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Showing 31 to 35 of 103 blog articles.
It needs to stop: Killing Contest!

Wildlife Killing Contests

Photo by Matt Knoth

Wildlife killing contests are organized events in which participants kill animals within a certain timeframe for cash, prizes, entertainment, or other inducements. Teams compete in judging categories that often focus on the number of animals killed, the weight or the sex of animals killed, particular species killed, or smallest or largest body or body part of the animal killed. Contests frequently involve betting and end with a check-in or weigh-in of the animals, followed by a party where contest prizes are awarded. Afterwards, away from public view, the carcasses of the animals are usually dumped.

Wildlife killing contests are cruel and have no place in a civil society or in modern wildlife management. Contests usually target native carnivores, including coyotes, bobcats, mountain lions, and foxes, as well as smaller animals, such as squirrels and rabbits. These events can result in hundreds of animals being wiped off a landscape in a single weekend. Such contests are antithetical to the respectful, ethical, and pro-conservation message necessary to ensure the long-term protection of our country’s wildlife. 

AWI is working to ban these contests at state and federal levels. We led the successful effort to ban killing contests in Colorado, and have engaged in advocacy work on this issue in other states as well, including in Arizona, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New York, Oregon, Virginia, and Washington. AWI is a member of the steering committee of the National Coalition to End Wildlife Killing Contests, which works to raise awareness about the issue; support action to ban contests through legislation, regulatory reform, and litigation; and advocate for humane wildlife management. As a steering committee member, AWI develops educational materials with the goal of ending all contests across the country.

WHY KILLING CONTESTS SHOULD BE BANNED
 

1. Wildlife killing contests are cruel and contravene hunting principles

Wildlife killing contests are cruel, barbaric, and wasteful, which violates fundamental hunting principles. The very nature of these events—where participants are motivated by financial rewards to kill as many animals as allowed over a designated time period—increases the likelihood that participants will fail to abide by established hunting principles. Such principles generally promote the concept of “fair chase” and decry waste and indiscriminate killing. Contest participants frequently disregard the principle of fair chase, with participants using bait and electronic calling devices to attract animals with sounds that mimic prey or distress calls of wounded young in an attempt to maximize the chances of winning cash and prizes. The carcasses of the animals are usually wasted because they are rarely used for food or fur, and are commonly thrown away after weigh-in. Furthermore, an untold number of animals are orphaned or injured during these events. Killing adult bobcats, coyotes, foxes, and other species inevitably leaves dependent young to die from thirst, starvation, predation, or exposure.

Numerous state wildlife agencies and officials have recognized that killing contests undermine the reputation of hunters. Contests have been characterized by state officials as “slaughter fests” and “stomach-turning examples of wanton waste” that are “about personal profit [and] animal cruelty.” Investigation video footage has shown contest participants slinging dead coyotes and foxes into piles to be weighed and judged, joking about the methods used to lure and kill the animals, and laughing and posing for photos in front of a row of foxes strung up by their feet. Such behavior demonstrates a complete lack of respect for wildlife, promotes gratuitous violence, and sends the irresponsible and disturbing message that wanton killing is fun.

2. Wildlife killing contests undermine modern, science‐based wildlife management principles and are not an effective wildlife management tool

The indiscriminate killing promoted by wildlife killing contests is counterproductive to effective wildlife population management. Scientific studies have shown that many wildlife populations depleted by unnatural means simply reproduce more quickly due to the sudden drop in competition for resources and changes to social structure from the loss of individuals. This effect is well documented for coyote populations in particular, which are common targets of wildlife killing contests. State wildlife management agencies across the country have recognized that killing contests do not control coyote population size over the long term. In the short term, loss of coyotes negatively impacts the environment because the species is an integral part of healthy ecosystems.

3. Wildlife killing contests do not increase populations of game animals

The best available science indicates that indiscriminately killing native carnivores is not an effective method for increasing game species abundance. Many state wildlife commissions and agencies—including those in Illinois, Louisiana, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming—have concluded that reducing predator numbers will not enhance populations of ungulates, small game animals, and game birds. These findings demonstrate that this common rationale for holding killing contests targeting predators is scientifically unfounded.

4. Wildlife killing contests do not prevent conflicts with humans, pets, or livestock—and may increase them

Although some argue that contests are needed to reduce depredation of livestock, such contests are not effective in removing individual, problem-causing animals. Most killing contests target predators in woodlands and grasslands, where conflicts with humans, pets, and livestock are minimal. Studies have found that killing predators fragments social groups, which can increase the likelihood of livestock depredation. In a signed statement, more than 70 conservation scientists concluded that killing contests do not represent the kind of targeted effort required for effective management of livestock depredations, and that indiscriminate killing of predators is likely to exacerbate risks to livestock.

