Thursday, 25 November 2021

Private zoo owners should experience jail for three years to find out what it's like to be in cages

NEWS AND COMMENT: Private zoo owners are ignorant. They are uneducated and they are stupid at least in respect of one topic: animal welfare. They don't know what it's like to be banged up in a cage. They think it's all right. They think that if a tiger is born in a cage it accepts the cage (wrong, the need for much space is in their DNA). Another indicator of ignorance. They should go to jail for a couple years or more and feel what it's like. This is exactly what has happened to the notorious Joe Exotic. 

Joe Exotic in prison
Joe Exotic in prison. Image in public domain.

He's been in jail for almost 3 years. I guess you know why. He was the star of the Netflix documentary which went viral. I guess the world and their dog know about Joe Exotic - real name: Joseph Maldonado-Passage. He is revelling in his celebrity status. Netflix should be ashamed of providing him with the platform to gain celebrity status.


In the follow-up series by Netflix he apparently expressed some sympathy towards the big cats that he kept locked up in his infamous zoo. At one time it was America's largest private zoo. He saw nothing wrong with it at all. He saw nothing wrong in exploiting big cat cubs for photo sessions after tearing them away from their mothers. He saw nothing wrong in killing adult tigers who became redundant for the purposes that he required them i.e. to make money.

RELATED: Joe Exotic gives his zoo to Carole Baskin

At the end of the first episode, I am told that Joe Exotic expressed some regret for what he's done. Being in prison has given him a different perspective on his treatment of the animals at his former zoo over the many years he kept it running. He admits that he now finally understands why it is wrong to keep big cats locked in cages because he knows what it feels like. In his words:

"After being lumped up her three years, I know now how my animals felt. I'm ashamed of myself. I hope I'll get a second chance just like my tigers."

And hearing that annoys me and many others. It's taken him all these years to realise that he has caused distress and pain in these magnificent creatures. And he did it all for financial gain and celebrity. Frankly it sucks and this is the exact sentiment of many other people as indicated by their tweets on Twitter.

RELATED: Joe Exotic was terrified of big cats and wickedly cruel says film producer

And yeah, in an act of added irony, one of his old mates in the private zoo business, Jeff Lowe, expresses sympathy towards Joe Exotic for his uncomfortable experience of being in prison. He said that it is a long time to be locked up in prison (2.5 years) but he was perfectly happy to lock up animals in his zoo for many, many years and of course the same applies to Joe exotic. I'm afraid that this is another example of ignorance. It is an example of an unenlightened and abusive approach to animals.

Wednesday, 24 November 2021

Prince William criticises rapid human birth rate in Africa but why did he have three kids?

Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, is a known wildlife conservationist which is good. He has once again highlighted the increasingly negative impact of human population growth on wildlife conservation. He is focusing on Africa where there is the world's most diverse and beautiful wildlife including many iconic large species and where the human population is on course to double by 2050 to 2.5 billion. That kind of human population growth inevitably leads to a heavy increase in agriculture and commercial enterprises and activities which squeezes out wildlife, essentially due to the destruction of their habitat.

Human birth rate is high in African putting pressure on wildlife
Human birth rate is high in African putting pressure on wildlife. Photo: Pixabay.

William criticised Africa's human population growth in 2017. At that time he condemned the "staggering increase of 3.5 million people per month" in Africa.

A royal-watcher and apparently a critic, Phil Dampier, an author of books on the royal family, tweeted at the time: "If Prince William thinks there are too many people in the world shouldn't he and Kate have stuck to 2 children?"

The problem is this: it isn't only about the human population of Africa increasing as fast as it is which is causing massive problems for the conservation of wildlife on the continent, is also the population growth of developed countries such as the UK. It is the people of developed countries with high consumption of products and foods which drives habitat destruction as forests are cleared for crops to feed UK and European livestock.

The UK is one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world. Britain needs to place a curb on population growth as well. I think that you'll find, by the way, that certain ethnic minority cultures have much larger families than other cultures and the islands of Great Britain.

And doesn't India need to be introspective and ask if it is time to consider human population growth? The Bengal tiger has for years been squeezed out of India.

RELATED: Human population growth effects on animals.

Prince William is repeating the thoughts of Sir David Attenborough who has had in the past stated that humankind is a kind of disease on the planet. What he meant was that humankind is destroying the planet and as the population of humans grows there is more destruction and it is more difficult to control that destruction. Humankind is operating like a bacterial infection inside a person.

