Category: wildlife

World Animal Day – October 4th

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

MISSION OF WORLD ANIMAL DAY

To raise the status of animals in order to improve welfare standards around the globe. Building the celebration of World Animal Day unites the animal welfare movement, mobilising it into a global force to make the world a better place for all animals.  It’s celebrated in different ways in every country, irrespective of nationality, religion, faith or political ideology.  Through increased awareness and education we can create a world where animals are always recognised as sentient beings and full regard is always paid to their welfare.

See Website:

 

Animals Burning in Man-Made Fires

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

For the thousands of mammal, reptile, amphibian, and bird species that call the Amazon their home, the current raging wildfires will cause a massive toll in the short term, and threaten their species’ existence long term.   

“They can try to hide by burrowing or going into water… They can be displaced. Or they can perish. In this situation, a lot of animals will die, from flames, heat from the flames, or smoke inhalation…

The entire ecosystem of the burning sections of rainforest will be altered… the dense canopy … largely blocks sunlight from reaching the ground. Fire opens up the canopy at a stroke, bringing in light and fundamentally changing the energy flow of the entire ecosystem. This can have cascading effects on the entire food chain.”

Read the National Geographic article here:

Love some: Poison and Desecrate Others…

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

The intelligent and resourceful possum was introduced into New Zealand from Australia in the mid19th century for the fur trade.  It is now generally loathed by the population, who hold the marsupial accountable for ruining forests and decimating the bird population.

The ‘war on possums’ is waged in New Zealand from the Government down.   Motorists try to kill them if they see them on the road at night.  School children go on hunts to see who gets the highest body count, and the school celebrates their success in gala days: parents and children ‘toss the poss’ or ‘dress up the poss’  for prizes.   The rural schools who carry on these activities maintain they support and strengthen the links between the school, its community, and its surroundings.

Such thinking is at the root of all that is wrong with our relationship with other animals.  New Zealand needs to address the problem of possums but there are other, more compassionate ways than putting a bullet in their heads leaving their joeys to starve, or making them die a painful, lingering death through 1080 poison. 

”Through developing an intelligent and sophisticated approach to conservation, guided by compassion, we may begin to heal our troubled past with the Earth and the animals who live here”. 

Read End Animal Slaughter contributor Lynley Tulloch’s article here:

Slaughterhouses of the Sea Series: 1: Death by Bombing

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 2 Comments on Slaughterhouses of the Sea Series: 1: Death by Bombing

End Animal Slaughter contributor LYNLEY TULLOCH briefly outlines cruel and unsustainable fishing practices.  

No 1: Death by Bombing

When we think of slaughterhouses we think of a building encased within impenetrable walls, a place where the unseemly happenings inside are hidden from public view, where land animals go to be killed for our consumption.    But what about the trillions of fishes killed every year? How are they killed en masse? What are the watery slaughterhouses that we also know so little about?

Commercial and small business fisheries use a range of methods to kill fishes, and all of them result in extremely painful and drawn out deaths. What we do to fishes and other sea creatures, who are every bit as sentient as you and I, is nothing short of torture.  In this series I will give a short outline of some of the cruel and unsustainable fishing practices used worldwide.

Blast fishing is one of the most unsustainable and cruel methods of killing huge schools of fish for easy collection. This mostly illegal practice has been happening for decades, causing lively colourful coral reefs, the underlying habitat that supports fishes and other organisms, to turn into desolate grey graveyards. It has been widespread in Indonesia, Malaysia, Lebanon, the Philippines, areas of the Pacific, and Tanzania. All that is needed is a plastic bottle and some dynamite and the fish are killed in the hundreds.

Tanzania, however, is the only country where blast fishing is still widespread. Explosives have become readily available due to a construction and mining boom (excuse the pun). A report released in 2016 recorded more than 300 explosions in 30 days, from the Kenya-Tanzania border down to Mozambique. The report concluded that “given the scale of blast fishing, the environmental impact on fisheries, coral reefs and cetaceans is likely to be substantial.”

