WHALE STRANDING UPDATE – Farewell Spit (New Zealand)

The ocean update

January 16th, 2014 (Kerry O’Brien). Despite more than two days of significant effort by the Department of Conservation (DOC), Project Jonah volunteers and the local community caring for, re-floating and attempting to herd the remaining pilot whales back to deep water using boats and people in the water, the survivors of Tuesdays pilot whale stranding in Golden Bay having been joined by a 9th whale and have again re-stranded overnight.

With a full moon last night causing a higher tide, rescuers this morning found the whales stranded much further up the beach making the prospect of a re-float considerably harder.

Unfavourable weather conditions in the form of high winds, which are forecast to get higher during the day, again working against those intent on a rescue.

The animals were this morning found to be stressed and in poor condition. DOC has therefore made the heart rending decision to euthanize rather than…

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It’s Time to Put Our Money Where Our Mouths Are When It Comes to Hounding: Please Help Friends of the Wisconsin Wolf

Wisconsin Wildlife Ethic-Vote Our Wildlife

Following the latest wolf slaughter season the anti-wildlife and anti-wolf factions have become even more emboldened. They openly brag on Facebook hate pages of poaching and even advocating the use of poison. The Wisconsin DNR has been presented with dozens of photographs, videos, and statements showing wolf/bear/coyote/bobcat hounders violating numerous rules and regulations and they refuse to take any action.

One of the most blatant examples of the DNR refusing to enforce their own rules and regulations concerns the refusal by their “investigators” to cite hounders, trappers,and shooters that do not tag killed wolves IMMEDIATELY as is stated in their own rules:

Tagging and Registration

Upon killing a wolf, the harvester must do all of the following:

1) immediately validate and attach the PELT tag to the wolf in the manner described on the tag. After skinning the wolf, the CARCASS tag shall be attached to the skinned carcass, and…

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ANIMAL ETHICS: An international court

FUR OUT THE CLOSET:

FELLOW ANIMAL LOVERS: WHAT DO YOU THINK?

                                                                           

