It’s obvious the disgusting reality of this issue. To think that they actually believe that killing elephants is the solution to this issue really shows that they simply WANT to eat elephants.
To look to no other options will likely leave the Zimbabwe Defence Forces (ZDF) and the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority in the running for the cruelest organizations of 2009, and for the most ignorant and short sided thinking groups of 2009.
Article:
‘Elephants Slaughtered To Feed Hungry Soldiers’
http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/local/21772-elephants-slaughtered-to-feed-hungry-soldiers.html
Thursday, 08 January 2009 20:18
IN a move likely to appal conservationists the Zimbabwe Defence Forces (ZDF) and the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority have reportedly struck a deal that has resulted in the authority slaughtering elephants to feed soldiers at army barracks across the country.
Sources in the army told the Zimbabwe Independent that there were acute food shortages in the barracks and the supply of elephant meat was a big relief.
Parks Authority director-general Morris Mutsambiwa yesterday said there was no such a deal with the army.
However, military sources insisted the existence of the pact and disclosed that shortages of food rations in the barracks started early last year after the Ministry of Defence exhausted its budgetary allocation due to the harsh economic environment.
Secretary for Defence Trust Maphosa last year admitted before the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Defence and Home Affairs that the government was fortunate that none of the soldiers had so far dared to take it to court for failing to comply with the statutes on food requirements.
“For the better part of last year army canteens have been preparing the staple sadza only and soldiers have been bringing their own relish,” one of the military sources said. “Although the state has a statutory obligation to provide soldiers stipulated amounts of kilojoules and calories per every meal, the government has taken advantage of their ignorance and docility to renege on its responsibility.”
The sources said most barracks started taking delivery of the elephant meat last week.
“People started eating the meat of elephants last week,” said a female soldier from 2 Brigade in Cranborne.
In a written response to questions from the Independent, Parks spokesperson Olivia Mufute said: “Dr Morris Mutsambiwa said there is no such agreement that exists between the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority and the Zimbabwe National Army.”
Army director for public relations Simon Tsatsi professed ignorance of the matter before requesting written questions.
“I am sorry I am not aware of that, please put your questions in writing and fax them to our offices,” Tsatsi said.
The government is desperate to reduce the population of elephants in the country which it claims has far exceeded the carrying capacity of its national parks.
Pressure from animal rights groups has, however, prevented it from wholesale killing of the animals while it cannot afford the other control options that include translocation to countries with smaller populations and contraception.
While control and management of the animals is giving the Zimbabwe government serious headaches, in other parts of the world they have become an endangered species which has to be protected under the Convention on International Trade on Endangered Species of Flora and Fauna.
Showing posts with label poaching wildlife. Show all posts
Showing posts with label poaching wildlife. Show all posts
Friday, January 09, 2009
Friday, June 06, 2008
Indiana Jones Star Harrison Ford Speaks About the Evils of Illegal Animal Trafficking and How You Can Help to Stop It
As I’ve said before, it’s always positive when famous people dedicate themselves to causes greater than themselves. In this case, it’s hard to find a bigger movies star than Harrison Ford.
Harrison does an excellent job of stating what should be simple – that purchasing products that look like they contain rare animal products (such as skin and fur) likely come from an endangered species. In addition, when you buy these products, then the cycle continues. More will be killed.
As he states in the article below: "Many of the world's most magnificent animals are being pushed toward extinction by the illegal trade and products made from their body parts….When you travel abroad you may be offered some of these products. It might look nothing like the animal itself but don't be fooled. An animal has been killed to make one of these."
Article:
Harrison Ford Warns Against Illegal Animal Trafficking
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=5001932&page=1
'When the Buying Stops, the Killing Can Too,' Actor Says in PSAs
By KIRIT RADIA
June 5, 2008
When moviegoers settle in to watch the new Indiana Jones movie in theaters, they may first see an unexpected message from its star, Harrison Ford.
Before Indiana Jones tries to save the artifacts in the movie, Ford will tell the audience to save the animals.
"Our endangered animals are being destroyed by illegal wildlife trade. It's up to us to stop it. Never buy illegal wildlife products. When the buying stops, the killing can too," the actor says in one of three public service announcements taped for an international campaign to curb illegal animal trafficking.
Ford has teamed with the U.S. State Department and the nonprofit organization WildAid to promote the message around the world.
