Save our wildlife: save the date!

“New Jersey has only 17 days a year when some animals are not hunted.”  As an animal-advocating state resident, I was shocked by that statement -- and the accompanying information:

On the 348 other days [of the year], deer, bears, turkeys, geese, opossums, coots, coyotes, groundhogs, squirrels, ducks, rabbits and numerous other species are all in the crosshairs of hunters.

That list of target animals was followed by “partial kill lists,” which are probably under-estimates since not all killings are reported.  Please, force yourself to look at all those horrifying specifics and try to picture the animals who lost their lives.  

Our state’s wildlife is and has long been in grave danger because of the attitudes and practices of the NJ Division of Fish and Wildlife (NJDFW), considered by many to be a “rogue state agency” -- one far more intent on “sport” hunting than on management or conservation.  Its antiquated outlook has made killing its default action in conflicts with wildlife (as the kill list totals readily demonstrate).

This inhumane and ineffectual practice must stop!  

That’s why the Animal Protection League of NJ (APLNJ) is sponsoring a “Wildlife Protest” on Saturday, Feb. 24, calling for nonlethal 21^st century means of dealing with wildlife conflicts that could put an end to hundreds of thousands of animal deaths each year.  

Please use this link to see the entire call-to-action message about the Wildlife Protest: ttps://conta.cc/3Ik8Xjv

                                                                   Jersey is blooming!

No, that’s not Garden State news.  It’s about my rescue cat, Jersey, with me for more than a year.  A lovable multi-colored and toothless tabby, he has definitely made his presence felt.  But for much of his time here, he was (probably necessarily) subordinate to Billy, my dear aging tuxedo.  

Now that sweet Billy is gone, Jersey’s a changed creature: more affectionate, outgoing, playful, and fun.  As the new “king of the hill,” he’s more assertive toward me and even his vet (!).  It’s been an interesting transition to watch.

I’ve read about this pattern so often it’s become an animal-behavior cliché:  A new, young or abused pet is suddenly accepted, adopted or newly treated lovingly.  In turn, that animal’s personality undergoes a positive, dramatic change -- sometimes described as “blooming.”

Familiar to you?  It’s familiar to me now, too!   

 Adult cat seeks home

Meet Bronx, an all-black 4-year old with no tail, now in the care of the EASEL Animal Rescue League shelter, in Ewing.  Reported to be both gentle and playful, Bronx is seriously searching for -- and deserving! -- a loving home.  

(Specs on visiting and adopting cats are available at EASELNJ.org.)                                

 

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Chilly pets, killer kitty, flying free & adoptable adult cats

Other people who watch the weather have already commented on the weird, unpredictable weather we’ve had, including days this month and last that wanted to be spring-like.  Even though they didn’t take hold, those days allowed for at least one “robin convention,” as I describe them, in my neighborhood, and an unusual number of squirrels, including what looked like squirrel babies in training.  

Then there are the decidedly wintery days (including a now-novel snowstorm), when there are myriad ways to assure our pets’ comfort, indoors and out.  The first thing that comes to mind is straw – never hay! -- as the best ingredient for outdoor pet and community/feral cat shelters, with doorways covered with waterproof burlap or heavy plastic.

Pets who are walked outdoors would appreciate warm sweaters or coats and paw-protecting booties -- or at least thorough towel-wiping back inside.  Not only can snow and ice cause discomfort, but thickly sprinkled ice-melting “salt” can be even worse.  All house pets need warm, comfy beds away from in-house drafts (as well as home temps set high enough for all inhabitants). 

Overall, keeping warm takes extra energy, so give pets more food in winter.  Warm car engines appeal to cold cats and small wildlife, so bang on your car hood to scare them away before you start driving.

For still more advice, google “keeping pets warm in winter,” ready to take notes.  And take a look at these 7 tips: http://tinyurl.com/2547w4yy.

No passport for her (please!)

“She weighs less than three pounds, she makes you go aww, and she’s one of the best killers on the planet.”