About the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics

~~~ The Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, founded in 2006 by its director Professor Andrew Linzey, is an independent Centre with the aim of pioneering ethical perspectives on animals through academic, research, teaching and publication. The Centre has more than 70 Fellows drawn from a variety of academic disciplines from throughout the world. For more information about the Centre and its Fellows please see its website at  www.oxfordanimalethics.com. ~~~

PRESS RELEASE:                                                  …

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Tree disease is threatening orange juice

Grist

About 80 percent of America’s orange juice comes from Florida orange trees. And now roughly half of them have tree cancer. If this keeps up, the $9 billion citrus industry in Florida might have to start making your morning OJ from fruit that’s been genetically modified to withstand bacteria.

By “tree cancer,” to be precise, we actually mean “an incurable bacterial infection from China that goes by many names: huanglongbing, ‘yellow dragon disease,’ and ‘citrus greening,’” according to the Washington Post. It kills tree roots, ruins fruit, and ultimately conquers the entire tree. A wee bug, the Asian citrus psyllid, helpfully spreads the disease from unhealthy to healthy trees. The psyllid is so effective, five other states and several countries are seeing the disease devastate their citrus crops. Aye yi yi.

About 500 scientists put their heads together in February 2013, but despite $80 million in funding, they still…

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Recovered porpoise Ella back in the North Sea

Dear Kitty. Some blog

This video is called Harbour Porpoise Species Identification.

Dutch news agency ANP reports that harbour porpoise Ella has been freed on 14 January 2014 after recovery from illness.

On 18 October 2013, Ella had beached on Texel island. In the SOS Dolfijn centre in Harderwijk, she recovered from pneumonia. A bus brought her back to the North Sea where she swims again now.

Harbour porpoises lead solitary lives. So, contrary to when releasing killer whales, they don’t have to be brought back to their pod.

Related articles

• Dutch beached porpoise Ella recovering
• Porpoises on European coasts maintain their populations but migrate southwards
• Porpoises spotted swimming up River Thames in Westminster
• Pod of porpoises spotted swimming up the river Thames near Westminster
• Porpoises in the Thames: did storm surge lead pod up river?
• Porpoises Seen In Thames After Tidal Surge

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DFO seeks data on seismic testing’s impact on endangered whales

The ocean update

January 14th, 2014 (DON BUTLER). With offshore oil and gas exploration ramping up off the Nova Scotia coast, the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) wants to know more about its effects on endangered whale populations.

DFO invited contractors this week to submit proposals to collect acoustic recordings from endangered North Atlantic right whales and northern bottlenose whales in Scotian Shelf waters.

“The impacts of noise produced by seismic surveys on cetaceans and their habitat are not well understood, though seismic activities are identified as a potential threat to several at-risk species in Canada,” the department said in its statement of work.

In 2012, Nova Scotia awarded BP Exploration Company and Shell Canada exploration licences for land parcels off the western Scotian Shelf, a large section of the Continental Shelf southwest of the province. It has also issued a call for bids for parcels on the eastern Scotian Shelf.

Shell…

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Fears Farewell Spit whales still in danger (New Zealand)

The ocean update

Wednesday January 15, 2014. Fears that the eight whales re-floated earlier today may re-strand are set to continue into the night.

DOC has advised that although the whales are in reasonably deep water, they are not showing any signs of moving out to sea.

This afternoon rescuers were forced to return to the water to discourage the whales from returning to the shallows.

A human chain was formed in an effort to stop the whales from swiming any closer.

It was hoped that the deepening water of the incoming tide would keep the whales from re-stranding.

The whales were part of a pod of about 70 that was seen close to the shore yesterday morning.

Most managed to make it back out to sea and are thought to be out of danger.

But 13 became beached and DOC staff and volunteers worked through the day to keep the whales wet and…

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Up to 100,000 dead fish in Nevada marina a mystery

The Extinction Protocol

