Environmental enrichment for chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) should be designed to promote species-typical behaviors, mental stimulation, and occupation periodically throughout the day (Fritz & Howell1993). This is a challenging task because the dexterous ability , intelligence, and great strength of the chimpanzees enables them to rapidly destroy items or figure things out quickly so that devices may last seconds rather than the envisioned days...or at least hours.
Date created: April 8, 2016
Last updated: October 30, 2020
Pennsylvania, long notorious for its weak repercussions for even the worst cases of abuse, took a giant leap forward when Governor Tom Wolf signed Libre’s Law.
Date created: March 23, 2018
Last updated: April 24, 2024
Perdue Farms engages thousands of “contract farmers” each year to raise company-owned birds. Contract farmers are obligated to abide by Perdue’s animal-raising standards and any other specifications established by the company. The standards and specifications are notoriously neither bird- nor farmer-friendly.
Date created: March 6, 2015
Last updated: January 9, 2020
The Council of Better Business Bureau’s National Advertising Division (NAD) has concluded that claims made by Perdue Farms in a national broadcast advertising campaign were misleading.
Date created: September 26, 2018
Last updated: September 26, 2018
Perdue Farms, one of America’s largest industrial poultry producers, unveiled a plan in June designed to “accelerate its progress in poultry care.” Perdue claims that the plan, to be implemented over the next several years, is based on the “Five Freedoms”—an internationally recognized benchmark for animal husbandry.
Date created: September 19, 2016
Last updated: January 15, 2020
Perdue Farms has become the first major poultry producer in the United States to commit to adopting a process of stunning with gas, known as controlled atmosphere stunning (CAS), at all of its chicken slaughter plants.
Date created: June 29, 2018
Last updated: June 29, 2018
That amphibians are the most imperiled class of vertebrates in the world is largely beyond debate. Such threats as habitat loss and overexploitation for meat or the pet trade are decimating amphibian species worldwide.
Date created: September 18, 2015
Last updated: January 9, 2020
Bethany Brookshire begins her engrossing book, Pests: How Humans Create Animal Villains, with an eastern gray squirrel named “[expletive] Kevin” who is decimating her tomato plant.
It is an illuminating anecdote, since Brookshire—an award-winning science writer and host of the podcast Science for the People—fully acknowledges that whether an animal is considered cherished wildlife, pet, or pest is all about perspective (i.e., how much of an inconvenient irritant they are). Squirrels scampering in the forest are a delight, while the squirrel christened Kevin, who is using her garden patch as a smorgasbord, must be eradicated.
Date created: April 4, 2023
Last updated: April 7, 2023
Recent events have moved domestic violence out of the shadows and into public consciousness where it can be addressed as the serious crime that it is. But still hidden from view is an all-too-real obstacle many survivors face when trying to leave their abusive partners: the fear that those partners will harm or kill their companion animals.
Date created: December 10, 2014
Last updated: April 24, 2024
Any member of a household can become a victim of domestic violence: spouses or partners, children, elderly relatives, even companion animals. In fact, fear of what might happen to their pets keeps many human victims from leaving. The PAWS Act will help bridge the gap between the tremendous need for services for domestic violence survivors with pets and the ability of agencies to meet those needs.
Date created: March 10, 2015
Last updated: April 13, 2023
In an effort to stop experimentation on illegally acquired dogs and cats, Senator Daniel Akaka (D-AK) and Representative Mike Doyle (D-PA) are again sponsoring the Pet Safety and Protection Act.
Date created: November 6, 2009
Last updated: April 18, 2024
The Pet Safety and Protection Act would establish integrity in the provision of dogs and cats for research purposes.
Date created: June 27, 2011
Last updated: August 30, 2024
The global trade in ornamental fish is a multibillion-dollar business involving the annual global export of around 2 billion fish from 2,500 freshwater and marine species.
Date created: December 15, 2023
Last updated: April 17, 2024
The Animal Welfare Institute works to secure protections for animals in agriculture by engaging with federal administrative agencies through petitions for rulemaking and complaints made pursuant to federal regulations.
Date created: December 5, 2022
Last updated: August 29, 2024
AWI and allies submitted a petition for rulemaking to the US Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service in November urging the agency to adopt regulations governing its Wildlife Services program to improve the welfare o
Date created: April 8, 2024
Last updated: April 22, 2024
The Animal Welfare Institute, Center for Biological Diversity, and Project Coyote petitioned the Obama administration today to reform the federal wildlife-killing program known as “Wildlife Services,” which kills nearly 1.5 million coyotes, bears, otters, foxes, birds and other animals each year without any requirement to disclose its activities to the public. The secretive killing—which includes aerial gunning, traps and exploding poison caps—has gone on for decades with little public oversight or rules requiring the use of the best available science or techniques to reduce the deaths of nontarget animals.
Date created: December 3, 2013
Last updated: February 2, 2022
Today, the Animal Welfare Institute and other conservation groups petitioned the National Marine Fisheries Service to list the Atlantic humpback dolphin under the US Endangered Species Act (ESA). Atlantic humpback dolphin populations are in serious decline, and the species is already recognized as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.
Date created: September 8, 2021
Last updated: January 18, 2024
In December, AWI and its allies petitioned the Obama administration to reform USDA's Wildlife Services program, which kills nearly 1.5 million animals each year without regard for sound science or animal welfare.
Date created: February 25, 2014
Last updated: January 10, 2020
AWI spearheaded the introduction in June of the Mink VIRUS Act (HR 3783), sponsored by Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-NY).
Date created: June 20, 2023
Last updated: April 17, 2024
The African elephants have lost a grand and valiant champion. Pierre Pfeffer, director of research at both the National Museum of Natural History in Paris and France’s National Center for Scientific Research, passed away on December 29 at the age of 89.
Date created: March 17, 2017
Last updated: April 24, 2024
A majority of the 125 million pigs raised in the United States for meat are housed indoors in barren, cramped concentrated animal feeding operations (often referred to as “factory farms”), and are subjected to mutilations such as cutting off the tail (i.e., tail docking) and castration, both without pain medication. Pregnant sows are traditionally confined to crates for their four-month long gestation; while in the crates, these sows can only stand in place or lie down. Along with the severely restricted movement, they are deprived of any other mental and physical stimulation.
Date created: September 20, 2011
Last updated: August 17, 2023
Looking to take advantage of the disaster unfolding in China, US meat production giants Tyson Foods and JBS USA have announced they are ending the use of ractopamine throughout their supply chains.
Date created: January 2, 2020
Last updated: January 22, 2020
The Laboratory Animal Refinement and Enrichment Forum (LAREF) is an online platform, hosted by AWI, where individuals working with animals in research share ideas and experiences related to improving the welfare of animals under their
Date created: August 19, 2021
Last updated: August 30, 2021
Pig Tales, James Beard Award–winner Barry Estabrook’s investigation into the commercial pork industry, travels over ground familiar to many farm animal welfare advocates. Illustrating that “factory raised meat may be cheap, but those inexpensive chops come at a cost,” Estabrook chronicles the negative impacts of intensive animal raising on farmer and worker health, on communities, and on the animals themselves.
Date created: June 2, 2015
Last updated: April 24, 2024
“If it wasn’t for his hard head, he wouldn’t be here,” the vet told Roberta Trawick, owner of the lifesaving pit bull, D-Boy.
Date created: January 16, 2020
Last updated: May 27, 2021
