It was a miracle that these kayakers happened to be on on a quiet part of Blackstone River in Massachusetts. They spotted a potato sack floating in the river and thought nothing of it until they heard noises coming from the sack. 
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After a poor owl was found in terrible condition, a wildlife center helped him make an incredible recovery. The Raven Ridge Animal Centre, in Pennsylvania, announced last month that it had taken in a Great Horned Owl who had been rescued from a manure pit. 

A group of fishermen will never forget this day after meeting a huge sperm whale!

In a heartwrenching moment of pain, Ali was seen hugging his cat as he tried to process what happened to his house and the dozen hens. 

Footage of an endangered white rhino trained to perform in a circus has prompted an outpouring of anger and calls to boycott shows featuring live animals.

Social-media users were furious at the videos taken in Russia showing a rhino being forced to parade or carry a man on its back in a circus ring, while the trainer holds whips at the ready. Rhinos are rarely seen in circuses, although elephants have long been used – and are being phased out following years of protests about cruel training and the unnatural conditions they are kept in.

In a clip circulating online taken at the Russian State Circus, the rhino is made to sit and let the trainer clamber onto his back before setting off to tour the ring. A couple of times the animal also appears to turn away quickly from the trainer as he approaches with a whip.

In another clip, suspected of having been shot at the Safari Circus in Moscow, what is thought to be the same rhino is seen on a circular platform under a bright spotlight, hesitating several times before stepping off.

Experts in wild-animal welfare said using a white rhino - which can weigh up to 2,300kg - in public show was extremely risky for the trainer and spectators. “It could quickly cause injury to the trainer, and if there isn’t a substantial barrier, to the public,” said Chris Draper, of the Born Free wildlife charity. “However well trained it is, rhinos are naturally nervous and impulsive.”

The animal, probably hired out from one circus to another, would have been trained using cruel, painful methods behind the scenes to perform as instructed, he said.


“To see the animal in this circumstance when you’ve seen one in the wild is utterly incongruent,” he said. “Not only is it being exposed to substantial noise, but the use of the whip is wrong. They would say it doesn’t hurt, but if that’s the case why use it at all?”

Transporting the rhino around would also inflict stress and strain on him, Dr Draper added.

In a separate video, the rhino, Mafa, is filmed away from the ring, being fed by the trainer, Sergey Nesterov, who says: “I put a bed next to it, and I left it only when I had to eat, in order to spend more time with it. This way it got used to people.”


Mr Nesterov says it took a year to arrange the paperwork to transport Mafa from South Africa.

The Safari Circus’s website states that it uses exotic animals, and said that in 1996 Sergei Nesterov and Elena Fedotova decided to create a new attraction with exotic animals based on an older one created by Elena's parents.


Safari’s site features photos of the rhino, as well as shots of a kangaroo with a chain around its neck and boxing gloves on, apparently sparring with a human. There are also photos of five white tigers in the ring with the trainer. Facebook and Twitter users condemned the use of the rhino, saying the animal belonged in the wild and had not been domesticated like a cat or dog.

The behind the scenes of the white Rhino of the Russian circus. Outrageous!!!! pic.twitter.com/buXw4k1Q8J

— Warriors4Wildlife_Int™ 🌐Ⓥ🐾 (@W4W_Int) August 13, 2018

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Poacher pleaded guilty to killing Rafiki, a well-known and beloved mountain gorilla in Uganda.

The 25-year-old silverback lived in a protected area in the Bwindi Impenetrable National Park and was the leader of the Nkuringo gorilla troop. The species is listed as endangered with only 1,000 mountain gorillas left in the world, with half living in the 80,000 acre national park.

Tourists from around the world fell in love with Rafiki and were heartbroken when they heard he was missing in June. Rangers set out to try and find the missing gorilla and sadly found his body the following day.

Photo: Facebook/Uganda Wildlife Authority
They arrested and charged Byamukama Felix and three other poachers with entering a protected area and killing Rafiki. Byamukama confessed to killing Rafiki but said it was in self-defense. He said the gorilla charged him and he killed Rafiki with a spear.

Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) released a statement that said Byamukama was sentenced to 11 years in prison for killing Rafiki and other wildlife in the protected park. “Byamukama pleaded guilty to three counts of illegal entry into a protected area, killing a gorilla, and a duiker.”

The other three poachers denied the charges and are waiting trail in Kisoro Prisons.


“We are relieved that Rafiki has received justice and this should serve as an example to other people who kill wildlife, said Sam Mwandha, executive director of UWA. “If one person kills wildlife, we all lose.”

He goes on to say that the new Wildlife Act 2019 is “tough and that anyone involved in illegal wildlife activities will face the wrath of the law.”


The group once led by Rafiki has a new leader and UWA reports they are doing well. People are happy that the beloved gorilla received some justice, but many wrote that the poacher deserved the life sentence he was originally facing. “I thought the new law says life imprisonment for killing an ENDANGERED animal..Where did we go wrong ?😭

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Do you know if your luring lashes are mink?

Minks, are being held captive in terrible conditions, so their fur can be glued onto fake eyelashes for a “fuller, more thicker look.”

Mink furs historically have been the most popular furs in the world, but you may be surprised to learn they’re lurking in your fake lashes. Many mink eyelash brands – most of which are carried by Sephora – market their products as “cruelty-free,” “ethically sourced,” or “free-range.”

However, animal rights groups like PETA say that there is no such thing as cruelty-free mink:


The idea that minks can be raised ethically on a farm is a contradiction, the organization say. They’re an aggressive, territorial solitary animal and would fight each other if they were put in a “free-range” farm. So caging is necessary.


These “ethically-sourced” farms jam minks into tiny, wire cages, while denying them adequate food, water and medical care.

Lined up in stacks of cages, they live out their lives trapped in unsanitary conditions before meeting their fate in a gas chamber.


If they’re not gassed to death, they’re electrocuted, bludgeoned, or their necks are broken.

If they’re still breathing after the attempted murder, their skin and fur are still stripped from their conscious body.

Avoid the following fake eyelash brands to make sure you’re not supporting this horrific industry:

Cosmetic Laser Clinic
Flirty Lashes
Klepki Lashes
Lash Bar Australia
Lash House
The Lash Store
MINK MINK
Velour Lashes by Redefining Beauty

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This picture taken on July 24, 2016 shows visitors taking photos of a polar bear inside its enclosure at the Grandview Mall Aquarium in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou. A Chinese aquarium holding a forlorn-looking polar bear named Pizza said on September 20 it has "no need" for foreign interference, after activists offered to move the animal to a British zoo. / AFP / - (Photo credit should read -/AFP/Getty Images)

Pizza, “the saddest polar bear in the world,” is said to have at least a short break from the “showcase” in which he lives in the Grandview shopping center in Guangzhou, southern China.

This is followed by a worldwide outcry, with one petition and one million signatures, and the joint efforts of 50 animal rights organizations in China.

This step is welcome news for all people concerned about the welfare of animals in general and the welfare of pizza in particular. Pizza showed what ethologists call “stereotypical behavior” – going back and forth, “shaking his head from side to side and sniffing and pawing at an air hole.” In short, whether out of boredom or stress, when he constantly flashes camera flashes in the eye or hits visitors to the windows of his enclosure, pizza seemed to be gradually losing his mind.

Pizzas misery is unfortunately not an isolated case. Even in more formal zoos and aquariums, social beings who are used to walking far, climbing high, or flying high, are often alone and isolated, in spaces too small to meet their basic needs, and where they are either too much attention of the wrong kind, or experience indifference or neglect. Like pizza, these animals wander restlessly and endlessly through their bare enclosures or spend their days in despair, turned face to the wall.


Pizza was taken to the zoo in Tianjin near Beijing, where he was once born. However, the mall spokesman said that he will come back as soon as the bear’s enclosure has been renovated. Qin Xiaona, director of Beijing Animal Welfare Association and one of the main voices in favor of pizza, said to the three-year-old bear, “It’s a good decision, the right decision for pizza, but it is not final. Temporarily is not good enough. ”



She’s right – and that’s not just pizza. What he and the 500 other species Grandview hosts is room to roam, a chance to be with their fellows, and an opportunity to express their natural behavior – to seek, hunt, hunt down a partner to hide and play, in other words: (at least something) to be free.

