Help Save Animals and Pets http://www.helpsaveapet.com Help us promote Animal Abuse Awareness. Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:24:27 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 Ohio struggles to draft tougher law after exotic animals’ escape http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/ohio-struggles-to-draft-tougher-law-after-exotic-animals-escape/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/ohio-struggles-to-draft-tougher-law-after-exotic-animals-escape/#comments Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:18:17 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/ohio-struggles-to-draft-tougher-law-after-exotic-animals-escape/

By Jo Ingles | Reuters – 20 hrs ago

COLUMBUS, Ohio (Reuters) – Ohio legislation designed to clamp down on ownership of wild animals after the escape last year from a farm of dozens of dangerous beasts including lions, tigers and bears, is drawing criticism from private animal owners for being too tough and from animal rights activists as too weak.

More than four dozen exotic animals caused a panic near Zanesville, Ohio last year when their owner turned them loose and then committed suicide. Sheriff’s deputies had to go on a big game hunt to track them down and killed most of them.

Since then, the Ohio legislature has tried to craft rules to make it harder for private people to own potentially dangerous wild creatures. Ohio is one of only a handful of states that has no limits on exotic animal ownership.

The state Senate passed a bill on Wednesday that would ban Ohio residents from buying lions, tigers, bears, elephants, wolves, alligators, crocodiles, and certain kinds of monkeys as pets, unless they follow strict guidelines.

Existing owners of wild animals can keep them if they follow the new rules, which include permit fees, registration and constructing proper facilities.

Republican state Senator Troy Balderson said the bill was designed to protect citizens, preserve the rights of law-abiding owners to care for their pets, and ensure animal safety. The House is reviewing the bill, and could vote by the end of May.

“If you own one of these animals and are willing to meet the state standards, you can keep your animal by simply obtaining a wildlife shelter permit” from the Department of Agriculture, Balderson said.

But Anna Wilcox, a Dayton woman who owns a small monkey, said the new state bill would require her to give up her animal because she cannot meet registration requirements and cannot afford the required $250,000 dollar insurance policy.

Wilcox argued that dogs can kill people, yet the state does not require dog owners to jump through these hoops.

She said her monkey does not have the ability to really hurt anyone. “He doesn’t pose no more threat than a ferret. He’s one pound ten inches and that’s it.”

Ohio Governor John Kasich expressed support for the bill.

“We don’t want to have a situation where people continue to have lions, bears, and tigers on their front lawn,” Kasich said.

Wayne Pacelle, president of the Humane Society of the United States, said some parts of the bill should be stronger.

The Humane Society is not happy that the restriction on constricting snakes was weakened. The bill exempts boa constrictors, as well as constricting snakes less than 12 feet long.

“We don’t think people should have these strong, constricting snakes as pets,” Pacelle said. “Our greatest hope is that they don’t weaken the bill further.”

(Reporting By Jo Ingles.; Editing by Mary Wisniewski and Greg McCune)

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]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/ohio-struggles-to-draft-tougher-law-after-exotic-animals-escape/feed/ 0 The rise and rise of the humble £5 note http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-note/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-note/#comments Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:18:16 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-note/

Reuters – 45 mins ago

LONDON (Reuters) – Once hovering on the brink of being classified as an endangered species, the humble five pound note is back with a vengeance.

Britons are using 10 times more “fivers” than they were two years ago, the Bank of England said on Thursday, as the notes become more widely available in cash machines and scruffy old ones are replaced.

Consumers in Britain now withdraw almost 200 million pounds worth of fivers from cash machines every month, the Bank said.

As people use these notes to buy goods, shopkeepers become less inclined to hoard dirty old notes and these can then be removed from circulation more quickly.

Bank Governor Mervyn King said in 2007 he was concerned about the deteriorating condition of old notes in circulation. He said the public needed five pound notes but few banks issued them because it was cheaper for them to stock cash machines with 10 and 20-pound notes.

Two years ago, the central bank set lenders the goal of ensuring that at least 1.2 percent of the cash their hole-in-the wall machines dispensed was in five-pound notes by 2012.

Lenders adapted some of their cash machines so that they could hold the notes and now 1.5 percent of the money consumers withdraw from machines comes in fivers.

“This initiative has made significant progress in dealing with (my) concerns, which were also shared by the public,” King said in a statement on Thursday.