SUCCESSES TO DATE

Eight states—Arizona, California, Colorado, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Vermont, and Washington—have enacted bans on certain types of wildlife killing contests. In 2014, the California Fish and Game Commission banned contests targeting game species, furbearers, and nongame mammals. In 2018, the Vermont General Assembly banned coyote-killing contests. In 2019, the New Mexico General Legislature banned coyote killing contests, the Arizona Fish and Game Commission banned contests for predator and furbearing species, and the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife banned contests for predator and furbearer species. In 2020, the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission banned contests for furbearing species and certain small game species, and the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission banned contests for species without a bag limit. In 2021, the Maryland legislature banned contests targeting coyotes, foxes, and raccoons, with overwhelming bipartisan support. Additional states have pending legislation or have proposed rules that would limit wildlife killing contests.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

Please take action to help end wildlife killing contests. Here are some steps you can take:

  • Learn more about wildlife killing contests from the National Coalition to End Wildlife Killing Contests.
  • Use this toolkit to learn how to advocate for bans on wildlife killing contests.
  • Call, send letters, and meet with your state legislators to encourage them to ban wildlife killing contests.
  • Call, send letters, and meet with your state’s wildlife agency staff and wildlife commissioners to encourage them to ban wildlife killing contests.
  • Encourage your city or county council to pass a resolution or an ordinance against wildlife killing contests. For guidance, review these sample resolutions. 
  • Write a letter to the editor of your newspaper to raise awareness about killing contests and to encourage readers to express their opposition to the contests to their lawmakers. 
  • Educate your family, neighbors, and friends by informing them about wildlife killing contests and what they can do to help end them. Hand out this informational postcard, post on social media, and ask people to fill out this blank postcard to send to policymakers.
  • Host a screening of Project Coyote’s award-winning documentary KILLING GAMES—Wildlife in the Crosshairs and invite stakeholders to attend.
  • Help shut down contests in your state by politely urging event hosts and sponsors to stop supporting killing wildlife for fun and prizes. Sample letters can be found in this toolkit.
  • Donate your time and/or provide financial support to wildlife protection organizations working to end wildlife killing contests.
Article by

CCAH
  1 year ago
Damaliscus lunatus.


CALVING SEASON

Unlike their close antelopes, topis usually calve at the end of the dry season and have a good success rate.

FEEDING TIME 

These animals have two feeding peaks, one in the morning and one in the late afternoon, but they can be found feeding at any time.

MATING PROCESS 

Every year, males go to traditional breeding areas, and the females arrive shortly afterwards in small groups or singly. Males approach a female in either a rocking canter or in a low stretch posture, searching for a female in heat. The female shows that she is ready by raising her head and standing tall.

https://youtu.be/w0IgJlIAZtE


TOMORROW I WILL SHARE BEHAVIORS OF TOPI

GodfreyUg
  1 year ago
Sweden: 622 Bears will be killed in trophy hunting



Unmasking the myth of a civilized country. Cruelty to animals prevails in Sweden.

by Eva Stjernswärd, artist painter and hunting critic
Image: Abraham Hondius, Chasse à l’ours (1683)/Wikimedia commons


Sweden is selling out strictly protected animals like brown bears, lynxes and wolves to brutal trophy hunting. The Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) give permission to the County Administrative Boards to decide the hunting quota each year. Hunting activists in the Swedish Hunting Association and in the reindeer industry succeed every year lobbying for an increased elimination of endangered predators. Trophy hunting is an act of sanctioned animal cruelty and appeals for protection are constantly denied.
This year’s massacre of 622 bears started 21st of August.  

Sentient beings do suffer  
In 1789: the British philosopher Jeremy Bentham challenged “The question is not Can they reason, nor Can they speak – the question that must be asked is: Can they suffer?”

Barbaric hunting methods, illustrated in baroque art three hundred years ago, correspond to the way predator hunting prevail in Sweden. Today’s hunters subject their dogs as well as the bears to violence. Bears, over-sensitive to heat and stress, are hunted with aggressive hounds from dawn to dusk, during two months, in seven counties. This occurs during the critical period of vital feeding (hyperphagia) for bears to accumulate enough fat to survive the long Scandinavian hibernation of 5-7 months. The stress to find energy food is even greater for
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female bears, as they must give birth to the new generation during hibernation and feed their young with high-fat milk.  

