News for Florida animal advocates

” . . . everything from fleas and ticks to illegal drugging, lack of sufficient water, overcrowding and suspicious deaths.” These are some of the problems that investigators from Florida’s Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering uncover at dog tracks, according to an article in today’s Miami Herald. Unfortunately, under current law the division’s hands are often […]

Last Thursday, the Tampa City Council passed a resolution condemning the intensive confinement of egg-laying hens. Tampa is the fifth city in Florida to pass such a resolution.
The resolution noted:
“About 95% of the roughly 300 million hens in the United States are confined in barren, wire battery cages so restrictive the birds don’t even have […]

In his blog on Friday, Mike Cazalas, managing editor of the Panama City News Herald, wrote about recent “deer-on-human attacks” (as well as a few incidents involving wild turkeys). Although his writing was tongue-in-cheek, he was serious about his main argument: thanks to hunters, “very, very few of you were attacked and injured by deer […]

Easter is this Sunday, and the advice from local humane societies and our state wildlife agency is that chocolate bunnies and stuffed-animals are much better gifts for children than live animals. Unfortunately, animal shelters are preparing for those people who don’t get the message.
Judy LaRose, director at the SPCA Wildlife Care Center in Fort Lauderdale, […]

On Sunday the City of Holmes Beach, just west of Bradenton, held its annual “Beach Bistro St. Patrick’s Day Parade.” The parade featured marching bands and drum lines from local high schools, and a D-Day survivor as grand marshal. Also marching was a 39-year-old Asian elephant named “Judy.” Ireland is known for many things, but […]

Yesterday, the Dutch parliament voted unanimously to make sex with animals a crime. Bestiality is now explicitly forbidden in 80 countries and more than 30 U.S. states, but not in Florida. ARFF is working to fix that. In this year’s legislative session, we are supporting bills (HB 1227 and S 744) to make sexual contact […]

When it comes to cutting costs, states often look to their prison budgets first for cuts. Among several cost-cutting proposals that Florida’s Department of Corrections are considering this year is one that we’re pleased with. Officials from the DOC told a Florida Senate committee this week that they had conducted taste tests of vegetarian burgers […]

If hundreds of thousands of cows died due to cold weather, our guess is that it would be big news. Even if the victims were chickens, one of the most abused animals in Florida farms, the story might generate some compassion among average Floridians. But it says a lot about how our society views different […]

The Langerado music festival ended on Sunday at the Big Cypress Seminole Indian Reservation. Unfortunately, ARFF was asked to pack up our information booth at the festival on Friday night after raising concerns about the treatment of an alligator on site, and for showing a video about the treatment of animals in factory farms.
ARFF had […]

That was the good news from a report released February 27 by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC).
Ken Haddad, FWC’s Executive Director, boasted in a press release, “The total economic impact of wildlife viewing in Florida is strong and growing, almost doubling in the past five years.”
The report, “The 2006 Economic Benefits of […]