If, for whatever reason, they can not survive in the wild, they should be withdrawn to protected areas in regions that are climate and geographic appropriate.

When nature is made into a commodity
It is, however, what we want and need for strange, profit-seeking, bipedal primates that are probably the most baffled and disturbed. In all societies we are attracted to charismatic wildlife such as bears, lions, wolves, tigers, eagles and others. These top predators have exerted their talisman power beyond our imagination, perhaps even before our species began to consider themselves separated from them (and superior to them). We long for their physical energy, their “otherness,” their fearsome strength and unusual grace, as well as their (compared to our) more advanced senses such as smell and hearing.

No matter if these animals live in zoos and aquariums or in this special shopping center, we only wish to have this closeness in order to deprive them of everything powerful and savage. We want them to acknowledge us, but not in a manner that demands something from us except our entertainment, amusement, and our desire to exercise control over them in their captive state.

Grandview’s placement of pizza and other animals in his mall is not just clever marketing. It is rather a symbol of the objectification and marketing of nature by the global consumer society.

In this context, animals and nature only have value if they can be used profitably.

Pizza, whose name characteristically describes its identity as something consumable, is virtually demoted to another exhibit in the midst of all the goods for sale in the mall.

It’s another product that allows shoppers to spend one or two fun, hilarious or carefree minutes before moving on to another distraction.

Grandview has incorporated pizza into its replacement winter landscape because management feared losing buyers to online retailers. In other words, it took a bit of nature to rip people off the Internet and get them to visit the real mall. (How many more shopping malls in China or anywhere else will it mimic?) But what do most people do when faced with the living, breathing and feeling bear? They go back to yet another screen to turn that creature into the camera in their cell phones, from Pizza’s real existence in his unnatural reality in the store to their digital world.

The biggest irony might lie in the possible interpretation that the lonely picket of pizza in a miniature landscape reflects the climate crisis that is typically pictured today by the iconic representation of a lonely polar bear on a dwindling ice floe. In this sense, the disappearance of pizza into the virtual world indicates the disappearance of millions of other species because humanity has so far failed collectively to act decisively to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

Qin Xiaona’s observation that “temporarily is not enough” could go far beyond the fate of pizza and other captive animals like him. It could be a call to the collection to prevent or even reverse our seemingly insatiable destruction of this unique Blue Planet that is our home and millions of other species.
They need, like us, a safe space without being made object and exposed to destruction in which we all can breathe and be the unbound, self-determined beings we once were and could be again.


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She was found all alone on a suburban driveway. She was burning from the heat of the sun beating down on her small body, desperate for shade. She was just a baby.

Luckily, help arrived. Lucy, as she was named, was taken to the Australia Zoo Wildlife Hospital in Queensland, Australia (founded by the late Crocodile Hunter himself, Steve Irwin).

Lucy also suffered from a case of pinkeye, but is now well on her way to making a full recovery. She will then be released back into the wild. Her most recent update shows the koala is not dependent on milk and is well enough to nibble on solids.

It is unknown how Lucy ended up orphaned on a driveway, but according to the Australian Koala Foundation, approximately 80 percent of original koala habitat has already been destroyed through methods such as deforestation, forcing more and more of them to live alongside humans in urban and suburban areas.


Thankfully, this cutie was found just in time and is on a road toward healing filled with love.



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The Maafaru Airport in the Maldives welcomes many people to the area, including an unexpected guest in April 2019. Workers came in that day and found an endangered green sea turtle in the middle of the runway, leaving a trail of eggs on the tarmac.

The turtle had returned to her home to lay the eggs, which was now part of the airport.

Photo: Parveen Kasawan via Twitter
The active turtle nesting site is now home to the Maafaru Airport runway. Sea turtles will often return to the same beach where they were born to lay their eggs. They may even take a number of years to reach that specific beach.

The sea turtle shown in the picture was probably hatched on that very beach and she had laid her own eggs on the same beach before it became an airport runway.

“Most of the species [of sea turtles] are drawn to the same area where they themselves were born and where they have nested in the past,” David Godfrey, executive director of the Sea Turtle Conservancy, told The Dodo. “That turtle was very likely born and hatched on that stretch of beach… For the turtle to be dropping her eggs tells me it’s not the first time she came to this shore.”

