For “Mammal Monday”:
Death of Alpha Wolf Sparks Renewed Concern over Hunting near Yellowstone
Researchers dubbed the alpha female 832F, though her admirers commonly refer to her as “06” for the year she was born. And she had many admirers—from wildlife photographers to weekend tourists to the researchers who tracked her movements with a sophisticated $4,000 collar. Her mate had also been killed this year & her pups were left alone to survive on their own.
Gray wolves have had a complicated history in Yellowstone. People eradicated them from the area in the 1920s and they were gone from the landscape for decades until the Park Service successfully reintroduced them in 1995. In the 17 years since, research in Yellowstone has shown the positive impact that wolves have had on the park’s plants and wildlife. But with the success of the wolf reintroduction, these iconic creatures have just recently been removed from the endangered species list and hunting has ensued in Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming. Although hunters cannot shoot the animals within Yellowstone’s boundaries, the wolves themselves do not recognize lines on a map and frequently roam outside the park
It has been just two years since state officials removed gray wolves from the endangered list in Montana, and only two and a half months since the animals were delisted in Wyoming, but already this year’s hunting season has taken a significant toll on the wolf populations in national parks. To date, hunters have killed five wolves in Yellowstone that were wearing expensive scientific research collars to help researchers study their behavior. Hunters killed at least two other collared wolves at Grand Teton as well.” More at: http://www.parkadvocate.org/death-of-alpha-wolf-sparks-renewed-concern-over-hunting-near-yellowstone/ By Sharon Mader, Senior Program Manager, Grand Teton
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832F, First wolf to have obituary in New York Times:
Doug McLaughlin
The wolf that researchers called 832F, left, was shot. The alpha female of the Lamar Canyon pack, she wore a tracking collar. The wolf with her, known as 754, was killed the previous month.
“Yellowstone National Park’s best-known wolf, beloved by many tourists and valued by scientists who tracked its movements, was shot and killed on Thursday outside the park’s boundaries, Wyoming wildlife officials 
The wolf, known as 832F had become so well known that some wildlife watchers referred to her as a “rock star.” The animal had been a tourist favorite for most of the past six years.” More at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/09/science/earth/famous-wolf-is-killed-outside-yellowstone.html
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Is Your Pet Buckled Up?
“A New Jersey assemblywoman has introduced a state bill requiring drivers to secure pets in vehicles or face fines ranging from $25 up to $1,000.
- Other states, including Tennessee, Hawaii, Connecticut, Illinois and Maine have regulations governing car travel with pets.
- Whether or not they agree with laws regarding pets in cars, most pet owners realize the risks of allowing a dog or cat to ride unrestrained in a moving vehicle.
- Cats should always travel in carriers. There are many options for restraining and securing your dog in your vehicle, including harnesses, booster seats, and various types of safety barriers.
- Letting a pet ride unrestrained amounts to animal cruelty if the driver gets into a crash.” More at: http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites/healthypets/archive/2012/12/31/traveling-with-pets.aspx
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Toxic rats, mice spur rodenticide battle
“Poisoned rats and mice are spreading toxic chemicals into the ecosystem despite widespread pressure from federal regulators, wildlife officials and environmentalists to remove the most harmful rodenticides from store shelves.
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Litter Box Issues
We tend to set up litter boxes in the places that accommodate our own lifestyles, but to raise happy cats (who won't ruin our homes) we have to look at the world through their eyes and create litter box environments that fall more in line with our cat's natural instincts.
My clients often say "but they were fine with all of the litter boxes in the laundry room until age 2. What happened?" Social maturity happened.
Once cats enter social maturity, somewhere between 2 and 4 years of age, they begin to look at their environment in a more territorial way. If you have a multi-cat household, this is the time when they will begin structuring their very flexible social hierarchy. Your cats will work out a time sharing arrangement with important resources, such as food, water, perching areas, and yes, the litter boxes.
