Living near prime wildlife habitat means that at any
given moment you might witness the astounding sight of
great Vs of migratory ducks or cackling Canada geese
flying right overhead. If you’re lucky, trumpeter swans
might be among the waterfowl feeding and calling in the
nearby estuary. And wood ducks or hooded mergansers
might pay your inland pond a visit while searching for a
quiet place to nest.
The downside of living near a natural wonderland?
Being awakened Sunday morning at first light by the
repeated volley of shotgun blasts, as though all-out war
has been declared on all things avian (as is currently happening here this morning). The Elmers (hunters) out there
(no doubt dressed in the latest expensive camo-pattern—
a fashion statement apparently meant to impress the other Elmers out…
The Dutch Parliament has voted overwhelmingly to permanently shut down an estimated 128 mink fur farms, following coronavirus outbreaks at 17 of them. The parliamentary decision is expected to be approved by the government.
The Humane Society of the US is reporting that the move comes after “the government confirmed that two farm workers were ‘extremely likely’ to have contracted the virus from mink”. Hundreds of thousands of mink were subsequently killed on the infected farms “to prevent future outbreaks”.
The Netherlands was in the process of phasing out fur farming, with a ban due to take effect in 2023 but this latest vote is likely to speed up the demise of the cruel industry. The country has already phased out fox and chinchilla fur farming.
Denmark – Europe’s largest mink fur producer – has also detected infected…
Below is a timeline of vegan activists who died speaking out for the animals.
When possible I have posted pictures of the slain individuals so they can be more than just words on a page.
1976, January 6th: William Sweet, LACS member Anti-hunting activist, Murdered after an altercation with a man who was shooting birds. His murderer was jailed for life but was later released.
1985 October 7th: Fernando Pereira a Greenpeace photographer was murdered by the French Secret Service when the vessel “Rainbow Warrior” was sunk by two explosions in Auckland Harbor, New Zealand.
The Photographer Fernando Pereira (right) and Rongelap Islander Bonemej Namwe ride ashore in the ‘bum bum’. Born on Kwajalein, Namwe, 62, has lived most of her life on Rongelap. The Rainbow Warrior is in Rongelap to assist in the evacuation of islanders to Mejato. Rongelap suffered nuclear fallout in 1954, making it a hazardous place for this community to continue living in. Eyes of Fire: p49
1988, December 22nd: Chico Mendes an anti-deforestation activist was murdered in his own home after an assassination order by a cattle rancher. He was the 19th Brazilian rainforest activist murdered that year.
1991, February 9th: Mike Hill an 18 year old hunt saboteur was deliberately run over and killed during a meet of the Cheshire Beagles. Death is deemed “accidental”. No charges are brought against the driver Allan Summersgill.
1993, April 3rd: 15-year-old hunt saboteur, Tom Warby, is deliberately run over and killed by a fox hunter as other huntsmen stand and laugh, proclaiming a “victory”. The driver, Alan Ball, is not prosecuted.
1995, February 1st: Jill Phipps was a 31-year-old British activist and mother, who was crushed to death under the wheels of a veal transporter truck carrying live animals for export at a protest at Coventry airport. The Crown Prosecution Service decided not to bring any charges against the driver.
1995, March: Dr. Karel Van Noppen was a Belgium veterinarian who was assassinated in 1993 by hitmen after exposing mafia connections to the meat industry. Dr. Van Noppen was the victim of a powerful, international mafia who violently imposing its rule on the meat business, ruthlessly bullying anyone daring to stand in its way. In 1995, a few days before his murder, Van Noppen was explicitly threatened by people linked to the “hormone black mafia” underworld.
Dr. Karel Van Noppen
1998, September 17th: David “Gypsy” Chain was an American eco-activist who was crushed to death after an irate logger fell a tree on him in California’s redwood forest. On September 17, 1998, the 24-year-old environmental activist was crushed to death by a falling tree at the Headwaters Forest in Northern California.