Anti-predator rhetoric. The seven northern County Administrative Boards motivates licensed trophy hunting as a remedy to; “alleviate people’s fear of predators”, “reduce illegal hunting and increase confidence in the local management of predators”.  
As illogical as if legalized prostitution would lessen men’s violence against women.

Omen of chaos and death. Hunting inflicts extreme stress, causes PTSD, disrupts feeding, mating and hibernation. This year nearly 25 percent of the bear population of Sweden’s 2900 individuals will be slaughtered and last year more than 500.
What are the psychological, ecological, biological and demographic consequences of such extreme hunting in times of climate change, wild fires, seasonal timing shifts, habitat loss and pollution? This day and age - what does it say about Swedish moral and ethic?  

Sweden entertains a new warrior class. A country that increase animal factory farming, keep up mink farming and supports gamifying violence against wild animals in hunting, is not the model state for animal welfare that some Swedish politicians falsely asserts before the European Union. Wild animals are not protected by the Animal welfare law. Hunting regulations protect hunter’s interests, as to normalize the violence against wild animals; hunting as leisure and sport, population control and wildlife management. This agenda has created a new warrior class: extreme predator hunters with fighting dogs.  
Illegal hunting with sadistic methods is common, but Swedish hunt managers never take into consideration how legal hunting in tandem with poaching afflict animals. In practice, Swedish hunting regulations sanctions legal killing of wild animals basically every day of the year. Day and night depending on the species. Wild animals are forced to live in constant fear of human predators and hunting dogs. Hunters can even train their dogs on live animals. The Hunting Association proudly commercialize Sweden as “the most hunting liberal country” to attract additional 30 000 foreign hunters every year to plunder Nature of her peaceful inhabitants.

The unbearable lightness of killing wild animals for pleasure and sport is a murderous business in Sweden. Semi-automatic weapons and silencers, GPS device and cameras on the dogs, all for a subculture of trophy hunting warlords to develop within the traditional Swedish hunting. Privat events with celebrities test shooting on live animals, are sponsored by exclusive brands from the weapon industry. Commercialized hunting is the obscene business entertained by both private and stately landowners.

Swedish wildlife management is the human-induced Ecology of Fear. The “misogynistic” practice of hunting females and their young or killing young in front of their mothers is a common hunter practice for all sorts of wild species. It is even recommended in protective hunting of lynxes and bears, “to shoot the young before the mother”, by the County Administrative Boards. Against all ethics, the trophy hunt for lynx is shamelessly scheduled during their mating period. Also wolves, foxes, badgers and wolverines and their cubs are persecuted and killed in their dens or resting places. Technically also pregnant females can be killed as hunting seasons have been largely extended. Trapping, snaring and baiting are medieval methods used in “civilized” Sweden as well as attractants to lure animals into death traps or ambush gunning. Animal families are destroyed, their young are abandoned or orphaned, bears and all other animals often suffer painful deaths. None can defend themselves from today’s war on wildlife.

3 / 4
Collateral damage to bears, even if not killed, is openly ignored. Maiming and injuring animals during hunting is belittled and killing bear cubs or yearlings “by mistake” is common. Hunters are never punished: the hunter that injured and shot a bear in the mouth 2020, could boast of finishing off the same bear in 2021.  
Professor Birger Schantz, former veterinary surgeon and expert in studying gun wounds for twenty years, explained: “Nobody can say that a shot animal does not suffer. What we do know is that the nerve system that register pain looks the same in all mammals. A good rule (for understanding) is that what you think hurts on you, also hurts on an animal.”

A mother bear was killed when protecting her cubs from a hunting dog. The moose hunter claimed defense of the dog he had let loose, knowing it was a bears habitat. The cubs hiding up in a tree, as they are taught by their mother, likely starved to death as cubs depend on their mother for at least two years. No legal policy exist to rescue wild animals.

Hunting poison the Circle of Life. An environmental scandal, is the use of 600-700 tons of lead every year for hunting ammunition. Wounded animals and birds from gun shots continue led poisoned but die out of sight: more than sixty percent of wild geese live with led pellets in their bodies and so do many wolves, lynxes and foxes. Hunters are leaving butchery and carcasses everywhere and poisoned birds and scavengers have long been silent victims of this abuse. Birds also mistake lead pellets for grains around feeding places where animals are lured to be shot, often close to or on agricultural soil. The ecological hypocrisy of landowners selling hunt leases.  
Now lead is also found in the blood and milk of Swedish brown bears: ten times higher than the EU threshold value for damage on the human nerve system. The bear cubs are contaminated from birth in their den. This is not mentioned when issuing hunt permits, on the contrary, consumption and commercialization of bear meat and trophies is encouraged by the County Administrative Boards, that also have been caught creating illicit slaughtering sites, violating CITES-rules, to facilitate for hunters to take the trophies in situ.    

