In other corporate responsibility news, restaurants and producers are beginning to make commitments to improve the lives of chickens raised for meat (known to the industry as “broiler” chickens).
Date created: June 26, 2017
Last updated: June 26, 2017
New research by scientists in South Florida indicates that a high percentage of stranded dolphins were almost deaf at the time of stranding. The cause of the near-deafness is unknown.
Date created: February 7, 2011
Last updated: January 10, 2020
Fish can perform simple addition and subtraction, a study recently published in the journal Scientific Reports revealed (Schluessel et al., 2022).
Date created: June 14, 2022
Last updated: June 24, 2022
Texas real estate scion and former chairman of Perot Systems, H. Ross Perot Jr. has met his match over a white rhino trophy head in a battle with South African wildlife officials.
Date created: February 25, 2010
Last updated: January 9, 2020
At a time when thousands of whales were being slaughtered each year, the release of the album Songs of the Humpback Whale in 1970 sparked a movement that eventually led to one of the great conservation achievements to date, the moratorium on commercial whaling.
Date created: September 19, 2016
Last updated: April 24, 2024
The U.S. Navy has requested authorization from the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to allow it to take (harass, harm or kill) many tens of millions of marine mammals incidental to thousands of training and testing activities in the Atlantic Fleet Training and Testing Study Area (AFTT).
Date created: May 21, 2013
Last updated: January 15, 2020
This past December, mute swans in New York finally gained protection under legislation introduced by Senator Tony Avella and Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz. The New York Department of Environmental Conservation released a draft management plan in 2013 calling for eradication of all 2,200 birds by 2025 (see AWI Quarterly, spring 2014).
Date created: March 17, 2017
Last updated: January 15, 2020
Wolf–human conflicts are an ongoing concern that can lead to both legal and illegal killing of wild wolves, poor support for wild carnivore welfare among local human populations, and legislative changes that negatively affect wolf conservation.
Date created: December 17, 2020
Last updated: September 1, 2022
South Africa's Kruger National Park is taking bids from private landowners for 500 of its white rhinos. Newspaper ads advise parties to "make a written offer to purchase white rhinos in batches of 20 or more."
Date created: December 10, 2014
Last updated: December 4, 2019
A study recently published in Royal Society Open Science, however, indicates that protections afforded humpback whales over the past half century have helped reverse the decline. The study authors predict that this population may be fully recovered by 2030 but caution that ongoing monitoring is necessary to evaluate how these whales respond to modern threats, particularly entanglement in fishing gear, and to climate-driven impacts to their habitat.
Date created: January 2, 2020
Last updated: January 22, 2020
A major spill of heavy fuel oil from a wrecked freighter has fouled the waters surrounding one of the world’s most important bird nesting sites on a remote South Atlantic island. On March 16, the Oliva, a Maltese-registered cargo vessel carrying a load of soybeans from Brazil to the Philippines, ran aground and sank off Nightingale Island.
Date created: May 4, 2011
Last updated: January 8, 2020
The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) today praised the South Dakota Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee's rejection of S.B. 170, a bill that would have pumped up to $1 million of state funds into the construction of a horse slaughter facility.
Date created: January 23, 2009
Last updated: February 3, 2022
A Hawaii souvenir shop’s owner, employees, and business partners were indicted on 21 counts in June for illegally trafficking in whale bone, elephant and walrus ivory, and black corals.
Date created: September 18, 2015
Last updated: January 9, 2020
Cage space requirements for non-human primates in the United States of America are less than those in European countries. Studies in support of the assumption that the US legal minimum cage size provides adequate space have limited value because they only tested cages without structural enhancement. It is not surprising that non-human primates cannot be animated to be more active or to behave in more species-typical manners by only providing them with extra barren space.
Date created: January 21, 2009
Last updated: December 16, 2022
The purpose of this study is to consider space use patterns of a single group of captive chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) housed in an indoor exhibit at the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo. Previous studies have focused on the space use of a group following movement from a small enclosure to a large outdoor enclosure (Bettinger et al., 1994; Clarke et al., 1982; Traylor-Holzer and Fritz, 1985; Matevia et at., 1991), use of large outdoor facilities (Menzel. 1969; Horvat and Kraemer, 1976), or space use patterns of mother-infant (Goff et al., 1994).
Date created: May 2, 2016
Last updated: October 30, 2020
Eight baboon groups (Papio sp.) were observed for over one hundred scan samples both before and after the provision of structural enrichment. Additions to their home-cage included a galvanized ladder suspended horizontally by chains and a plastic drum hung from the ladder. Observations were conducted for three weeks before and three weeks after the structures were added to determine changes in space use.
Date created: April 29, 2016
Last updated: November 11, 2020
Space utilization was assessed in a heterogeneous group of 16 captive rhesus macaques. The area covered by the floor was 3 times larger than that covered by elevated structures; nonetheless the animals were located significantly more often (89.8% of 108 scan samples) on elevated structures than on the floor (8.6% of 108 scan samples). They were found only rarely (1.6% of 108 scan samples) on the mesh wire walls of their enclosure.
Date created: May 27, 2016
Last updated: November 11, 2020
A coalition of environmental groups released today a new brief, “Convenience Kills,” detailing the whale meat sales of SPAR Norway—part of the international SPAR convenience store chain. The groups are calling on the company to discontinue supporting Norway’s struggling whaling industry.
Date created: July 15, 2015
Last updated: May 2, 2022
In many communities throughout the United States, particularly in the Northeast, if you want to rile up the neighbors ask them about deer. Many people see these big-eyed ungulates as real-life Bambis, survivors in a habitat modified by humans, and are thus tolerant of the deer’s transgressions and willing to modify their own behaviors and expectations to live with these elegant animals.
Date created: May 29, 2015
Last updated: January 9, 2020
Old World nonhuman primates commonly found in research institutions are distinguished by the following characteristics: Social disposition: Like human primates, nonhuman primates have an inherent need for companionship. Prolonged social deprivation may lead to depression (Figure 1) and gross behavioral disorders such as self-biting and self-clasping.
Date created: January 21, 2009
Last updated: October 30, 2020
As the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) ends, the outcome appears disastrous for a multitude of imperiled species.
Date created: March 26, 2010
Last updated: February 2, 2022
In February, the House of Representatives passed the Sportsmen’s Heritage and Recreational Enhancement Act. A companion bill, the Bipartisan Sportsmen’s Act of 2014, was then introduced in the Senate. AWI rallied opposition to this bill, as it would have substantial and direct adverse impacts on wildlife, public health, and existing conservation efforts.
Date created: August 21, 2014
Last updated: April 24, 2024
On October 7, the House Natural Resources Committee voted to advance HR 2406, the Sportsmen’s Heritage and Recreational Enhancement (SHARE) Act, which presents a clear assault on wildlife both at home and abroad. The current House version of this recurring bill is even more extreme than its Senate counterpart (S 405, the Bipartisan Sportsmen’s Act), and is little more than a grab bag of troubling measures that jeopardize already fragile ecosystems and animal welfare.
Date created: December 30, 2015
Last updated: April 24, 2024
Congress is currently considering legislation that would, if enacted, launch a broad assault on America's wildlife and public lands. The Sportsmen's Heritage Act of 2012 (H.R.
Date created: August 8, 2012
Last updated: April 24, 2024
In 2011, AWI’s Safe Havens Mapping Project developed an integrated, comprehensive state-by-state listing of sheltering services for the animals of those experiencing domestic violence.
Date created: August 19, 2021
Last updated: August 30, 2021