Introducing Gaia (please see story for image), a virtually unknown cat native to Africa who is bth tiny and terrible, yet terribly cute.  (When you learn about her, you’ll want assurance that she’s safely secured in a US zoo.)  And you can drop any impulse to cuddle her or other black-footed cats, some 30 of which live in other US zoos.

Weighing a trace more than 2-1/2 pounds, Gaia is part of a breeding-for-conservation effort.  Because numbers of black-footed cats in the African wild are declining, they’re classified as “vulnerable,” heading for “endangered.”

And since “conservation” is becoming a more common word and practice, Gaia and her cat compatriots may help build their numbers back up, motivating more such programs for other animals.    http://tinyurl.com/28pwxnva

Look! Up in the sky! 

With a wingspan of about six feet and glowing fierce orange eyes, little wonder that Flako, the Eurasian eagle-owl who escaped from the Central Park Zoo last year, has become the talk of Manhattan.  Besides merely tracking and watching him, his fans take pictures, create art, write poems and sport Flako tattoos.

While they busy themselves honoring Flako, the bird himself has toured the city and learned to hunt, apparently deciding this is the life for him.  It’s not an easy life, either, as the deaths of other big birds due to city traffic and rat poison prove.

Details on “The Life of Flako” filled more than two pages of a recent Sunday NYTimes story, complete with numerous photos.     http://tinyurl.com/5b6n4he7

They’re coming, they’re coming!

Yes, the [many-colored]coats are coming!  That would be spring’s crop of kittens, coming soon.  During “kitten season,” winsome baby cats effortlessly win hearts merely by existing.

But please remember: kittens quickly grow into cats, when you can really know about them.  Only then will you see adult looks and experience adult behavior.

An easier, better way to get the pet cat you hope for is to start with a grown-up cat!  Adult cats have “been there, done that,” and they come with experience and savvy that will save you working from the ground up.  Much more important, adult and senior cats appreciate having a home and can fit in faster.

It’s almost the time of year when would-be adopters race right past smart, beautiful, adult cats to seize kitten(s).  Getting to know some adult cats could change all that.  

So meet Reggie, a “male model” adult cat now at the EASEL Animal Rescue League shelter, Ewing.  Estimated to be about 7 years old, Reggie’s looking for a home.  While he has no teeth, that doesn’t inhibit his enthusiasm for food.  And get that gorgeous coat he’s wearing!  

(Specs on visiting and adopting cats are available at EASELNJ.org.  And there’s more to come here on adoptable adult cats.)

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This one, deservedly, is wholly ‘for the birds’

California Condor

Hours of torrential rain, often with high winds.  Day-long snowfall with intense cold.  How and where do the birds shelter? 

So small, birds can seem so vulnerable.  And yet these beautiful, winged, often tuneful descendants of dinosaurs have proven able to cope with conditions that would baffle or defeat us.

Much like sharks, another ancient breed, birds survived after dinosaurs and others went extinct and after drastic environment changes.  But, like sharks, they’re now seriously threatened . . . by humans.

Tufted titmouse

Today, largely unaware of their long history that includes 150-million-year-old bird fossils, we take birds for granted.  They started out as feathered small, meat-eating dinosaurs (theropods) with sharp teeth that over time evolved into beaks.  

Their survival, one theory has it, occurred because they were small, could eat a variety of foods and could fly.  But now, population numbers have declined by around 3 billion birds in North America during the last 50 years alone.  http://tinyurl.com/mr385vxu  and http://tinyurl.com/2p9d6tmr

Female cardinal

Given the estimated 11,000 bird species in the world, it’s impossible to imagine the great variety that must exist among them.  But this look at some of the birds mentioned lately in the media might suggest the possibilities – and enhance the respect. There’s much more to say about birds than the common advice in health and fitness articles – listen to bird song and feel better.   

