Critter News

OCTOBER 17, 2011

Morgan, a 4-year-old killer whale, has lost her bid for freedom Agriculture Secretary Henk Bleker ruled Wednesday that the orca, rescued last year ailing and emaciated from the Wadden Sea off the northern Dutch coast, should be transferred to an amusement park on the Spanish island of Tenerife. Here's an excerpt from the online Boston Globe.

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Whaling Whales Boston Zoos 100

10,000 Birds

APRIL 2, 2012

This may be the most awesome pelagic you’ll ever experience… For me it was the publication in 1984 of Peter Harrison’s ground-breaking identification guide to ‘ Seabirds ’ that opened up the off-shore world of pelagic birding right on Cape Town’s door step.

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Albatross Penguins Dolphins Whales 241

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 1, 2011

And from July through to December one can sit and watch Cape Rockjumpers, whilst a dozen or so Southern Right Whales propel their massive bodies clean out of the water, then belly-flopping with thunderous amounts of spray. And rightly so.

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South Africa Penguins Africa Birds 257

10,000 Birds

JUNE 22, 2024

There are Harbour Porpoises right next to the ferry! He gets a good look of the little whales too, but everybody else on the ferry is seemingly unaware of the spectacle. If you miss the turn-off at the yellowish house on the right, U-turn at the railway line and return. What’s that? A fin, another one. So it is this morning.

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Sweden Birds Porpoises Deer 242

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 4, 2014

That’s right, I, along with my family and some really good friends, was camping. It was big, private, right next to the lake, and well-maintained. You’ll remember Javi from whale-watching. No, I wasn’t being punished, the apocalypse had not come, and I was putting myself through these privations voluntarily!

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New York Cooking Chipmunks Whales 212

10,000 Birds

APRIL 15, 2024

They are ridiculously unafraid of people there – so the cynic in me suspects that swan meat is not regarded as tasty by the Japanese (another explanation, that the Japanese just like animals too much, can presumably be discarded given the country’s very principled approach in insisting on the right to kill whales).

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China Iceland Whales Whaling 246

10,000 Birds

APRIL 17, 2013

Two hours after getting off the boat after checking out Sperm Whales we were off again out to find some albatross. We also passed White-fronted Terns , one of which was being harrassed by an Arctic Skua (Parasitic Jaeger to Americans), which broke off its pursuit when a fish jumped out of the water right beside it.

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Albatross New Zealand Fur Seals 203

Critter News

DECEMBER 2, 2011

Animal-rights activists claim an orca is being held in an "inadequate tank" in the Miami Seaquarium. They sued the National Marine Fisheries Service for excluding captive killer whales from listing under the Endangered Species Act. Read the rest of the article in the Courthouse News Service.

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Miami Animal Legal Defense Fund Ethical Treatment Whaling 100

Critter News

FEBRUARY 9, 2012

Do whales deserve constitutional protection against slavery? PETA went on to request that the whales be freed and released to a habitat better suited to their needs. Well, it's still historic and precedent-setting. Here's hoping we see more of these legal challenges. Full story posted on Global Animal and from the Huffington Post.

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PETA San Diego Ethical Treatment Whaling 100

Critter News

AUGUST 24, 2009

PETA put up a billboard in Florida that says "Save the Whales, Lose the Blubber: Go Vegetarian". I think they are right to be angry. But, when they start throwing around words like "whale" and "blubber", they're guaranteed to lose their potential audience on that one. On it, is an overweight woman standing on a beach.

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PETA Whaling Whales Vegetarian 100

Animal Person

APRIL 14, 2009

According to Reuters: Japan, which considers whaling to be a cherished cultural tradition, killed 679 minke whales despite plans to catch around 850. It caught just one fin whale compared with a target of 50 in the hunt that began in November. We wouldn't use a brain-damaged human, right? That's one result.

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Animal Liberation Front UCLA Animal Liberation Primates 100

10,000 Birds

JUNE 24, 2012

My friend on the end of the line got right to the point: “What does a Kingfisher look like?” Birds like American Coots and Long-eared Owls in Arviat, to Bald Eagles in Whale Cove. ” As I started describing them he added “Do they look like they’re having a bad hair day and have a pointy beak?