Photo: Parveen Kasawan via Twitter
Thankfully, the workers and local officials were able to get the turtle back to the ocean and she was in good health. As it turns out, however, other sea turtles are also coming to the beach to lay their eggs and finding a runway as well.

“Despite the construction of the runway, the frequency with which turtles visit the island for nesting purposes has not decreased,” a source from Maafaru Island Council told the Edition.

The Maafaru Airport is still under construction and when it is finished, it will hold up to six jets. A hotel and resort is also planned on the same beach. The green sea turtles will have a more difficult time coming back to lay their eggs when all is finished.

I hope people are getting the message. It is not about this turtle. It's about a species which is coming to this location each year to lay eggs. And then all the turtles will come to same location where they were hatched once. It's a circle. Stopped now.

— Parveen Kaswan, IFS (@ParveenKaswan) April 11, 2019

Activists are trying to work with the Maldives government to remedy the problem. They are also working with developers to come up with a sustainable model that will help to save the animals and plants that are unique to the area.

Sea turtles are also facing problems in other areas. The ocean is getting warmer and sea levels are rising, resulting in thinner shorelines and less area where the turtles can lay their eggs.

“Sea turtles need voices,” Godfrey said. “Voices from voters, from citizens – they rely on us.”

The Maldives rely on tourism and as a result, developers and environmental activists must continue to work together to help keep the turtles and their eggs safe from harm. More information is available on the Sea Turtle Conservatory’s website.

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Between 5,000 and 7,000 tigers are kept as “pets” in the United States – more than exist in the wild!

In 2011, approximately 50 exotic animals escaped near Zanesville, Ohio, raising awareness about the complex issue of ordinary citizens keeping wild animals as domestic pets. The incident was a result of Terry Thompson releasing a hoard of lions, tigers, bears, monkeys and other creatures from their cages before committing suicide. As a result, authorities were forced to shoot and kill nearly fifty of the untamed animals to protect nearby residents.

Ohio is one of many states that does not regulate or restrict keeping wildlife captive. It’s for this reason that millions of wild creatures, including large felines, reptiles, and non-human primates, are kept in private possession all across the U.S. As one might suspect, it is a difficult feat properly caring for an animal that should ideally be allowed to thrive freely in the wild. Exotic animals require special care, housing, diet and maintenance that most people cannot provide.

Like orcas and dolphins at SeaWorld needing to live freely in the wild, exotic animals deserve to thrive in their natural habitats. The following infographic makes a compelling case for the above argument and is likely to change your perspective on keeping wild creatures as “pets”.


Because there are few restrictions on caring for wild animals, there are now between 5,000 and 7,000 tigers kept as “pets” in the U.S – more than exist in the wild! To make matters worse, tigers can be purchased for as little as $300, which is less than the cost of a purebred dog.

Though exotic creatures might be fun to handle, there are compelling reasons as to why humans and certain animals are not meant to co-exist in close proximity. For example, approximately 90% of all reptiles carry and shed salmonella in their feces. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) estimates that 93,000 cases of salmonella are a result of exposure to reptiles.

Additionally, as many as 90% of all macaque monkeys are infected with herpes B virus. The virus is harmless to the monkeys but can be fatal in humans. Finally, there have been numerous incidences in which wild creatures have escaped and injured – and in some cases killed – their “owners.”

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Illegal Amazon rainforest loggers ambushed a young indigenous leader on Friday, murdering him in cold blood and wounding another member of the Guajajara people in Brazil.

Paulo Paulino Guajajara, 26, was shot in the head during the ambush. The murder occurred in the Araribóia Indigenous Reserve, an area under serious threat from illegal miners and loggers attempting to exploit the indigenous land.

Paulo was a prominent member of the Guardians of the Forest indigenous land defense group and took on the task of becoming a land defender. Guardians is a group of 120 indigenous Guajajara who risk their lives to defend theirs and other indigenous groups’ homes against loggers.

Reports say that during the attack, fellow member of the Guardian, Laércio Guajajara, was shot twice, grazing his arm and back before escaping the aggressors. He was later taken to hospital, said the Guardians’ leader who has also received threats from loggers.