Tyranny of the hunting minority (<3% of population). The strategy of institutions that enables wildlife exploitation, the EPA and the County Administrative Boards, is to employ hunters. Hunting has corrupted Swedish wildlife management and politicians to such an extent that the purpose of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) and the EU species and habitat directive are regularly violated. Sweden blatantly abuses these stringent protection laws by adjusting its own national loopholes and unrestrainedly interpreting the limited hunting exemptions to sustain the trophy hunting industry. Interestingly, the Court of administrative law, for appeals concerning protected predators (Luleå), is geographically placed in the region that houses the highest number of hunters per inhabitant. Could this affect the jurymen?  

A Swedish disgrace. The County Administrative Boards have increased protective hunting each year since 2010. The reindeer industry wins over bears, wolves, lynxes and wolverines as they can be gunned down legally from helicopters and chased with snowmobiles, accused of disturbing reindeer husbandry. In spite of the industry being generously compensated by the state for any loss of reindeers. The hatred of predators in these regions is irreconcilable. A village recently proposed bounty money for killing them.  
In 2017 as many as 71 bears were killed in few spring months. The five tons of bear carcasses where burned and destroyed to the greedy annoyance of hunters. Animals killed in protective hunting could not be kept as trophies before. Reminding corruption, the EPA recently sneaked through a new pro-hunter instruction to please hunters in the North – now they can keep trophies and even take on “hunting guests” for the helihunting.
 
4 / 4
Rotten Santa reside in Sweden. Swedish reindeer meat products from across Lapland have EU’s Protected Designation of Origin status (PDO) and function as a marketing coup for the reindeer meat industry to reach the global food market.
Can export of gourmet food to Europe be considered “environmental friendly” if the value include the killing of protected bears, lynxes, wolves and wolverines? Are the unethical and gruesome handling and slaughter methods of the reindeers not known as are the horrors behind French luxury food foie gras?
Nothing seem to have changed in spite of the investigation and undercover journey to Sweden by British journalist Rich Hardy. In his book “Not As Nature intended”, the chapter “Last Christmas” describe the methods of handling, transporting and killing reindeer. A scary nightmare far from the nomadic sami culture that once existed. Hardy writes “…the tens of thousands of reindeer are herded (with helicopters and snowmobiles) and trucked to commercial slaughterhouses to meet a demise that is anything but traditional.”

What if our children would understand the bloody nightmare of real Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer – and for all the “Teddy-Bears” killed in this instant all over Sweden?

The intricate Web of Life has never been more fragile. The decline of wildlife worldwide and above all - the suffering caused by humans to non-human animals every second - how can nations like Sweden pretend to be civilized when nurturing a shady business like trophy hunting? How can Sweden trivialize cruel hunting for self-gratification, when this clearly exposes a sadistic side of man against the innocent. Hunting is about cruelty and killing for fun is an addiction.  

Barbarians in Sweden exposed.
“The time will come when the mere pleasure of killing will die out in man. As long as it is there, man has no claim to call himself civilized, he is a mere barbarian.” (Swedish writer Axel Munthe, 1929) Citations from journalist Eduardo Gonçalves book Trophy Hunters exposed: “It is time for a new contract with nature. Society has banned many forms of animal cruelty and blood-sports such as bear baiting and dogfighting. However trophy hunting has so far escaped. The unbridled human supremacy within the natural world must be discarded, for all our sakes”.  

There it is! The great Counter Force of Protectors, on the rise thanks to intelligent and compassionate journalists, scientists, writers, activists and hard working animal defenders together with all humans who understand that we share the fear of pain and the fear of death with all beings. 

Admin
  1 year ago
BIWFC

The Botstiber Institute for Wildlife Fertility Control's (BIWFC) 2022 Summer Newsletter is now available. In this edition you will learn about the recent 9th International Conference on Wildlife Fertility Control hosted by BIWFC in Colorado Springs, as well as other wildlife fertility control projects and issues.