Activists from Earth First! accused loggers of deliberately cutting down trees in their direction, part of escalating violence against activists condoned by the Pacific Lumber Company and the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department.
Gypsy was part of an action to stop PL from destroying one of the last ancient redwood forests in the world.
The logging operation was illegal as a survey had yet to be done for the marbled murrelet, an endangered species of bird. PL attempted to portray the death as a “freak accident” and even tried to blame the victim as well as Earth First! According to PL spokesperson, Mary Bullwinkle:https://tpc.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-37/html/container.html
“Despite all our precautions, a trespasser was apparently killed by a falling tree at one of our logging sites on our private property.”
On September 18, Earth First! released a videotape revealing that loggers not only knew that demonstrators were in the area, but were angrily threatening them shortly before Gypsy was killed.
A logger shown shouting profanities and threats was, according to Earth First!, the very same logger who felled the tree that struck David. The video also showed activists scrambling up a steep hillside to escape falling trees. According to a witness statement:
“Gypsy’s death is not an isolated incident of violence. In the last several months trees have been intentionally felled at nonviolent activists at the Luna tree sit and in the Mattole watershed in Humboldt County. This is part of an escalation of violence against nonviolent forest defenders in the Northwest and all over the world.”
On September 18, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department issued preliminary findings concluding that the death was “accidental”. According to an Earth First! activist speaking at a press conference, “Police have routinely refused to file charges against anybody who assaults a forest activist.” In 1999, Mr. Chain’s parents filed a wrongful death lawsuit against PL. The company settled out of court in October of 2001, just three days before the trial was set to begin.
A collage of David “Gypsy” Chain made by a morner
2003: Animal rights activist Jane Tipson is murdered in an alleged contract killing after protesting against the construction of a dolphin aquarium in St Lucia. To this day, her killers have not been found or prosecuted.
2005: 73-year-old anti-deforestation campaigner, Dorothy Stang, is approached in the Amazon by 2 armed men working on behalf of an animal agriculture organization. Asked if she has any weapons, she produces her Bible and says that’s all she has. She is shot in the stomach, then fatally shot 5 more times as she lays on the ground.
2006: Joan Root, a conservationist, and activist against poaching and illegal fishing is murdered by 4 gunmen in her own home. To this day, her killers have not been found or prosecuted.
Joan Root and Alan Root
2010, May 12th: Elvio Fichera a volunteer for the Association of Abandoned Animals was murdered while trying to serve a warrant with police on Renzo Castagnola for cruelty to animals. Renzo Castagnola shot Elvio dead.
May 12, 2010: Paola Quartini, animal activist for LIPU (Italian League for Bird Protection – UK) from Genoa, Italy was murdered whilst trying, with police, to serve a warrant on Renzo Castagnola for cruelty to animals. Renzo Castagnola shot him dead.
2011: Two anti-deforestation activists, Jose Claudio Ribeiro da Silva and Maria do Espirito Santo, are shot dead by hired thugs, after years of constant death threats from cattle ranchers. The main suspect is acquitted. No other prosecutions.
2013: Jairo Mora Sandoval, a sea turtle activist, is bound, beaten, then fatally shot in the head by sea turtle poachers, after being kidnapped along with 4 other activists.
2020, June 19th: Regan Russell, an activist with the Animal Save Movement was murdered by a slaughterhouse truck driver that by all accounts did so on purpose.
We remember our fellow fallen friends by continuing on with the activism they died for. Any single one of their deaths could easily have been ours and that’s one reason their deaths hit so hard.
Every time we go to a vigil, protest, shutdown, undercover investigation, or any form of protest we place our lives at risk so that we can help change the world.
Never forgetting those who have sacrificed everything for a more just and equal world is the least we can do but it’s even better if we remember on the days we are too tired, or sick to go to an event.
In the end we are all brothers and sisters in this together fighting for what’s right. We are all in this together.