“A key objective for the Bank is to maintain public confidence in the currency, by meeting demand with good-quality genuine banknotes that the public can use with confidence.”

(Reporting by Michelle Martin; Editing by Steve Addison)

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]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-note/feed/ 0 The rise and rise of the humble 5-pound note http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-pound-note/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-pound-note/#comments Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:18:13 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-pound-note/

Reuters – 34 mins ago

LONDON (Reuters) – Once hovering on the brink of being classified as an endangered species, the humble five pound note is back with a vengeance.

Britons are using 10 times more “fivers” than they were two years ago, the Bank of England said on Thursday, as the notes become more widely available in cash machines and scruffy old ones are replaced.

Consumers in Britain now withdraw almost 200 million pounds worth of fivers from cash machines every month, the Bank said.

As people use these notes to buy goods, shopkeepers become less inclined to hoard dirty old notes and these can then be removed from circulation more quickly.

Bank Governor Mervyn King said in 2007 he was concerned about the deteriorating condition of old notes in circulation. He said the public needed five pound notes but few banks issued them because it was cheaper for them to stock cash machines with 10 and 20-pound notes.

Two years ago, the central bank set lenders the goal of ensuring that at least 1.2 percent of the cash their hole-in-the wall machines dispensed was in five-pound notes by 2012.

Lenders adapted some of their cash machines so that they could hold the notes and now 1.5 percent of the money consumers withdraw from machines comes in fivers.

“This initiative has made significant progress in dealing with (my) concerns, which were also shared by the public,” King said in a statement on Thursday.

“A key objective for the Bank is to maintain public confidence in the currency, by meeting demand with good-quality genuine banknotes that the public can use with confidence.”

(Reporting by Michelle Martin; Editing by Steve Addison)

 

]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/the-rise-and-rise-of-the-humble-5-pound-note/feed/ 0 Wills, Kate attend ‘African Cats’ London premiere http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/wills-kate-attend-african-cats-london-premiere/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/wills-kate-attend-african-cats-london-premiere/#comments Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:18:11 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/wills-kate-attend-african-cats-london-premiere/

Associated Press – 35 mins ago

LONDON (AP) — Prince William and his wife Kate were guests of honor at the U.K. premiere of Disneynature’s “African Cats” on Wednesday.

Filmed in Kenya’s Masai Mara region from August 2008 to October 2010, “African Cats” follows a pride of lions and a family of cheetahs in the savanna. British actor Sir Patrick Stewart narrates the documentary, which is directed by Keith Scholey (“Big Cat Diary”) and Alastair Fothergill (“Earth,” ”Deep Blue”).

The event was held at the British Film Institute on London’s Southbank, and served as a charity fundraiser for the conservation group Tusk Trust.

Tusk Trust has 40 projects in 17 African countries that aim to protect wildlife, alleviate poverty and encourage education in rural communities. Prince William has been the charity’s Royal Patron since 2005.

“It’s what we call an ‘integrated approach’ to conservation,” said Charlie Mayhew, the charity’s chief executive. “It’s really that integration that has drawn Prince William as our patron. It’s something that he believes passionately in, and tonight’s premiere of ‘African Cats’ just gives us an opportunity to communicate that onto the global stage.”

Scholey and Fothergill said keeping track of the stars in “African Cats” was a substantial task.

“The most challenging (part) was actually to stay with our cats for a whole two year period,” Scholey said. “These are wild animals, they can go wherever they want, and we had to stay with the same characters, so that was quite hard.”

“We’re looking here at a drama, a soap-opera, but it’s all real-life,” said cameraman Simon King. “There are elements of the story that we couldn’t possibly have hoped to have written. The natural world wrote the script.”

“African Cats” will be released in the U.K. and Ireland on Friday.

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]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/wills-kate-attend-african-cats-london-premiere/feed/ 0 Human Body Language Can Mislead Dogs http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/human-body-language-can-mislead-dogs/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/human-body-language-can-mislead-dogs/#comments Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:18:09 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/human-body-language-can-mislead-dogs/

By Stephanie Pappas | LiveScience.com – 31 mins ago

Want to trick a dog? It’s all in the body language, a new study finds.

When given a choice between a big serving of food and a small one, dogs almost always go for the bigger option. But when a person makes a fuss over the small amount, particularly by handling it, dogs can be tricked into picking the less-hearty portion.

