The Ethics of Culling Wildlife — More News from GEIG

Dateline Florence (I just like saying that), where the Global Ecological Integrity Group Conference continues: One of today’s speakers — an ecologist from Australia — asked: When is it ethically appropriate to cull wildlife to reduce the disease threat to humans? While I am pleased that such questions get posed, they raise predicate questions which [...]

Taking Animal Advocacy Seriously (Part 2 of 3)

A couple of months ago I wrote a post on why it is that people fail to take animal advocacy seriously. Today I want to elaborate that claim by illustrating it with a recent example. As most readers of AnimalBlawg probably know, President Obama swatted a fly during an interview with John Hardwood several weeks [...]

Talking Factory Farming and Vivisection in Florence

I’m in Florence at the moment and, when not gawking at the Duomo, am attending the annual conference of the Global Ecological Integrity Group (GEIG).  This conference offers a good venue to talk to my fellow enviros about animal issues.  The audience tends to be receptive, albeit sometimes skeptical — just the kind of folks [...]

Proposed Ban on Exotic Animals in Westchester Hits Wall (of Legislators)

This past Monday, at the invitation of the Committee to Ban Wild and Exotic Animal Acts, Michelle Land and I attended a meeting of the Legislation Committee of the Westchester Board of Legislators.  We were there to testify in favor of proposed legislation banning USDA certified “dangerous” animals from county property.  Such a bill would [...]

Pennsylvania State Legislator Fights for Animal Cruelty Bill

Thomas Caltagirone, Chair of the Judiciary Committee of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, authored an animal cruelty bill that is currently languishing in the Senate even though it passed the House unanimously in March.  The bill would outlaw ear cropping and “debarking” of dogs.   Mr. Caltagirone is tired of waiting.   He has declared that [...]

Geese and Airplanes — Is Extermination the Answer?

Guest Blogger Alexandra Dapolito Dunn, Pace Law School.  June 22, 2009. This is my first contribution to the Animal Blawg.  I mentioned to my colleague, Prof. David Cassuto, that I was somewhat troubled by recent stories about how Canadian geese are being managed at LaGuardia Airport following the “double bird strike” which brought down US [...]

Antibiotics in Your Organic Lettuce and Other Tales from the Factory Farm

I’m writing a piece about CAFOs and climate change for the Animals & Society Institute, which, as you might imagine, is not a cheerful pursuit.  Still, even with all my carping about antibiotics in animal feed, I had not realized that vegetables like corn, potatoes and lettuce absorb antibiotics when fertilized with livestock manure.  Usually, [...]

Free Speech at the Margins — ALDF and Animal Law Profs File Amicus Brief in U.S. v. Stevens

In U.S. v. Stevens, the Supreme Court will decide whether a federal law forbidding depictions of animal cruelty violates the First Amendment.  Suzanne first blogged about the case here.  ALDF and animal law professors from all over the country (of whom I am one) recently filed an amicus brief in this case.  One of the [...]

Misplaced Activism?

I found the trailer for The Cove the other night while browsing the apple.com/trailers. You can find it here.  I’m encouraged that this is on the front page of the trailers page; it gives me hope that it might been seen by more people than it would if it were advertised only in independent movie [...]

Duck Liver, Bob Herbert and the Plight of the American Worker

Zoe Weil does a fine job taking Bob Herbert to task for his cavalier dismissal of the plight of the ducks at an upstate NY foie gras facility.  Herbert concerns himself with the exploitation of the workers at the facility — which is all to the good.  But he gratuitously dismisses the gruesome existence of [...]

Industrial Agriculture and What NOT to Read During Summer Vacation

Washington State University assigned Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma to all incoming freshmen as required summer reading.  The idea: to spur a debate about industrial agriculture and its impact on American society.  Great idea, right?  I guess not.  Citing “budget constraints,” the university has withdrawn the book. According to this article in the Chronicle of [...]

Agriculture Exempt from Carbon Caps Under Waxman-Markey

Anyone who was hoping that the climate change bill currently making its way through Congress would have any significant impact on global warming should read this post at Grist.  As the bill currently reads, agriculture is exempt from any carbon caps (despite a carbon footprint exceeding that of the transportation sector).  Yet, Big Ag and [...]

New Peer Review Format at Pace Environmental Law Review

I have mentioned before that, in my view, environmental law and animal law are inseverably linked.  In the spirit of bridging the counter-productive gulf between between the two disciplines, I note the following announcement from the Pace Environmental Law Review: Pace Environmental Law Review is Raising the Bar with Peer Review As of August 1, [...]

Animal Law in New York

Guest Blogger: Stephen Iannocone It seems that animal law is beginning to evolve in the state of New York. While animal cruelty has not been on the same level as a mere traffic violation for quite some time, New York Law continues to move in the right direction. New York’s Agriculture and Markets Law even [...]

What to do About our Non-Vegetarian (vegan) Loved Ones

I always struggle with how to deal with my non-vegetarian (vegan) loved ones. On the one hand, I love them to death and don’t want to alienate them by continuously explaining to them the immorality of some of their food choices. On the other hand, I feel that I have a moral obligation to let [...]

The Underbelly of Horse Racing

Summer Bird won the Preakness yesterday.  So, perhaps now would be a good time to revisit the world of thoroughbred racing (Luis first posted about it here). A Few Basic facts: – Horse racing is a $4 Billion industry – racehorses weigh over 1000 pounds, but have been selectively bred to have smaller legs – [...]

More on Cows and Climate

Following up on the post below, this article in the NYT bears a look.  Some in the dairy industry (e.g. Stonyfield Farms) are experimenting with feeding dairy cows green plants instead of corn to see if it lowers their methane output.  Guess what?  It does. Cattle fed alfalfa and flax emit less methane than those [...]

Agriculture, Climate Change and the UNFCC

The International Federation of Agricultural Producers has produced a declaration addressing the role of agriculture in both causing and potentially mitigating climate change.  The document bears reading in its entirety both for what it says and for what it does not.  It advocates creating a framework for carbon sequestration and for increased access to and [...]

Week-Long Series at Slate on “Pepper the Stolen Dog Who Changed America”

Slate features an important, fascinating, and disturbing  tale of dog who was kidnapped from her home in Pennsylvania and made the subject of a grotesque series of experiments (which I will not dignify with the adjective “scientific”) by Ivan Pavlov (of “Pavlov’s dog” fame).  First article in the series is here. –David Cassuto

Fish Feel Pain; Now What?

Guest blogger: Elaine Hsaio One of the most common arguments for not eating meat is animal suffering, but this rationale all too often stops short at recognizing the pain of other beings.  Common example: pescatarianism.  Fish don’t feel pain or experience suffering, so we can continue to eat fish despite having given up meat because [...]

The Continuing Impact of Proposition 2

In the wake of Prop 2, lawmakers in California have apparently been bitten by the animal protection bug.  Legislation is working its way through both chambers that would ban tail-docking of dairy cows, ban importation of eggs from out-of-state facilities that use unacceptable battery cages, abolish large-scale puppy mills, and increase the penalties for poaching [...]