As Bat Week kicks off October 24, the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) is hosting its first-ever bat-tacular fundraiser to help organizations operating bat rescues, sanctuaries, and educational outreach programs promote and protect these vanishing mammals.
November 28 is Giving Tuesday, a global day of giving to inspire positive change in our communities and beyond. This year, the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) is partnering with six farmed animal sanctuaries across the United States to provide rescued chickens, pigs, cattle, turkeys, sheep, goats, geese, and more with the safety, security, love, and respect they were previously denied.
It was an unusual discovery. As the mercury soared to triple digits last October in Yuma, Ariz., a hermit crab later named "Hermie" was found near a drip irrigation line in a state park - a victim of the crustacean pet trade. More than likely, he was purchased at a local pet store and then dumped near a canal behind the park’s headquarters before being rescued.
Actress Hayden Panettiere, who plays cheerleader Claire Bennet on NBC's hit series Heroes, will lead a rally against a resumption of commercial whaling at 1 p.m. this Sunday, January 27, in Washington, DC's Dupont Circle (event flyer).
This past year has brought heightened attention to a very special class of veteran—the Military Working Dog (MWD)—especially when it was reported that an MWD was part of the team that rousted out Osama Bin Laden!
In September, more than 100 representatives of equine rescue, sanctuary, and advocacy organizations from across the country met in Washington, DC, for the 2024 Homes for Horses Coalition (HHC) Conference.
Last October, the Bureau of Land Management finalized plans to employ an inhumane surgical sterilization procedure—ovariectomy via colpotomy—to control the population of wild horses in Utah’s Confusion Herd Management Area (HMA).
As the largest seafood trade event in North America—Seafood Expo North America—concludes in Boston, members of the Whales Need US (WNUS) coalition are pleased to announce that a leading North American seafood company, High Liner Foods, has committed not to purchase products sourced from Icelandic companies linked to whaling.
Now through March 16, 2025, high school seniors who are passionate about improving the lives of animals and want to continue making a positive impact through college and beyond can apply for an Animal Welfare Institute Scholarship.
In the United States, federal regulations require that pigs be stunned prior to slaughter by one of four methods: electricity, chemicals (gas), captive bolt device, or gunshot. The smallest slaughter plants generally use gunshot or captive bolt; mid-sized plants often use electricity, and the nation’s largest pork companies—Smithfield Foods, Tyson Foods, and JBS USA—mostly use carbon dioxide (CO2) gas to stun pigs.
In March 2014, California Assemblymember Richard Bloom (D-Santa Monica) introduced into the California Assembly AB 2140—a bill to prohibit the breeding of captive orcas and their use in theatrical shows in the state and require their retirement to a sanctuary. AWI, a cosponsor of the legislation, testified in favor of the bill at the hearing in the Committee on Water, Parks, and Wildlife, where it received strong support.
Conservation groups and the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) announced a historic settlement today to recommit to the conservation and recovery of the world’s only wild red wolf population, which in recent years dropped to as low as seven known wild wolves after the USFWS abandoned its previous, successful conservation efforts.
In an important victory for Tennessee Walking Horses, the US House of Representatives today passed the US Senator Joseph D. Tydings Memorial Prevent All Soring Tactics (PAST) Act (H.R. 693) by a vote of 333–96. The PAST Act would end the cruel practice of injuring the hooves and legs of horses to alter their gait during certain walking horse competitions. It represents the most significant protections for Tennessee Walking Horses and related breeds since passage of the Horse Protection Act (HPA) in 1970.
Promoting high welfare, animal-sensitive standards of animal husbandry in farming is a major objective of the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI). In 1988, with assistance from farmers, veterinarians and ethologists who specialize in the natural behavior of farmed animals, AWI developed its first set of pig husbandry standards. In 1989, AWI obtained the first USDA-approved label for pork from pigs who were raised on family farms, able to roam free on pastures or in bedded pens, and lived without the routine use of antibiotics to promote growth and prevent diseases associated with factory farming.
Representatives from dozens of national and state-based equine protection, advocacy and rescue organizations gathered April 9 and April 10 at Bally's Las Vegas for the third annual Homes for Horses Coalition Conference to discuss the re-homing of at-risk horses in America and other equine welfare concerns.
Even an ardent equine enthusiast will likely come away with a new appreciation for the horse after reading Hoof Beats: How Horses Shaped Human History. Ambitious in scope, the book examines humanity’s close relationship with horses across the globe since the dawn of civilization. Author William T. Taylor, assistant professor and curator of archaeology at the University of Colorado Boulder, conducts a rigorous analysis of archaeological data to illustrate how a number of ancient cultures used horses to their advantage. Striking images of archaeological excavations and sites—an enormous ancient horse-and-chariot burial pit in China and hoof petroglyphs in Mongolia, for example—help illustrate horses’ outsized impact on our collective psyche.
North American wildlife lost one of their staunchest advocates with the death in June of esteemed author and naturalist Hope Ryden. AWI is honored to have worked with Hope: From the 1980s through 2004, she served on the board of trustees of AWI’s lobbying arm, the Society for Animal Protective Legislation (SAPL). After AWI and SAPL merged in 2004, Hope moved to AWI’s scientific committee.
The viability of 89 family-owned organic dairy farms in the Northeast is now in jeopardy following an announcement by Horizon Organic, the world’s largest organic dairy brand, that it will be dropping these farms as suppliers.
The victim was caught out of trapping season and appeared to have been in the trap for days. The trap lacked required identification, and did not catch a furbearing animal, the brutal device’s typical intended target.
Six people and 14 rare okapi at a conservation center in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) were brutally murdered June 24 by mai mai rebels. The killings occurred in retaliation against staff at the Institute in Congo for the Conservation of Nature for thwarting the rebels’ elephant poaching operations in the region. Two guards, the wife of one of the guards, and three civilians were among the dead.
A coalition of animal protection and wild horse advocacy groups filed a motion Friday for a preliminary injunction in US District Court in Oregon to stop the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from performing risky and inhumane sterilization surgeries on wild mares in Oregon. The procedure involves blindly locating and severing the ovaries while the animals remain conscious.