The study, published Wednesday (April 25) in the journal PLoS ONE, highlights dogs’ ability to follow human social cues, a tendency which has likely served them well over thousands of years of domestication.

Researchers recruited 149 dog owners to bring their ordinary household pets into the psychology laboratory at the University of Milan, Italy. There, study leader Sarah Marshall-Pescini and her colleagues set up a series of experiments in which dogs had a choice between two plates, one with a single piece of food on it and one with six pieces. Other experiments had dogs choosing between equal-size portions.

In some cases, the dogs were allowed to pick a dish freely. In others, a person came in before the dog was allowed to make a choice, interacting with the food in some way. Sometimes the person would approach and stare at one of the plates; sometimes he or she would hold the piece of food near their mouth; and sometimes he or she would talk to the dog during the interaction.

The researchers mixed and matched these various conditions. For example, in some conditions the person merely looked at the dog and then at one of the plates. In others, the person might walk up to the food, pick up a piece and say, “Oh wow, this is good, this is so good!” while looking at the dog.

When left to their own devices, 73 percent of the dogs made a beeline for the bigger portion of food in the majority of trials. But when people started to get involved, the dogs were more often swayed to make the worse choice, going for the smaller food portion. The most powerful gesture for tricking dogs into making this choice turned out to be a hand-to-mouth action by the person. [What Your Dog's Breed Says About You]

Dogs in two experimental conditions were significantly more likely to make a dash for the small plate, the researchers reported. In one, the person approached the food, picked up a piece and held it to her mouth for five seconds before putting it down and retreating. In the second, the researcher did the same thing, except she also talked to the dog and looked at it as she held the food. When food was lifted and dropped with utensils from behind a curtain — so dogs couldn’t see that a person was involved — the dogs were no more likely to pick that plate, suggesting that the animals are cueing in to human actions.

Dogs may see the handling of food as an explicit invitation to come chow down, the researchers wrote. Or it may be that seeing a person grasp a piece of food makes dogs want to do the same, much in the same way that babies imitate their parents’ expressions and gestures. Earlier research has suggested that dogs are at least as receptive to human communication as are pre-verbal babies.

The study also highlights that imitation is not always the best strategy for learning, the researchers reported.

“The current study adds to a small but growing literature showing that social learning is not necessarily always the best strategy and provides an experimental paradigm which may potentially be used to explore when an animal will rely on private vs. social information,” they wrote.

You can follow LiveScience senior writer Stephanie Pappas on Twitter @sipappas. Follow LiveScience for the latest in science news and discoveries on Twitter @livescience and on Facebook.

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]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/human-body-language-can-mislead-dogs/feed/ 0 Tigers’ ace Verlander no threat to baseball video gamers http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/tigers-ace-verlander-no-threat-to-baseball-video-gamers/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/tigers-ace-verlander-no-threat-to-baseball-video-gamers/#comments Mon, 09 Apr 2012 03:35:45 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/tigers-ace-verlander-no-threat-to-baseball-video-gamers/

By Larry Fine | Reuters – 24 mins ago

(Reuters) – Detroit Tigers pitcher Justin Verlander is eager for his Opening Day assignment on Thursday, while video gamers were already in action with Wednesday’s launch of Major League Baseball 2K12′s $1 Million Perfect Game Challenge.

Verlander, who was 24-5 last season for the American League Central Division champion Tigers including a no-hitter, will take the mound in Detroit against the Boston Red Sox and Jon Lester to begin the six-month-long major league season.

The hard-throwing righthander, who graces the cover of the video game after winning last season’s American League Cy Young Award and Most Valuable Player honors, has already been a hit with his amusing TV ad for the video game with Sports Illustrated cover girl Kate Upton.

Verlander, 29, said he used to play 2K’s baseball video game, but that gamers will not have to worry about him in their quest for the big prize.

“I did play 2K Baseball 2006 when I first got to the big leagues, which was fun, getting to play with myself as the pitcher,” Verlander told Reuters in an interview.

“But then I didn’t to do it too much because I would play online and these little kids would beat me when I was pitching with myself and I didn’t like that too much.”

Video gamers got the all-clear to begin their quest for the million-dollar prize a day ahead of Verlander’s opening game start and will have until the end of the month to qualify for the finals of the Perfect Game Challenge.