First, back to that concern about how birds survive major storms.  Their methods are surprising.  A large percentage of birds are migratory, which helps, as does their ability to detect and “read” air pressure system changes, then react accordingly.       http://tinyurl.com/3px7wz2z  

However, even in migrating, birds face obstacles, starting with habitat losses along the way http://tinyurl.com/54dme94m  and modern hazards, like building lights at night, which can attract them and cause fatal or debilitating window strikes.     http://tinyurl.com/sp9c3s2f

Pelicans & pouches

Whether stay-at-homes or travelers, birds are also affected by temperature changes, particularly severe cold snaps that can lessen survival rates of new-born hatchlings. One for-instance: cold kills nsects, so parent birds can only scout up less food for their young. 

 http://tinyurl.com/yc8d2rd7

Then this sadly familiar fact about birds: As is true in human life, birds too are sometimes the victims of sexism in science.  Male specimen birds have been found to prevail in 5 respected natural history museums, often accompanied by denigrating assumptions about female birds that were reached because of incomplete study.         http://tinyurl.com/yezzh2cd 

In short, “Half of all birds are females, yet they have long been overlooked in ornithology.”  (And yes, steps are underway to correct this practice of sex-skewing!)

Hawk

I'm not a “birder,” in the usual sense of the word, but more and more I’m intrigued by news about birds – such as word that a particular woodpecker may not be extinct after all (http://tinyurl.com/2hxar8k6 ) or that near New Zealand’s capital, conservation efforts succeeded in the hatching of kiwi eggs in the wild for “the first time in living memory.”    http://tinyurl.com/2ebhhpy6

Further, I’ve been delighted to learn that love still actively lives between 2 long-separated macaws in Brazil.  For decades now, one bird regularly visits the other and they commune between the netting that keeps them apart.  I challenge you to read their story without welling up.    http://tinyurl.com/2vjbu7yv

Chickadee

Vultures.  Did you “Ugh!” at that word alone?  Both their looks and their job of carrion-eating can prompt such reactions.  But read this story and learn how very smart these birds are in pursuing their scavenging occupation – using their “wide-angle intelligence.”       http://tinyurl.com/2y8hvnum

Stale bread with soup: wouldn’t you dip the bread to make it more palatable?  That’s just what these white parrots also do with their dry, twice-baked toast and water every day at lunch -- and they’re the first known to do so.  (Shades of our tendency to dunk biscotti!)     http://tinyurl.com/mr2jyjax

Seabird

Birds are such varied and fascinating creatures, we may all be happy about plans to improve on their North American names – to focus “attention on the unique features and beauty of the birds themselves,” rather than keeping names with “associations with the past that continue to be exclusionary and harmful today.”

Starting this year, the re-naming process will be carried out by the American Ornithological Society, and affect around 150 birds, some now named for racists, slaveholders and others now in disrepute.  As the admired writer of the article linked here says, “If renaming the birds becomes part of a broad reorientation toward nature itself, it’s a symbolic gesture that could be the start of saving it all. The birds and us.”    http://tinyurl.com/5cys36fs   

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First, a 'soft opening,' then 2 victories at sea

Ummm, so soft and luxurious: cashmere!  Everybody’s wearing it, buying or craving it.  Two-ply, three- ply and no doubt multi-ply too.  In short, cashmere has caught on, big time, most noticeably during winter holidays.    

Cashmere goat

That’s not good.

As one scientist explains, “Demand for Cashmere Is Harming the Environment” – specifically, the cold, arid pastureland of the steppes of China and Mongolia, where herders have historically raised sheep, horses, yaks, camels and other animals.  

But since it takes goats to produce cashmere fabrics from their soft downy undercoat, and cashmere is so in demand, herders increase the number of goats in their livestock.

And that’s not good either.

Unlike other animals, goats “eat plants down to the roots so they cannot regrow, degrading habitat and causing soil erosion.”  That leads to soil damage, and goats that graze on inferior rangeland produce inferior fibers, which find their way into to affordable-but-lesser cashmere sweaters. 

Yak

So the degeneration of pastureland – and cashmere – continues, while efforts to come up w/ sustainable production practices are only beginning.  One suggestion consumers are likely to reject is to forgo cashmere altogether, even though they could opt instead for soft fabrics from sheep, yaks or camels: greater quantity for less ecological damage. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/16/opinion/holidays-environment-cashmere.html

As with African elephants, “conservation” is a meaningful word today.  Now, move mentally to the US Pacific Northwest, where veterinarians have taken on a massive challenge: helping conserve a population of endangered orcas, aka “killer whales.”

