DNA data may decide which dog did the killing, but maybe not who was at fault SOISSONS, France––Pack hunters and pit bull enthusiasts are pitted against each other in a melodrama gripping French media since November 16, 2019, when someone’s dog or dogs killed Elisa Pilarski, 29, six months pregnant. Anxiously awaited DNA test results […]
Santa Anita deaths just a fraction of the toll in horse racing
Breeding & slaughter drive the industry SANTA ANITA, California; SYDNEY, Australia––A year-long nightmare string of fatal racehorse breakdowns continued at Santa Anita Park through October 2019 with the deaths of horses named Emtech, Colonel, Satchel Paige, and C Q Covergirl, the 35th fatality on the Santa Anita dirt, turf, and training tracks since December […]
Four black leaders who built the humane movement
More people recognized William Key, John W. Lemon, Richard Carroll, & F. Rivers Barnwell in their own time than would have recognized ASPCA founder Henry Bergh INDIANAPOLIS, Indiana––“I am the only colored speaker on the program, and in fact I have not seen a single colored visitor to it,” wrote the Reverend Richard Carroll […]
Last acts for animal circuses in Russia, India, New Jersey, & Hawaii
Russian law protects Moscow State Circus monopoly MOSCOW, NEW DELHI––New legislation in Russia, whose circuses have for almost a century been the most attended worldwide, and in India, where the circus tradition started, appear to be among the final acts in several thousand years of traveling exhibitions of performing animals. The new Russian “Law […]
Wayne Pacelle & Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom celebrate returns from extinction
Sagas of alleged giant predators turned animal rights stars WASHINGTON D.C.––Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, a saga of supposedly vanished giant predators, reinvented as animal rights celebrities, debuted to bad reviews on June 22, 2018, yet proved to be a box office magnet, grossing $1.2 billion in its first month. Animal Wellness Action, a political action […]
Driving at demonstrators costs “Big Lick” champ’s insurers $50,000
Billygoboy wins again TUNICA, Mississippi––Having organized boycotts that have shut down “Big Lick” walking horse shows in at least 13 southern cities, semi-retired attorney Clant Seay, 71, better known as Billygoboy, is now celebrating a victory of a different sort. This time Seay has collected $50,000 on behalf of four clients, plus himself, in […]
Big win over the “big lick” walking horse industry in 2018 federal budget
“Big lickers” kicked, but Congress kicked back WASHINGTON D.C.––Winning increasingly often against initially steep odds, BillyGoBoy and friends opposed to soring horses to make them step higher appear likely to enjoy the last horse laugh over the walking horse show industry. Walking horse shows have been infamously dominated for decades by trainers who––defying the […]
Leaving The Wild: The Unnatural History of Dogs, Cats, Cows & Horses
by Gavin Ehringer Pegasus Books, distributed by W.W. Norton & Co. 364 pages. $27.95 hardcover. In stores December 5, 2017. Reviewed by Merritt Clifton Remember the most gripping and informative few books you ever read about dogs, cats, cows, and/or horses, by authors as thorough as the multi-time best sellers Desmond Morris, Elizabeth Marshall Thomas, […]
Could soring horses leave top Republicans limping in red-state Tennessee?
Political columnist & senior attorney both think so CHATTANOOGA, Tennessee––Could being associated with soring horses to induce the “Big Lick” goose step favored at walking horse shows cost the Republican candidates the 2018 Tennessee gubernatorial and U.S. Senate elections? Roy Exum thinks it could. And attorney Clant Seay, a 72-year-old walking horse show breeder turned […]
Hurricane Maria: monkeys hold on, horses endure
“Oh my goodness, how could anything have survived this?” CAYO SANTIAGO, Puerto Rico––Hurricane Irma mostly missed the renowned Cayo Santiago rhesus macaque colony, on an island just east of the Puerto Rican mainland, but Hurricane Maria hit it head-on, at full Category 5 strength. The thousand-odd macaques on Cayo Santiago are ninth generation descendants from […]