Traditional methods of fishing in Tanzania included basket traps and hook and line. However, lucrative tuna are more easily caught by blowing them out of the water.  Gill Braulik , Director of Cetacean Program Tanzania, says that the explosion causes a pressure wave  in the seas killing everything within a few meters. It kills not only adult fish but also juveniles and any other sea life in the vicinity including corals and turtles. It reduces the three-dimensional reef structure, an important ecological habitat for living,  spawning and feeding, to a one dimensional rubble, affecting the biodiversity of the entire area.

A coral reef destroyed by blast fishing

Yet the Minister for Livestock and Fisheries Development, Mr Luhaga Mpina calls for an increase in ‘fish production’ in 2019 to meet demand from an increase in population growth and tourists. He said that in 2016 Tanzania was compelled to import 13.92 million kilograms of fish in 2016 to meet local demand. Despite being a signatory to the United Nations sustainable development goals, Mr Mpina blithely ignores Goal 14: Life Below Water.  Mr Mpina suggests that Tanzania has  2,736,248 tons of harvestable fish in the oceans and lakes. He is calling for more and not less fishing. Let that sink in (again, excuse the pun).

Economic imperative is the driving force behind the killing of fish by blasting them from their salty water homes direct to a dinner plate.   Some may also sink unseen and unknown to the bottom of the rubbly ocean floor, along with other victims.    The loss is unimaginable.

Blasting fish out of the water dead, or gasping their last breaths, is just one method of destroying the life of fishes.   Our ocean kin are casualties of violence against the innocent and helpless.   It can only be described as a War, one with no rules of engagement.

Mental Illness in Animals

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

 

It seems self-evident that animals, who suffer from the same physical diseases as we do, can also suffer from similar mental disorders.   Post Trauma Stress Disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Self-harm, Anxiety, Depression have all been studied in animals in the wild and especially in captivity.    If you want to know how animals feel begin by asking yourself:   How would I feel without freedom to express my natural instincts, with extreme boredom and confinement, with trauma and loss…..?  

Read the BBC Earth article by SHREYA DASGUPTA here:

 

‘There Is a Sense of Trust Between Us’

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle | 3 Comments on ‘There Is a Sense of Trust Between Us’

This moving  story of human/non-human friendship is one of the most unusual we have seen.  It is the story of a Japanese Diver and his friend Yoriko, a humphead wrasse. 

The wrasse is a large, diverse and remarkable fish.  There are more than 600 species of wrasse, ranging in size from 20 cm to 2.5 metres, and they can live up to 50 years.  The most well known wrasse,  the ‘cleaner fish’, lives in symbiosis with larger, often predatory, fish, grooming them (sometimes swimming into their open mouths and through their gill cavities) and benefiting by consuming the parasites they remove. They can clean many hundreds of ‘clients’ every day, and as many visitors to Aquariums know, it is a sight to behold to see a line of fishes congregated at cleaner stations, waiting for their turn! 

It has been well established that fishes feel pain, and it is thought increasingly likely they feel emotions too.   Why then do we cause these sentient creatures, trillions of individuals a year,  so much suffering?   We happily teach our children to impale them in their sensitive mouths and haul them into a medium where they cannot breathe.     Our appetite for fish means that cruel commercial and factory farming practices prolong their suffering and also risk depleting the ocean of its inhabitants.  Is this not madness?   

It’s time we called a halt to the carnage.   It’s time we stopped eating fish.    

Read the article and watch the video about Hiroyuki Arakawa and Yoriko. 

See also:

Marc Bekoff’s article on fish sentience.

A message from Thich Nhat Hanh

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

The article below was written by Buddhist monk, teacher and author, THICH NHAT HANH, and we have reprinted it with original illustrations of New Zealand native plants and animals by Alex L Scott.   