Eight finalists who achieve perfection — pitching no-hit games in which not one batter reaches base — will earn all-expenses-paid trips to New York in May to compete in a live, single elimination tournament at the MLB FanCave to determine who walks away with the grand prize.

Finalists will be determined by a dynamic leaderboard ranking the ‘most perfect’ games thrown, using an algorithm to rank individual perfect games based on degree of difficulty such as the opposing team’s offensive prowess, and degree of perfection such as number of strikeouts.

The top eight gamers with verified perfect games achieved on Xbox LIVE online or PlayStation entertainment system will compete in the finals May 9-10 in New York’s MLB FanCave.

Verlander said he was looking forward to his own 2012 season and playing with Detroit’s newly acquired slugger, first baseman Prince Fielder.

“We’re really excited to have him,” the Tigers’ ace pitcher said about the signing of the former Milwaukee Brewers slugger to a nine-year, $214 million contract.

(Reporting By Larry Fine in New York; editing by Patricia Reaney)

Are you excited for the start of the MLB season?

 

Optimized with InboundWriter]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/tigers-ace-verlander-no-threat-to-baseball-video-gamers/feed/ 0 In Self-Control, Dogs Are Only Human http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/in-self-control-dogs-are-only-human/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/in-self-control-dogs-are-only-human/#comments Mon, 09 Apr 2012 03:35:43 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/in-self-control-dogs-are-only-human/

By Stephanie Pappas | LiveScience.com – Wed, Apr 4, 2012

Man and his best friend have something in common: Both get worn out by having to exert self-control and end up making dumb decisions, a new study finds.

Dogs required to sit and stay for 10 minutes were more likely to approach a caged, aggressive dog than when they simply had to wait in a cage for the same amount of time, according to the new research. The findings reinforce the biological nature of self-control, said study researcher Holly Miller of the University of Lille Nord de France.

“When humans are depleted, they are less helpful, more aggressive, gamble more, etc.,” Miller told LiveScience in an email, citing a wealth of research regarding the depletion of self-control in humans. “Well, apparently, these consequences also have biological roots. When dogs are depleted, they too are more likely to behave rashly and impulsively.”

Sit, stay and self-control

Miller and her colleagues had previously found that dogs give up sooner on a puzzle-solving task after they’ve had to hold a sit-stay position than if they didn’t have to exhibit any self-control. In the same way, humans give up more quickly on puzzle tasks when they’re mentally fatigued by having to resist temptations beforehand. As in humans, the drain on self-control could be reversed with a sugary drink.

Self-control research also shows that a mentally depleted person is more likely to take risks and make impulsive gambles than someone who is refreshed. Miller wanted to know if the same was true for pups.

To find out, the researchers had 10 family-owned dogs come into the lab for two variations on the same experiment. In one session, the dog was told to sit and stay on a mat while a distracting hamster (played by a robotic ZhuZhuPet toy) roamed around the floor. In the other session, the dog was caged for 10 minutes, and so did not have to exert self-control.

After the sit-stay session, the dog was brought into a room that held a cage. The cage held a territorial 11-year-old female bull terrier that snarled and barked when it saw the second dog.

The researchers recorded the dog’s actions for four minutes, particularly noting where in the room it spent its time. A dog that chose to get closer to the snarling bull terrier’s cage was judged as being more impulsive. A dog that kept its distance was judged as more cautious. [10 Things You Didn't Know About Dogs]

Impulsive dogs

The results, published online March 30 in the journal Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, showed a clear difference between a canine that was fresh and one that was dog-tired. Dogs spent 58.9 percent of their time in the portion of the room closest to the angry dog’s cage after the sit-stay session, compared with only 41.8 percent after 10 minutes relaxing in a cage, a significant difference.

“There was literally a dog in a kennel barking the equivalent of ‘I’m going to kill you! I’m going to beat the s— out of you!’ and depleted dogs would approach this dog. And sit in front of it,” Miller said. “But when they were not depleted, they were more cautious, and spent more time farther away.”

The results are important for humans and dogs alike, Miller said. People should realize that their tendency to make dumb decisions when tired isn’t a sign of personal failure or even something that can be overcome with willpower, she said.

