Month: April 2004

Georgia House Approves Ballot Question for Hunting/Fishing Amendment

In January, the Georgia House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure that would provide a constitutional guarantee of the right to fish and hunt in that state.

By a vote of 154-14, the House approved asking voters in November whether the foll0owing should be added to the Georgia constitution,

Paragraph XXVIII. Fishing and hunting. The tradition of fishing and hunting and the taking of fish and wildlife shall be preserved for the people and shall be managed by law and regulation for the public good.

The proposed ballot measure is now making its way through the Georgia Senate. If it is passed by a supermajority there, then it could go to voters as early as November 2004 where a simple majority vote would result in its adoption.

The full text of the proposed ballot question can be read here.

Source:

Hunting/fishing ‘right’ must be written. Ledger-Enquirer (Georgia), February 8, 2004.

MP Denounces Harassment of Owners of Guinea Pig Farm

MP Michael Fabricant spoke in the House of Commons in early February to denounce extremists animal rights activists who have been harassing the owners of David Hall & Partners, which breeds guinea pigs for medical research.

Although not as well known as the harassment against Huntingdon Life Sciences, groups such as Save the Newchurch Guinea Pigs and individual activists have emulated the strategy of groups and individuals trying to bring down HLS.

Fabricant described such tactics in his speech,

One of my constituents runs a guinea pig farm for medical research which is controlled by the Home Office to protect the animals and to ensure the guinea pigs are bred and kept humanely.

He has written to me saying: ‘Before New Year’s Eve, the activists smashed all the downstairs windows of my 86-year-old father’s home whilst he was in the house, and then threw red paint bombs through the smashed windows. He was petrified. Between Christmas and New Year they were also at my niece’s house . . . and they turned off all her water and then concreted the stop cock so she could not get it back on.’

The fascinating thing — and what is exactly the problem in the UK — was the response from Cabinet Minster Hain who is the Leader of the Commons,

Many of us have a lot of sympathy with animal rights movements and support them. We want proper protection for animals and an end to cruelty, but to take things to such an extent and to terrorize scientists, doctors and others involved is wholly unacceptable.

So the irrational nonsense spouted by the animal rights movement is a good thing, it’s just some of the tactics they use that are a problem for Hain. Gee, I can’t imagine why the animal rights movement is so emboldened in the UK.

Source:

MP’s fury at animal rights attack. Jonathan Walker, Birmingham Post, February 3, 2004.

Tufts vs. NEAVS and Boston Herald on Dog Experiments

Earlier this year, I noted the controversy created by animal rights activists and groups over canine bone research at Tufts University that involved killing five dogs in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the surgical procedure being tested.

Tuft’s Dr. Robert Bridges was unhappy at a story on the controversy that appeared on January 3rd in the Boston Herald and fired off the following letter that the Herald published on January 22,

The Herald’s portrait of Tufts Veterinary School’s canine research project was unbalanced and unjustified, causing undeserved harm to an institution with a history of caring animals (“Dogs now gone: Tufts destroys five research canines,” Jan. 3).

The four non-veterinary students who first went to the press did so with the urging of a local anti-vivisection chapter and did not represent the veterinary students. Inspections following the lodged complaint of cruelty were determined to be without merit by multiple regulatory agencies, including the US Department of Agriculture, the Animal Rescue League of Boston, and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. Moreover, the experimental protocol had received critical and careful review by Tuft’s internal animal care committee prior to being approved.

The Herald did not engage in responsible journalism. The result: damage to a compassionate institution.

Frankly, it’s difficult to know what Bridges was so upset about, as the article appeared fairly balanced to this reader. It didn’t mention all of the above, but it quoted Tufts officials on the need for such research as well as outlined some of the layers of oversight that oversee animal research in at institutions such as Tufts.

New England Anti Vivisection Society president Theodora Capaldo wrote a letter in response saying, in part,

We must be precise: it is what Tufts allowed to be done to those dogs that did “damage to a compassionate institution” not the students, not NEAVS and not the Herald. Once Tufts accepts responsibility with policy that prevents this kind of experiment from ever happening again, its esteem will be restored.

Well, to keep with Capaldo’s desire to be precise, she and NEAVS claimed that the research at Tufts was unreasonable and unjustifiable and that Tufts’ Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee was derelict in approving the experimental protocol. But as Bridges noted in his letter, that was nonsense and several external organizations that examined the protocol agreed with the IACUC that the experimental protocol was appropriate.

Sources:

Letter to the editor. Theodora Capaldo, New England Anti Vivisection Society, February 2004.

Rap on Tufts Unfair. Robert Bridges, Boston Herald, January 22, 2004.

Dogs gone now; Tufts destroy five research canines. Elisabeth J. Beardsley, The Boston Herald, January 3, 2004.