“This is the kind of awareness, the kind of awakening that we need, and the future of the planet depends on whether we’re able to cultivate this insight or not. The Earth and all species on Earth are in real danger. Yet if we can develop a deep relationship with the Earth, we’ll have enough love, strength and awakening in order to change our way of life”.

If we cultivated a reverence for ‘Mother Earth’ and all life that depends on her, we could not kill other beings.  With the consciousness Thich Nhat Hahn talks about in this article, it would be literally impossible to massacre billions of our fellow beings every year.  The world would be transformed.

 

We and the Earth are one

The Earth is our mother, nourishing and protecting us in every moment–giving us air to breathe, fresh water to drink, food to eat and healing herbs to cure us when we are sick. Every breath we inhale contains our planet’s nitrogen, oxygen, water vapor and trace elements. When we breathe with mindfulness, we can experience our interbeing with the Earth’s delicate atmosphere, with all the plants, and even with the sun, whose light makes possible the miracle of photosynthesis. With every breath we can experience communion. With every breath we can savor the wonders of life.

We need to change our way of thinking and seeing things. We need to realise that the Earth is not just our environment. The Earth is not something outside of us. Breathing with mindfulness and contemplating your body, you realise that you are the Earth. You realise that your consciousness is also the consciousness of the Earth. Look around you–what you see is not your environment, it is you.

Great Mother Earth

Whatever nationality or culture we belong to, whatever religion we follow, whether we’re Buddhists, Christians, Muslims, Jews, or atheists, we can all see that the Earth is not inert matter. She is a great being, who has herself given birth to many other great beings–including buddhas and bodhisattvas, prophets and saints, sons and daughters of God and humankind. The Earth is a loving mother, nurturing and protecting all peoples and all species without discrimination.

When you realize the Earth is so much more than simply your environment, you’ll be moved to protect her in the same way as you would yourself. This is the kind of awareness, the kind of awakening that we need, and the future of the planet depends on whether we’re able to cultivate this insight or not. The Earth and all species on Earth are in real danger. Yet if we can develop a deep relationship with the Earth, we’ll have enough love, strength and awakening in order to change our way of life.

Falling in love

We can all experience a feeling of deep admiration and love when we see the great harmony, elegance and beauty of the Earth. A simple branch of cherry blossom, the shell of a snail or the wing of a bat – all bear witness to the Earth’s masterful creativity. Every advance in our scientific understanding deepens our admiration and love for this wondrous planet. When we can truly see and understand the Earth, love is born in our hearts. We feel connected. That is the meaning of love: to be at one.

Only when we’ve truly fallen back in love with the Earth will our actions spring from reverence and the insight of our interconnectedness. Yet many of us have become alienated from the Earth. We are lost, isolated and lonely. We work too hard, our lives are too busy, and we are restless and distracted, losing ourselves in consumption. But the Earth is always there for us, offering us everything we need for our nourishment and healing: the miraculous grain of corn, the refreshing stream, the fragrant forest, the majestic snow-capped mountain peak, and the joyful birdsong at dawn.

True Happiness is made of love

Many of us think we need more money, more power or more status before we can be happy. We’re so busy spending our lives chasing after money, power and status that we ignore all the conditions for happiness already available. At the same time, we lose ourselves in buying and consuming things we don’t need, putting a heavy strain on both our bodies and the planet. Yet much of what we drink, eat, watch, read or listen to, is toxic, polluting our bodies and minds with violence, anger, fear and despair.

As well as the carbon dioxide pollution of our physical environment, we can speak of the spiritual pollution of our human environment: the toxic and destructive atmosphere we’re creating with our way of consuming. We need to consume in such a way that truly sustains our peace and happiness. Only when we’re sustainable as humans will our civilization become sustainable. It is possible to be happy in the here and the now.

We don’t need to consume a lot to be happy; in fact we can live very simply. With mindfulness, any moment can become a happy moment. Savoring one simple breath, taking a moment to stop and contemplate the bright blue sky, or to fully enjoy the presence of a loved one, can be more than enough to make us happy. Each one of us needs to come back to reconnect with ourselves, with our loved ones and with the Earth. It’s not money, power or consuming that can make us happy, but having love and understanding in our heart.

