Animal News — Fireflies and Turkeys and Seals
“The female fireflies turned out to be remarkably picky. In many cases, a male flash got no response at all. In some species, females preferred faster pulse rates. In others, the females preferred males that made long-lasting pulses.”
======
In a huge victory for animals, two former Aviagen Turkeys, Inc., employees have been convicted of cruelty to animals following a PETA undercover investigation. This is the first time in U.S. history that factory-farm employees have been convicted of abusing factory-farmed turkeys.
The convictions came following our undercover investigation at Aviagen’s factory farms in West Virginia, where workers were documented breaking turkeys’ necks, stomping on their heads, and shoving feces and feed into turkeys’ mouths.
One of the convicted former workers, Edward Eric Gwinn, admitted guilt to stomping on a turkey’s head and lifting a turkey above his head before maliciously throwing the bird to the ground. This morning, he was sentenced to serve 6 months’ home confinement on each count, concurrently, and is not allowed to own, live with, or work with any animals for five years.
Another man, Scott Alvin White, admitted to shoving feed down a turkey’s throat and maliciously breaking a turkey’s neck. White was sentenced to serve the maximum 6 months’ jail time on each of two counts, consecutive, for a total of up to 1 year. Read more about the convictions on our blog, The PETA Files.
=====
GOOD NEWS! Europe passes a ban on seal products, driving another nail in the coffin of the cruel commercial seal hunt. From HSUS: “This is the beginning of the end for the Canadian seal hunt. The Canadian government estimates that losing this primary market will cost Canada’s sealing industry $6.6 million (CAD) each year. The hunt brought in less than $7 million last year. It’s not hard to do the math. Just the promise of an EU ban was enough to drive the prices for seal fur down to $15 (CAD) per skin — a decline of 86 percent since 2006. As a result, many sealers stayed home. Out of this year’s quota of 280,000 harp seals, fewer than 60,000 have been killed so far. Now that the EU has banned its trade in seal products, countless more seals will live their lives in peace from this year forward.”
Go EU.