“We tend to believe we should have some superhuman power to avoid these things. We don’t,” Miller said. “What we do have the ability to do is to plan ahead. To recognize our weaknesses, and to prevent ourselves from having the opportunity to behave in ways that are not optimal for our lives.”

For example, in both dogs and humans, a sugary drink seems to provide the brain with the fuel it needs to harness our silliest impulses. A dieter, then, might take care not to avoid food too assiduously, given that a small snack could boost the willpower needed to avoid a big food splurge. [7 Diet Tricks That Really Work]

Dog owners should take note, too, Miller said. A family dog that has to restrain its urge to snap at yelling, screaming kids all day may eventually reach a willpower limit and bite, possibly explaining a large proportion of the 4.5 million dog bites in America each year. It’s up to people to recognize that dogs need breaks and rest as much as we do, she said.

“The average family dog lives a precarious life. If it inhibits the majority of its natural behavior, (barking, peeing in the house, chewing, etc.) it gets to stay and to live [in the home]. If it doesn’t — it ends up in the animal shelter. And as humans, I think we owe it to the dogs to help them as best we can.”

You can follow LiveScience senior writer Stephanie Pappas on Twitter @sipappas. Follow LiveScience for the latest in science news and discoveries on Twitter @livescience and on Facebook.

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]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/in-self-control-dogs-are-only-human/feed/ 0 Web privacy rules turn poachers into gamekeepers http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/web-privacy-rules-turn-poachers-into-gamekeepers/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/web-privacy-rules-turn-poachers-into-gamekeepers/#comments Mon, 09 Apr 2012 03:35:42 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/web-privacy-rules-turn-poachers-into-gamekeepers/

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – When you ‘like’ something on Facebook or read an online newspaper, perhaps a dozen or more companies are squirreling away data on your tastes, your habits, whether you’re male or female, old or young, gay or straight.

They mean no harm. They just want to give you, the customer, exactly what you want – it’s the grandfather of all business slogans. Their dilemma, now regulators’ noses are twitching, is how to serve you, and serve themselves, when what you want is to be left alone.

There are thousands of analytics companies, audience targeters, ad brokers, ad exchanges and the like that can collect and sell data-based services on internet users for 5,000 euros a time to big brands, which then buy ad space where their potential customers might be lurking.

You only know these trackers are at work if you read the fine print. The New York Times has a disclaimer saying it hires WebTrends and Audience Science to interpret its readers’ interests, and Britain‘s Guardian newspaper says it pays Criteo and Quantcast, among others, to do the same.

Sometimes a website can sell ad space to, for example, a luxury hotel, within three seconds of knowing a person with a penchant for spa breaks is on their site. The website running the ad earns money when people click on it. It is their lifeblood.

“There is no way websites will survive without targeting,” said Kimon Zorbas from the Internet Advertising Bureau, an online ad lobby in Brussels.

Analysts estimate that targeting has almost tripled what brands pay websites to run their ads. In the United States, online ad revenue was just shy of $15 billion in the first half of 2011, 23 percent higher than the previous year. Figures for the European Union are harder to come by.

In Europe, outfits like Nugg.ad, which serve big brands such as L’Oreal and Eastman Kodak Co, place small parcels of code, or “cookies”, on a site visitor’s computer so they can see what kind of content a person clicks on. Then they write algorithms that make assumptions about what people might buy online.

L’Oreal thus increased its ability to reach their ideal buyer by 168 percent, according to figures from Nugg.ad.

Now regulators want to put the brakes on tracking.

CONSUMER CHOICE

The United States and the European Union both say they want people to choose whether ad firms can collect their data or not, but disagree over how much choice readers should have.

European regulators want companies to seek explicit consent for tracking, while the United States is happy to leave the initiative with the web user.

The EU agreed new rules on internet privacy in May last year, putting the onus on member states to ensure that companies store user data only if the user is provided with “clear and comprehensive information” about the purposes of and access to that data and has given their consent.

The ePrivacy Directive does not give any guidelines as to what constitutes user consent, but says that cookies, unless “strictly necessary for the delivery of a service requested by the user”, cannot be placed without it.

Many countries are struggling to put the rules into effect. In Britain, the regulations allow for consent to be signified by future browser settings that have yet to be introduced, and companies have been given until May 28 this year to comply. In Germany, regulators are not that far along. They are trying to please the EU without turning the Internet into a jungle of pop-ups.