January 16, 2014 – NEVADA – State wildlife officials are trying to figure out why all the fish have died in a northern Nevada marina where the stocked fishery has flourished since the man-made lake was created nearly 15 years ago. As many as 100,000 trout, bass and catfish have died over the past month in the Sparks Marina along U.S. Interstate 80 east of Reno, apparently the result of a dramatic, unexplained drop in dissolved oxygen levels, Nevada Department of Wildlife spokesman Chris Healy said Wednesday. Scientists say a bitter cold snap could have caused oxygen-poor waters to rise from the old rock quarry’s bottom to the surface, but they don’t understand what sparked the massive die-off. Fish biologists confirmed low oxygen levels caused the death of an estimated 3,000 fish in one corner of the lake in mid-December but Healy said they thought at the time the event…

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Endangered tortoises are branded to make them unattractive to poachers

Internet Hacking Organization “Anonymous” Announces Targeting of Walmart

Higher Learning

“Anonymous”, a group of hackers who originated on the imageboard 4chan, has been targeting different organizations since their beginnings in 2003. They recently released this video, announcing plans to target Walmart.

Among Anonymous’s previous targets are businesses like Sony and Aiplex (an Indian company that was contracted by ilm studios to target sites with pirated material, like the Pirate Bay), Law Offices in Britain, services like Amazon and Paypal, and even the Church of Scientology.

Typically, the hackers will obtain access to their targets’ websites and then proceed to wreak havoc. This includes fake-posting on the site, disrupting its operations and, if possible, shutting it down completely.

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TAKE ACTION! The Next Keystone XL?

This old thing? San Francisco finds new life for dead threads

Grist

Style meccas, tilt your ears: San Francisco’s moving sustainability forward along with their fashion. On Wednesday, Mayor Ed Lee announced the debut of a city-wide textile recycling initiative.

San Franciscans trash 4,500 pounds of clothing an hour, according to the SF Environment Department. To put a dent in that number, more than 160 textile recycling bins were rolled out at noon in schools, stores, and libraries around the city.

The bins, and today’s announcement, are the first step in what will be a learning process for both San Francisco and the global clothing recycler they’re working with, I:CO.

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Did You Know… The First Mechanical Gear Was Designed by Mother Nature? (Pictures & Video)

Higher Learning

Meet the issus planthopper, a close relative of the grasshopper.

In September of last year, scientists studying this insect discovered that the issus was using a built-in mechanical gear to synchronize the powerful jumping mechanisms that it uses to jump distances over 100 times its body-length. Here’s a close up:

It’s the first mechanical gear found within a living creature, and helps the planthopper achieve jumping accelerations up to 400g’s (ie. 400x the force of gravity), 20 times what the human body can withstand.

Here’s a video showing the mechanism in action. It has been slowed waaaay down- the actual process happens in less than 30 milliseconds:

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Sustainable butcher shop responds to PETA attack in classiest way possible

Grist

Yo PETA! I got a bone to pick with you (as it were). Why go after a small, sustainable neighborhood butcher shop when you could take on, I DUNNO, Tyson? Hormel? Cargill? You know, pick on somebody your own size!

The consistently assholey (and sexist) animal rights group put up a billboard across the street from Chicago’s Publican Quality Meats. (“You can live without those ribs. I can’t,” the sign reads, with a photo of a pig. “Try vegan.” Image above.) But rather than get ragey (like, say, I just did), Publican responded with grace and intelligence:

We choose to eat meat, but acknowledge that death as respectfully as possible. We deal with farms and purveyors where animals are free-range, uncaged, fed natural diets, are given no antibiotics or steroids and are slaughtered as humanely and painlessly as possible. But they ARE slaughtered. There is a death.

This is…

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Scientists Baffled by Mass Sardine Die-Off on West Coast

Nwo Report

Mystery fuels concerns that radiation buildup is fueling mass sea life die-off

source: Adan Salazar

Experts are baffled by a confirmed and unexpected die-off of the West Coast’s sardine population, a mystery adding to an already long list of devastating environmental mysteries taking place in the wake of the Fukushima radiological disaster.

One that follows not only the discovery of various radiation hot spots along the very same coast, such as a 1,400% increase as documented by Infowars‘ ongoing investigation into the subject, but anomalies such as seen with the conjoined gray whale calves that were found dying along the coast. Meanwhile, the mainstream media has once again failed to even mention the reality that Fukushima’s effects have already been documented within the United States. From studies proving the radioactive contamination of seafood, to the admission that 70 plus percent of the radioactive waste from the plant was dumped…

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Discovery Channel: Stop Worrying About Fukushima Radiation!