"Many of the world's most magnificent animals are being pushed toward extinction by the illegal trade and products made from their body parts," Ford says in another ad, standing among alligator coats and holding snakeskin boots. "When you travel abroad you may be offered some of these products. It might look nothing like the animal itself but don't be fooled. An animal has been killed to make one of these."
Ford is an avid environmentalist and is the vice chairman of the group Conservation International's board of directors.
"People pay attention when someone like Harrison Ford delivers the message so we're lucky to have him do the ads," Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans Environment and Science Claudia McMurray told ABC News.
The State Department said it will distribute the ads through more than 30 of its embassies around the world. Already, they have been shown on television and in movie theaters in India and Brazil, some of the most populous countries that also happen to be the origin for many of the poached animals.
"Given the global nature of this campaign, I think we have the capacity to reach millions of people," McMurray said in a phone interview from New York, where she will unveil the ads at the United Nations alongside actress and animal rights activist Bo Derek, who has also served as the secretary of state's special envoy for wildlife trafficking issues.
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Finding and Convicting Poachers Being Made Easier with High –Tech Techniques
Very good news. Looks like at least one person is serious about this.
Article:
Poaching probes go high-tech
http://www.casperstartribune.net/articles/2007/
08/08/news/regional/40633927f89f60548725732f006f3029.txtBy
REBECCA BOONEAssociated Press writer
CALDWELL, Idaho -- A knife with traces of blood found in a suspect's truck. A few hairs picked up at the crime scene hundreds of miles away. Authorities feared the victim was dead, perhaps already dismembered and eaten.
Dr. Karen Rudolph didn't have much time: She had to see if DNA on the bloody knife matched the scattered hair found on a rock outcropping in the Idaho wilderness. Two days later, working quickly but carefully on delicate equipment in a state laboratory, she had an answer for investigators. The DNA was a match.
The suspect was arrested and charged -- with poaching.
"Idaho poachers, until recently, were kind of your average Joe Bad Guy out in the woods doing small-fry things," said Rudolph, a wildlife laboratory biologist for the Idaho Department of Fish and Game. "But now many of them literally hunt every day and night -- looking for antlers to sell so some rich guy in Jackson Hole can have an antler chandelier, or ingredients to make some strange alternative medicine or to get a trophy for bragging rights. It's become commercial."
That means more high-stakes court cases, she said, with defendants hiring top-dollar attorneys and juries expecting high-tech evidence.
And that's where Rudolph comes in.
As the state's only wildlife DNA expert, the 44-year-old Horseshoe Bend resident handles evidence for many of Idaho's poaching cases. At its simplest, Rudolph's job requires her to forensically determine the species, gender and identity of any given hunk of tissue, wayward tuft of hair, bone chip or dried splatter of blood.
In many cases, her work has helped prosecutors win convictions and encouraged defendants to plead guilty without going to trial, officials said.
In one recent case, Gary Lehnherr of McFarland, Wis., and Ronnie Gardner of Jerome, Idaho both pleaded guilty in federal court to illegally killing a trophy mule deer in Lincoln County with a high-caliber center fire rifle. Rudolph matched DNA in blood and hair found at the kill site -- in an area where only muzzleloader hunting was allowed -- with DNA from the deer's antlers, found in Lehnherr's home.
When the two are sentenced Oct. 15, they face up to one year in prison and $100,000 fines for the federal misdemeanor. Assistant U.S. Attorney George Breitsameter, who prosecuted the case, said Rudolph's work was "an important investigative tool" in the case.
DNA also helped crack the case of a man who was suspected of trying to poison wolves in Wyoming and Idaho with pesticide-laced meatballs. No wolves were found dead, but the tainted meat was suspected in the death of more than 20 pet dogs.
First, DNA from some meatballs found at a crime scene near Salmon was matched to DNA found in blood in Tim Sundles' freezer. The former Salmon resident, who now lives in Montana, was headed for trial but pleaded guilty after more DNA evidence turned up.
Investigators had taken samples of yellow snow found at the crime scene that day, suspecting that the person who left the meatballs had relieved himself at the site. They were right, Breitsameter said -- DNA from human cells found in the urine was a perfect match for Sundles.
In February, Sundles was sentenced to six days in jail, banned from federal or public land for two years and ordered to pay more than $1,500 in fines for violating the Endangered Species Act.
