test blog 3

My apologies to wmtc readers who saw this on Facebook, but this story must be recorded on this blog! Yesterday morning the dogs were barking at the back door, really going nuts, and not settling down. Checking to see what was going on, I got quite a surprise. A skunk with a container stuck on its head was running in circles, frantically trying to get the thing off. What to do?? I wanted to help it, but I'm not keen on getting skunked! Our dogs have been sprayed many times over the years; our suburban landscape is full of skunks. Watching this poor creature run wildly around the lawn was so horrible. I called Allan to lure the dogs away from the door, then ran outside with a broom. I thought I could knock the container off the skunk's face from a distance, then get inside before he could hurt me. I hit the container with the broom several times, but it wouldn't come off. The whole time I was muttering, please don't spray me please don't spray me please don't spr...

I've begun changing my personal care products to cruelty-free: natural products from companies that are better for the environment and don't test on animals. I'm not sure how far I'll be able to go, but I've begun the process. After a lifetime of using conventional products, I was moved to think more about this by a few different sources. When I worked in the children's library, I often saw a book about animal cruelty. It was not the one I wrote about here , about dogs, but a book in a series called "Tough Issues," similar to the kind of series I used to contribute to. This "tough issue" asked the question, "Why do people harm animals?"  It's a good book, one that successfully treads that very careful line separating honesty from the overly graphic. Even so, there was one image that burned in my brain. (I know this image would have been highly disturbing to me as a child. Considering I saw the image in a children's book, thi...

I've mentioned Beretta Farms in many different posts over the years, but I've never specifically blogged about them. With grilling season underway, it's time to give Beretta a shout-out. When I learned about the horrors of factory farming, first from reading Michael Pollan , and later through other sources, I knew I needed to change my eating habits. I needed to translate my knowledge into action, but I was at a loss for what to do. In the 1990s, I had eaten a vegetarian (almost vegan) diet for more than two years, but it didn't work for me, and I gave it up. I certainly don't eat meat with every meal, but I learned that I do need animal protein for optimal function. But once the curtain had been lifted on the horrors of factory farming, I could no longer stand the thought of contributing to the industrial food chain, especially as it relates to animal abuse. The first step was releasing myself from all-or-nothing thinking about food. We're not going to buy onl...

I'm working on a few actual posts, where I actually write something and you might actually read it. Until those materialize, please enjoy these fine examples of interspecies love. First, the incredible story of Mr. G. and Jellybean. Read more about it here. Bring a tissue. Next, friendship is not just for funny little grass-eaters. Big carnivores have friends, too. And finally, a beautiful German Shepherd and an adorable piglet are in love in BC. Slide show here. Many thanks to Steph and Miss Essie Ash for sharing these! (Can any code-friendly readers tell me why there is a huge space after that second embed?)

After living in the Toronto area for more than eight years, I still had never visited the Toronto Zoo , opting for several trips to Jungle Cat World and the Haliburton Wolf Centre instead (links here and here ). But when one of the polar bears in the Toronto Zoo gave birth in November , there was finally enough incentive to plan a trip. My friend J and I went in March, when the cub was four months old. We took an insane number of photos, which you can see here on Flickr . (The set is about half of what I shot.)

If this doesn't tug at your heartstrings, better call 911. You might be dead. Many thanks to Stephanie for helping me stay afloat.

I am always astonished to see stories such as these. A tree-dwelling animal with a teddy-bear-like face and rust-coloured fur has become the newest mammal species discovered by scientists. The olinguito, the smallest known member of the raccoon family, lives in the cloud forests high in the Andes Mountains of Colombia and Ecuador, reported a team of scientists from the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., which described it in the journal ZooKeys Thursday. The animal has actually been displayed in museums and zoos over the past 100 years, but was mistakenly identified as a different, known species among its close relatives, the olingo. "It's been kind of hiding in plain sight for a long time," Kristofer Helgen, curator of mammals at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, and lead author of the new report, told The Associated Press. And this. Giant Maya Carvings Found in Guatemala Archaeologist Anya Shetler cleans an inscription below an ancient...