“We have a big problem matching regulatory demands with technical practicalities,” said Ninja Marnau, a lawyer from the data protection commissioner’s office in Schleswig-Holstein.

“This is operationally and technically a nightmare,” said Phil Lee, a lawyer from Field Fisher Waterhouse.

Based in London, Lee is advising companies in the United States and EU on how to walk the tightrope of satisfying EU requirements without going much further than the U.S. standard.

Given the choice, nearly half of web users in the United States and Britain want some distance between their data and ad companies, surveys by analytics firms show.

And the job of developing a tool to give users cover from prying ad firms has fallen to the companies that benefit from the services of the ad firms. The poachers are now guarding the grouse.

Up to 50 blue-chip companies from Facebook to Walt Disney Co are holding weekly conference calls with a handful of data privacy experts on how users can turn off targeting and how companies can get the regulators off their backs.

Collectively, they are part of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), and European regulators have given them until June to deliver something called Do Not Track, a tool first developed by Mozilla’s Firefox, one of the world’s leading web browsers.

Aleecia McDonald from Mozilla, who co-chairs the W3C’s tracking group, said she does not know if they will have the application nailed down by June.

The group is trying to invent a tool that covers all kinds of tracking “to end the arms race” between tracking developers and regulators.

WINNERS AND LOSERS

In the meantime, companies who depend on the Web for a significant portion of their business are left wondering how painful Do Not Track will be.

Nugg.ad said it was impossible to say how much revenue would be lost if some regulators get their way and people are forced to choose whether a website can track them or not, “but it could definitely hurt our business”.

European regulators’ insistence on explicit consent to tracking could mean that those who simply forget to switch it on are out of companies’ targeting reach for good, McDonald said.

Until now retailers have enjoyed almost unfettered access to the 75 percent of European consumers that have Internet access, and they fear an effective shrinking of the market.

In 2012, online sales in Europe are forecast by the British-based Centre for Retail Research to grow by 16.1 percent to 233 billion euros.

McDonald said it was likely that the overall rate of using Do Not Track would be higher in the European Union than in the United States.

There are already products to shield consumers from trackers, some as standalone software or as add-ons to browsers, and Nugg.ad’s Chief Executive Stephan Noller said the firm had already noticed a slightly higher likelihood among European users to switch some tracking off.

Ironically, there is one form of tracking, geolocation – perhaps the most invasive of all, since it knows where you live, work, eat and play – that could come through the tighter regulation relatively unscathed.

“Because where someone is located may affect how they are treated under law,” said Mozilla’s McDonald.

(Editing by Will Waterman)

]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/web-privacy-rules-turn-poachers-into-gamekeepers/feed/ 0 Agency stops seismic tests; worries about dolphins http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/agency-stops-seismic-tests-worries-about-dolphins/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/agency-stops-seismic-tests-worries-about-dolphins/#comments Mon, 09 Apr 2012 03:35:42 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/agency-stops-seismic-tests-worries-about-dolphins/

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — With sick and dead dolphins turning up along Louisiana‘s coast, federal regulators are curbing an oil and natural gas exploration company from using seismic equipment that sends out underwater pulses known to disturb marine mammals.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has told Global Geophysical Services Inc. to not conduct deep-penetration seismic surveys until May, when the bottlenose dolphin calving season ends. The agency says the surveys are done with air-guns that the emit sounds that could disrupt mother and calf bonding and mask “important acoustic cues.”

The company said it laid off about 30 workers because of the restriction, which it called unnecessary.

But environmental groups suing BOEM over the use of underwater seismic equipment say restrictions should be extended to surveyors across the Gulf of Mexico.

The new limit on exploration highlights the friction over oil drilling in the Gulf since the April 20, 2010 blowout of a BP PLC well that resulted in the death of 11 workers and the nation’s largest offshore oil spill in the nation’s history.

After the 2010 spill, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Center for Biological Diversity sued to get curbs placed on underwater seismic surveys. The environmental groups argued they harm marine mammals and that the federal government violated animal protection laws after it declared in 2004 that the surveys were safe.

The government is in settlement talks with those environmental groups, according to court documents.

“Imagine dynamite going off in your neighborhood for days, months on end,” said Michael Jasny, a senior policy analyst at the NRDC. “That’s the situation these animals are facing.”