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Bald Eagle Breeding Whales Whaling 222

10,000 Birds

MAY 1, 2013

Happy tourists amongst a massive pod (which went for a while either side of this shot) of Dusky Dolphins right off the coast of Kaikoura. You have to give the crew their due, they tried hard, staying out longer than they had to and heading right out of the harbour. It wasn’t long before we saw them, either.

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Dolphins Sharks New Zealand Albatross 204

Critter News

NOVEMBER 4, 2009

He takes the right attitude: I could not care less how I was personally ridiculed, lampooned, and insulted. Hell, being ridiculed, lampooned and insulted on South Park is a declaration to the world that Sea Shepherd and Whale Wars are effective and have cracked through to the other side of the media culture curtain.

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Whaling Whales Ducks Tagged 100

10,000 Birds

JUNE 22, 2011

A great place to watch whales and pelagic seabirds. As such I am unsure who to credit for most of them, although a few were certainly taken by Annie Schmidt, who has a great photo blog of this season on the Farallones going right now which is definitely worth a look. Anyway, unlike my usual deal, all rights reserved for all photos.

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Breeding Stray Seals Whales 241

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 18, 2014

The time of year was right and I had high hopes. Then I got tired and lied down and when I woke up two hours, a Bridled Tern , a Minke Whale , and a Loggerhead Sea Turtle had went by. Just hungry, which wasn’t surprising considering at that point it was 2 PM and everything that I had eaten had been launched right over the rail.

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New York Sea Turtles Whales Whaling 216

10,000 Birds

MAY 9, 2017

The albatross photos are from pelagic trips out of Half Moon Bay by Alvaro’s Adventures and the Northern Fulmar photo was an unusual event—the beaching of a a blue whale carcass—that brought hundreds right up to the shore (video here ), also near Half Moon Bay.

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Albatross Hawaii Puerto Rico Chile 187

Critter News

FEBRUARY 1, 2009

s director of wildlife, Gabriel Nirlinguyak} said, recalling that the two had cooperated on bowhead whale management issues. He said that a lot of Inuit feel betrayed by the animal rights movement, and by some biologists when it comes to polar bears. But not with polar bears."

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Polar Bears Bears Animal Rights Movement Canada 100

Critter News

FEBRUARY 6, 2012

PETA claims the captured killer whales are treated like slaves, forced to live in tanks and perform daily at its parks in San Diego, California and Orlando, Florida. Advertisement: Story continues below "This case is on the next frontier of civil rights," said PETA lawyer Jeffrey Kerr, representing the five orcas.

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San Diego PETA Ethical Treatment Whaling 100

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 20, 2017

North America is aflame with eclipse fever right now, which provides yet another opportunity to wonder what life would be like if the average citizen felt a fraction as much passion for birding as is devoted to countless sports, media, celebrities, fashion, or even the rare astronomical phenomenon.

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2017 Whaling Whales North America 100

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

Kricher is well-known in naturalist book circles as a scientist who can write about complex scientific topics in engaging smart prose touched with just the right amount of dry wit. I’m sure it must have been on my list of suggested reading for my tour (I just checked my files, and yes, it was).

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2006 Tortoises Sea Lions Porpoises 279

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 16, 2020

I just have to be at the right place at the right time. And then I went and saw six new species so I should have managed to predict at least half of them, right? I took a gamble and got the family out on a (socially-distanced) whale-watching boat on the 12th and was rewarded, finally, with my Queens Great Shearwater !

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New York City Birds New York Blackbirds 200

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 3, 2017

The answer was right in front of me, a bit to the right, an adult keeping an eye on oblivious tourists, the nest deep within the tree. (2) I tested the waters before my California pelagic, with a brief Atlantic Ocean voyage, a whale watching trip from Montauk, N.Y. 2) Plum-headed Parakeet. But, I saw the bird!

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2016 India Ducks Costa Rica 167

4 The Love Of Animals

MAY 14, 2012

We loved seeing penguins, whales, polar bears, and wolves. We loved it when the penguins jumped out of the water, and right onto a camera man! We have loved seeing places that few people ever get to see, and learning about the interesting wildlife that lives there. Some of it is quiet funny as well.

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Polar Bears Penguins Wolves Whaling 100

Animal Ethics

DECEMBER 1, 2010

If an animal has the relevant moral capacities, actually or potentially, then it can be a possessor of rights. However, further research on animals such as whales and dolphins, although seemingly not in respect to monkeys, apes, chimpanzees, may yet reveal that man is not the only animal capable of being a bearer of rights.

