Monday, March 30, 2009

The lioness who showed remorse after realising it had killed a pregnant antelope


These are the shocking pictures that show that nature is brutal - but also profoundly moving.

After realising an antelope she has killed was pregnant, a lioness removes the unborn calf, tries to nudge it back to life and even protects and hides it as if it is her own cub.

The lioness even seems to show regret for her actions and the pictures will spark a debate about the awareness of animals.

The remarkable sequence of photos were captured by conservationist and reserve ranger Gerry Van Der Walt.

The party had been travelling through the Madikwe Game Reserve, in South Africa, early this year when they came across the predator and a dead Red Hartebeest antelope.

He and a group of visitors spotted the big cat just moments after she had made her kill and expected to witness nothing more than a simple feeding.

But what followed astounded everyone.

Gerry, 33, who has worked on reserves and with wildlife in South Africa for more than two decades, said that he thought the kill was going to be pretty much 'by the book'.

He said: 'My guests were also watching the scene through their video cameras and binoculars.

'As the lioness got hold of what we thought was the stomach she started pulling it out.

'But as the cat stood up to get a little more leverage a ranger next to me said: "That is not the stomach".

'I have seen a lion kill where the prey was pregnant but normally they would just carry on feeding as if nothing was wrong.

'But this time the scenes that followed had us all dumbstruck.

'Once out of the mother the lioness very gently placed the foetus on the floor and spent quite a bit of time smelling and investigating the unborn Hartebeest.

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Monday, March 23, 2009

Insist on Eating Meat at your own Peril! Dangers of Animal meat eating.

Dangers of Animal meat eating
Maneka Gandhi

All meat eating is risky because of the diseases that meat carries and the reaction it causes in the human body which is intended to be vegetarian. Even more unnatural is for meat-eating humans to consume carnivores because of their greater disease load , smell and the extra allergy of our bodies to theirs. To cite one example of the increased risk of consuming meat-eating animals: those who eat cows and sheep that have been force fed meat run the terrible risk of getting CJS or “ Mad Cow Disease” a fatal condition where the brain melts down. Alzheimers is another condition that scientists have traced to the same source. However in a couple of Asian countries including India’s northeast states, dogs and cats are eaten. This is not for nutrition but for the most bizarre reasons including the foolish belief that dog meat enhances sexual potency. Sometimes it is eaten out of superstition or even as a cure for tuberculosis! But even i n Korea , China and the Philippines where dog eating is most prevalent, dogs are not listed as an animal husbandry produce showing that it is a deviant practice rather than a mainstream food habit. The trade is conducted out of public sight with no official records maintained by agencies that normally track commerce because this would be an admission of a traffic of which many citizens disapprove. As petkeeping gains in popularity, petkeepers could soon lobby to finally end this perversion.

