned by the Government, clearly demonstrate that feeding is not the main cause of aggressive behaviour.  In fact the reports state that loss of fear when combined with hunger, is the actual cause of problem behaviour (Price 1994) and the incidence of stalking is most likely attributed to lack of foods available.

This study confirms what scientists and researchers have been saying for years, lack of food is a major factor in causing unnatural and inappropriate behaviour. A hungry animal can become volatile and unpredictable. Constant trapping, ear-tagging, hazing and destroying of animals disrupts the pack structure which, in turn, leads to anti-social behaviour, but this is not recognised in the Dept. Of Environment and Resource Management’s Dingo Strategy.

DERM was aware that limiting food sources, such as closing the dumps, would have consequences. “The dump closure…is blamed for starvation” (Price 1994),  but did not consider it of importance.  

The study also discusses the fact that nipping and biting is usually provoked by visitors and that a juvenile dingo’s natural curiosity and play-behaviour can be misinterpreted as aggression. Price states, “nuisance behaviour is usually associated with a juvenile animals playful character”. But again DERM has ignored its own findings and the majority of animals destroyed today are juveniles.

Jennifer Parkhurst, Wildlife Photographer, was fined a sum of $40,000 including a 3 year suspended sentence for feeding starving animals and allegedly causing them to become dangerous. At the time this was considered excessive, as the maximum fine for feeding a dingo is $4000; now it seems ridiculous. 

DERM’s management strategy is apparently based on the observations of rangers and students during the course of their field work. Jennifer Parkhurst spent 7 years of observations but her findings were dismissed.

In light of this study questions need to be asked:

Why did DERM spend so much time and effort pursuing Ms. Parkhurst in an attempt to denounce her research when her findings were similar to those of their own department?   

Why did DERM subsequently use a photograph from Ms. Parkhurst’s study on its website if her findings were discredited? 

Why does DERM continue to deny that its management was not responsible for starvation of the dingoes when clearly this document shows that the strategy had a huge impact on the dingoes behaviour?

Why is the public only fined for feeding, but allowed to torment and tease the dingoes?

Why is the signage on the Island only warning tourists not to feed dingoes, but no signage warning tourists not to abuse the animals? 

Why are members of the public not held accountable for their actions, such as not supervising children?

Why are juvenile dingoes still being targeted for destruction when exhibiting natural behaviours?  

Save Fraser Island Dingoes Inc. will be taking these questions, and many more, to the government…

Sincerely,

Save Fraser Island Dingoes Inc. Committee

President Malcom Kilpatrick

50 Old Maryborough Rd.

Pialba Qld. 4655

Ph: 07 4124 1979 Email: mkrail@bigpond.net.au

Note: Jennifer Parkhurst’s photographs were not only misappropriated but misrepresented and subsequently removed without explanation.

“DERM stated under the photo: “do not mistake this behaviour as ‘play’. It is not a game.”..when in fact, it was a game and the dingoes were playing.”  Jennifer Parkhurst.

Access the Price report bu cliking on the following link:      

Price report

Picture on the DERM Website – March.

Before National Parks

Copyright.

Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional | Leave a comment »