Sadly, this will not embed. So please click . You won't be sorry. Go click now! Thanks to Stephanie!

A while back, I asked: " how can we live without polar bears? ". The world has taken one step closer to that vision, helping the polar bear along the road to extinction. Stephen Harper's government was one of the worst offenders. From NRDC: As I wrote last week, the international community rejected a US proposal to ban the global commercial trade in polar bear parts (skins, teeth, claws, skulls) at a meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in Bangkok, Thailand. For the second time in three years, parties to the convention turned their backs on the plight of polar bears and the threat over hunting poses to the species – a species that, according to the best science, will likely lose more than two-thirds of its population by 2050 as a result of climate change. It was this dual threat of climate change and over hunting that created one of the biggest challenges for the US proposal. Parties at CITES are used to assessing and analyzing...

It's been a while since I've written about children's books, and an even longer while since I've done an interspecies love post, so why not combine the two? There's a spate of children's books depicting cross-species animal friendships, some excellent, some better avoided. Children love these stories for the same reasons we do. There is something so touching - and off-the-charts cute! - about these friendships between animals who should, by nature, be afraid of each other, or even in a very different kind of relationship - at mealtime. For kids, some of these books have a moral overlay, teaching about difference and tolerance. That's fine, as long as its done with a light touch. Children's books don't need to be didactic to get their message across. I've seen at least a dozen animal-friendship books, and there are probably a dozen more I haven't seen. I've chosen four good ones, and highlighted two others that are noteworthy for the wrong...

In this post, I look at two nonfiction books for young readers. Both are featured in the current " Forest of Reading " program, a province-wide recreational reading program sponsored by the Ontario Library Association. Both fiction and nonfiction winners of the various Forest of Reading awards - Silver Birch, Red Maple, and so on - are featured in public and school libraries throughout the province. In other words, lots of kids will read these books. And that is a very good thing. The Sea Wolves: Living Wild in the Great Bear Rainforest , Ian McAllister and Nicholas Read, 2012 This beautiful book introduces young readers to some fascinating creatures and their unique habitat. The Sea Wolves begins with the many cultural myths and fears about wolves, then dispels those misconceptions with facts about these beautiful, intelligent, highly social animals. The book examines a unique sub-species of wolf that lives in the rainforest on Canada's Pacific coast. Smaller and thinne...

Company abuses animals/the environment/labour. Employee comes forward to make the abuse public. Company tries to silence employee. It's an old story, and it repeats itself again and again, in many different contexts. You've seen it dramatized in movies like Silkwood and Erin Brockovich. It's what Bradley Manning is going through on a grand scale. Whistleblowers risk their jobs, and in some cases their lives, to stand up for others. Often, without whistleblowers, we would never know the truth. That's why we have an obligation to stand up for whistleblowers. If you live in Ontario and watch any television, you've seen the ads for Marineland, with that cloying song: They come from a land of ice and snow, now belugas have a home in On-tar-ee-o... Everyone loves Marineland... Everyone loves Marineland... That chorus is bitterly ironic. If the residents of Marineland could speak, I doubt those marine mammals would say they love living in unhealthy water that causes const...

This beautiful wolf, the alpha male of the pack at the Haliburton Wolf Centre, was shot and killed on New Year's Day . The previous night, some idiot cut both the inner and outer fences on the pack's enclosure. Four wolves escaped. Haida is now dead, and the other wolves, who were born in captivity and are unlikely to be able to survive the winter on their own, were missing. An update from a local paper says that the other escapees have been spotted outside the fence, trying to get home. Wolf centre people are trying to lure them in with food. Poor Haida. What a terrible waste, and so traumatic for the rest of the pack. My wolf-loving friend J, who sent me this story, says: "It's just a shame that whoever vandalized the compound didn't get munched by the wolves on their way out." Can't say I disagree.