Orca

About 75 in number, these so-called “Southern Residents” have earned scientists’ interest, motivating them to devise new ways to “perform veterinary exams on a wild, multi-ton marine mammal that might surface for only seconds at a time.” 

The scientists have developed methods -- including an experimental “breath-collecting drone” – to capture parts of the “clouds of mist” expelled from the whales’ blowholes!  They’re also moving toward more ways to assess these whales to learn what’s normal for them and to decide when intervention may be called for.  

BTW, the videos with this article are noteworthy.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/26/science/orcas-killer-whales-veterinarians.html?campaign_id=2&emc=edit_th_20231226&instance_id=111016&nl=todaysheadlines&regi_id=20760274&segment_id=153562&user_id=a360dad7b26df61ea65737080d3deedd

In the belly of the . . . whale

Giant squid

In Daniel Kraus’s novel, Whalefall, a young man named Jay enters the ocean off California to find his suicidal father’s remains.  Minus a few key elements of his diving gear, he plans to search the sea floor where he knows his father, secretly weighted down, slipped off the small boat a friend was piloting.

Once beyond the coast and near the canyon, he encounters a giant squid, is wrapped in a tentacle and sucked into the mouth of a sperm whale.  (It doesn't matter that he's only "by-catch" in the whale's pursuit of the squid.) 

Sperm whale

With his oxygen running out, his strength ebbing and his injuries mounting, Jay struggles inside the whale's first of four stomachs, adapting the detritus he encounters into escape tools and playing back his father's extensive whale knowledge and respect. 

Even though I know zip about diving and simply skimmed over chapter names and other exotica, Whalefall was compelling reading -- a real adventure story, with fascinating details about sperm whales, especially this one, allied with Jay in his escape efforts.

(Years ago, my husband and I traveled to the canyon off the NJ coast in a friend’s commercial fishing boat – a night-time voyage to a tremendously deep place that I was too naïve, or dopey, to be apprehensive about. 

(While there were no encounters with squid or whales, it was exciting enough: while we napped below in the dark, a large mackerel hook fell from a ceiling mount onto my chest – a big rat in transit, I was sure.  Later, starting at dawn, the crew winched huge lobster traps up onto the long deck. . . .)

A timely resolve

Finally, since it’s that time of year, this line from New Yorker online “humor”: “One whale says to another: “My New Year’s resolution is to lose thirty-eight thousand pounds.”

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It's time to recognize long-time stellar 'friends of animals'

Besides all the “festivating” underway right now, with holidays quickly coming and going, this is also the traditional time when many publications recognize the year’s stand-outs, both people and events.   

I’m eager to salute two outstanding people and a notable (and noble!) event –  a 40 year-old one, in fact.  

First, here’s to Angi Metler.  Forty years ago this year, Metler co-founded the Animal Protection League of NJ (first known as NJ Animal Rights Alliance), the only truly state-wide organization founded in NJ, for NJ animals – and still going strong.  

A few years later, Janine Motta joined her, taking on whatever roles were necessary.    

For each of these women, APLNJ has been her life’s work.  And what a job they’ve done!  Through dramatically changing times, including humans’ attitudes toward animals, numerous successes and crises, APL has soldiered on, with unflagging idealism and determination.

Virtually untiring since 1983, Executive Director Metler has led efforts on many fronts to grow the organization, while Projects Director Motta leads and aids members’ efforts.

And yet, in its leaders’ typical self-effacing fashion, the organization’s holiday greeting card focuses exclusively on its “dedicated and compassionate membership.” (That would be anyone who agrees with its mission, and pitches in!)   

APLNJ’s vision, Metler says in the card, is “simple”: “A world where animals no longer suffer at the hands of humans, but are free to live their own lives.”  Its mission is “to create a compassionate society.  Working with the public, policy makers and government officials, we advocate for lifestyle changes, programs, policies and laws that promote nonviolent coexistence with animals.”  (aplnj.org/about/).

