Gentle Insectivores Subject To Unimaginable Cruelty For Traditional Medicine

Gentle Pangolins are beaten then, blood pouring from their wounds, boiled alive for traditional Asian medicine. Over a million pangolins have been illegally poached from the wild just in the last 10 years to feed the demand for their scales and meat.  They are the most trafficked animals in the world.  The pangolin was implicated in the 2019 Coronavirus outbreak.
A  permanent ban on all wildlife trade is the only long-term solution to eliminate unimaginable animal suffering, and prevent major health epidemics. You can take action to help pangolins and other wild animals by signing the petition to ban the global trade of wild animals and urging public officials to pass the Global Wildlife Health and Pandemic Prevention Act.

 

Read the World Animal Protection article here (contains graphic video)

It’s Time For A Sea Change In Our Thinking About Fishes

We slaughter fish in their trillions every year, and force them to lead lives of prolonged suffering in aquaculture operations.   The majority of scientists now agree that fish are sentient, but what about their intelligence? 

Because they live in an environment that humans could not survive in, we tend to view marine life as ‘alien’, and not as intelligent as land animals.  But fishes are much more like us than we think.  

In his fascinating book ‘What A Fish Knows: The Inner Lives Of Our Underwater Cousins‘, ethologist and author Johnathan Balcombe challenges our assumptions about fishes, and asks his readers to take a more enlightened view of Earthlings who live in the sea.  

 

Read more information here

 

Watch the video on humanedecisions.com

 

Q&A: Matt Ellerbeck, Snake Advocate

SNAKES are amazing creatures. They hear with their mouths, smell with their tongue, dislocate their jaws to swallow prey many times larger than themselves, and their species both lays eggs and gives birth live.   They form bonds with other snakes, and at least one study has shown that they are capable of feeling ‘anxiety, stress, distress, excitement, fear, frustration, pain, and suffering.’

Snakes are found in just about every place on earth (there are a few exceptions, eg Antarctica and New Zealand), but their numbers are in decline right around the globe. Some species have already gone extinct, and many others are at risk.   

Snake Advocacy is an initiative created and run by Canadian snake advocate Matt Ellerbeck, whose preservation work has earned him both a Green Globe Nomination and an Award from the Cataraqui Conservation Foundation.

Matt Ellerbeck focuses his snake advocacy efforts largely on outreach education. His objective is to educate the general public about the threats that snake populations are facing, and providing information and how individuals can combat these threats. This includes habitat management, environmental stewardship, and informed decision making.

 

End Animal Slaughter asked Matt a few questions.

 

When and how did your interest in snakes come about?

I have loved snakes and been fascinated by them since I was a young child. I can recall observing large Water Snakes (Nerodia sipedon), Garter Snakes (Thamnophis sirtalis), and Smooth Green Snakes (Opheodrys vernalis) at my grandparent’s summer cottage when I was about 8 years old. The memories of these snake encounters are still very vivid in my mind, which is a testament to love of these animals. As a kid, I remember sharing my enthusiasm for snakes with others. Sadly, this enthusiasm was often retorted with negative comments about snakes. ”The Only Good Snake is a Dead Snake” was a statement I heard many times from people. Individuals would often callously tell me stories about snakes they had killed. I was devastated by this. It was this hatred of snakes that inspired me to want to become a Snake Advocate and Preservationist. Now for over 15 years I have been trying to advocate for the protection of these misunderstood animals.

Matt watching a rattlesnake slither peacefully by.

Tell us why snakes are amazing.

Snakes are amazing in many ways. First of all, they have existed for around 100 million years. They have diversified into some 3,000 different species and managed to find ways to survive in a wide array of habitats like deserts, oceans, mountains, forests, and prairies. They have extremely varied colors and patterns that are all beautiful. Snakes are also amazing just simply due to their intrinsic value.

Are snakes endangered?

Yes, there are many endangered snake species from all over the world. Snakes are threatened by habitat loss, road mortality, and climate change. Sadly, snakes are also captured from the wild and killed for food markets and for their skins. Legions of snakes are also intentionally killed by people who hate and fear them. 

Northern Brown Snake Matt moved off of a busy path.

What can we do to help snakes?

There are many things we can do to help snakes. From creating small habitats on our properties, to being good stewards to the environment, they are lots of efforts that can be made to help snakes. For a list of actions that people can take that will contribute to the betterment of snakes please visit my website, www.snakeadvocacy.com.

An Indictment Of What Is And Should Never Again Be – The ‘Invisible’ Animals In Our Lives

In a powerful new book co-edited by Jo-Anne McArthur, “Hidden: Animals in the Anthropocene“, 30 award-winning photojournalists shine a light through their photography on the ‘invisible’ animals in our lives – the ones we eat, wear, use for research, work and entertainment. 

