Born a “displaced person,” Biruté Galdikas spent her life aiding & advocating for displaced orangutans LOS ANGELES––Orangutan researcher, rescuer, and conservationist Biruté Galdikas, 79, died on March 24, 2026 in Los Angeles, after a prolonged illness. “Born in Germany, on May 10, 1946, while her parents were en route from Lithuania to Canada,” as displaced […]
Mule deer are again in Catalina Island Conservancy crosshairs
Mule deer are the major natural brakes on growth of tindery browse & grass, but conservancy wants to kill them all in the name of fire prevention AVALON, Catalina Island, California––The Catalina Island Conservancy, owners of 88% of Santa Catalina, California’s largest offshore island, as of January 30, 2026 has the go-ahead from the California […]
Five little noted but accomplished animal advocates who died in 2025
Marshall R. Thompson, Jamie Massey, Sarah Fisher, Neil C. Wolff, DVM, and Vincent van der Merwe Among the many accomplished animal advocates whose passage in the last months of 2025 mostly escaped notice from all but family and friends were Marshall R. Thompson, Jamie Massey, Sarah Fisher, Neil C. Wolff, DVM, and Vincent van der […]
Save the Elephants founder Iain Douglas-Hamilton, 83, felled by bees
Studied everything about elephants from their psyches to the tips of their tails & fought for elephant survival from the northern Kenyan desert to lecture halls in Beijing, China NAIROBI, Kenya––Save the Elephants founder Iain Douglas-Hamilton, 83, died on December 8, 2025 at his home in Nairobi, Kenya. Excellence in all things was expected of […]
Big wins for elephants, rhinos, giraffes, sharks & falcons in Uzbekistan desert
The big loser at CITES Conference of the Parties 20 was the saiga antelope, native to host nation Uzbekistan SAMARKAND, Uzbekistan––Elephants, rhinos, giraffes, white-tipped sharks, peregrine falcons, and the Vantara captive wildlife sanctuary in Gujarat state, India, were among the big winners at the twentieth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the […]
New Zealand escalates war on feral cats, but H5N1 is greater threat to birds
Feral cats can even help to prevent an H5N1 outbreak. Compound 1080 will be useless. WELLINGTON, New Zealand––What most threatens the unique New Zealand bird ecology, an estimated 2.5 million feral cats, or 124 million factory-farmed chickens? Calling feral cats “stone cold killers,” New Zealand conservation minister Tama Potaka in late November 2025 formally added […]
How Sharon Pincott survived Zimbabwe with the Presidential Elephants
All The President’s Elephants 52 minutes. Free view at: https://stirr.com/movies/5831/all-the-president-s-elephants Reviewed by Beth Clifton Upset by alleged land grabs and poaching involving people well-connected within the Robert Mugabe government, Australian elephant researcher Sharon Pincott on April 16, 2014 e-mailed to ANIMALS 24-7 that she was reluctantly leaving Zimbabwe, giving up a 13-year effort to protect the herd […]
“Kill the barred owls!” agree U.S. Senate Democrats with Republicans
Scheme to kill barred owls allows timber industry to log off northern spotted owl habitat WASHINGTON D.C.––Twenty-nine days into a U.S. government shutdown due to a partisan impasse over a budget bill, Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Senate on October 29, 2025 overwhelming agreed in favor of massacring barred owls to protect northern spotted […]
Mute swans & trumpeter swans: bird artist Barry Kent Mackay testifies
“The trumpeter swans where I live, in southern Ontario, associate with non-native mute swans” Barry Kent Mackay, a friend for 47 years, a longtime colleague on the animals and nature news beat, and among the senior animal advocates in Canada, also happens to be a distinguished ornithological painter with an especially strong fondness for waterfowl. […]
What Diane Keaton had in common with Wendy Spencer of Wolf Haven
Both testified in favor of legislation against private ownership of wildlife, for starters TENINO, Washington; SANTA MONICA, California––Wolf Haven director of animal care Wendy Spencer-Armestar, 60, who died of cancer on September 30, 2025, and actress Diane Keaton, 79, who died of bacterial pneumonia on October 11, 2025, pursued starkly life trajectories, yet––while they may […]