Animals 24-7

News on dogs, cats, horses, wildlife, zoonoses, & nature

Making a Thanksgiving place for Tofurky

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Eventually live turkeys joined the feast.  But not at first. Chloe Sorvino,  food and drink editor for the business magazine Forbes,  marked Thanksgiving 2020 by looking back 40 years to the invention of Tofurky in 1980,  by then-nature educator Seth Tibbott. Described as a “turkey alternative,”  blending tofu and wheat with a wild rice and […]

Can killing an animal be compensated for by the creation of a new animal?

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by Karen Davis, PhD, president, United Poultry Concerns (with afterword by Merritt & Beth Clifton) There is a line of thought in moral philosophy that says “yes” to killing an animal,  so long as the animal lived a pleasant life and the method used to kill the animal is humane – quick and painless. This […]

Mink the missing link? COVID-19 deaths & new data suggest yes.

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Dutch findings come as COVID-19 hits mink farms & humans in Wisconsin & Utah             GREEN BAY, Wisconsin;  SALT LAKE CITY,  Utah––Which came first,  the COVID-19 coronavirus infecting humans,  or infecting mink? No one right now knows for sure whether mink might have been the incubator species through which COVID-19 passed from horseshoe bats in […]

Kamala Harris: long record on animal issues, including pit bull attacks

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Prosecuted two dog attack fatalities, enforced pit bull sterilization ordinance, but favors adoptions of fighting dogs             SAN FRANCISCO––U.S. Senator Kamala Harris,  named vice presidential running mate to Democratic Party presidential nominee Joe Biden on August 11,  2020,  brings to the election campaign both a strong record on animal protection and a mixed record in […]

Poland moves to ban fur farms & kosher/halal meat exports––why?

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Proposed law may be more about Catholic nationalist politics,  anti-Semitism,  and COVID-19 than about concern for animals             WARSAW, Poland––Is a new omnibus animal protection law recently proposed in Poland really all about animals,  driven in part by concern that mink farming may be a reservoir for the pandemic COVID-19 coronavirus? Or is the proposed […]

Cockfighter Cozad missed chance to hide behind U.N. “Agenda 21”

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BL Cozad garbled Bible & U.S. Constitution             MORGANTOWN, Kentucky––If cockfighting advocate BL “Billy” Cozad had ever actually read the 1992 United Nations Earth Summit Agenda 21,  instead of blindly denouncing it,  he might have found that certain passages in it better support his arguments than anything he misquoted and misrepresented from the Bible and […]

A challenge to Mike Pence, Kamala Harris, & “A chicken in every pot”

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70 Members of Congress & United Poultry Concerns ask VP candidates to address global warming & meat             SALT LAKE CITY, Utah––Will the October 7,  2020 debate between Republican vice president Mike Pence and Democratic vice presidential challenger Kamala Harris bring the first direct challenge in 92 years to the political promise of putting a […]

Hurricane Laura: mouse takes the spotlight while 10 dogs die on truck

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Marine life are major wildlife casualties             COOKEVILLE,  Tennessee––Pipsqueak the three-legged mouse,  a cow dead for perhaps 160 years,  ten dogs succumbing to heat exhaustion aboard a rescue transport,  and acres of decomposing marine life scattered across beaches more than 300 miles from where Hurricane Laura made landfall at Cameron Parish,  Louisiana,  appear to be […]

Wildfires, COVID-19, & cockfighting besiege Monterey County

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Cockfighting may be accelerant behind COVID-19 explosion MONTEREY, California––The 50,000-acre River wildfire,  destroying at least 13 homes,  and the 7,000-acre Carmel wildfire,  razing 50 homes,  reportedly forced the evacuation of more than 500 animals to the SPCA for Monterey County shelter during the fourth week of August 2020––and then forced the animals’ re-evacuation to the […]

Pro-cockfighting rally draws fewer participants than local cockfights

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Apathy thwarts “Call To Action BBQ” VERBENA, Alabama––One inept attempt to rally nationwide support for cockfighting,  convened on short notice amid a global pandemic,  scarcely means the multi-million-dollar cockfighting industry is unraveling,  protected as it is by “good old boys” in legislatures and law enforcement. But that fewer people rallied in defense of cockfighting on […]