Why Does The Government Allow This To Happen?
Violence has escalated against the forest protectors under the current far-right government of President Jair Bolsonaro. According to the Brazilian pan-indigenous organization APIB, a group that represents almost one million indigenous people throughout Brazil, the President is to blame.

“The Bolsonaro government has Indigenous blood on its hands.

The increase in violence in Indigenous territories is a direct result of his hateful speeches and steps taken against our people,” APIB said in a statement.

Despite federal law enforcement investigating the murder—allegedly a logger was also killed—Paulo’s body remains missing.


APIB leader Sonia Guajajara blasted the government over dismantling the environmental and indigenous agencies and urged lawmakers to refuse a deal that will see the sign off on a major trade deal with the EU. The deal, Sonia told Reuters, could see farmers and loggers driven by open markets to drive production and invade further indigenous lands.

“It’s time to say enough of this institutionalized genocide,” she said.



Just like other governments around the world (Australia and the United States), Bolsonaro condemns activist groups, NGOs and blames environment laws for hindering economic growth. Following his election last year, President Bolsonaro vowed to reverse indigenous protections that keep 15 percent of Brazil’s land reserved for indigenous tribes.

While Bolsonaro has yet to make good on his threats, his continued racism against the indigenous peoples has encouraged illegal logging, mining, and violence.

Amazon Watch program direction Christian Poirier spoke to Democracy Now!:

“[The Guajajara are] doing this on behalf of all of humanity, because they are protecting the critically important Amazon forests that sustain our climate, protect our climate, power or, I should say, fuel the rainfall all over Brazil, but also here in this country. In the state of California, rainfall is slackening due to the fact the Amazon is being decimated today.

Their rights are enshrined in Brazil’s Constitution—their rights to territory and to their way of life … Yet they have been systematically deprived of these rights.

And what we witnessed today—or, two days ago, with the murder of Paulino, was an example of that, a manifestation of the violence that’s growing in these communities.”

Before his death, Paulino spoke to Reuters in September about the inherent dangers he faced by guarding the rainforest:

“There is so much destruction of nature happening, including trees with wood as hard as steel being cut down and taken away.

I’m scared sometimes, but we have to lift up our heads and act. We are here fighting.

We have to preserve this life for our children’s future.”

A recent case study of crash test simulations in China has shown that some researchers are involved in extremely inhumane animal testing. Images released with the case study show live pigs being used as crash test dummies.

The study highlighted the case of one test that involved 15 young pigs, who were strapped into car seats and used as dummies for high-speed simulations. Many of these pigs were still very young, having only been alive for 70 or 80 days before they were used in the tests. In the tests, the animals were strapped into various different seatbelts for impact testing.


Half of the animals died in the tests, and the others were badly injured and likely traumatized from the experience.

The researchers said that it was necessary to use the young pigs because their bodies are very similar to that of a human child, and they were hoping to actually see what these crashes would do to a living creature’s organs.

The scientists responsible for these experiments say that they were compliant with US guidelines and claimed that their study was approved by an ethics committee. However, it seems that they may not be very familiar with what the laws in the US are, because it has been illegal to use pigs and other animals in these types of experiments in the states since the 1990s.


Zachary Toliver of PETA sais that these experiments were senseless and cruel.

“Despite the existence of sophisticated animal-free models, experimenters continue to fasten abused, frightened animals into car seats and crash them into walls until their bodies are bloody, bruised, and mangled. Live pigs are pulverised in these tests, leaving them with broken bones and severe internal injuries before they’re killed and dissected,” he said.

“Pigs don’t naturally sit up in car seats. Their anatomy is also very different from that of humans, so the data obtained from these horrific animal experiments aren’t applicable to human car-crash victims. Car companies figured out years ago that these kind of experiments are worthless and tell us nothing about a human experience in a car crash,” he added.

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A product many have not even heard of is causing an apocalypse of sorts for the world’s orangutans.

In Indonesia and Malaysia, rainforests are being slashed and burned at an alarming rate to make way for a third world cash crop: palm oil.