Nwo Report

…And learn to love the fallout

Source: Paul Joseph Watson

The Discovery Channel has posted a YouTube video urging its viewers to ignore “trolls” and “fearmongerers” and stop worrying about Fukushima radiation.

In the clip, host Trace Dominguez blames a “mob” for trying to make others believe that deadly radiation from the crippled nuclear power plant could be hitting the west coast of the United States and is responsible for killing animals and sea life.

Dominguez highlights a viral video showing an individual using a Geiger counter to detect abnormally high levels of radiation on a beach in San Francisco, an act that led public health officials to discover radiation hot spots 1400% normal levels that one expert said posed a health risk to young children and babies. As Infowars reporters who subsequently visited the beach confirmed, authorities have failed to erect warning signs to notify residents that the…

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Protect Island Animals from Rat Poison

Our Compass

Please click HERE to take action

Background Source Care2

The Farallon Islands, a group of islands off the coast of San Francisco, is home to a huge variety of seabirds, seals, whales and sharks. They’re also one of the only breeding sites for the ashy storm-petrel, an small, increasingly endangered bird that depends on the islands for survival.

Unfortunately, the islands are also overrun with house mice. Though the mice mostly eat crickets and salamanders, their main danger is attracting burrowing owls to the Farallons. When those owls run out of mice to eat, they turn to the islands’ native species — including the storm-petrels.

To save the storm-petrels, the US Fish and Wildlife Services plans to bomb the islands with rat poison pellets. But the poison won’t just wipe out the mice; it will also put the islands’ diverse native species in grave danger, particularly the endangered black abalone…

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“Endangered” Hunter Auctioned off to Save Species

Exposing the Big Game

Believing the spin that “hunters are an endangered species,” trophy-hunter hunting group, the Sahara Club, a conservation group dedicated to preserving the hunter herd for future generations of trophy-hunter hunters to harvest, auctioned off a chance to hunt an aging, expendable hunter to raise funds for their cause. Taxidermy services will also be awarded to the winning bidder. Proceeds will be used to enhance hunter habitat for the species known taxonomically as Homo huntsman horribilis and will go towards funding more logging roads to allow access for their trucks and four-wheelers, as well as building more conveniently located gas station/mini-marts, taverns and mobile home parks.

Biologists blame a long history of inbreeding for the decline in hunter fertility and viability. When asked about the ethics of hunting down and killing this unfortunate individual, a Sahara Club spokesman stated, “Overall I think it will be a good thing. While it may…

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Five Foods That Are Killing the Planet

Eco Books 4 Kids

Spoiler alert: Stop reading now if you can’t live without Quarter Pounders,  packaged pastries, or expensive sushi. —Avital AndrewsWe’ll let Pulitzer Prize–winning food critic Jonathan Gold get on his soapbox for this one: “People need to stop eating BLUEFIN TUNA. Period. It’ll be difficult because bluefin is uncommonly delicious and tends to be served at high-end sushi bars, where the fashion is to say ‘omakase‘ and submit to the chef’s will. But the numbers of these magnificent fish are dropping fast. If we don’t stop eating them now, we’ll stop in a few years anyway because there won’t be any more.” Carl Safina, who founded the Blue Ocean Institute, adds, “Because they’re long-lived, bluefin populations don’t stand up well to heavy fishing pressure—that’s why they’re so depleted. It’s just too sad to eat them. Plus, big fish are high in mercury.” To rein in your share…

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I decided that I Hate all Japanese people; Just because of the ones in Taji!

Good African elephant news

Dear Kitty. Some blog

This video says about itself:

The Elephant Documentary

24 July 2013

Elephants are large mammals of the family Elephantidae and the order Proboscidea. Traditionally, two species are recognised, the African elephant (Loxodonta africana) and the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), although some evidence suggests that African bush elephants and African forest elephants are separate species (L. africana and L. cyclotis respectively). Elephants are scattered throughout sub-Saharan Africa, and South and Southeast Asia. They are the only surviving proboscideans; extinct species include mammoths and mastodons. The largest living terrestrial animals, male African elephants can reach a height of 4 m (13 ft) and weigh 7,000 kg (15,000 lb). These animals have several distinctive features, including a long proboscis or trunk used for many purposes, particularly for grasping objects. Their incisors grow into tusks, which serve as tools for moving objects and digging and as weapons for fighting. The…

