Tag Archives: wildlife

Japan To Resume Commercial Whaling After 1986 Ban

The Guardian reports: Japan is facing international condemnation after confirming it will resuming commercial whaling for the first time in more than 30 years The country’s fleet will resume commercial operations in July next 2019, the government’s chief spokesman, Yoshihide Suga, said of the decision to defy the 1986 global ban on commercial whaling. Suga told reporters the country’s fleet …

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Leaked DOJ Memo Advises Thwarting Public Requests For Records On Changes To Endangered Species Act

Courthouse News reports: A leaked memo from what conservationists say is the Justice Department advises the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to withhold or delay releasing records sought in Freedom of Information Act requests regarding implementation of the Endangered Species Act. The Center for Biological Diversity said the memo, dated Sept. 6, 2018, asks Fish and Wildlife to limit public …

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IDAHO: Wildlife Official Faces Resignation Calls For Boasting That He Killed An “Entire Family Of Baboons”

Do not scroll down if the photos will upset you. The Idaho Statesman reports: Idaho Fish and Game Commissioner Blake Fischer shared photos of his guided hunting trip in Africa with friends and colleagues when he returned last month, expecting they’d appreciate his success. Instead, several former Fish and Game commissioners are pushing for his resignation — with a photo …

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KENYA: Melania Trump Laments Elephant Poaching

Bloomberg reports: First lady Melania Trump played with orphaned elephants in Kenya on Friday, providing a contrast with her stepson, Donald Trump Jr., who was photographed holding a severed elephant tail in one hand and a knife in the other during a big game hunting trip in Africa. Her visit to the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, an elephant orphanage in …

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Japan Seeks To End Ban On Commercial Whaling

The Guardian reports: Japan has launched a controversial bid to end the ban on commercial whaling, claiming that populations of certain types of whale have recovered sufficiently to allow the resumption of “sustainable” hunting. Representatives of Japan’s 70-strong delegation at this week’s International Whaling Commission [IWC] meeting in Florianópolis, Brazil, argued that the 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling was intended …

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PETA Prompts Animal Crackers Box Redesign [VIDEO]

The Associated Press reports: After more than a century behind bars, the beasts on boxes of animal crackers are roaming free. Mondelez International, the parent company of Nabisco, has redesigned the packaging of its Barnum’s Animals crackers in response to pressure from PETA, which has been protesting the use of animals in circuses for more than 30 years. Mondelez agreed …

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Cruise Ship Staffer Shoots And Kills Polar Bear

CNBC reports: A polar bear that injured a cruise ship guard on an Arctic archipelago was shot dead by another of the ship’s workers, Norwegian authorities said. The incident Saturday sparked criticism that tourists intruded in the wilderness and then killed one of the reasons they were there. The attack occurred when tourists from the MS Bremen cruise ship landed …

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Feds Hand Out Lion Trophy Permits To GOP Donors

The Huffington Post reports: The federal government has issued more than three dozen permits allowing hunters to import lion trophies from two African nations since 2016, according to copies of the applications obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request.  Thirty-three Americans were issued permits to import 38 lion trophies between 2016 and 2018, at least half of whom have …

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Feds Seek To Gut 1973 Endangered Species Act

Bloomberg reports: A decades-old environmental law credited with saving the American bald eagle from extinction would be reworked under a proposal the Trump administration announced Thursday. Enforcement of the Endangered Species Act, which seeks to prevent plans and animals from becoming extinct, would be changed to make it is easier to remove species from the list of protected ones. The …

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SOUTH AFRICA: Lions Eat Three Rhino Poachers

The Telegraph reports: At least three suspected poachers who were apparently hunting for rhinos have been mauled to death and eaten by lions on a game reserve in South Africa, the owner said on Thursday. The men entered the Sibuya Game Reserve on the southeast coast armed with a high-powered rifle and an axe in the early hours of Monday …

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Republicans Seek To Gut Endangered Species Act

Courthouse News reports: The Republican chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee introduced a draft bill this week that has conservationists worried. The legislation proposed by Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso will significantly revamp the Endangered Species Act, but critics of the move say it will essentially gut the law. Jason Rylander, a senior attorney with Defenders of Wildlife, …

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US Hunter Celebrates Killing “Rare” Black Giraffe

USA Today reports: Photos of an American hunter posing with the dead body of a “rare” black giraffe she had just killed during a hunt in South Africa have sparked outrage. The pictures emerged after they were posted on Twitter by the South Africa-based AfricLand Post website. Accompanying the post, which shows two pictures of Tess Thompson Talley of Kentucky, …

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Koko The Sign Language Gorilla Dies At Age 46 [VIDEO]

NPR reports: “The Gorilla Foundation is sad to announce the passing of our beloved Koko,” the research center says, informing the world about the death of a gorilla who fascinated and elated millions of people with her facility for language. Koko, who was 46, died in her sleep Tuesday morning, the Gorilla Foundation said. At birth, she was named Hanabi-ko …

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SOUTH AFRICA: Lion Poacher Eaten By Lions

Agence France-Presse reports: A suspected poacher was mauled to death and eaten by a pack of lions close to the Kruger National Park in South Africa, police said Monday, adding that little was left of the victim’s body. The remains were found at the weekend in the bush at a private game park near Hoedspruit in the northern province of …

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Trump To Lift Ban On Importing Elephant Trophies

ABC News reports: The Trump administration plans to allow hunters to import trophies of elephants they killed in Zimbabwe and Zambia back to the United States, reversing a ban put in place by the Obama administration in 2014, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service official confirmed to ABC News today. Even though elephants are listed as endangered under the Endangered …

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KENYA: Censor Wants Ex-Gay Therapy For Male Lions, Says They Learned Gay Sex From Watching Humans

The New York Daily News reports: Two male lions photographed while seemingly having sex has fur flying in Kenya, where a local moral leader and censor blames the same-sex behavior on gays who’ve visited the area. “These animals need counseling, because probably they have been influenced by gays who have gone to the national parks and behaved badly,” Ezekiel Mutua, …

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Cape Cod Sees Boom In Great White Sharks

Bear Week is almost upon us so here’s a bit of wildlife news from Cape Cod: An influx of great white shark sightings has residents and tourists worried about potential encounters in the water, especially during the heart of summer. Senior Fisheries Biologist Dr. Greg Skomal told ABC News the increase in the great white shark population off the Massachusetts …

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March Of The Penguins…For Science [VIDEO]

You’ll enjoy this: In honor of Earth Day and the March for Science, the Monterey Bay Aquarium held it’s own mini Science March with several of its African penguins. The aquarium dubbed its livestream the “March of the Penguins for Science,” and it included their African penguins taking an “enrichment walk” through the Kelp Forest gallery. Onlookers held signs for …

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Big Game Hunter Believed Eaten By Crocodiles

And now a moment of silence for the guy who made his living shooting elephants and lions. The Telegraph reports: A professional hunter who mysteriously vanished last week is believed to have been eaten by crocodiles on the banks of the Limpopo River in Zimbabwe. South African Scott van Zyl, 44, had gone on a hunting safari with his pack …

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FLORIDA: Manatees Removed From Endangered List

Hey! Actual good news! The Miami Herald reports: The manatee — for decades the poster mammal of environmental decline in Florida — is officially no longer an endangered species. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced on Thursday that the manatee will instead be designated “threatened” — a status change that reflects a boom in population over the last decade. …

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