Author Archive
Bison on Birth Control
November 27th, 2009 | 
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Catalina Bison
With great ardor, Bill Dyer, IDA’s Southern California Coordinator, has been fighting for the rights of one species or another every day of his life or so it seems. There have been the feral cats, dogs, goats, abused captive elephants, and whales, among so many others, and the American bison, specifically the ones on Catalina Island, 23 miles west off the coast of Los Angeles. In 2003, when the Catalina Island Conservancy, which controls more than 90 percent of the island, wanted to reduce the non-native bison population—the clock ticking infallibly—Bill, in one of the more thrilling rescues of his storied career, raised the funds to relocate 103 bison to three Native-American tribal lands in South Dakota, where they would live freely. Bill choreographed that inspired odyssey with Catalina resident Debbie Avellana, and the conservancy.
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Grady finds a home because Project Hope found him.
Grady, a Mastiff mix, spent months in the Winona Animal Shelter, in Winona, Mississippi, a prisoner of a five-run outdoor facility, with one barrel in each run and constantly running water, leaving him and the rest of his kennel mates always cold and wet—a purgatory for captive dogs. He had mange, a bacterial infection, and was undernourished. Doll Stanley had seen the miserable dog on a number of occasions, but there was no room for him at the Project Hope sanctuary, and she had to stay focused on getting the mothers and puppies out so the puppies wouldn’t die. And, finally, the day came when she was able to take Grady, and then immediately boarded him at Veterinary Associates in Grenada, where the staff fell in love with him and revivified his physical state and spirit to the point where he was able to go the sanctuary. “Rescue takes time. Unlike ‘Animal Planet,’ there are months of rehab, expenses, and the search for a home worthy of them.”
The Nine Elephants of Zimbabwe
Nine elephants who survived the grim and punishing assaults of being forcibly captured from the wild and then endured the harrowing training methods for elephant back safaris at a Zimbabwe ranch—with its sickening smell of human injustice, along with chains, severe deprivation, and torturous taming methods—were rescued in an elation-bringing moment by the Zimbabwe National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty Against Animals (ZNSPCA) and have now been released into Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe. Fully recovered from injuries incurred during the breaking and training process, radio collars for tracking reveals the elephants are now forming new bonds as a herd, and socializing well with one another in the intricately unified and sophisticated world of elephant social groups.
Gigi’s Tail
Gigi and Family
Mike Massucco and Trese Biagini are drawn to the abused, scarred, ill, and old—a mosaic of the not loved enough. Outcasts all. The tan and white Pit Bull puppy with the white blaze on her forehead and stockings on her short front legs was found walking along a highway and didn’t fit the usual bill. With her good looks, coquettish smile, and her tail-wagging, fervor-for-life character, Gigi was nearly perfect.
Dorothy’s Photo
It is with rapt fascination that a photograph of a deceased chimpanzee being visibly mourned by dozens of chimpanzees looking on as the body is being wheeled for burial has transfixed viewers across the Internet, on television, and in countless publications, with its soul-piercing sadness. The image of the matriarch Dorothy, lying still amid orphaned chimpanzees at Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue Center, in Cameroon, Africa, is something wondrous to behold. The Sanaga-Yong Center, which provides sanctuary for nearly 70 orphans, victims of the illegal bushmeat trade, is a project of IDA Africa, the creation of In Defense of Animals’ Dr. Sheri Speede. who first traveled to the country to volunteer her veterinary skills. She made friends with three chimpanzees, Becky, Jacky, and Pepe—who had suffered decades in small cages at a resort hotel and, in 1999, became the first adult chimpanzees who had been rescued in Cameroon. In 2000, IDA Africa organized a forced confiscation of adult chimpanzees Dorothy and Nama, and eight monkeys, the first armed confiscation of illegally held primates in Cameroon.
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