Palm oil has become almost ubiquitous in household products; it is used in instant ramen dishes, shampoo and conditioner, makeup and skin care products, chocolate-hazelnut spreads and nearly half of all packaged goods at any given supermarket. Many manufacturers have turned to palm oil because it is so cheap—until one factors in the cost to both human health (it is horrible for your heart), and the irreplaceable rainforests both our global ecosystem and the native orangutans depend upon.


To date, over 90 percent of orangutan habitat has already been destroyed. Additionally, smoke and debris from the fires are causing further damage to our primate relatives.


“The problem with fire and smoke is absolutely dire,” said Lis Key, International Animal Rescue’s communications manager in a Takepart interview. “Wild orangutans and orangutans in centers like ours are badly affected by the smoke. Some suffer upper respiratory tract infections, which can even prove fatal. Some of the babies we’ve taken in recently have been suffering not only from dehydration and malnourishment through lack of food but also breathing problems from the polluted air.”


One must wonder if a lower price point is worth the suffering and even possible extinction of living beings.

Luckily, it is not game over for orangutans yet, and there are steps we can all take, right now: boycott products or companies that use non-sustainable palm oil, write to companies that make products you use with this ingredient and tell them you won’t support unsustainable palm oil, educate friends and family and click here. A different ending to this story may yet be possible.

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Humans have become so greedy that rampant deforestation of amazon, destruction of rainforests around the world, plummeting wildlife population, and plight of animals doesn’t deter the most intelligent species from assaulting the nature and driving humanity to the brink of extinction.

In the latest heartless and cruel display of indifference, animal rescuers caught a weak, frightened, heavily pregnant, and starving orangutan clinging to the final tree as massive bulldozers destroyed her once pristine rainforest home.

Boon-Mee was so weakened and traumatized that she couldn’t leave the tree trunk where she had sought sanctuary as heavy machines ripped apart her home in Borneo. As a result, she could not forage for food to feed herself or her unborn baby, meaning she had nothing to look forward to besides death by starvation.


Luckily, the plantation owners told UK-based charity International Animal Rescue (IAR) about her. Soon, an IAR team backed by local forestry officials was dispatched; when they finally arrived at the scene, they found not just Boon-Mee but three other orangutans.

While Boon-Mee was barely surviving on bark, Charanya had a baby and was desperately searching for food. Kalaya was semi-conscious and lactating; she may have delivered a baby which had either died or had been taken as a pet.

Since Boon-Mee was too weak to climb down the tree, rescuers were forced to shoot her with a tranquilizer before catching her in a net. IAR official Lis Key said:

“It’s heart-breaking to see the appalling state of these animals as their habitat is razed for the palm oil industry – they were weak from hunger. It’s a small comfort that this time rather than chase them off or kill them, the ­company did the right thing and ­contacted us.”




The three adults and one infant were taken to a refuge, where Boon-Mee successfully had her baby. According to the Mirror, all the apes were nursed back to health and later released into the wild deep in another part of the forest. Lis added:

“Despite the condition they were in, they really are the lucky ones. The worst thing is there are hundreds of orangutans who won’t be so lucky because of the awful conditions they are forced to try to survive in.”

Deforestation for palm oil is the leading reason why only 41,000 orangutans are left in Borneo and only 7,500 in Sumatra—the only two places where they can be found. A century ago there were over 230,000 orangutans in Southeast Asia.

Palm oil, a vegetable oil that is extracted from the fruits and seeds of the oil palm, is used in up to half of all processed foods like instant noodles, is increasingly being used as bio-fuel, and is a key ingredient in items like shampoos, detergents, and cosmetics. Roughly 66 million tons of palm oil are produced each year, driving a trend that has seen forests burned and land robbed to make room for plantations.

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A strange trend in China has caught on, and many people in other areas of the world are horrified. Animal rights activists are especially upset that people in China are keeping live fish, turtles and other amphibians as keepsakes on their keychains.

These charms are simply little plastic bags that contain just enough water to allow the animal to survive.

The bag also contains a small amount of crystallized oxygen and other nutrients to keep the animals barely alive. However, the creature is trapped in a tiny prison for the amusement of its owner.


The animals only actually survive for a short amount of time in their tiny prison, so if the owner wants their pet to survive, they must cut it out of the plastic.