Such ambitious moral goals deserve all the support – including financial support – they can get. (Visit APL’s website – APLNJ.org -- for a more complete idea of the organization’s advocacy activities.  And then, I hope, contribute to their success.)  Click on the “Ways to Give” page and review all the options, including especially the teal-colored “DONATIONS” box.  

You will do immeasurable good for animals by helping support activists fighting for them -- for 40 years.  Please do it now!

Winter re-viewed

Autumn will soon give way to winter for us, as well as for Margaret Renkl.  Now, dependably, her essay provides many reasons to appreciate winter for “its cold silence and its lonely darkness.”               https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/04/opinion/seasons-nature-winter.html

 

                                                AnimalBeat II returns in early 2024.

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Elephants forever! But only we can make it happen

                                                                                     AMNH image

It’s up and running: “The Secret World of Elephants” at New York’s American Museum of Natural History (AMNH).  And of course, readers, I hope it’s part of your plans for the next couple months.    

The museum’s 7-minute video about elephants should spur attendance at this exciting exhibition that covers the 60 million year-evolution of the elephant family, showing ancient and modern elephants via casts, fossils and life-size models: meet a woolly mammoth and see a dwarf elephant, just 4 feet high at the shoulders!     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTbLHV7lDV8

Elephants, those marvelous creatures who have played major roles in human history, are endangered (at best) and facing extinction (at worst).  For many years, humans’ mad desire for ivory and the resulting slaughter of elephants for their tusks have been largely to blame. 

Maternal love

And in some places now, elephants and farmers are competing for living space and food crops that are grown by and for people, but that also mightily appeal to elephants.  Less conservation-minded and hungry themselves, angry farmers may kill the elephants who eat up their crops.

Conservationists work diligently to combat such threats to elephants, starting with the poachers who kill for tusks and profit and the countries where ivory is still a valuable commodity.  They’ve also devised wise ways to deter elephants from raiding gardens.   

Illustrating another way to minimize elephant loss, the Humane Society of the US recently applauded Canada, where “landmark regulations” that ban trade in elephant ivory . . . as well as imports of hunting trophies . . . . take effect early January, ’24.  If wildlife hunters can’t bring home their “trophies” to brag about, they may be less inclined to hunt.     https://tinyurl.com/39tdd8ck   

Elephants have been extolled for numerous behavioral wonders (that humans could learn from!).  Physically, they’re also marvels.  

Only consider their trunks – far stronger and more versatile than they may look.  An elephant’s (boneless) trunk can weigh up to 300 pounds and lift 700 pounds, yet thanks to remarkable musculature, it’s amazingly flexible. 

Gabon landscape with elephant

Fusing elephants’ upper lip and nose, trunks can be used for -- take a breath! -- “everything from drinking water, foraging, bathing, smelling, exploring, tossing dust and mud onto their bodies, picking up and manipulating objects, blowing objects away or sniffing them in, signaling aggression, producing sounds, tactile contact with other elephants,” and more.  (Thanks for these specs to the Performing Animal Welfare Society [pawsweb.org]).

Till I get there to see for myself, I can only hope that “Secret World of Elephants” includes effective pitches to savor and protect elephants -- animals who deserve to live forever!

 Canned that idea!

After my total failure to inspire readers to creatively re-purpose the numerous jangling metal cat-food cans, I’ll propose a better, more worthy idea now and see if it flies: 

how about a pet ambulance to take pets to an animal hospital when their families can’t?  

Some loving pet parents simply don’t drive or can’t drive in dark or bad weather, while desperate to get a pet with major health issues to care-providers right away.  That's a job for . . . a pet ambulance! 

Maybe this idea already exists somewhere.  If it does, I hope a reader who knows will tell us about it.  Please comment!    

‘Hay is for horses!’

Community cats (those who live outdoors, formerly known as “feral cats”) can be woeful sights, especially in cold, icy weather.  How can we make life more comfortable for them?