The use of DNA evidence in wildlife investigations is fairly new, but it's being used more and more, Breitsameter said.
"I'm not sure if that's because of people's expectations, but DNA is the modern fingerprint that people can use to attach an individual to a crime," he said. "It's only come up in the last couple of years or so here, and as it's available, it's required because it can either exculpate somebody or has the potential to inculpate them."
At the tiny cinderblock Fish and Game lab where Rudolph works in Caldwell, the mail may bring a cardboard tube filled with bear bait or a wrapped hunk of meat taken from someone's freezer. Game wardens often stumble on suspected crime scenes while they're hiking in the wilderness, Rudolph said, so they have to collect the evidence with whatever makeshift container they can find in their backpacks.
Sometimes Rudolph finds herself living something like a countrified scene from the TV crime thriller CSI.
"I've been given a bone saw that had tissue from different animals stuck between the tiny teeth of the blade. Once, I had to pick through a shop vacuum for tissue. We mostly found hair," she said. "I spent hours examining a pontoon boat for moose blood, because the officer had a tip that the poacher had been fishing the same day he killed a moose, and both the boat and the moose were transported in the same truck."
Some suspects, apparently unaware that investigators use advanced forensic techniques, get a little cocky and unwittingly help investigators, Rudolph said.
"One guy had a folding knife that a warden thought had been used in a poaching case, and when the officer asked for it, the guy laughed and said, 'Go ahead and take it. I've already cleaned it and boiled it and you won't find anything."'
Back in the lab, Rudolph was undeterred. She put a layer of aluminum foil down on the lab counter and slowly opened the folding knife. As she ran a tiny brush over the hinge, the bristles dislodged a speck of dried blood.
The sample was minuscule. But it was enough to run a DNA test and connect the knife to the poached animal, she said.
Few states have their own wildlife DNA lab, said Ken Goddard, director of the National Fish and Wildlife Forensics Lab. So Goddard's Ashland, Ore. lab handles wildlife evidence from across the nation, as well as for some international cases.
"Maybe 8 or 9 states have one person, but have never been able to get the funding for a real lab," Goddard said. "The idea is to take what works in a human crime scene and transfer it to wildlife crime management. All labs -- human or wildlife -- try to link the suspect, the crime scene and the evidence together. But in wildlife, you have to figure out first if a crime was committed. That can depend on time of day, what side of the road someone was on and even the type of weapon used."
Ultimately, the use of DNA evidence helps keep game wardens safe by minimizing their initial contact with suspects, Goddard said.
"Before, you had to catch them with the deer or poached bear and they're generally armed at the time. That can be terribly dangerous," he said. "Now they don't have to catch people in the act -- they can just gather the evidence later."
Article:
Poaching probes go high-tech
http://www.casperstartribune.net/articles/2007/
08/08/news/regional/40633927f89f60548725732f006f3029.txtBy
REBECCA BOONEAssociated Press writer
CALDWELL, Idaho -- A knife with traces of blood found in a suspect's truck. A few hairs picked up at the crime scene hundreds of miles away. Authorities feared the victim was dead, perhaps already dismembered and eaten.
Dr. Karen Rudolph didn't have much time: She had to see if DNA on the bloody knife matched the scattered hair found on a rock outcropping in the Idaho wilderness. Two days later, working quickly but carefully on delicate equipment in a state laboratory, she had an answer for investigators. The DNA was a match.
The suspect was arrested and charged -- with poaching.
"Idaho poachers, until recently, were kind of your average Joe Bad Guy out in the woods doing small-fry things," said Rudolph, a wildlife laboratory biologist for the Idaho Department of Fish and Game. "But now many of them literally hunt every day and night -- looking for antlers to sell so some rich guy in Jackson Hole can have an antler chandelier, or ingredients to make some strange alternative medicine or to get a trophy for bragging rights. It's become commercial."
That means more high-stakes court cases, she said, with defendants hiring top-dollar attorneys and juries expecting high-tech evidence.
And that's where Rudolph comes in.
As the state's only wildlife DNA expert, the 44-year-old Horseshoe Bend resident handles evidence for many of Idaho's poaching cases. At its simplest, Rudolph's job requires her to forensically determine the species, gender and identity of any given hunk of tissue, wayward tuft of hair, bone chip or dried splatter of blood.
