News About Animals - December 9, 2010

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December 9, 2010   San Antonio Zoo Elephants Queenie And Lucky Need Your Help Again After the elephant Queenie was sent to the San Antonio Zoo in April to join the unfortunate Lucky – amid great controversy and opposition from thousands of pro-elephant advocates around the country – IDA pledged to closely monitor their situation. We recently received alarming videotaped footage of dangerous aggression between Queenie and Lucky, and filed a complaint with the USDA, demanding they be removed from this unsafe situation caused by the very small size of their enclosure. Backed by one of the world’s leading elephant scientists, ElephantVoices co-director Dr. Joyce Poole, who has been studying elephant behavior in Africa and Asia for more than 30 years, the complaint warned of dire consequences should Lucky and Queenie continue to be held in the zoo’s outdated exhibit. Please click here to read more and send a quick e-mail asking the USDA to help these two elephants. Wolves In The Northern Rocky Mountain Region Need Your Support The U.S. Senate is considering S. 3864, introduced by Montana Senators Max Baucus and Jon Tester, which would eliminate vital protections for endangered gray wolves in the Greater Yellowstone and Northern Rocky Mountain regions. If this bill is passed and signed into law, the Endangered Species Act would be significantly compromised, gray wolves in Idaho and Montana wouuld be delisted, and permits to slaughter more than 1,000 animals would be issued, thereby destroying the potential for any recovery of the species. S. 3864 is due to be voted on (without public hearings or comments) any day. If passed, it would effectively end the recovery of the gray wolf population of the Greater Yellowstone and the Northern Rockies area. Please click here today to send an e-mail to your Senators! Elephants In Sri Lanka Are In Trouble More than 50 people and 228 elephants in Sri Lanka, an estimated 5% of the remaining wild population, were killed last year as a consequence of human/elephant conflict, caused by ever-shrinking habitat.  Captive elephants in Sri Lanka have no government protections, allowing them to be held in substandard conditions, including at zoos and in tourism-supported facilities such as the Pinnawela Elephant Orphanage. The orphanage was originally established to care for calves orphaned in the wild, but has become an uncontrolled breeding ground without thought for the future of the elephants. Calves from Pinnawela are often abducted from their mothers and given to temples, individuals or sent to zoos in Sri Lanka where they spend their lives in chains, repetitively swaying from side to side, often malnourished and alone. Very alarming is the Sri Lankan government’s practice of exporting elephant calves to foreign zoos. Since 2002, babies have been sent to zoos in China, Japan, Croatia, and the Republic of Korea; New Zealand may be next. U.S. zoos are also looking to Pinnawela as a source of elephants for their newly expanded elephant exhibits, including the National Zoo in Washington, DC. Please click here to read more and send a message to Sri Lanka's Minister of Economic Development. IDA Supporting Activists At UN Climate Conference In Cancun IDA and the Veg Climate Alliance, Farm Animal Rights Movement, A Well Fed World and AnimaNaturalis, an animal rights group in Mexico, are encouraging UN delegates to acknowledge animal agriculture’s impact on global warming and other environmental threats at the UN Climate Conference in Cancun, Mexico. Our declaration, The Cancun Declaration on Livestock and Climate Change, highlights the serious impact livestock emissions have on the planet and offers recommendations for action by the world’s governments. Thousands of activists are in Cancun to demand immediate action on climate change. With irreversible climate disruption becoming more of a reality every day, a world-wide shift to a plant-based diet is essential. We are receiving so many wake-up calls - massive floods, severe droughts, major heat waves, widespread wildfires and much more. According to a 2009 study by two prominent World Bank environmental advisers, animal agriculture accounts for 51% of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions. Reducing or eliminating the consumption of animal products is one of the most powerful ways to reduce your carbon footprint. Numerous scientific studies have concluded that animal agriculture is significantly contributing to global warming. The coalition support of activists at the UN conference includes funding, demonstrations, presentations, and publications. IDA provided 20,000 brochures including scientific studies specific to Mexico. Members of our coalition are in Cancun offering presentations and workshops. Click here to learn more about this campaign. Over 100 Cities Mark Fur Free Friday Fur Free Friday took the animal rights message to the streets again this year, with thousands of grassroots advocates around the world raising their voices for fur-bearing animals. IDA played a major role in organizing actions both large and small, and advocates for animals in more than 100 cities marked this iconic holiday shopping day, the day after Thanksgiving, with a strong message of compassion. Please check out our inspiring slide show of demo photos and video links sent in from activists like you, and read about the media coverage. Fur Free Friday marks the beginning, not the end, of the season to educate the public about the senseless cruelty of fur. Click here for more information on IDA’s campaign to end fur sales at Nordstrom. Please contact IDA's Fur Campaign Director, Matt Rossell, for ideas to keep the compassionate message alive in your community.             Buy this button and others for only $1!.    Order Puppy School by NCIS actor and author David Dayan Fisher, and IDA gets 50 %!   Great tax write-off - donate your car or other vehicle to IDA! We do all the legwork!      Click to enter our Vegan Activist All Star contest.      Awesome black hoody in 100 % soft cotton fleece, only from IDA!  This message was sent to sweetygirl2002@uol.com.br In Defense of Animals, located in San Rafael, Calif., is an international animal protection organization with more than 100,000 members and supporters dedicated to ending the abuse and exploitation of animals by protecting their rights and welfare. IDA's efforts include educational events, cruelty investigations, boycotts, grassroots activism, and hands-on rescue through our sanctuaries in Mississippi, Mumbai, India, and Cameroon, Africa. In Defense of Animals is a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization. We welcome your feedback and appreciate your donations. Please join today! All donations to IDA are tax-deductible. In Defense of Animals 3010 Kerner, San Rafael, CA 94901 Tel. (415) 448-0048 Fax (415) 454-1031 idainfo@idausa.org To unsubscribe, please click here.

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