Tragic. Criminal. Completely unnecessary. The alpha female known as 832F is dead. She was murdered. Yellowstone National Park’s best-known wolf, beloved by many tourists and valued by scientists who tracked its movements, was shot and killed on Thursday outside the park’s boundaries, Wyoming wildlife officials reported. The wolf, known as 832F to researchers, was the alpha female of the park’s highly visible Lamar Canyon pack and had become so well known that some wildlife watchers referred to her as a “rock star.” The animal had been a tourist favorite for most of the past six years. The wolf was fitted with a $4,000 collar with GPS tracking technology, which is being returned, said Daniel Stahler, a project director for Yellowstone’s wolf program. Based on data from the wolf’s collar, researchers knew that her pack rarely ventured outside the park, and then only for brief periods, Dr. Stahler said. This year’s hunting season in the northern Rockies has been especially controversial ...

Please watch this 45-second video, then sign a letter a to Ken Salazar, US Secretary of the Interior. Your click may or may not save the lives of wolves. But not clicking will surely allow the killing to continue. Sign here.

Canadian Senator Mac Harb has been fighting for many years to end the commercial seal hunt in Canada. I admire him and his struggle, which must be lonely at times, and at the moment has little to no official support. The Canadian commercial seal hunt is a shameful waste of life that contributes very little (if at all) to the economy of Atlantic Canada. It is a vestige of a bygone era, and it should be retired along with the specious arguments propping it up. Despite claims to the contrary, abolishing the seal hunt will not harm aboriginal sustenance hunters, as their native status exempts them from laws governing commercial fishing and sealing. Evidence against the commercial seal hunt continues to pile up. Most recently, a landmark study concluded that the seal hunt is "inherently inhumane", and cannot be altered to conform with acceptable animal-welfare standards. "Canada’s commercial seal hunt does not occur in a controlled environment. Rather, it happens far offsho...

Please watch this beautiful video from Pacific Wild , featuring former NHL goalie (and Hall-of-Famer) Mike Richter, and more importantly, featuring the Spirit Bear Coast. In less than four minutes, you will understand the utter madness of bringing an oil pipeline and supertankers to this area. Madness, that is, unless you're one of the few who will profit from the destruction. The Northern Gateway pipeline is now open for public comment. We have until August 31 to add our voices to the opposition. Here's how. 1. Sign a message from the David Suzuki Foundation. It will be sent to the relevant elected officials. 2. Register your opinion with the National Energy Board Joint Review Committee on the Enbridge Northern Gateway project website. Hearings on the pipeline continue into 2013, but the deadline for public comment is August 31, 2012 . Please sign, comment, and share widely. Many thanks to Mike Richter, the NRDC, and Pacific Wild for the video. It's great to see a former...

In light of the horror show taking place in Ottawa, this would be the perfect time to post notes from " Can We Stop the Harper Agenda ," the big panel discussion at Marxism 2012. However, I'm waiting to get an audio file of the talk, which will greatly improve the post. While I wait for that, I'll try my hand at two other pieces I've been thinking about for a long time. * * * * I recently wrote about two books - What Is the What and A Long Way Gone - that I recommended with warnings. Both are excellent and well worth reading, and both deal with highly disturbing subjects, including graphic depictions of atrocities and other violence. This led me to think about the choice to read or watch that kind of disturbing, difficult material - and the choice not to. In the past, I've had no patience for people who refuse to deal with anything that might be upsetting or disturbing, people who seem to live in ignorance and denial, who steadfastly avoid anything that migh...

Jean Craighead George, author of some classics of children's literature, died a few days ago. In one of those eerie coincidences that seem to happen so often, I was just talking about George. At the library, I noticed that one of my favourite childhood books, My Side of the Mountain , was written by author of Julie of the Wolves , a book I loved when I was slightly older. I wondered if I knew that as a child, or if my love of My Side of the Mountain pre-dated my interest in authors. (That seems unlikely, as I worshipped Laura Ingalls Wilder, and knew the names E. B. White and John Steinbeck as a very young reader.) George wrote more than 100 books, and I'm sure I read several of them. But My Side of the Mountain and Julie of the Wolves remain in my heart to this day. Thank you, Jean! I'm glad you lived a full life. This excerpt from the New York Times obituary captures some of what made George's writing so meaningful. “My Side of the Mountain” tells the story of Sam...