PETA Protests at Civil Rights Speech

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals protested outside a speech given by Columbia University president Lee Bollinger to honor the 50th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka that found segregation in schools unconstitutional.

PETA activists have been protesting Bollinger’s public appearance since October in an effort to get Columbia to drop primate research at the university. PETA’s Alka Chandna connected animal rights with civil rights, telling The Memphis Flyer (emphasis added),

There are terrible things happening to the primates at Columbia. In one experiment, a researcher cuts out the left eyes of baboons and then induces a stroke by inserting a clamp into the eye socket, closing three critical arteries . . . We understand from a veterinarian who was working at Columbia that the animals were not given sufficient pain relief during or after the experiments.

Lee Bollinger has an excellent track record as far as civil rights are concerned, but we’d like him to also see that primates are complex and intelligent being with a social structure similar to our own. They shouldn’t be deprived of basic rights either. That a person of his caliber cannot understand that is shocking to us.

Perhaps if Chandna and other PETA activists were of the same caliber as Bollinger, they might understand.

Source:

Fighting for their rights. Bianca Phillips, Memphis Flyer, February 12, 2004.

Hawaii HB 2495 HD1 – Animal control from aircraft

Report Title:

Animal control from aircraft

Description:

Allows federal agencies to conduct animal control activities from aircraft or conservation programs on state, county, or private land. Requires DLNR to promulgate guidelines to minimize the targeted animals’ suffering. (HB2495 HD1)

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

H.B. NO.

2495

TWENTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2004

H.D. 1

STATE OF HAWAII

  

 

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

RELATING TO ANIMAL CONTROL FROM AIRCRAFT.

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

SECTION 1. Section 263-10, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended to read as follows:

Ӥ263-10 Hunting from aircraft; penalty. (a) Any aeronaut or passenger who, while in flight in, across, or above the State, intentionally kills or attempts to kill any birds or animals shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and punished by a fine of not [more] less than [$1,000,] $500, or by imprisonment for not more than one year, or both.

(b) Subsection (a) shall not apply to any authorized employee or agent of any federal agency that obtains the approval of the department of land and natural resources and the applicable landowner to conduct animal control activities from aircraft for the sole purpose of conducting conservation programs on state, county, or private land. The department of land and natural resources shall promulgate guidelines to minimize needless suffering and ensure that animals are killed quickly.“

SECTION 2. Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken. New statutory material is underscored.

SECTION 3. This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

High Costs Sink Effort to Relocate Hedgehogs

I’ve written before about the controversy over plans to eradicate hedgehogs from the island of North Uist.

The Scottish Natural Heritage, which is responsible for the island, wants to trap and kill the animals. Animal rights activists decried that decision, saying the hedgehogs could be relocated. But a group given the chance to prove the efficacy of doing precisely that abandoned its plans in February after the costs became too much.

Scottish Natural Heritage agreed to allow People’s Trust for Endangered Species to try a pilot relocation project with 60 hedgehogs. But PTES abandoned that project when costs for doing so ballooned to 2,700 pounds per animal.

PTES complained that Scottish Natural Heritage put up unreasonable requirements that caused the costs to increase. Specifically, SNH wanted PTES to study the effects that relocating the hedgehogs had on wildlife in the areas where they were relocated to. In a letter to SNH, PTES chief Valerie Keeble wrote,

SNH’s insistence on studying any possible effects of the translocated hedgehogs on animals resident in release areas has quadrupled the budget to £ 160,000. A sum of this size is quite impossible for a charity to find or raise in such a short period of time.

Given that it was at your insistence that the translocation plans had to be so greatly expanded, we do not think it unreasonable to have expected SNH to at least contribute towards the cost. SNH’s intransigence in refusing to provide some financial backing is particularly disappointing as, in spite of the difficulties, we had secured at least half the monies required, a considerable achievement in such a short period.

The remaining sum we needed to be able to implement the revised plan is small in comparison with the large sums allocated for the annual removal of the hedgehogs from the islands.

SNH spokesman George Anderson told the The Herald (Glasgow) that the organization had serious concerns about the effects that hedgehogs would have on the mainland,

SNH believes there are significant animal welfare problems associated with moving hedgehogs to the mainland, both for the Uist animals and mainland hedgehogs. We have, however, always remained open to being proved wrong on this.

The offer of 60 animals for a trial translocation was made in this spirit. We are disappointed there is to be no trial, but the SNH board was adamant it would not fund the exercise. We will now be continuing with our plans to cull hedgehogs on North Uist and Benbecula this coming spring.

The Herald notes that PTES has annual income of about 1 million pounds a year.

Sources:

£ 160,000 spikes hedgehog rescue;Charity abandons project. David Ross, The Herald (Glasgow), February 3, 2004.

Hedgehog Relocation Plans Shelved. Andrew Black, Scottish Press Association, February 3, 2004.