Cop26 is an example of how hard it is to unify the world in one objective even when that objective is saving the planet; saving humankind's home.

Hawaiian government procrastinates about how to deal with their 'cat problem'

US News today reports on a male Hawaiian monk seal dying after a five-week battle with toxoplasmosis. It has prompted another discussion about how Hawaii should deal with both domestic and feral cats. The argument is that the toxoplasma oocysts which are shed in both feral and domestic cat faeces (once) somehow make their way to the sea where monk seals ingest the oocysts and become infected with toxoplasmosis.

Comparison of size of Hawaii 4 main islands with UK
Comparison of size of Hawaii 4 main islands with UK. Image: MikeB from mylifeelsewhere.com.

They tried to save this seal but, as mentioned, it died. The seal, known as RW22, was treated at the Marine Mammal Center. They called on cat owners to keep their pets indoors and to dispose of faeces in cat litter in the trash. It's another instance of where putting cat litter down the toilet is a bad idea. It has to going to landfill. However, I guess oocysts can still make it to the sea from landfill under certain circumstances.

But the point of this article is that in 2016, five years ago, there was a report of eight monk seals dying for the same reason. The symptoms in the infected seals vary but they included lesions in the brain, adrenal glands, diaphragm, lymph nodes and spleen. In the case of RW22, the seal showed signs of partial facial nerve paralysis and a corneal ulcer which they believed were symptoms of toxoplasmosis.

So there is an ongoing problem if the experts are right in Hawaii of feral and domestic cat faeces making their way to the ocean around the four main islands. And little or nothing has been done about it, it seems to me, over the intervening five years and I presume longer.

They are constantly moaning about a feral cat problem on Hawaii with the cats attacking precious Hawaiian birds. There's been report about that as well. They appear to be scratching their heads about how to deal with the problem.

I think the real problem is a lack of leadership in the Hawaiian government. This is combined with a lack of commitment in dealing with this problem.

One website louisegund.com tells me that there are TNR programs on Hawaii run by volunteers which is very normal but that the government opposes them. They don't think it works. That too is quite normal. Some people support TNR and others disagree with it. It is too slow for some and returning the cats to where they came from doesn't make sense to some people.

However, the 4 Hawaiian main islands are about 1/15 the size of the UK. The point is that it is not a huge geographic area and it makes me believe that the government could successfully operate widespread TNR on the three smaller islands to start off with. 

They could support the volunteers and formalise TNR programs to make them more widespread and therefore more effective. Currently it is the only way to deal with feral cats humanely. You have to deal with the cats humanely because people put them there. And killing them is ineffective due to the vacuum effect. 

RELATED: Kerala, India: High Court orders registration of companion animals

In parallel with that there should be more determined approach to managing domestic cat ownership and raising standards. You'll find quite a lot of discussion in other parts of the world on obligatory micro-chipping, spaying and neutering and on occasions curfews either during the night to keep the cats inside or even mandating keeping cats within the bounds of the owner's property full-time. 

I'm not saying that that is the way to go but with a manageable human population size it may be feasible to operate obligatory registration of domestic cats and from there to make micro-chipping and spaying and neutering obligatory as well. The hard part is effective enforcement of mandatory pet registration laws.

This would improve domestic cat ownership, reduce the number of unwanted cats, reduce the number of feral cats in parallel with TNR which will gradually over a period of say 20 years reduce the population of feral cats. It's a long-term project. There is no other way. But if they'd started this 20 years ago they would have made some progress by now.

Tuesday, 23 November 2021

America's police officers can't shoot pets in the absence of an 'objectively legitimate and imminent threat'

NEWS AND COMMENT: This is a brilliant case from America. I love it. God bless the courts of America is what I say. A Federal Court of Appeal in America has ruled that a police officer who unreasonably shoots a dog can be held liable in the civil courts for violating the constitutional rights of the dog's family. That also must apply to any companion animal including cats which is why I am writing about it on this website.

A Federal Court of Appeal just ruled that a police officer who unreasonably shoots a dog can be held civilly liable for...

Posted by Nathan Winograd on Thursday, November 18, 2021

Yes, police officers have shot or bludgeoned to death innocent cats in the past in America. I have written about these stories. But obviously dogs can potentially pose more of a threat to police officers than cats. In this instance, the story is frankly horrendous and it demonstrates how badly behaved police officers can be. It doesn't have to be in America. It can be in Great Britain or any other country but this story is about America, specifically Minnesota. I believe that there is an attitude problem by police officers in their relationship with animals. It is probably because often they are right-wing and white. And also they probably like guns and hunting.