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Regan Russell, says friend Julie Maue, “taught me how to have long friendships. How lucky am I?” (Agnes Cseke)
As far as Mark Powell is concerned, his life ended last Friday when his wife, Regan Russell, was hit and killed by a transport truck during a Burlington animal rights protest.
Now he’ll spend the rest of his days, he says, trying to get rid of the bill that haunted her.
Powell, a west Hamilton contractor, says there’s been an international outpouring over Russell’s death, from artwork to YouTube tributes, and it’s helped make the grief a little lighter. His wife was deeply rattled by Bill 156, which creates “animal protection zones” that prohibits animal rights activists from “interfering or interacting with the farm animals in the motor vehicle.”
He’s hired a lawyer for two reasons: to see justice in her death, and to try to get the new bill repealed.
“I’ll fight it the rest of my life,” he said. “My life ended on Friday, so for as long as I’m left here, we have to pick up the torch, and we have to fight things like Bill 156.”
The notion of Russell having a legacy is comforting to Powell and others who knew her. The 65-year-old activist often protested in front of Fearman’s Pork Inc. as part of Toronto Pig Save. The group gives a last gulp of water to pigs packed into hot trailers, moments before they’re slaughtered.
That’s what she was doing at 10:20 a.m. June 19. Somehow, witnesses say, she ended up being hit by the transport truck.
Regan Russell (left) and Katherine Wightman are shown as young models in the photo on the left. In the more recent photo, Russell is on the right. “I’ve lost my right arm,” Wightman says. (Katherine Wightman)
Halton Regional Police Service said Thursday that the collision reconstruction unit is doing a “thorough investigation.”
“A determination on charges will be made by the collision reconstruction unit once the investigation is complete,” said Const. Steve Elms in an email. “At that time, investigators will issue a media release to update the community.”
Russell was also a women’s rights and Black Lives Matter supporter and attended a rally days before her death, says close friend Katherine Wightman. She believed strongly, Wightman says, that all beings are equals, and that informed her activism.
Russell often posted her thoughts on Facebook, most recently about Bill 156. “Bill 156 has passed,” she wrote on the day before she died. “Now, any time an animal is suffering on a farm in Ontario, no one, not even an employee, has the right to expose it.”
The bill was introduced in the Ontario legislature late last year. Agriculture Minister Ernie Hardeman said it’s in response to complaints from farmers about animal rights groups trespassing on their private property.
Friends and community, including Russell’s parents and husband, gathered for a vigil last weekend. (Jo-Anne McArthur / We Animals)
The bill, he said, is a “bio-security” measure. It increases the fines for anyone caught trespassing on farms or food processing plants, and makes it illegal to gain access to a farm under “false pretenses,” which effectively makes undercover filming an offence.
The Ontario Federation of Agriculture rallied support for the bill, saying it “protects our farms, families, livestock and food supply” from increasingly aggressive tactics from animal rights groups.
“Ontario farms have come under increasing threat from trespassers and activists who illegally enter property, barns and buildings, breaching biosecurity protocols,” president Keith Currie said in a June 12 media release.
“Once peaceful protests have now escalated to trespassing, invasions, barn break-ins, theft and harassment.”
There’s precedent, however, to what Powell is considering. In Idaho, Iowa and Utah, courts have struck down similar “Ag-Gag” laws as being unconstitutional. That’s led Ontario animal rights activists to consider whether Ontario’s law could be struck down in court.
“She was dynamic,” friend Julie Maue says of Russell. “She was confident. She always made you feel like you were as beautiful as her.” (Toronto Pig Save)
Powell has retained Anandi Naipaul at Ross & McBride LLP. Russell’s family has also launched a fundraising campaign “to continue Regan’s work and assist the family.”
Powell says it’s the best way he knows to honour his wife’s life. Russell’s activism began when she was 24, he says, and living in Winnipeg. She made her own sign that said “Stop the seal hunt” and stood outside a downtown government building on a frigid winter day. After several hours, she thought she’d instigated some change.