In India, dogs are eaten openly only in Nagaland and to a smaller extent in Mizoram. Unfortunately the traffic of dogs into Nagaland is draining the dogs from all the other states nearby like Assam , Manipur, Sikkim, Meghalaya , Arunachal Pradesh even West Bengal and Burma. Cats are not openly eaten anywhere but secretly by gypsies like the Narikauravas of South India and one ethnic sect in Kerala. However dhabas and roadside restaurateurs routinely pass off cat and dog meat as chicken or other meat.
Not only is this illegal but downright dangerous. In the Philippines where dog meat is now banned , there are health warnings about the deadly diseases including rabies that it can cause. Dr. Roberto Umali, regional director of the National Meat Inspection Commission, explains these hazards, "Eating dog meat may cause anthrax, hepatitis, leptospirosis, internal parasites and brucellosis, a virus that causes abortion in both humans and animals. However, the most dangerous are the E. Coli 107 and salmonella virus, most common in contaminated meat. Dogs are not food animals and we appeal to the public to refrain from eating them".
On February 1, 2006 the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported that a 4 year old girl, who was given dog meat by her neighbours, died of rabies and encephalitis. Her father said she had developed high fever and symptoms of rabies shortly after eating the meat. She was rushed to hospital but died within a few hours. Doctors say the rabies virus may have entered the girl's system through a tooth cavity. When chewing the meat of a dog infected with rabies, the virus enters the nerve endings through a cavity, loose tooth or a cut in the gums, passes through the lymph nodes and multiplies in the brain, resulting in the victim's death. The incubation period for rabies can be as short as 4 to 6 weeks or as long as 1 to 5 years. People handling dog meat could also be infected by their hands touching their eyes or lips.
Nor is it just the meat of a rabid dog that is fatal, a normal healthy dog’s meat is equally hazardous. Dogs eat raw meat, rats, vermin and garbage. All of this is passed onto the consumer. In the Northeast, death from such cases is simply documented as routine food poisoning. But in Namibia after 68 villagers were hospitalized after eating a dog, Namibia’s Director of Health has forbidden dog meat .
Recently in Azerbaijan, 12 people were taken to hospital with trichinellosis . They had unknowingly eaten dog meat disguised as keema (mince) and put into sausages and shish kebab. Trichinellosis is a parasitic disease caused by eating carnivorous animals infected with the roundworm Trichinella spiralis. Within 1-2 days of infection, it is manifested as nausea, heartburn , dyspepsia and diarrhea. As the worms travel to different parts of the body, other symptoms may occur such as headache, fever, chills, cough, eyeswelling, joint pains and itching. Most dangerous is when worms enter the central nervous system causing serious neurological problems such as respiratory paralysis and even death. Infestation of the heart can also lead to death. Symptoms occur within 1-2 days with further symptoms following 2-8 weeks after eating contaminated meat. Mild cases of trichinellosis are seldom specifically diagnosed and are assumed to be the flu or other common illnesses. It has been suggested that trichinellosis may be one of several factors that led to religious prohibitions as in Islam and Judaism against eating dog or pork meat.
After tightening meat checks, the incidence of trichinellosis is falling in Russia but increasing in neighbouring countries like Poland and Turkey where clandestine sale of dog meat is on the rise. In China too dog meat has become an increasing source of the disease. Since its first documented outbreak of human trichinellosis resulting from the consumption of dog meat in 1974, such cases have multiplied alarmingly.
Are you at risk for trichinellosis? Certainly, if you order meat at dhabas, or eat bear, pig, cat, fox, dog and wolf meat. Curing (salting), drying, smoking, freezing or microwaving meat does not kill the worms.
Here are other zoonotic diseases that dog meat can transmit:
Cryptosporidosis: A parasitic disease that causes a mild to severe infection of the gastrointestinal system manifesting in watery diarrhea, fever, abdominal cramps, nausea, and vomiting.
Giardia: Giardiasis is the most frequent cause of nonbacterial diarrhea in North America and the most commonly diagnosed intestinal parasite in humans.
Leptospirosis: A bacterial disease spread through the urine of infected animals. In people, the symptoms are often flu-like. The risk of leptospirosis through common contact with a dog is negligible, the primary mode of transmission is through contact with contaminated animal tissues, organs, or urine.
Roundworm: Toxocara is a parasitic infection caused by roundworms commonly found in the intestines of dogs and puppies and shed through their stool. Toxocara infections can cause eye disease leading to blindness, or swelling of the body's organs and central nervous system.

Check the food you eat. Eating dogs is neither friendly nor healthful.

To join the animal welfare movement contact gandhim@nic.in


SOURCE


Did you get your dose of arsenic today?

ACTION NEEDED... This Bill is important

Thanks to a courageous Canadian Senator, Marc Harb, there is now a Bill to end Canada's commercial seal hunt, which is expected to take the lives of more than 250,000 baby seals this year alone.

Support the historic Bill to stop the hunt! »

Imagine a world in which there are no more baby seals hooked and dragged onto boats while still conscious. No more seals as young as three weeks old skinned alive. No more needless slaughter of hundreds of thousands of seals each year.

With the proposed seal product ban in the EU and Russia's recent ban on hunting harp seals less than a year old, this dream can soon be made a reality. The momentum to end Canada's commercial seal hunt has never been stronger.

Senator Harb wants to fill the Senate with messages of support for his Bill. Please sign the petition today! »

Take action link: http://www.care2.com/go/z/e/AFlLC/zjYY/AOBBi

Thanks for taking action!

Thursday, March 19, 2009

New Blog for Harb Seal Bill Challenge

As things heat up in Canada and around the world in preparation for the seal hunt, or the seal harvest as some Ministers so proudly state, I am continuing to write letters to the Senators, Canadian Officials and the EU Representatives.

I am also encouraging everybody continue to write as well.
I have been scattering my posts around Facebook and will continue to update my Events listed there, but am starting a blog site to try to collect all the information in one place.

Here is the new blog site with more posts to come shortly.
http://harbsealbill.blogspot.com/

Thank you,
Amanda

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Human Apathy and the Struggle for Non-Human Individuals

BY CAMILLE A MARINO

I see human behavior through a rather unflattering lens. So maybe that's the reason that I put very little emphasis on persuading humans that other sentient beings deserve respect and consideration. I recognize the moral necessity of animal rights. And I need to advance the agenda by attacking the sources: the capitalist structure that relies on the apathy of our population to continue the despicable forms of expliotation upon which they depend. I have a finite number of years on this planet. I refuse to spend them pandering to a mob mentality that is offended by my disgust at their selfishness, apathy and ignorance. By the time I leave this world, I will have effected change, despite the righteous indignation of the mobs. You see, people have not changed since I've been paying attention. And I don't expect them to anytime soon.