The Botstiber Institute for Wildlife Fertility Control is a non-profit organization that aims to advance the use of effective, sustainable fertility control methods to mitigate human - wildlife conflicts and promote coexistence worldwide. BIWFC, established in 2016 as a partnership between the Dietrich W. Botstiber Foundation and The Humane Society of the United States, is headquartered in Media, PA with an additional office at the University of York in the United Kingdom. To learn more visit wildlifefertilitycontrol.org


BIWFC
  1 year ago
Fun from our partners - The Goat Games


“Have You Goat What It Takes?” Ask 14 Farmed Animal Sanctuaries

Competing in the 2022 Goat Games

Happening August 12-15, The Third Annual Goat Games Inspires Friendly Competition Among 14 Farmed Animal Sanctuaries Nationwide and Their Animal Champions

SAUGERTIES, N.Y. July 27, 2022 – Here we “goat” again! Catskill Animal Sanctuary (CAS), one of the world’s leading sanctuaries for farmed animals, is pleased to announce that it will host the third annual Goat Games. From August 12-15, CAS will be joined by 13 additional farmed animal sanctuaries located throughout the U.S. that will rally the support of animal lovers nationwide in support of their life-saving work. To register or make a donation, visit thegoatgames.org.

While the goats don’t actually compete, human athletes can sign up for an activity of their choosing – “whatever floats your goat!” – to raise awareness and funds for the sanctuary team of their choice. Participants can join this nationwide, virtual event from anywhere in the U.S.

“Covid did a number on us, as it did on nonprofits around the world,” said Kathy Stevens, Founder of Catskill Animal Sanctuary. “Funding plummeted, while the urgent needs of hundreds of animals remained the same. So in 2020, we created The Goat Games as a way for animal lovers to support the work of farm sanctuaries and the thousands of animals who call these special places home. We’re thrilled to host The Goat Games again to raise funds for farmed animals everywhere— and that need is more urgent than it’s ever been.”

Stevens explained that not only are sanctuaries “just digging out, in year three” of the pandemic, but they’re doing it at a time when the cost of everyday supplies is through the roof. “Grain cost is up. Hay cost is up. Medical supply costs are up. The cost of building materials is so high that a contractor suggested we not build anything.”

The Goat Games is a virtual event that challenges human participants to run, walk, bike, hike, or complete any activity of their choosing to raise money for a participating sanctuary. Each sanctuary has selected a farm animal as their team captain, and “athletes” will rally behind the farmed animal representing the sanctuary they want to support.

“We want to inspire animal lovers around the country to participate,” said Stevens. “Do whatever it is that you love – whether it’s running, reading, volunteering or binge-watching Netflix! Once folks pick their activity, they simply invite friends and family to support them as they raise funds for their favorite sanctuary.”

In its first year, Catskill Animal Sanctuary raised over $42,000. In 2021, CAS expanded The Games, inviting nine other farmed animal sanctuaries across the country to join, as a way to build camaraderie and increase national awareness of their life-saving work. The consortium raised over $217,000 to help rescued farmed animals. This year, they hope to increase that figure to $260,000.


The participating sanctuaries in the 2022 Goat Games include:

· Catskill Animal Sanctuary - the hosting Sanctuary (Saugerties, NY)

· Alaqua Animal Refuge (Freeport, FL)

· Farm Sanctuary (Watkins Glen, NY & Acton, CA)

· Farmaste Animal Sanctuary (Lindstrom, MN)

· Heartwood Haven (Wauna, WA)

· Indraloka Animal Sanctuary (Mehoopany, PA)

· Iowa Farm Sanctuary (Oxford, IA)

· Kindred Spirits Sanctuary (Citra, FL)

· Little Bear Sanctuary (Punta Gorda, FL)

· Piedmont Farm Animal Refuge (Pittsboro, NC)

· River’s Wish Animal Sanctuary (Spokane, WA),

· Safe Haven Rabbit Rescue (Clinton, NJ)

· Wildwood Farm Sanctuary (Newberg, OR)

· Yesahcan Sanctuary, Inc. (Arcadia, FL

Funds raised through donations and sponsorships will support the life-saving mission of each participating sanctuary. For more information on The Goat Games 2022 including registering and/or making a donation, visit thegoatgames.org.

About Catskill Animal Sanctuary

Founded in 2001, Catskill Animal Sanctuary is a non-profit, 150-acre refuge in New York's Hudson Valley. It is home to eleven species of rescued farmed animals with between 275 and 400 residents at any given time. In addition to direct animal aid, the Sanctuary offers on-site tours, a weekly podcast, an award-winning vegan cooking program, and educational programs that advocate veganism as the very best way to end animal suffering, improve human health, and heal an ailing planet.

Catskill Animal Sanctuary is the only U.S. farmed animal sanctuary with highest honors and accreditations from:

Charity Navigator (4 Stars), GuideStar (Platinum Rating), Better Business Bureau, and GFAS: Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries

For more information, call (845) 336-8447 or go to www.casanctuary.org.

-End-

Media Contact Information:

Lauren Witt, Account Supervisor

(817) 721-5576

catskillanimalsanctuary@Interdependence.com

Admin
  1 year ago

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