The police arrive and they cause problems when there were none.
The police arrive and they cause problems when there were none.

The police officer shot two dogs in the backyard of the family who owned the dogs. They sued, I'm told by Nathan Winograd. I presume that they sued the police department and/or the police officer individually. I also presume that they sued for negligence or some other tort seeking compensation i.e. damages. This was not a criminal matter although to be frank, I would say that this police officer's behaviour was criminal. However, it would have been too hard to prove that.

After the dogs' family sued the officer he asked a lower court to dismiss the case. He said that he had immunity from prosecution because he acted reasonably when shooting the dogs in self defence.

The lower court refused to dismiss the case. They ruled that the question that should be asked at the time was whether the dogs posed an imminent danger to the officer. A jury would decide that based upon bodycam footage.

As it happens, both dogs were wagging their tails at the time. They were non-threatening with one dog turned to the side.

The officer appealed the lower court's decision but the Court of Appeal backed up the lower court's decision. They ruled that "an officer cannot shoot a dog in the absence of an objectively legitimate and imminent threat to him or others."

The officer concerned went to the house because an alarm had been set off by kids, accidentally. The alarm was turned off. The alarm company was informed that it was a mistake. Two officers arrived anyway. The family told one officer that it was a mistake that the alarm went off. That officer did not relay the information to a second officer. That second officer jumped over the fence into the backyard and shot the dogs. The dog survived but required extensive medical attention.

To compound matters the family's 15-year-old son arrived following the shooting and demanded to see the officer. The officers refused. The son became agitated and emotionally distraught. The officers threatened to arrest him. Comment: this is so typical of police officers who make problems for themselves. They create situations where law-abiding citizens are frustrated and angered to the point where the officer feels that they have grounds to arrest. But they create the problem.

I can't tell you how horrible this is I was in previous veterinary technician in the City of Lawrence Massachusetts on at least five occasions pit bulls had been shot for exactly what this officer tried to say self-defence and all of them we're not aggressive! I am knowledgeable and test dogs for these issues and none of those dogs were labelled aggressive. It happens more than people know...--Jeanelle Gramo.
The lawsuit stated that Minneapolis Police Department's officers very rarely receive dog-related training despite the fact that there are practices and strategies in place for police officers when encountering dogs. This alludes to negligence on the behalf of the police department.

The point of this story is that the federal courts in America have decided that it is time to stop police officers killing pets without due cause. They can't wriggle out of it claiming self-defence when clearly it is not an issue of self-defence. I would like to see more families suing more police officers under similar circumstances.

Monday, 22 November 2021

21 points about the alleged scam to get people to donate to treat a sick rescue cat

This is a compressed summary in bullet fashion of an alleged scam concerning a community cat who needed expensive med treatment to be paid for via online donations. Scroll down for the bones of the story.

Gogi - alleged but not true
Gogi - alleged but not true. Pic: FB

Alleged fake vet bill
Alleged fake vet bill. Pic: FB.

  1. This is a story about an alleged scam by a 20-year-old woman who gave the impression she lived in Singapore;
  2. She called herself Nora Nur;
  3. She said that she had rescued a community cat from Punggol, Singapore. She claimed the cat had been abandoned;
  4. She had called the cat Gogi;
  5. On the Facebook group Sayang Our Singapore's Community Cats she asked for donations, small amounts like $5.10 dollars;
  6. She uploaded pictures of the cat and a veterinarian's bill from a real veterinary surgery: Frankel Veterinary Centre;
  7. She said the cat needed expensive treatment: 6,000 Singapore dollars for feline infectious peritonitis treatment and 800 Singapore dollars for a hysterectomy;
  8. It is quite common for cat rescuers to seek donations on Facebook for veterinary treatment;
  9. Allegedly, she was using this fact to get donations from people who are sympathetic towards rescue cat;
  10. A member of the above Facebook group, Lee Siew Yian, did some research and decided that her appeal for donations was a scam;
  11. They decided that the vet bill was a fake and the photographs of the cat were also faked. The pictures of the cat were taken from other pages on social media and there was no such cat called Gogi in need of expensive veterinary surgery and treatment;
  12. The veterinary clinic concerned confirmed that they did not issued the aforesaid bill and neither had they treated a cat with that name;
  13. This got back to the police and they investigated;
  14. Police officers from Bedok Police Division establish the identity of the 20-year-old woman and arrested her;
  15. 60 people had donated to her alleged fake cause;
  16. A 25 year-old man is assisting police investigations;
  17. Nora Nur changed her story said that the cat and her diseases were real but that the cat lived in Vietnam and not Singapore. She had tried to raise money in Vietnam without success. She therefore had sought funding through the Internet on a Singapore community cat Facebook webpage instead of in Vietnam;
  18. Nur has been criticised by people for using animals as part of a scam to get money off people;
  19. Nur apologised for what she's done and said that she will give the money back to the people who donated. She insisted that the fundraising operation had indeed occurred in Vietnam and that she had never tried to scam money. She sincerely apologised.
  20. Nur and her mother decided to sponsor all of Gogi's medical bills. I take this to mean that between them they will pay the bills;
  21. Can anybody trust her bearing in mind what she has done? Is she now telling the truth?