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DIY Instant Hand Warmers

Allow Lifesaving Fostering At Florida Shelters!

A global overview of death-dealing monocultural agricultural practices

Giant squid in Japanese fishing net

Dear Kitty. Some blog

Metro in Britain writes about this video from Japan:

Elusive giant squid found in fishing net off the coast of Japan

Monday 13 Jan 2014 12:10 pm

It’s usually one of the mysteries of the deep – but an elusive giant squid has been found in a fishing net off the coast of Japan.

The 4m (12ft) beast was found by fisherman Shigenori Goto swimming in one of his fixed nets about 70m underwater off the coast of Sadogashima island.

After it was brought to the surface, the squid – later found to be male – died.

‘This is the first time I’ve seen such a large squid,’ Mr Goto told reporters in Japan.

The giant squid was taken to a local government marine research institute in Niigata for research.

Giant squids are rarely seen because of the depths at which they live.

The first footage of a live adult

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A Vegan Doctor Addresses Soy Myths & Misinformation ~ Free From Harm

Girl for Animal Liberation

Soy has long been recognized as a nutrient-dense food and as an excellent source of protein by respected dietitians and clinical nutritionists. The soybean contains all of the essential amino acids, as well as an impressive list of micronutrients (vitamins and minerals). Micronutrients in rich supply in soy include: calcium, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, potassium, vitamins B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, B9, C and zinc. Fiber and omega-3 and 6 fatty acids are also present in soy. The composition of these nutrients varies among preparations, but is in the highest quantity in whole soy foods such as edamame (whole soy beans), soy milk, tofu and tempeh.

Yet despite the powerful health benefits of whole soy foods, myths and misinformation regarding the ‘dangers’ of soy consumption are being widely circulated and presented as fact. I will address a few of these myths by taking a closer look at some of the…

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Blog the Change!

Haiku By Ku

“You must be the change

You wish to see in the world”

Gandhi was so wise

 

 

Today is one of the Blog the Change For Animals days! Blog the Change asks:

• What have you done to Be the Change for Animals?
• Who do you know who acts tirelessly on the behalf of animals?
• What favorite cause has a special need right now?

As many of you know, animal rescue is near and dear to my heart. I wrote my book, Kuruk: The Little Bear That Could, One Rescue Pup’s Journey of Healing, to raise money for animal rescue organizations. You can  order it through Create Space or Amazon or Barnes & Noble. Also: Amazon Canada, Amazon UK, Amazon India, and other international Amazon stores.

The last Blog the Change, I announced my first donation to the Washington Alaskan Malamute Adoption League (WAMAL). They are…

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Boycott Canadian Goose Jackets: They Are Using Fur From Cruelly Trapped Coyotes And Down From Foie Gras Geese

Ann Novek( Luure)--With the Sky as the Ceiling and the Heart Outdoors

Jag skäms över att jag en gång i tiden har investerat pengar i en Canada Goose jacka

Canada Goose må vara på väg bort efter att ha styrt vinterjacksmarknaden i 10 års tid. Istället har andra aktörer kommit in på marknaden, b.la Para Jumper. Jag tänkte t.om köpa en parajumper inför denna vinter men istället köpte jag en Tommy Hilfiger jacka med fakepäls och herregud vad glad jag är över det nu.

Vet man inte så är det svårt att göra något. Genom detta inlägg får ni som inte vet veta och handlar ni jackor med riktiga pälsar efter att ha läst detta så vet ni i alla fall vad ni bidrar till.

Stackars, stackars djur!! Den här industrin stödjer vi genom att köpa dessa jackor.

Dessa fåglar nedan blir alltså dunet som är inuti b.la goose jackorna. Fåglarna blir tvångsmatade genom rör och inte nog med det även plockade…

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Jim Morris, 77, Vegan Bodybuilder Interview (2:46)

“THE ARCH”: Retired but NEVER tired

FUR OUT THE CLOSET:

“We Must Fight Injustice to Animals” –– Archbishop Desmond Tutu

You might have noticed my 2014 emoticon,, which I will be using to commend those who take a stand against animal abuse.

I think it is so important that we do not lose sight of the evidence that attitudes and practices towards animals are changing for the better, albeit slowly.

This time the applause is for archbishop emeritus Desmond Tutu, fondly referred to as “The Arch” by South Africans. Tutu is known for speaking out against injustice. He is not scared  to stand up in the face of opposition and many South Africans admire him for that. In 1984 he won the Nobel Peace Prize ~ a decade before South Africa became a democratic country.                

This photograph was taken in  2006 when Tutu, wearing his favourite cap…

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