Jasny said the restriction placed on Global Geophysical was a good sign, but far from enough.

In its ruling, the federal agency said it was concerned that seismic surveys could affect marine mammals, and even cause them to lose their hearing.

Amy Scholik, a fisheries biologist with NOAA, said it was unknown what kind of effects air-guns have on bottlenose dolphins, but she said there was concern about possible effects on dolphin calves because they are vulnerable to stresses. She added that whales in Alaska have been shown to change migration routes because of seismic surveys.

George Ioup, a physics professor at the University of New Orleans studying the effects of air-guns on marine mammals, said the verdict was out on the effects of air-guns on mammals. He said BOEM seemed to be ruling “on the side of caution.”

“Proving there is an effect, I don’t know if that has been done,” he said. “I don’t think the answer is overwhelmingly simple.”

The air-guns are towed at low speeds behind a survey ship and emit high-intensity, low-frequency sound waves to find geological layers. Seismic surveying is essential to drillers because they tell them where to drill and not drill.

The government also relies on the seismic data to know where it’s safe to drill and to determine how much it should charge for leasing offshore blocks to oil and gas companies.

Marc Lawrence, Global Geophysical’s vice president in the Gulf region, said the seismic surveys do not pose a danger to marine mammals.

“We see no hazard to them whatsoever,” Lawrence said. As proof, he said dolphins routinely ride along with ships when they are conducting surveys.

He said the restriction covers an area that ranges out to about 20 miles off the Louisiana coast. He called BOEM’s restriction unprecedented. His company is searching for overlooked reservoirs in areas along the central Louisiana coast: Grand Isle, Timbalier island, the West Delta and south Pelto.

This is the same area where government scientists say they have found sick and dead dolphins.

From February 2010, NOAA has reported 180 dolphin strandings in the three parishes that surround Barataria Bay — Jefferson, Plaquemines and Lafourche — or about 18 percent of the 1,000 estimated dolphins in the bay.

Last month, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said it had found 32 dolphins in the bay underweight, anemic and showing signs of liver and lung disease. Nearly half had low levels of stress hormones that help with stress response, metabolism and immune function.

Lori Schwacke, a NOAA scientist, said the dolphins’ hormone problems could not definitely be tied to the oil spill but were “consistent with oil exposure.”

Over the same period of time, NOAA says 714 dolphins and whales have been found stranded from the Florida Panhandle to the Texas state line, with 95 percent of those mammals found dead. Normally, the region sees 74 reported dolphin deaths a year.

]]> http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/agency-stops-seismic-tests-worries-about-dolphins/feed/ 0 Dead wolf photos stir tensions in West http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/dead-wolf-photos-stir-tensions-in-west/ http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/dead-wolf-photos-stir-tensions-in-west/#comments Mon, 09 Apr 2012 03:35:42 +0000 Webreporter http://www.helpsaveapet.com/news/dead-wolf-photos-stir-tensions-in-west/

By Laura Zuckerman | Reuters – Sat, Mar 31, 2012

SALMON, Idaho (Reuters) – Photos of dead and maimed wolves have pervaded the Internet in recent weeks, raising tensions in the Northern Rocky Mountains over renewed hunting and trapping of the once federally protected animals.

Escalating rancor between hunters and animal rights activists on social media and websites centers on pictures of wolves killed or about to be killed. Many have text celebrating the fact that Western states are allowing more killing of the predators.

Commenting on a Facebook-posted image of two wolves strangled to death by cable snares, an individual who identified himself as Shane Miller wrote last month, “Very nice!! Don’t stop now, you’re just getting started!”

A person going by the name Matthew Brown posted the message, “Nice, one down and a BUNCH to go!” in response to a Facebook image of a single wolf choked to death in a snare.

Such pictures and commentary have intensified online arguments over the ethics of hunting and trapping wolves. The debate took a threatening turn this week with an anonymous email warning that animal rights advocates will “be the target next.”

In Idaho and Montana, hundreds of the animals have been killed — mostly through hunting — less than a year after being removed from the U.S. endangered species list.

Stripping the wolves of federal protection last spring opened the animals to state wildlife management, including newly licensed hunting and trapping designed to reduce their numbers from levels the states deemed too high.