The bread in your hand is the body of the cosmos

We need to consume in such a way that keeps our compassion alive. And yet many of us consume in a way that is very violent. Forests are cut down to raise cattle for beef, or to grow grain for liquor, while millions in the world are dying of starvation. Reducing the amount of meat we eat and alcohol we consume by 50% is a true act of love for ourselves, for the Earth and for one another. Eating with compassion can already help transform the situation our planet is facing, and restore balance to ourselves and the Earth.

Nothing is more important than brotherhood and sisterhood

There’s a revolution that needs to happen and it starts from inside each one of us. We need to wake up and fall in love with Earth. We’ve been homo sapiens for a long time. Now it’s time to become homo conscius. Our love and admiration for the Earth has the power to unite us and remove all boundaries, separation and discrimination. Centuries of individualism and competition have brought about tremendous destruction and alienation. We need to re-establish true communication–true communion–with ourselves, with the Earth, and with one another as children of the same mother. We need more than new technology to protect the planet. We need real community and co-operation.

All civilisations are impermanent and must come to an end one day. But if we continue on our current course, there’s no doubt that our civilisation will be destroyed sooner than we think.

But if we continue on our current course, there’s no doubt that our civilisation will be destroyed sooner than we think.

The Earth may need millions of years to heal, to retrieve her balance and restore her beauty. She will be able to recover, but we humans and many other species will disappear, until the Earth can generate conditions to bring us forth again in new forms. Once we can accept the impermanence of our civilization with peace, we will be liberated from our fear. Only then will we have the strength, awakening and love we need to bring us together. Cherishing our precious Earth–falling in love with the Earth–is not an obligation. It is a matter of personal and collective happiness and survival.

VOICES FOR ANIMALS ACROSS THE AGES: LOREN EISELEY

Posted on | by Sandra Kyle

Loren Eiseley  (September 3, 1907 – July 9, 1977) was an American anthropologist, philosopher and natural science writer.   During his lifetime he received many honorary degrees for his accomplishments.   A ‘scholar of imagination and grace’,  dubbed ‘the modern Thoreau’,  he taught and wrote from the 1950s through the 1970s.

Eiseley’s reputation was established primarily through his books, including The Immense Journey (1957), Darwin’s Century (1958), The Unexpected Universe (1969), The Night Country (1971), and his memoir, All the Strange Hours (1975).

His beautiful prose was written with a sense of reverence before the natural world, and the mysteries of life.  Eiseley was an evolutionist, and both understood scientifically, and felt intuitively, the interconnectedness of all beings.  

 

‘THE STAR THROWER’

The famous ‘Starfish Story’ is based on an original story by Eiseley called  The Star Thrower’,  which appeared in his book ‘The Unexpected Universe’.  Here is an excerpt:-

I have caught a glimpse of what man may be, along an endless wave-beaten coast at dawn. It began on the beaches of Costabel. I was an inhumanly stripped skeleton without voice, without hope, wandering alone upon the shores of the world. I was devoid of pity, because pity implies hope… I concealed myself beneath a fisherman’s cap and sunglasses, so that I looked like everyone else on the beaches of Costabel, which are littered with the debris of life. There, along the strip of wet sand that marks the tide, death walks hugely and in many forms. The sea casts them repeatedly back upon the shore. The tiny breathing pores of starfish are stuffed with sand. The rising sun shrivels their unprotected bodies. The endless war is soundless. Nothing screams but the gulls. In the night, torches bobbing like fireflies along the beach, are the sign of the professional shellers. Greedy madness sweeps over the competing collectors, hurrying along with bundles of gathered starfish that will be slowly cooked and dissolved in the outdoor kettles provided by the resort hotels for the cleaning of specimens. It was there that I met the star thrower. As the sound of the sea became heavier and more menacing, I rounded a bluff into the full blast of the offshore wind. Long-limbed starfish were strewn everywhere, sprawling where the waves had tossed them as though showered down through the night sky. The sun behind me was pressing upward at the horizon’s rim ~ an ominous red glare amidst the tumbling blackness of the clouds. Ahead of me, over the projecting point, a gigantic rainbow of incredible perfection had sprung shimmering into existence.