My clients who have the biggest problem with cats urinating around their homes often group all of the litter boxes into the same room. This practice, though common, is a great way to cause territorial thinking that leads to tension in multi-cat households. Even if there are the correct number of litter boxes -- one box for each cat plus one more -- and they are all sparkly clean, uncovered, and not located in total darkness, cats may feel the need to create new litter box locations (under your dining room table, for instance!)
The easy way to solve this problem is to place the litter boxes in different locations throughout your home. Think upstairs, downstairs, north end, south end. Simply creating an environment that allows your cats to easily time share these important resources will ease tension and eliminate problems.”
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Bitterant placed in antifreeze to protect pets
The Consumer Specialty Products Association (CSPA) had partnered with the Humane Society Legislative Fund to pass laws in seventeen states to require the addition of bitterant. "Today, all major marketers are placing the bitterant in antifreeze in all 50 states,” said Phil Klein, executive vice president, legislative and public affairs for CSPA.
"The Humane Society Legislative Fund applauds them for taking this important step to help protect our pets, kids and wildlife in every state,” added Sara Amundson, executive director of the Humane Society Legislative Fund.
Anywhere from 10,000 to 90,000 animals are poisoned each year after ingesting ethylene glycol, according to Amundson. This highly toxic substance used in auto antifreeze and coolants smells and tastes sweet, making it attractive to animals as well as children. One teaspoon of antifreeze or engine coolant can kill an average-sized cat.” From: http://theanimalrescuesite.greatergood.com/clickToGive/ars/article/Bitterant-placed-in-antifreeze-to-protect-pets306
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Animal advocates ensuring no puppies sold on Facebook Marketplace
“You can rent an apartment or buy a used laptop on Facebook, but soon enough, you won't be able to buy puppies bred in puppy mills. That is, if the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) has anything to do with it, PetMD.com reports.
The ASPCA is working with Facebook and Oodle, the company that powers the social networking site's Marketplace, to ensure that online classified ads on the site do not list dogs from puppy mills. The measure is part of the organization's "No Pet Store Puppies" campaign.
The campaign, which boycotts buying anything from a pet store that sells puppies, aims to end the inhumane conditions that characterize most large-scale dog breeding operations. According to the campaign website, large-scale breeders value profit over the well-being of the animals, which means many are kept in unsanitary, overcrowded conditions for most or all of their lives. The ASPCA argues that online puppy sellers may also get their puppies from these facilities.
"Consumers who purchase a puppy from a website run the risk of acquiring an unhealthy animal and often end up with expensive vet bills and broken hearts," Cori Menkin, senior director of the ASPCA Puppy Mills Campaign, told the news source. "We hope additional online retailers and classifieds will follow this example and stop providing a platform for puppy mill sales."” From: http://www.aspca.org/News/facebook-rejects-puppy-mill-ads-for-good
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On This Day:
Harlem Globetrotters play their first game, Jan 7, 1927:
“On January 7, 1927, the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team travels 48 miles west from Chicago to play their first game in Hinckley, Illinois.
The Globetrotters were the creation of Abe Saperstein of Chicago, who took over coaching duties for a team of African-American players originally known as the Savoy Big Five (after the famous Chicago ballroom where they played their early games). At a time when only whites were allowed to play on professional basketball teams, Saperstein decided to promote his new team’s racial makeup by naming them after Harlem, the famous African-American neighborhood of New York City. The son of a tailor, Saperstein sewed their red, white and blue uniforms (emblazoned with the words "New York") himself. The lineup in that first game, for which the Globetrotters were paid $75, was Walter "Toots" Wright, Byron "Fat" Long, Willis "Kid" Oliver, Andy Washington and Al "Runt" Pullins.