‘HIDDEN is a historical document, a memorial, and an indictment of what is and should never again be’.

Feature photo of a silver fox in a fur farm in Poland

 

Read the Guardian article here

 

The Invisible Threat To Our Ocean Wildlife: Noise Pollution

Over the past 50 years increased human activity in the oceans has escalated noise pollution affecting, sometimes catastrophically, animals who live in the sea.  Recent studies suggest that noise pollution can harm whales and dolphins directly by driving them away, disrupting their social patterns, damaging their hearing, and even causing internal bleeding and death.   Naval sonar systems, shipping, deep-sea fishing, and the construction and operation of oil rigs are among the contributors to the increasing amount of noise pollution in our oceans. 

(Feature photo credit, We Animals Media)

 

Read The Guardian Environment article here

 

Voices For Animals Across The Years: Dian Fossey

Born in San Francisco in 1932 Dian Fossey’s parents divorced when she was young, and she grew up with her mother and stepfather.   She had loved animals her whole life, and at first wanted to be a veterinarian, but finding physics and chemistry challenging turned her focus to occupational therapy, graduating from San Jose State College in 1954.

 

Dian worked for some years as an occupational therapist but she longed to travel, and in particular she wanted to visit Africa.  In 1963, while she was working at the Kosair Children’s Hospital in Kentucky, she took out a bank loan to make her dream come true.   She travelled to Africa for the first time, visiting Kenya, Tanzania, Congo, and Zimbabwe.  One of the last sites on her tour was the Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania, the archaeological site of famed paleoanthropologists Louis and Mary Leakey.  Visiting Dr Louis Leakey was a pivotal experience in Dian’s life, and on hearing about his initiation of Jane Goodall’s work with chimpanzees, ’a seed was planted in her head.’

 

Upon arriving home in Kentucky, she resumed her work at Kosair Children’s Hospital, and in 1966 when Dr. Leakey visited Louisville she went to one of his lectures and showed him articles she had published about her African trip.  He was impressed, and suggested that she head a long-term field project to study the gorillas in Africa, adding – as a way of testing her level of commitment to what he knew would be an arduous assignment – that she would need an appendectomy first.  By the time he had secured funding for the study Dian had repaid her bank loan, was trying to learn Swahili – and had had her appendix removed!    In December 1966, she was again on her way to Africa, the beginning of her groundbreaking work with mountain gorilla groups that contributed enormously to the field of primatology, and that lasted until her tragic murder in 1985.

 

Read Dian Fossey’s full story and legacy here

Mega farms in Europe affecting well-being of neighbours

Key Points:

–  All over Europe small-scale operations with a diversity of crops and livestock are disappearing, being replaced by mega farms such as a 23,000 cow dairy farm in Spain and enormous piggeries in Denmark, one of the world’s biggest producers of pork.

–  This growth of Europe’s animal farming sector has seen it exceed what scientists have claimed are safe bounds for greenhouse gas emissions, nutrient flows and biodiversity loss.

–  Greenpeace campaigners visited animal farms and their surrounding communities in France, Denmark, Spain and Italy between December 2018 and March 2019 to find out what is happening.

–  They discovered many of these European mega farms are near small towns, and are affecting the health and well being of their close neighbours in a variety of ways.  These include possible toxic substances through manure and air.  

–  Residents next to one giant Danish pig farm frequently see pigs in rubbish bins, for weekly collection.   

Read The Guardian article here

 

 

 

UK Doctors: We Need A Food System Change Now

  • UK-based Plant Based Health Professionals (PBHP) say the connection between major disease outbreaks and factory farming is being ‘swept under the carpet’ amid the coronavirus pandemic.
  • While former coronavirus epicentre Wuhan has introduced a law against the breeding, hunting and consumption of wild animals this week,  this is not just a problem for China.
  • The vast majority of new infectious diseases that have appeared in humans over the past century have been caused by tampering with farmed animals and their habitats, including Swine Flu (pigs), Avian Flu (birds) and Spanish Flu (poultry). 
  • In the UK demand for cheap meat has fuelled a huge expansion of factory farming – providing the perfect conditions for the generation of novel infections with epidemic and pandemic potential, as well as an antibiotic resistance among humans.   
  • A vaccine won’t solve the problem, because of the risk of mutations.   
  • A growing body of evidence shows a balanced vegan diet can provide all nutrients the body needs and improve human health by minimising the potential for cardiovascular disease, obesity and type 2 diabetes.
  • The coronavirus crisis has seen a record number of sign-ups in PBHP’s ‘No Meat May’,  but while such campaigns are important, effective, change will only come about if it is implemented from the top. 
  • We need a food system change now. 

Read the metro.co.uk article here