 

Toward its foot I discerned a human figure standing, as it seemed to me, within the rainbow. He was gazing fixedly at something in the sand. He stooped and flung an object beyond the breaking surf. I labored another half a mile toward him and by the time I reached him, kneeling again, the rainbow had receded ahead of us. In a pool of sand and silt a starfish had thrust its arms up stiffly and was holding its body away from the stifling mud. “It’s still alive,” I ventured. “Yes,” he said, and with a quick, yet gentle movement, he picked up the star and spun it over my head and far out into the sea. “It may live if the offshore pull is strong enough,” he said. In a sudden embarrassment for words I said, “Do you collect shells?” “Only ones like this,” he said softly, gesturing amidst the wreckage of the shore, “and only for the living.” He stooped again, and skipped another star neatly across the water. “The stars,” he said, “throw well. One can help them.”

‘THE JUDGEMENT OF THE BIRDS’ is another famous Eiseley work.

Original watercolour ‘SPARROW’ by Alex L. Scott

I have said that I saw a judgment upon life, and that it was not passed by men. Those who stare at birds in cages or who test minds by their closeness to our own may not care for it. It comes from far away out of my past, in a place of pouring waters and green leaves. I shall never see an episode like it again if I live to be a hundred, nor do I think that one man in a million has ever seen it, because man is an intruder into such silences. The light must be right, and the observer must remain unseen. No man sets up such an experiment. What he sees, he sees by chance.

 

You may put it that I had come over a mountain, that I had slogged through fern and pine needles for half a long day, and that on the edge of a little glade with one long, crooked branch extending across it, I had sat down to rest with my back against a stump. Through accident I was concealed from the glade, although I could see into it perfectly.

 

The sun was warm there, and the murmurs of forest life blurred softly away into my sleep. When I awoke, dimly aware of some cornmotion and outcry in the clearing, the light was slanting down through the pines in such a way that the glade was like some vast cathedral. I could see the dust motes of wood pollen in the long shaft of light, and there on the extended branch sat an enormous raven with a red and squirming nestling in his beak.

 

The sound that awoke me was the outraged cries of the nestlings parents, who flew helplessly in circles about the clearing. The sleek black monster was indifferent to them. He gulped, whetted his beak on the dead branch a moment and sat still. Up to that point the little tragedy had followed the usual pattern. But suddenly, out of all that area of woodland, a soft sound of complaint began to rise. Into the glade fluttered small birds of half a dozen varieties drawn by the anguished outcries of the tiny parents.

 

No one dared to attack the raven. But they cried there in some instinctive common misery, the bereaved and the unbereaved. The glade filled with their soft rustling and their cries. They fluttered as though to point their wings at the murderer. There was a dim intangible ethic he had violated, that they knew. He was a bird of death.

 

And he, the murderer, the black bird at the heart of life, sat on there, glistening in the common light, formidable, unmoving, unperturbed, untouchable.

 

The sighing died. It was then I saw the judgment. It was the judgment of life against death. I will never see it again so forcefully presented. I will never hear it again in notes so tragically prolonged. For in the midst of protest, they forgot the violence. There, in that clearing, the crystal note of a song sparrow lifted hesitantly in the hush. And finally, after painful fluttering, another took the song, and then another, the song pass-ing from one bird to another, doubtfully at first, as though some evil thing were being slowly forgotten. Till suddenly they took heart and sang, from many throats joyously together as birds are known to sing. They sang because life is sweet and sunlight beautiful. They sang under the brooding shadow of the raven. In simple truth they had forgotten the raven, for they were the singers of life, and not of death.