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All in Animal Welfare
Coffee shops around Japan have fully embraced the concept of the animal cafe. First came pet-friendly spots, then cat and dog cafes, then all manner of creature-themed stops, including the latest craze: the pig cafe.
A 55-year-old Asian elephant named Nidia had chronic foot problems: painful fissures on her foot pads, cracked and ingrown toenails, persistent abscesses. She had no appetite and was losing weight. “The veterinarian in charge of Nidia’s care at a wildlife park in Mexico, was desperate,” reports the New York Times.
Last week scientists in Berlin announced they had successfully transferred a northern white rhinoceros embryo into a surrogate mom, the first successful use of a method that they say could save the nearly extinct rhino subspecies.
Researchers have been probing the thermal vents off the west coast of Costa Rica, using a remotely operated vehicle miles below the surface. Two expeditions by the Schmidt Ocean Institute team in 2023 have yielded a wondrous find: four new species of octopus.
What if we could synthesize rhinoceros horn, would that squeeze out the illegal trade of the real thing? Three companies have been working on such a scheme for over ten years, but nothing has come of it; all three are either out of business or about to be.
A zoo in the Czech Republic has announced the birth of an adorable pygmy hippopotamus, a wee male named Mikolas. The baby boy was born in December but unveiled to the public this week at the Dvur Kralove Zoo, about 75 miles east of Prague.
On the second Sunday in February, while most of America watches the Super Bowl, there is another football contest called the Puppy Bowl, a mock game between dogs to raise awareness on pet adoption and rescue. This year Puppy Bowl turns 20, and will feature among the canine contestants a half dozen special-needs dogs.
According to a Humane Society of the United States investigation, a petting zoo in Hauppauge, Long Island has been abusing its sloths. Disturbing video footage taken at Sloth Encounters Long Island shows staff members hitting sloths, sloths kept in crowded conditions, sloths fighting each other, and other abuses.
South Korea’s parliament this week passed a bill to ban the trade in dog meat. The legislation banning the breeding, selling, and slaughtering of dogs for their meat will come into effect in 2027, ending the centuries-old practice of doggie dining.
Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have found that great apes and chimpanzees can recognize mates they hadn't seen for years — in some cases for more than two decades — evidence of the longest-lasting nonhuman memory ever recorded.
Amateur ornithologist John Murillo happened upon one of the rarest sights in the birding world: a half female, half male green honeycreeper. The brilliant little bird was spotted at a bird-feeding station in a nature reserve near Manizales, Colombia.
It’s been a rough few years for the Florida manatee, which has suffered shocking population decline along the Sunshine State’s Atlantic coast, due mostly to i poor malnutrition. But 2023 showed a modest but encouraging improvement in both the mortality rate and the health of the seagrass on which these gentle creatures feed.
A pair of male black swans at the Melbourne Zoo have hooked up and appear to be ready to commit. After they built a nest together (with very tasteful decor), zoo caretakers deployed a 3D printer to create a clutch of faux eggs for the boys to bond over.
The US Fish and Wildlife Service wants to enlist shotgun-wielding assassins to kill more than a half million barred owls in the Pacific Northwest. The object: to save the habitat for the invasive birds’ endangered cousins, the northern spotted owl.
This week the Colorado Parks and Wildlife released five gray wolves in the wild, the first phase in the state’s program to establish a permanent, self-sustaining wolf population. The project was set in motion by a 2020 voter referendum demanding the reintroduction of the wolves, which had been eradicated from the state nearly a century ago.
On the coast of southern Tasmania, a 1,300-pound southern elephant seal has been plopping his prodigious girth on beaches, in driveways, on the road, and on front lawns. The 3-year-old, dubbed Neil the Seal by the locals, has a special fondness for traffic cones, which he plays with and gnaws on like a toddler with a pram toy.
New Jersey Transit commuters were delayed last week when a bull was spotted pacing near the passenger platform at Newark Penn Station. The longhorn steer had escaped from a local slaughterhouse.
For weeks, bears in eastern Russia’s Amur region were having a hard time bedding down for the winter, as warm weather has kept the region unfit for hibernation. In a normal year, the bears will tuck in by the end of October, but the temperature didn’t drop until this week, so it’s time to say goodnight at last.
In September, eight African painted dogs were born in South Bend, Indiana’s Potawatomi Zoo, but the zookeepers saw right away that the mother wasn’t interested in her new brood. Fearing for the survival of the new pups, the zoo brought in a surrogate mom, a heroic golden retriever named Kassy.
The ten finalists in CNN’s Hero of the Year 2023 honors are involved in literacy projects, reef-building, children of incarcerated parents, and the like, described by Anderson Cooper as “Inspiring people who are making the world a better place.”