“She went home, freezing cold,” Powell said. “She took a hot bath and thought, ‘There, that’s done. What’s next?'”
Russell was born and raised in Hamilton, Powell said, and moved to Moose Jaw and then Winnipeg. In Winnipeg, she became a model, an occupation that continued until 2002. She also enjoyed spending time with the family’s seven rescue cats, which Russell warned Powell about when they started dating.
“She said, ‘You have to understand there will be cats, plural,'” he recalled. “I accepted that, and it’s grown to a family of seven cats.”
Animal activists embrace at the scene on June 19. (Andrew Collins/CBC)
In 1985, Powell says, she read Animal Liberation: A New Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals by Peter Singer, which changed her life, and she became vegan. She gave her dad Bill, now 89, the book, and he became an animal rights activist too. The pair protested together at Marineland, Powell says, and also at a 2017 Bill Cosby show in Hamilton.
Wightman met Russell as a teenage model in Winnipeg, and “she was instantly like a big sister.” The pair talked on the phone as often as five times a day. Wightman called Russell’s cell phone on June 19, not knowing Russell had died until Powell answered it and told her.
Now, “it feels like I’ve lost my right arm,” Wightman said. Their last conversation, she said, was about Bill 156. “She said, ‘I am so tired. Do you realize now the work that lies ahead of me?'”
If there is a bright spot, she said, it’s that “the word has become global about who she is and what she stood for.”
Russell’s friend Julie Maue says the last time she saw her friend, they went to the office of Hamilton West-Ancaster-Dundas MPP Sandy Shaw to talk about Bill 156. Russell, Maue says, was compassionate, intelligent and logical.
Watch
Activist killed after being struck by vehicle during Burlington pig plant protest
8 days ago
0:54
A animal activist protest in Burlington has turned deadly after Halton police say a vehicle struck and killed one of the activists. 0:54
“She was dynamic,” Maue said. “She was confident. She always made you feel like you were as beautiful as her.”
Anita Krajnc, founder of the Save movement, says Russell’s death has inspired vigils in multiple countries. She wants to keep the momentum going.
Krajnc made headlines at the Burlington plant in 2016 when she was charged with mischief for giving water to pigs. She was ultimately found not guilty after a lengthy trial that included slaughterhouse footage and testimony from a variety of experts. Russell attended the trial.
“I wake up multiple times a night, and I’m instantaneously thinking about her,” Krajnc said. Then “I go online and I watch the vigils.”
“I believe that site where Regan was killed, there will one day be a plant-based facility. I truly believe that.”
Enough of this championing one type of hunter over the other already! It just helps perpetuate the myth of the “ethical hunter.” You’re more likely to see a UFO land in the middle of a crop circle than to meet a hunter who is truly ethical to the animals he kills. How can tracking down an inoffensive creature and blasting it out of existence ever really be ethical anyway? No matter how a hunter may rationalize, or claim to give thanks to the animal’s spirit, the dying will never see their killer’s acts as the least bit honorable.
I’m sure Ted Nugent considers himself an ethical hunter. Hell, Ted Bundy likely thought himself an ethical serial killer. But to their victims they’re just murderous slobs. Likewise, Teddy Roosevelt—who, in his two-volume African Game Trails, lovingly muses over shooting elephants, hippos, buffaloes, lions, cheetahs, leopards…
New Jersey’s Marine Mammal Stranding Center was working Thursday with NOAA to find a spot where a necropsy can be performed to find out how the mammal died, authorities said.
The discovery was the first confirmed right whale death in U.S. waters this year, NOAA said.
Since 2017, 31 North Atlantic right whales have been found dead in U.S. and Canadian waters and of the 400 that are remaining, only 95 are breeding females, officials said.
Entanglement in fishing gear and vessel strikes are among the leading causes of North Atlantic right whale deaths, NOAA said.
