Expecting to validate the use of lethal culling, researchers find just the opposite HOBART, Tasmania, Australia––Perhaps the strongest scientific support yet for one of the key presumptions behind neuter/return feral cat control has emerged from a 13-month study by Tasmanian Department of Primary Industries biologist Billie Lazenby and two colleagues. Expecting to validate the use […]
United Nations arm CITES recommends trade boycott of Laos over wildlife trafficking
“Suspend commercial trade in specimens of CITES-listed species with the Lao People’s Democratic Republic” GENEVA, VIENTIENE–– The Secretariat of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), a treaty organization formed by the United Nations, on March 19, 2015 issued a rare recommendation that all 170 CITES member nations […]
Undercover video calls into question both how deer are culled and why
Have deer been over-counted? JOLIET, Illinois––Video surveillance of ongoing deer culls in Will County, Illinois, southwest of Chicago, has unexpectedly called into question not only whether the culling is humane, but whether the target areas support anywhere near the claimed numbers of deer. Opposition to deer culling––in the Chicago area and nationwide––has historically focused on […]
Ferrets, “pocket pets,” & pit bulls
New York City keeps 1989 ferret ban NEW YORK CITY––The New York City Board of Health on March 10, 2015 voted 3-2 with three abstentions to retain a 25-year-old ban on possession of ferrets. The vote left New York City and Washington D.C. as the two largest cities to prohibit ferrets, […]
Is this the most mismanaged U.S. National Wildlife Refuge?
Not so much as glimmering eyes to indicate the presence of the Columbian whitetailed deer for whom refuge was created by Merritt Clifton CATHLAMET, Washington––Traversing the Steamboat Slough dike at the Julia Butler Hansen National Wildlife Refuge with headlights and a jacklight on the night of January 29, 2015, Beth and I spotted a large Roosevelt […]
Theo Colborn, 87, identified chemical effects on animal & human health
by Elizabeth Grossman Theo Colborn, 87, died on December 14, 2014. Born in Plainfield, New Jersey, Theodora Emily Decker Colborn was a life-long bird-watcher who began her fascination with the natural world early. I spent several days interviewing her in December 2013 at her home in Paonia, Colorado. As we talked on a sub-zero morning, with huge […]
Want to know how many birds & bats are killed by wind turbines? Developer says “Blow me.”
Nature Conservancy loses bid to stop project TULSA, SALT LAKE CITY, WASHINGTON D.C.––Calling concerns about wildlife voiced by The Nature Conservancy “speculative,” District Judge Robert Haney, of Ottawa County, Oklahoma, on November 12, 2014 ordered Osage County to grant a conditional use permit to TradeWind Energy Inc. for the construction of 68 wind turbines on […]
Field Mortalities in Wildlife Research: It’s Time for a Conversation
Preface by Merritt Clifton Jon Geller, DVM, whose guest column “Field Mortalities in Wildlife Research: It’s Time for a Conversation” appears below, is scarcely the first to call into question the ethics of wildlife captures for research purposes. While Geller’s critique focuses on capture techniques, why animals are captured and what happens to them afterward […]
Protecting latrine owls from the consequences of crazy behavior
Contributing to the well-being of some of the best-known owls in folklore DENVER––Working to conserve the western screech owl, boreal owl, northern pygmy owl, and northern saw-whet owl, the Teton Raptor Center was honored on March 12, 2014 by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service for contributions toward the well-being of some of the most […]
Alleged rhino poaching gang served trophy hunters as well as Asian medicinal demand
Rhino industry insiders in the dock JOHANNESBURG––Startling photos of the September 22, 2010 arraignment of 11 alleged members of an international rhino poaching syndicate reached the world despite the officially unexplained efforts of police to keep photographers out. News photographers Werner Beukes of the South African Press Agency, Herman Verwey of Beeld, and Lewellyn Carstens […]