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Animal Rights Rights Animal Morals 40

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 9, 2016

If you aren’t the one driving it’s worth keeping an eye out for Southern Right Whales wintering in the bay (the road is rather to twisty to be looking if you’re driving). The coastal road from the suburbs is spectacular, winding along hills overlooking the bay through fynbos (the endemic scrubland).

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South Africa Penguins Africa Whales 124

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 30, 2013

Cory’s Shearwater – 06 Oct 2013 – Going on a whale-watching trip with my family really paid off. Somehow, I am just never in the right place at the right time. This bird surprised the heck out of Seth Ausubel and I and we barely got enough on it to identify it. Number 300 in Queens!

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2012 New York City Jamaica 2013 171

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 7, 2011

This makes it a particularly exciting time in New Zealand as the Rugby World Cup begins in two days, and the competition is being held right here in New Zealand (I would imagine they might be more excited if they hadn’t just lost two matches to Australia and South Africa, their big rivals in the Tri-Nations).

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New Zealand Penguins Sanctuary Fur 157

10,000 Birds

MARCH 15, 2011

Dale studied scarlet macaws, and worked in their conservation, for three years in southern Costa Rica, followed by a year in the Caribbean working on Whale Sharks. Wicked, right? Cats Are Still Public Enemy Number One, For Birds The New York Times and Tweety have it absolutely correct. Hat-tip to Stella.

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2011 Breeders Deer Breeding 235

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 3, 2013

It is acceptable to point out other sea creatures–dolphins or whales or dragonflies–but the main goal is the observation and identification of the birds. The photo of the Tundra Swan at right is by Ken Behrens.) This is a great feature for those of us who tend to read up on a species quickly, right before a field trip.

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Ducks Groups North America North Dakota 247

Animal Ethics

JANUARY 30, 2012

The legal rights of nonhuman animals might first be achieved in any of three ways. In 2002 the German Parliament amended Article 26 of the Basic Law to give nonhuman animals the right to be “respected as fellow creatures” and to be protected from “avoidable pain.” Steven M.

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Rights For Animals Animal Legislation 40

Animal Ethics

NOVEMBER 12, 2008

The land ethic, it should be emphasized, as Leopold has sketched it, provides for the rights of nonhuman natural beings to a share in the life processes of the biotic community. The conceptual foundation of such rights, however, is less conventional than natural, based upon, as one might say, evolutionary and ecological entitlement.

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Animal Liberation Ethics Whaling Whales 40

Animal Ethics

AUGUST 19, 2009

I assumed that Hume was right in thinking that ultimately morality depends on how we feel about things. Many prominent animal-rights advocates (such as Tom Regan ) are deontologists rather than consequentialists. In advocating utilitarianism to a group of people I therefore had to express my feelings and appeal to their feelings.

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Morals Animal Liberation Animal Dolphins 40

10,000 Birds

JULY 24, 2012

Today I’m exploring a couple questions that have been bouncing in my head for a while…I’d love to hear your thoughts…I’m not calling into question animal rights, just the focus of the movement. – The Great Ornithologist Felonious Jive Animal rights. This makes perfect sense.

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Animal Rights Movement Animal Rights Wildlife Rights 263

4 The Love Of Animals

MAY 11, 2010

We recently got an email about the dangers currently being faced by our whale population as a result of a recent proposal to legalize commercial whaling. As whale lovers, and people who hope to one day be able to see them in the wild, we wanted to share this information with you in case you would like to get involved.

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Whaling Whales International Fund For Animal Welfare IFAW 100

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 21, 2016

Right: Robert McCormick, by Stephen Pearce. Unlike Darwin, who was a self-funded gentleman naturalist on board, McCormick was bound to the Beagle by his duties and was furious that a civilian passenger on board had usurped his rightful position as ship’s naturalist. (“Antarctica” by Kim Stanley Robinson, 1998).

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Russia Penguins Whaling Whales 189

10,000 Birds

MAY 8, 2012

Furthermore we have another very special stork-like bird, the regal Shoebill , previously known as the Whale-headed Stork but now placed in its own family. During the intervening years it has spread right down to the far south of the province as well as inland, with hundreds of breeding pairs now in KwaZulu-Natal province.

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