The Globetrotters won 101 out of 117 games that first season and introduced many Midwestern audiences to a game they had not seen played before. As owner, coach, manager, publicist and sometimes even substitute player, Saperstein worked overtime to book games for his team. By 1936, they had played more than 1,000 games and appeared in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, Montana, Washington and North and South Dakota. (The Globetrotters didn’t actually play a game in Harlem until the late 1960s.) Their first national championship appearance came in 1939, when the Globetrotters lost to the New York Renaissance. That same year, the team began to add the silly antics they later became known for, including ball handling tricks and on-court comedic routines. The crowds loved it, and Saperstein told his team to keep up the clowning around, but only when they had achieved a solid lead.
In 1948, the Globetrotters earned a new measure of respect by beating the Minneapolis Lakers of the newly established National Basketball Association (NBA). Two years later, the NBA lifted its "whites only" ban and began to draft black players, forcing Saperstein to compete for his talent. By this time, the Globetrotters were actively touring on the international circuit, playing to audiences in post-war Berlin, Eastern Europe and Russia, among other places; they even performed once for Pope Pius XII in Rome. Some of the Globetrotters who went on to become NBA stars include Wilt Chamberlain, Connie Hawkins and Nat Clifton.
After Saperstein’s death in 1966, the team was sold to a group of Chicago businessmen for $3.7 million; they later sold it to Metro Media for $11 million. Reaching the height of their fame in the 1970s, the Globetrotters began to lose fans during the next decade, after the departure of such longtime stars as Meadowlark Lemmon. In 1985, Olympic gold medalist Lynette Woodard became the first female Globetrotter.
Over the years, the Harlem Globetrotters have played in more than 115 countries in front of 120 million fans. They have been the subject of two feature films and numerous television shows, including two animated series in the 1970s. In honor of their entertainment value, the team was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and made the subject of a permanent exhibit at the Smithsonian Institute. Their pioneering history and considerable athletic skill over the years was honored in 2002, when they were inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame.”
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Emperor Hirohito dies, Jan 7, 1989:
“Showa Tenno Hirohito, the 124th Japanese monarch in an imperial line dating back to 660 B.C., dies after serving six decades as the emperor of Japan. He was the longest serving monarch in Japanese history.
Made regent in 1921, Hirohito was enthroned as emperor in 1928, two years after the death of his father, Emperor Taisho. During his first two decades as emperor, Hirohito presided over one of the most turbulent eras in his nation's history. From rapid military expansion beginning in 1931 to the crushing defeat of Japan in 1945, Hirohito stood above the Japanese people as an absolute monarch whose powers were sharply limited in practice. After U.S. atomic bombs destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it was he who argued for his country's surrender, explaining to the Japanese people in his first-ever radio address that the "unendurable must be endured." Under U.S. occupation and postwar reconstruction, Hirohito was formally stripped of his powers and forced to renounce his alleged divinity, but he remained his country's official figurehead until his death in 1989. He was succeeded as emperor by his only son, Akihito.”
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Yesterday:
Misty and I went to get Jay, and had our walk-about down there. It wasn’t raining, but it was still coat weather.
Anything that I find in the house that I want to sell, I put in my hall. It is the one place where it won’t get animal hair on it. Then I pack it up in boxes and we move it into my ‘Yard Sale Dept’., in the storeroom. So Jay and I moved a lot of that stuff out of the hall.
Jay moved the sheets of galvanized roofing that came off the RVport to a less conspicuous place on the side lot, while I raked and swept the front porch by the front door. It has been too wet to use the blower on the pine needles. I also removed some of the lattice which had been screwed on top of the existing 3’ high wooden fence and gate. I had a doggie boarder that could stand on my steps and jump clear over the gate, so that is why that was put there. Removing it made the place look a lot better.
Then Jay painted some places on the fascia boards of the house which had been behind gutters which are no longer there. Some he did on a ladder, and some he did from the roof.
I tried to start the motor home again, it will turn over, start, but won’t stay running. It has an add-on electric fuel pump to prime it when it has been sitting for a while, and I can hear the clicking which tells me that it is working. I think that I will have to take a fuel line loose to check if the regular fuel pump is pumping. So I can’t move the motor home off the lot line before the appraiser gets here today.
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