I put myself through school at night. I would work all day and cut through Manhattan to get to class on time. I'd watch the socio-economic classes burst into Grand Central Station in a blur and separate into tidy little groups. There would be laborers and office workers heading underground and disappearing into the filthy subways for their treks back into the boroughs. There would be middle management drones and the pin-stripped-suit capitalists walking urgently, seemingly wary of human eye contact with inferior (or less economically viable) humans. These people, of course, headed out to the various suburbs... Connecticut and New Jersey mainly. A few more people would disperse into the bowels of the city. And that was rush hour.

My classes would let out anywhere between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m., depending on how many courses I could cram into a given night. So, I would head toward Grand Central Station on my own trek back to Brooklyn. And it seemed to me that I was the only person in all of New York City who was troubled by the homeless individuals, hungry and dirty, littered on the dirty floors throughout the terminal. The contrast between the homeless and the homeward bound was disturbing during rush hours; but at the hours where there was far less traffic, the human disconnect was glaring. I had my own problems trying to pay for a ridiculously-expensive education (capitalists put a huge price tag on learning) but if I had a couple of dollars (literally two dollars) I would have to give a homeless individual one. Why was I the only person who noticed? Why didn't anyone else, people who were far more well off financially than I, care? It takes no feat of mental acuity to come to a conclusion:

It was easier not to pay attention to the suffering that people saw face-to-face every single day, at least twice a day. The homeless people, like the non-human individuals I fight for today, were disenfranchised and "lesser" members of society. If people noticed, they would have to act, or at least care.

Well, let me fast forward two decades. While millions of animals suffer and die in shelters, why do we let capitalist filth keep breeding dogs and cats for profit? Because their ignorant human counterparts create a demand. Why are the horrors of factory farming so secreted into the social consciousness? Because without ignorance humans would be unable to enjoy the flesh and secretions they gorge on. Why are millions of non-humans imprisoned in cages and subjected to the most unimaginable torture regimens? Because humans choose to remain ignorant. Most people do not even know that once the non-human torture trials end, the human experimentation begins. But the capitalist system keeps on running fueled by society's utter ignorance. And there is only one commonality I can isolate that allows the entire system to function: apathy.

The immediate consequence of exploring the unpleasant topic of non-human genocide is that one must modify his/her behavior. If humans as a whole find it easier to look the other way when members of their own species suffer, I can't imagine what I could say or do that would prompt these same people to acknowledge the screams from the cages, crates and chains, the blood dripping from mutilated bodies, the fear and pain to which sentient beings are subjected. I have no magic words to make people choose to acknowledge their own complicity in these crimes.

I stand proudly at one extreme -- that of refusing to perpetuate atrocity. And those whose behavior I despise stand at the other extreme -- complicit in torture and genocide. And there is no compromise. If I can change a mind here or there along the way, great. But negotiation is not an option.

So I've chosen to focus on attacking what lies in the middle. Those who make their money by exploiting the inconsequential non-human members of society. Those are the people whose behavior we can affect. Those are the people who need to be persuaded that violence is not profitable. Only when sadists cannot comfortably make money will non-human individuals be allowed their inherent rights to life.

Monday, March 2, 2009

Pot Smoker Stuffs Cat In To Bong


hadow, a 6-month-old female cat, is seen in this March 1, 2009, photo provided by the Lancaster County Sheriff's Dept. Shadow was rescued by deputies, who discovered the cat trapped in a "bong" after responding to a domestic disturbance call at a residency that a 20-year old suspect shares with his grandfather in the Lincoln, Neb., area. (AP Photo/Lancaster County Sheriff Dept.)

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - A man who tried to mellow out his cat by stuffing her into a homemade bong is facing criminal charges—and catcalls from animal lovers. Authorities cited a 20-year-old man on suspicion of animal cruelty Sunday after catching him smoking marijuana from a contraption that had a cat stuffed inside its 12-inch by 6-inch base.

The man told Lancaster County sheriff's deputies the 6-month-old female named Shadow had been hyper and that he was trying to calm her down.

The cat was taken to the Capital Humane Society, where she appeared to be in good condition Monday, executive director Bob Downey said.

"What the human mind doesn't invent, huh?" Downey said.

The suspect did not return voice or text messages left on his cell phone by The Associated Press.

Deputies discovered the cat trapped in the device after responding to a domestic disturbance call at a residence the suspect shares with his grandfather, Sgt. Andy Stebbing said.

Deputies resolved the dispute and left the house, but they returned minutes later after discovering there was an arrest warrant on the suspect for possession of drug paraphernalia.

Upon re-entering the house, Stebbing said, deputies saw the suspect smoking marijuana through a piece of garden hose attached to the duct-taped, plastic glass box, in which the cat had been stuffed.

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ACTION ALERT Puppy Mills

In order to change the situation for animals in puppy mills, you have to educate yourself about the animal rights laws in YOUR STATE and take the time to CONTACT your senator sand representatives to let them know you want changes. You have to put pressure on them.
see videos about Puppy Mill Rescue with over 100 dogs this one on Missouri
Contact your elected politicians in Missouri

Live in a different state contact your elected officials here


http://video.bestfriends.org/media/p/219.aspx