Since the de-listing last May, Idaho has cut its wolf population by about 40 percent, from roughly 1,000 to about 600 or fewer. Some 260 wolves have been killed in Montana, more than a third of its population, leaving an estimated 650 remaining.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has also proposed lifting the protected status for another 350 wolves in Wyoming.

The threatening note received by an anti-trapping group based in Missoula, Montana, this week has drawn scrutiny from federal and local law enforcement.

The group says it was likely singled out because it had criticized and widely circulated a snapshot of a smiling trapper posed with a dying wolf whose leg was caught in the metal jaws of a foothold trap on a patch of blood-stained snow.

VILLAIN OR VICTIM?

Once common across most of North America, wolves were hunted, trapped and poisoned to near extinction in the lower 48 states by the 1940s under a government-sponsored program.

Decades later, biologists recognized that wolves had an essential role as a predator in mountain ecosystems, leading to protection of the animal under the Endangered Species Act.

Wolves were reintroduced in the mid-1990s over the vehement objections of ranchers and sportsmen, who see the animals as a threat to livestock and big-game animals such as elk and deer.

Environmentalists say the impact of wolves on cattle herds and wildlife is overstated and that the recent removal of federal safeguards could push the wolf back to the brink.

Wolves have long been vilified in the region as a menace, symbolizing for some a distant federal bureaucracy imposing its rules on the West.

“They’re putting us and our way of life out of business,” said Ron Casperson, co-owner of Saddle Springs Trophy Outfitters in Salmon, Idaho. “It makes me sick every day I look at this country. These wolves … I mean, come on.”

State wildlife managers had predicted that such passions would ease once the wolves were de-listed and states gained control. But discourse on the Internet and social networks appears to have grown more hostile.

Some hunters have expressed discomfort at the apparent bloodlust unleashed on the Internet, which they see as tarnishing the reputation of a sport that attracts less than 15 percent of Americans.

‘SCREAMING FOR MERCY’

“There are two groups — one supports fair chase and ethical hunting, and the other views the reintroduction of wolves and the recovery with venom,” said veteran sportsman Rod Bullis of Helena, Montana.

Idaho Fish and Game Commissioner Gary Power said he was bombarded with letters and emails from people representing extremes on both sides of the debate.

“There are some folks out there stirring the pot: ‘Get rid of government, get rid of this, they shoved it down our throats, kill them all,’ and they are adding to the contentiousness,” he said.

Animal rights activists said they are sickened at the online flurry of pictures depicting wolf kills, and alarmed by comments suggesting a growing desire to shoot, trap and snare wolves.

“Roughly $40 million has been spent on wolf recovery, and now we are witnessing the second extermination of wolves in the West,” said Wendy Keefover, director of carnivore protection for WildEarth Guardians.

Idaho and Montana are required to maintain about 150 wolves per state each year to prevent federal protection from being imposed again.

But Idaho plans to more than double the number of wolves a hunter may take in some areas for the 2012-13 season, raising their bag limit to 10.

Montana is seeking to raise its wolf-hunt quotas, and state wildlife managers are discussing allowing trapping, which is currently illegal there. At least one Montana county is considering a bounty for wolves killed by licensed hunters.

This week’s email threat to the animal advocacy group Footloose Montana raised the acrimony to a new level.

The image posted on its Facebook page was taken from the Trapperman.com website, including text that joked about the wolf being shot and wounded by a passersby after it was caught — “lucky they were not real good shots.”

The photo went viral over the Internet last weekend, and on Monday Footloose Montana received the email threat.

The message said “I would like to donate a gun to your childs (sic) head to make sure you can watch it die slowly so I can have my picture taken with it’s (sic) bleeding dying screaming for mercy body.” Then the email, a copy of which Footloose gave to Reuters, said the recipients would be the next targets.

A Missoula Police Department detective, Sergeant Travis Welsh, confirmed this week that investigators were looking into a “report from a local institution about a malicious email.”

Footloose Executive Director Anja Heister said FBI agents had interviewed a member of her group about the threat, but an FBI spokeswoman declined to comment.

By Tuesday, Trapperman.com, a site whose mission statement declares, “Always keep in mind that we are the true protectors of wildlife and the wild places in which the animals live,” had removed pictures of dead or dying wolves and commentary.

(Editing by Steve Gorman, Cynthia Johnston and Sandra Maler)

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