Think “straw”! Then go get some (see link below) for bedding and put it in the cat shelter(s) you plan to position outside.  Once you know that straw traps heat and repels moisture, what else do you need to know?  

As for the shelter itself, I’ve seen wooden ones and heard of using big Styrofoam boxes (lidded, of course), firmly positioned in sheltered spots – shelter the shelter! -- with as entrance hole cut into one side.

Voila: cozy cats!  

https://tinyurl.com/3fcnpd5e

 

                            They're after leaves but capable of pulling down branches                PAWS image

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Pity poor puppy mill pets & the people who love them

Decades ago, eager to bring home our first family dog, we went straight to the pet store at a nearby mall and soon walked out with a buff cocker spaniel puppy.  He was darling and we were thrilled . . . until one ailment after another afflicted him.

It soon grew to frequent vet visits, multiple medications and regular baths with special shampoo. The (inevitable) end was horribly sad.

There were puppy mills then, as there are now, often supplying pet stores with poorly-bred animals from overworked and undertreated females, often violating whatever guidelines and ground rules may have been in place.

Finally, people and the media are waking up to the perils of puppy mill pups.  Today's Times of Trenton included coverage of legislators’ determination to do better – for the animals themselves and unwitting buyers.

Last Sunday’s Times had showcased a special report, “Sick puppies, healthy profits” (linked below), about both animal and human pain and financial loss connected with puppy mills.  Forewarned is . . . happier families with happier pets.   https://tinyurl.com/m6db63ff

Vetting the cats – yes!

Soon after “Linda” and I met, the subject of cats came up, and she told me about her own cat’s recent vet visit – the first with Linda in 6 years– a new experience for both of them.  

Aware of how often my 2 cats are vetted, I was astonished.  When Linda reported that her cat was deemed ‘fine” by the vet, more astonishment, prompting me to check on “official” recommendations for how often pet cats should be seen by a vet.  (I looked for online info from the American Veterinary Medical Assn. and the American Assn of Feline Practitioners, besides recalling what I’d “always” been told.)

Once a year was the most common advice, with twice yearly or more suggested for older cats, and still more often for a cat with health issues.

A cat parent simply can’t tell just by looking whether a feline is OK; furthermore, cats are known for hiding signs of ill health.  And too, teeth can tell a tale, as can results of blood and urine tests.

Bottom line: pets and vets belong together!

Some horseshoe crabs spared harvesting

It wasn’t enough that they’re primordial creatures who have lived through one animal extinction after another; nor enough that substitutes exist for their use as bait by fishermen and their blue blood in biomedical testing. 

It took threatened shorebirds – red knots, specifically -- who need horseshoe crab eggs to fuel their long migration journeys.  And so female horseshoe crabs of the Delaware Bay won’t be harvested for a season.  Once again, Reed’s Beach on the bay will host the egg-laying and bird-feasting.   

Welcome back, everyone!

Diagnosis by Dodo

Since Jersey joined Billy and me, I’ve mentioned his frequent  (screeching? screaming? caterwauling? sound effects? – take your pick) and searched for reasons and cures.  Theories abounded.  So did suggestions for what to do about it.  None worked.

Major oral surgery to clean up his toothlessness didn’t change it, nor did more and more time in a loving home after life as an outdoor cat, or vet’s or Jackson Galaxy’s or friends’ ideas.

Then roaming around YouTube recently, I came upon a Dodo story about “Donut,” a cat who screams at his parents -- and why.  I didn’t yell it, but I sure thought it: “Eureka!” 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9GUSe0o328

I’ve known for a while that Jersey's at least partially deaf.  That’s where Donut’s story surprised me: he too is deaf – and he “talks” so loud all the time because he can’t hear himself at a normal sound level!

Simple, right? 

But . . . that suggests a treatment question: should I shout to Jersey so he’s sure to hear me?  Now, to avoid startling him if his back is turned, I walk more heavily and speak extra distinctly while approaching, before I touch him.

We’ll see (hear?) how it goes.

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