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The rocky relationship between modern humans and coyotes, since the first cowboys and sheep boys drove their stock out onto the western plains, prairies and cleared forestland, has played out as a one-sided war waged against an unarmed opponent. Like stormtroopers from an evil empire toting weapons of mass canid destruction (traps, snares, rifles, planes and poisons), ranchers have scored heavy casualties against the embattled, outnumbered and outgunned freedom fighters. Still, coyote populations continue to hold their own and (due in part to the annihilation of wolves over much of North America) have even expanded their range from primarily west of the Mississippi to include all 49 continental United States and much of Canada.
Across time and across the continent, the coyote has been persecuted by those who value animal life only in terms…
Fast-food chains, like the rest of us, are struggling through the global pandemic. Sit-down dining options are still limited in many states, drive-thru lines are serpentine, and employees fear their safety.
How are fast-food chains responding to these challenges?
This week Starbucks announced their new Impossible Breakfast Sandwich, which joins the Impossible Croissan’wich at Burger King (debuted in early 2020) and the Dunkin’ Beyond Sausage Sandwich (the OG plant-based breakfast sammich, which came out late October 2019).
With each new announcement of their plant-based offerings, the highly paid marketing departments at these global chains adorn their product with a sparkly health halo.
Dunkin’ says of their sandwich helps “deliver the nutritional and environmental benefits of plant-based protein.” Burger King advertises that their version is “sausage made from plants” and sets a picture of the sandwich to a backdrop of bright “eco” green on their drive-thru menus. And Starbucks advertises its plant-based breakfast sandwich as part of a new way to start your day.
As a longtime fan of meat-based breakfast sandwiches, and an occasional taste-test and health-check reviewer of their plant-based alternatives, I decided to strike out from self-quarantine and try all three (yes, all three!) of these new fast-food, plant-based breakfast sandwiches in one morning.
And because I was stir-crazy and always in need of fresh ideas to entertain him, I brought along my toddler-aged son.
This was going to be fun, right?
The Starbucks Impossible Breakfast Sandwich
Photo credit: Paul Kita
Starbucks markets their brand-new faux-tein breakfast sandwich as a “plant-based sausage patty, combined with a cage-free fried egg and aged cheddar cheese on an artisanal ciabatta bread.”
It sounds so very … Starbucks.
After my toddler and I waited in a lengthy queue that passed a series of increasingly aromatic dumpsters, I picked up our sandwich, parked, and found a table at an adjacent Five Guys. There we unwrapped our first plant-based breakfast sandwich (and my son’s first ever!) in the morning light.Story continues
LONDON (Reuters) – Last fall, European Space Agency satellites detected huge plumes of the invisible planet-warming gas methane leaking from the Yamal pipeline that carries natural gas from Siberia to Europe.
A undated handout image shows methane emission hotspots associated with oil, gas and coal between January 2019 and May 2020. KAYRROS/Handout via REUTERS
Energy consultancy Kayrros estimated one leak was spewing out 93 tonnes of methane every hour, meaning the daily emissions from the leakage were equivalent to the amount of carbon dioxide pumped out in a year by 15,000 cars in the United States.
The find, which has not been reported, is part of a growing effort by companies, academics and some energy producers to use space-age technology to find the biggest methane leaks as the potent heat-trapping gas builds up…
SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — A petition that called for new rules to limit when the state can kill endangered wolves that prey on livestock was rejected Friday by the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission.
The petition was filed in May by four conservation groups who sought to prevent conflicts that have led to the killing of 31 wolves in the state since 2012.
The conservation groups are the Center for Biological Diversity, Cascadia Wildlands, Western Watersheds Project and WildEarth Guardians.
00:0201:22
The groups requested rules that would require ranchers to use non-lethal deterrence measures to prevent conflict in an effort to avoid killing wolves.
Photo by Jim Robertson 
Photo copyright Jim Robertson
Exposing the Big Game 