Imagine 3,000 dead chickens piled in a truck after a company failed to protect them from freezing conditions during transport, or watching someone at a slaughterhouse place the heads (instead of the legs) of live birds into shackles and intentionally pull on their bodies to decapitate them.
In response to a string of recent natural disasters, USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service published a rule in December making it mandatory that all dealers, exhibitors, intermediate handlers, carriers, research facilities, and other entities regulated by the agency under the Animal Welfare Act have an emergency or contingency plan—the better to save the lives of employees and animals in the event of an emergency or natural disaster.
Due to AWI’s efforts, thousands of records about the treatment of animals at slaughter are now publicly available on the US Department of Agriculture’s website. The documents include records related to enforcement of the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act and the Poultry Products Inspection Act that expose inhumane treatment of animals at slaughter facilities across the country.
The US Department of Agriculture’s case against Santa Cruz Biotechnology, Inc. (SCBT), one of the world’s largest research antibody suppliers, is scheduled to be heard by an administrative law judge beginning Tuesday, August 18. The USDA case against SCBT is unprecedented: it is the first time that three separate complaints for willful violations of the Animal Welfare Act (AWA) have been filed and are pending against a research laboratory.
In a huge win for transparency and accountability, the US Department of Agriculture has agreed to publicly disclose on its website records related to the treatment of animals in US slaughter plants to settle a lawsuit filed by the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) and Farm Sanctuary.
The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) and the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) have petitioned the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) to amend the US animal export regulations to include “fitness to travel” requirements for all farmed animals exported to any foreign country except those traveling overland to Canada or Mexico.
The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) and the ASPCA® (The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals®) are leading more than 15 other organizations, farmers, and companies in urging the US Department of Agriculture to finalize the Organic Livestock and Poultry Standards (OLPS) rule.
A new report by the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI)—Humane Slaughter Update: Comparing State and Federal Enforcement of Humane Slaughter Laws— indicates that, more than two years after the shocking depiction of inhumane practices at the Westland-Hallmark slaughter plant in California, enforcement of humane slaughter laws has increased at both the state and federal levels, but remains inconsistent and low in comparison with other aspects of food safety inspection.
Once again, we are forced to highlight the abysmal state of enforcement of the Animal Welfare Act (AWA) and the Horse Protection Act (HPA) in recent years. As made plain by the graphs on this page, the US Department of Agriculture has all but abandoned its duty to protect animals under these vital laws. We hope that there will be better news to report from the new administration, but first we want to acknowledge the huge task newly appointed Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and his staff have ahead of them if they are to address this (in addition to the steps they should take to correct course on farm animal welfare issues—see page 4).
A pending lawsuit supported by a potent segment of the walking horse industry appears to be the major impetus for the US Department of Agriculture’s egregious decision to remove untold thousands of online Horse Protection Act (HPA) and Animal Welfare Act (AWA) records, the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) stated today.
A little-known US Department of Agriculture (USDA) program is using brutal methods and taxpayer dollars to indiscriminately kill wildlife across the United States. This program, ironically entitled Wildlife Services (WS), kills approximately 5 million animals each year in the name of “managing problems caused by wildlife.”
In July, a scathing New York Times editorial entitled “Agriculture’s Misnamed Agency” highlighted the myriad problems plaguing USDA’s rogue Wildlife Services program, including its outdated and nonselective killing practices, lack of transparency and accountability, and ecologically destructive approach to wildlife management.
Billions of birds fatally collide with human-made structures each year. These mortalities have consequences for avian population viability and the conservation of endangered species. This source of human-wildlife conflict also places economic and operational constraints on various industries. Furthermore, with continued increases in urbanization, the number and geographic extent of collisions continue to increase.
Stories can be a powerful way to share lessons with children about kindness and proper companion animal care. They provide children with an opportunity to consider new concepts and practice perspective-taking in a way that is fun and engaging.
In a presentation at the AALAS meeting, J. Hau from the University of Copenhagen described an interesting work in progress, the replacement of the rabbit with a free-range, free-will chicken as the traditional polyclonal antibody animal model.
The preservation of large carnivores such as jaguars will not be achieved only by conserving isolated protected areas. They need large landscapes. Subpopulations need to mix genes to remain genetically robust; therefore, animals must move between protected areas, through landscapes dominated by human activity. Our understanding of how individual movement and human-wildlife conflict affect regional population persistence is poorly understood, as, traditionally, it would require large-scale trapping of jaguars to outfit them with radio collars to monitor their movements over time.
The Arctic is warming faster than anywhere on Earth, and polar bears—listed as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act—are at risk due to decreasing sea ice habitat. Monitoring polar bear populations is important for their conservation and management, but is also challenging because they occupy vast, remote, and extreme regions. With the loss of sea ice, conventional monitoring methods (including expensive aerial overflights) are becoming less reliable. Some of these methods are also invasive (e.g., physical capture, chemical immobilization, and satellite collaring), which has been of concern to local Indigenous communities, conservationists, and researchers.
Long before elephant ivory carvings became fashionable, and before crocodile skin handbags and colorful tropical pet birds were stylish, people exploited wild animals as a source of food. Many ancient societies tried to limit the exploitation by imposing restrictions and taboos, and even religious prohibitions, but some people persisted nevertheless, and many wild species were forced into extinction as a consequence.
Surveying nesting raptors provides important information on population productivity. Since raptors occupy spots near the top of the food web, they are also often good indicators of ecosystem health. But surveying raptor nests using traditional methods requires climbing to the nest or flying over it in a small airplane or helicopter.
Noninvasive genetic tools are commonly used in conservation programs because they help practitioners address practical questions—such as estimating population size and reconstructing ancestries—without having to use stressful capture methods. Wolves across North America have benefited substantially from the use of noninvasive genetic methods, and the insights provided have helped wildlife managers make the best-informed decisions regarding population persistence.
In recent years, anthropogenic disturbances such as maritime traffic, pollution, and fishing have had a negative impact on the welfare of great whales around the world. The town of Sept-Iles, Québec, located on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, hosts the largest mineral port in North America, with an average 500 cargo ships docking annually. This area is also an important feeding ground for many marine mammals, notably blue and fin whales, prompting concern for their welfare. Traditionally, health assessments of great whales employed invasive tools such as biopsies and satellite tagging. A new approach is needed to assess overall welfare in a noninvasive way.
The Florida manatee (Trichechus manatus latirsotris) is an endemic subspecies of West Indian manatee that inhabits inland and coastal waters of the southeastern United States. Its population is threatened by natural and human-generated disturbances, including boat traffic, which may be ubiquitous throughout manatee habitat.