Hi everyone, after talking & talking, I have made a decision. All donors that transferred money to Davis Account...

Posted by Nora Nur on Tuesday, November 16, 2021

NEVER Turn Your Back on Big Cats!

NEVER Turn Your Back on Big Cats! That's what the experts say. It's to avoid provoking the prey chasing response inherent in feline predators. The advice when confronting a mountain lion is to face the cat and make noise and make yourself bigger. If you turn away and run the puma will run after you as if you are prey.

But the video is weak in my opinion. Firstly I don't like to see captive big cats in small pens whiling away the days bored to death. And secondly I am not sure that these big cats are trying to attack the video maker who has a successful YouTube channel. It looks to me that some of them are just interested in his presence and so they charge up to investigate. Anything will get them interested as the days roll by with almost nothing happening. Perhaps I am being too critical.


Note
: This is a video from another website. Sometimes they are deleted at source which stops them working on this site. If that has happened, I apologise but I have no control over it.

Iceland split on banning free-roaming domestic cats

Icelanders are discussing whether to keep domestic cats indoors full-time. The town council of Akureyri, the "Capital of North Iceland" has decided to ban outdoor cats from January 1 2025. It was a majority decision in favour. They are going to stop the free movement of domestic cats in this town and they've given residents a long lead-in to get used to the idea.

Akureyri
Akureyri. Photo: in public domain.

However, a poll suggested that Icelanders in general do not support banning the free movement of domestic cats. But there are distinct regional differences. In Hafnarfjörður, 60% of the residents were either very or rather supportive of outdoor cats, for example. Almost the opposite view was taken in East Iceland where 55% of the residents were very or rather opposed to allowing cats to go outside.

RELATED: Icelandic government proposes changes to the law regarding feral cats

The Veterinary Society of Iceland is opposed to a ban on outdoor cats. They also say that the proposed law concerning Akureyri is badly formulated. They argue that keeping cats indoors all the time can have a negative impact upon the health of the animals.

They say that if they are used to free movement, keeping them indoors may cause behavioural problems due to stress and even disease. Bára Eyfjörð Heimisdóttir, the director of RUV (Icelandic veterinary association) is no doubt referring to stress causing cystitis. This is correct but it is a balancing act between various competing objectives.

Note: Below is an embedded FB post. Sometimes they are deleted at source which stops them working on this site. If that has happened, I apologise but I have no control over it.

RELATED: Police kill tourist’s cat brought into Iceland illegally

The ban is to protect wildlife. The veterinarians think that there is a better way to do this by, for example, putting brightly coloured collars on cats and limiting their outdoor activity during the nesting season. They also believe that the better option is to focus more on feral cats and reduce their population and encourage people to get their cats micro-chipped. In other words they are going for a more nuanced approach to protecting wildlife.

It 2016, I wrote an article about the difficulties of obligatory sterilisation, micro-chipping and registration of domestic cats. This was an article about Western Australia amending their Cat Act 2011. The amendment required that all domestic cats were registered, micro-chipped and sterilised at six months of age from November 2013. There were difficulties in obtaining compliance.

The biggest barrier to banning outdoor cats is having a handle on it. You need to know how many cats there are and where they live in order to enforce the law. To achieve that you need to register cats. What if people don't want to register their cats?  You don't know where they are so it is hard to enforce.

You may struggle to make a law which bans outdoor cats effective. That's the argument against a universal ban on outdoor cats and the alternative argument is that you can protect wildlife in a more effective way with a more nuanced approach as suggested by the veterinarians of Iceland.

Source: three articles on the Reykjavik Grapevine website.

Featured Post

i hate cats

i hate cats, no i hate f**k**g cats is what some people say when they dislike cats. But they nearly always don't explain why. It appe...

Popular posts