In many cases, her work has helped prosecutors win convictions and encouraged defendants to plead guilty without going to trial, officials said.
In one recent case, Gary Lehnherr of McFarland, Wis., and Ronnie Gardner of Jerome, Idaho both pleaded guilty in federal court to illegally killing a trophy mule deer in Lincoln County with a high-caliber center fire rifle. Rudolph matched DNA in blood and hair found at the kill site -- in an area where only muzzleloader hunting was allowed -- with DNA from the deer's antlers, found in Lehnherr's home.
When the two are sentenced Oct. 15, they face up to one year in prison and $100,000 fines for the federal misdemeanor. Assistant U.S. Attorney George Breitsameter, who prosecuted the case, said Rudolph's work was "an important investigative tool" in the case.
DNA also helped crack the case of a man who was suspected of trying to poison wolves in Wyoming and Idaho with pesticide-laced meatballs. No wolves were found dead, but the tainted meat was suspected in the death of more than 20 pet dogs.
First, DNA from some meatballs found at a crime scene near Salmon was matched to DNA found in blood in Tim Sundles' freezer. The former Salmon resident, who now lives in Montana, was headed for trial but pleaded guilty after more DNA evidence turned up.
Investigators had taken samples of yellow snow found at the crime scene that day, suspecting that the person who left the meatballs had relieved himself at the site. They were right, Breitsameter said -- DNA from human cells found in the urine was a perfect match for Sundles.
In February, Sundles was sentenced to six days in jail, banned from federal or public land for two years and ordered to pay more than $1,500 in fines for violating the Endangered Species Act.
The use of DNA evidence in wildlife investigations is fairly new, but it's being used more and more, Breitsameter said.
"I'm not sure if that's because of people's expectations, but DNA is the modern fingerprint that people can use to attach an individual to a crime," he said. "It's only come up in the last couple of years or so here, and as it's available, it's required because it can either exculpate somebody or has the potential to inculpate them."
At the tiny cinderblock Fish and Game lab where Rudolph works in Caldwell, the mail may bring a cardboard tube filled with bear bait or a wrapped hunk of meat taken from someone's freezer. Game wardens often stumble on suspected crime scenes while they're hiking in the wilderness, Rudolph said, so they have to collect the evidence with whatever makeshift container they can find in their backpacks.
Sometimes Rudolph finds herself living something like a countrified scene from the TV crime thriller CSI.
"I've been given a bone saw that had tissue from different animals stuck between the tiny teeth of the blade. Once, I had to pick through a shop vacuum for tissue. We mostly found hair," she said. "I spent hours examining a pontoon boat for moose blood, because the officer had a tip that the poacher had been fishing the same day he killed a moose, and both the boat and the moose were transported in the same truck."
Some suspects, apparently unaware that investigators use advanced forensic techniques, get a little cocky and unwittingly help investigators, Rudolph said.
"One guy had a folding knife that a warden thought had been used in a poaching case, and when the officer asked for it, the guy laughed and said, 'Go ahead and take it. I've already cleaned it and boiled it and you won't find anything."'
Back in the lab, Rudolph was undeterred. She put a layer of aluminum foil down on the lab counter and slowly opened the folding knife. As she ran a tiny brush over the hinge, the bristles dislodged a speck of dried blood.
The sample was minuscule. But it was enough to run a DNA test and connect the knife to the poached animal, she said.
Few states have their own wildlife DNA lab, said Ken Goddard, director of the National Fish and Wildlife Forensics Lab. So Goddard's Ashland, Ore. lab handles wildlife evidence from across the nation, as well as for some international cases.
"Maybe 8 or 9 states have one person, but have never been able to get the funding for a real lab," Goddard said. "The idea is to take what works in a human crime scene and transfer it to wildlife crime management. All labs -- human or wildlife -- try to link the suspect, the crime scene and the evidence together. But in wildlife, you have to figure out first if a crime was committed. That can depend on time of day, what side of the road someone was on and even the type of weapon used."
Ultimately, the use of DNA evidence helps keep game wardens safe by minimizing their initial contact with suspects, Goddard said.
"Before, you had to catch them with the deer or poached bear and they're generally armed at the time. That can be terribly dangerous," he said. "Now they don't have to catch people in the act -- they can just gather the evidence later."
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