Unfortunately, not everyone takes this measure. Some people simply let the animals die and then throw them away.

These strange keepsakes are often sold outside of train and subway stations for as little as $1.50.

Photo Credit: Captain Planet (All Photos)
Qin Xiaona, director of the NGO Capital Animal Welfare Association said that these keychains were still legal because only wild animals are protected in China, and these animals do not fall under that classification.
“China only has a Wild Animal Protection Law. If the animals are not wild animals they fall outside the law’s scope,” Qin explained.

A petition to end the sale of these disturbing keepsakes has already reached over 1 million supporters.


According to Snopes, these strange keychains started hitting the market a few years ago, around 2012.

However, some sources, such as PETA, insist that these products were seen as early as 2008, when the trinkets were sold to tourists who came to watch the Olympic games.

The fact checking website also pointed out that it is difficult to tell exactly how widespread these keychains are in the country, just by reading a collection of news reports.

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A video of student bullfighters, some who are under 18, torturing young bulls to death has surfaced on the internet, and it is horrifying.

By now, animal rights campaigners have condemned the video in absolute rage. One of the clips shows the bull’s ears being cut off and being given to children while the other one received a tail.


One of the matadors has blood on his face as if the bull gave a fight while trying to survive.

According to activists from Animal Guardians and La Tortura No Es Cultura (Torture Is Not Culture), this was done on the behalf of an annual tradition in Cordoba. This tradition pays homage to Cordovan women.

However, Animal Guardians’ Marta Esteban said, “Every year they do this calf-fighting and they say they do it as a homage to Cordovan women,
Very few people attend, about 2,000 in a 17,000-capacity bullring. They also do it to promote the students learning bullfighting at different bullfighting schools in Andalusia.”

She added:

“The ear and/or tail of the animals are offered to the bullfighters if they perform well and then these are given to the public as a ‘present’.

One of the animals is still alive when the ear is cut off. The other ear is moving while they do that.
We cannot know the exact age of the bullfighting students involved. Some look under 18. They can kill animals from 14 years on. So those would be the ones actually torturing and performing in the bullfight.

Then there are spectators of any age and those who are invited into the bullring in their typical Cordovan costumes to pick up the ears.”


According to many campaigners, these claves already go through a lot during the events since the inexperienced matadors don’t know how to handle them properly.

Right now, they’re encouraging women to fight against this by sending complaints to council chiefs in Cordoba.

Aside from this, the hashtag #NoQuieroTuHomenaje, which translates as ‘I do not want your homage’, is making its way around Twitter and other social media.

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The bald eagle is our nation’s symbol as it represents freedom and independence. However, ironically, bald eagles are disappearing all over the country and no one seems to care about the matter.

The species is almost facing extinction as their food source is being poisoned. Extremely dangerous chemicals are released in their habitats causing them a painful death. When a bald eagle was brought to a wildlife rehabilitation centre, he wasn’t even able to hold his head up.

“His head was upside down when we got him. Lead affects the nerves, so that’s your brain, your use of muscles, all parts of the body. The birds often cannot stand … They usually have difficulty breathing. They cannot even open their beaks,” Lynn Tompkins, executive director of Blue Mountain Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center in Oregon, told the Dodo.


And what’s even more sad it’s that many other bird species are being affected by the manufactures negligence. As Tompkins declared: “We’re finding it in more and more species,. We started off with eagles but now we’re also testing hawks, owls and other birds. ”

As about those birds who were affected but managed to survive, it takes few months until they are fully rehabilitated.


“We had one eagle whose lead level was relatively low, but she was paralyzed, she couldn’t stand, she couldn’t unclench her feet,” Tomkins said. “It took several treatments to get the lead level down. It took several months for her to fly normally again. It took six months. That was a long time.”

Unfortunately, the latest eagle who was brought into the centre will never have the chance to fly again. Even after days of treatment. “This particular bird, every once in a while, he’d get startled and flap his wing out of fear, and then he’d stop. The treatment cannot reach the lead that’s already gotten into other tissues,” Tompkins explained.




“So far this year we’ve had three bald eagles come into the center – all of them had toxic levels of lead.It [the lead] is toxic. There’s no argument about that,” she added.


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