India is the fourth country to ban keeping cetaceans in captivity, behind Costa Rica, Hungary and Chile. Dolphins and other cetaceans have long been kept as a source of entertainment and guaranteed income in zoos and theme parks alike. But knowing what we know now about cetacean intelligence, is that really the right thing to do?
I’ll say it. I have now decided to give myself the title ‘former zookeeper’ because the more I examine zoo’s and the way they operate the less I am satisfied. Most zoos put their animals first, most zoos put most of their animals first, but really, I’ve learned that its a department to department kind of thing. I’ve seen departments who really value and I’ve seen places that are more likely to put the people’s experience before their animals welfare.
Happy 4th of July! What? It’s the 9th you say? Shh… I’ve been on vacation!
The birthday of America, a day to drink and shoot off fireworks and not really think about what the 4th of July is actually celebrating. It was the day that the Declaration of Independence was signed in, which gave us freedom from the Britts across the pond. But I’m not really here to talk about history, well, not U.S. history, but I thought that I would give you guys a little information about the interaction between the U.S. and the bald eagle.
Death toll:
The largest mass death of bombus ever recorded. 50,000 were found dead, lying in a parking lot, and the world is asking why? What are bombus? Why should we care?
The binturong, the malaysian bearcat, what ever you call it, it’s still one of my favorite animals. I vaguely remember hearing about the strange animals on some television show when I was young, but I never really knew anything about them until I began my internship at the Palm Beach Zoo. Behind the scenes of the Wild Things show lived the retired Scooter, a very old, very sweet binturong.
In April a greater one-horned rhino called ‘Rhino 17’ was shot and killed for her horn. These stories are all to common across India and Africa as rhino poaching is on the rise across the globe as the demand for ground horn soars. This rhino was a little different, however, because she had a new born calf by her side as she was killed. Now although this little rhino’s story is not a happy one, it may not have to end in tragedy.
I am sure you have heard me preach about the evils of palm oil, again and again, but if you’ve actually tried to shop for products without palm oil you’ve probably found that you’re going without a lot of your normal snacks. It sucks! Goodness, I’ve missed popcorn, but now theres a way to find who is using sustainable palm oil!
Cannibal snails, hairy snails and even neon slugs all make Mount Kaputar in Australia their home. This unique and fragile mountain habitat has saved these odd gastropods from extinction. Once upon a time New South Wales was covered by rain forests comparable to Papua New Guinea, but today climate shift even just two degrees could destroy the entire habitat.
Chimpanzees share 98% of our DNA, they have complex relationships, raise their young, wage wars, have friendships, alliances and enemies. They have extensive tool use and even have intricate means of communication. As far as I knew, they were endangered species. I mean, this is what IUCN’s website and even WWF will tell you. But today I learned that that was only applicable to free-living chimpanzees. This means that chimpanzees in captivity are listed as threatened. Maybe this doesn’t seem so bad, until you realize that that is the loophole that allows them to be test subjects and live in labs, in often, sub-par conditions.
The Marine Mammal Protection Act was enacted in 1972 to protect any and all marine mammals from U.S. citizens who might want to take them or import them. The Georgia Aquarium, SeaWorld and Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium are working to try to import the 18 Russian beluga whales that they captured between the years of 2005 to 2011.
Endangered Living 