The 1994 San Francisco “Adoption Pact” recast the roles of animal control & humane societies––but not as intended Again, in hundreds of cities and towns across the U.S., and indeed around the world, factions are polarized in furious conflict over what their local animal control agencies, humane societies and shelterless, volunteer-run “rescues” should be doing. […]
Why is the ASPCA stonewalling about the deaths of 20 dogs in transport?
Three-week silence howls for answers NEW YORK CITY––Twenty dogs died on May 15, 2019 aboard an American SPCA vehicle that was hauling them from one or more Mississippi shelters to Wisconsin to be offered for adoption. That could be called just a really bad accident, except that three weeks after Emily Jacobs and Ben […]
Secrets of Doris Day’s life & work for animals
Publicity added much spin & gloss to what was already a positive record CARMEL, California––Doris Day, 97, died from pneumonia on May 13, 2019. Day was remembered worldwide as a singer who recorded more than 650 songs between 1939 and 1967; an actress who starred in more than 40 films between 1947 and 1968, […]
How killing cats helped to keep Aussie Liberal Party in power
Cat purge masks otherwise weak record on endangered species CANBERRA, Australia––Cats were nowhere on the May 18, 2019 Australian federal election ballot, and were not among the official campaign issues for any of the contestants, either. Yet the Liberal Party scheme to kill two million cats by 2020 lurked just behind the polling results […]
300 cats found in apartment near the scene of multiple murders
Neighbors reportedly complained of corpse-like odor for seven years NORTH YORK, Ontario––Even before nearly 300 cats were found on May 3, 2019, huddled in Apartment 1811 at 30 Falstaff Avenue, North York, Ontario, the suburban Toronto building was well-known to police. Built in 1970, Falstaff Towers, a cluster of buildings including three 19-story public […]
Pit hags, rescue angels, crazy cat ladies, dog men & chicken fighters: what’s in a name?
The late linguist, lexicographer, and “crazy cat man” Reinhold Aman would have relished the question SONOMA, California––Researching the etymology of the terms “pit hag,” “rescue angel,” “crazy cat lady,” “dog man” and “chicken fighter,” absent from most dictionaries yet almost universally understood within the animal advocacy world, would have fascinated Reinhold Aman, 82, who died […]
Should giving shelter dogs & cats to university labs count as “live release”?
USDA says pound animal giveaways to vet schools are not covered by the federal Animal Welfare Act BATON ROUGE, Louisiana; TUSKEGEE, Alabama––Recent transfers of shelter animals to the Louisiana State University and Tuskegee University veterinary schools have allegedly been reported by shelter personnel as “adoptions” or transfers to “rescue.” The disputed transactions appear to […]
Culwell case: did high surrender fees lead to Coachella puppy-dumping?
Unsympathetic suspect, but shelter policies may have been accessories to the alleged crime COACHELLA, California––Deborah Sue Culwell, 54, now facing 14 criminal charges for animal abandonment in Riverside County, California, did not cull well. A Napa Auto Parts store surveillance camera on April 18, 2019 caught Culwell in the act of allegedly trying to […]
An Easter bunny, cat, & mongoose story from a Japanese island
Predators wrongly blamed for losses, ancient Amami rabbits make a comeback AMAMI, Amami-Oshima, Japan––The Easter 2019 bunny story of the year, and island ecology story, too, with even an angle involving egg hunts by ornithologists, is underway on Amami-Oshima and Tokunoshima islands, between Japan and Okinawa. Much to the evident embarrassment of the Japanese Environment […]
“No-kill” debacle: will Pueblo bring “responsible sheltering” into vogue?
90% “live release” mandate failed catastrophically in less than 90 days PUEBLO, Colorado––“You can’t manage an animal shelter to a number,” Humane Society of the Pikes Peak Region president Jan McHugh-Smith told Pueblo Chieftan reporter Anthony A. Mestas, hours after her organization returned to running the Pueblo Animal Services shelter on April 9, 2019, […]
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