From the open publishing newswire: Sea shepherd has started a coalition with Portland based ARA groups today [3/15] was the start of the "Compassion on the Columbia campaign" to save sea lions on the Columbia River.

Sea Shepherd has formed a coalition with "sea lion defense brigade" and IDA. Thankfully Sea Shepherd has arrived from out of town to provide some much needed leadership for the sea lion defenders. Since Matt Rossell has left his job at IDA and moved away there has been a minor and unorganized campaign to save the Columbia River sea lions. Both the SLDB and IDA have been nearly silent since Matt left. Now Sea Shepherd is here and they have a track record of results.

BeachCarolina link:
 link to beachcarolina.com

FaceBook link:
 http://www.facebook.com/events/364881553631221/

SeaSheperd link:
 http://www.seashepherd.org/dam-guardians/

From the open publishing newswire: Join a demo to educate the public and inform the zoo that elephants deserve the space we voted for in 2008 and the zoo should not be contracting with a company that trains animals for entertainment.
 http://www.facebook.com/events/232456736884656/

Demo for the elephants of the Oregon Zoo
The Oregon Zoo - Saturday, December 15th 12 to 2pm
sponsored by IDA and Real Friends of Packy and the Animals of the Oregon Zoo.

Come out and show your support for the long-suffering elephants at the Oregon Zoo. Packy is now 50. He has never experienced one day of freedom despite the fact that in 2008 we voted for a multi million dollar bond measure to pay for a preserve so that he might do so. Now the zoo has a new baby whose future is bleak regardless of whether she ends up in a circus like other zoo elephants have or not. The public is at last getting more informed thanks in large part to the excellent reporting by the Seattle Times. Come out and give a shout out for the elephants. IDA and Real Friends will provide flyers to hand out to the public.

Recently the Oregon Zoo has been in the headlines for their contract with a company that trains elephants for entertainment. [...]

RELATED PIMC POST:  http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2012/12/420888.shtml

From the open publishing newswire: On November 15th there will be a joint meeting of Washington Fish and Wildlife and Oregon Department of Fish an Wildlife to discuss the future of the Columbia River Salmon.

If you are concerned about Salmon on the Columbia River this is the meeting to attend. There is a working group made up of the commissions of the Washington Department of fish and Wildlife and the Oregon Department of ish and Wildlife that will decide the future of Columbia River Salmon at this meeting. The meeting is in Seaside the morning of November 15th but a free bus is being provided by the stop gillnets now coalition, of which the HSUS is a part.

Here is the link to sign up:  http://stopgillnets.com/seaside/

From the open publishing newswire: Please attend this very important meeting--the indigenous Columbia river sea lions lives are at stake here and so are 13 runs of endangered salmon--they depend on our voice to save them from being scapegoated by a greedy fishing industry--Sea Lions are being killed for eating only 1% of the fish while human's currently kill 17% of the fish and are asking for more. Please do not let sport fishing weaken and destroy the Marine Mammal Protection Act 1972 (MMPA) more than they already have. True conservation of our iconic endangered salmon starts with lowering human predation not raising it. The very survival of marine mammals and endangered species are at stake here---Please attend and let David Hunt know that marine mammals and endangered species survival on the Willamette /Columbia rivers are important to you. A healthy ecology coupled with indigenous marine mammal and endangered salmon survival should have higher priority than killing for sport.

Please bring the family, make signs if you like,
carpooling can be arranged--please share this message

Town hall on sea lions is Nov. 8
Oregon Rep. Dave Hunt (D-Clackamas) will be holding a town hall about California sea lion/fish conflicts on Nov. 8 in Oregon City.
The free meeting is at 6:30 p.m. in the Banquet Room, Rivershore Hotel, 1900 Clackamette Drive.

From the open publishing newswire: "On the night of September 21, 2012, saboteurs tore open a lone flight pen located at the newly incorporated Primrose Pheasant Farm (27368 S. Primrose Path Canby, Oregon), releasing dozens of slaughter-bound ring-necked pheasants into the countryside.

Naturalized populations of ring-necked pheasants have resided in the Willamette Valley for hundreds of years and the surrounding farm land serves as ideal habitat that these captive bred non-domesticated birds can undoubtedly survive in. Destined otherwise to be killed by butchers and sport hunters, these sentient beings will now get the chance to live out the rest of their natural lives in the wild.

For the silent ones.. A.L.F."

directaction.info

[ Related: AAnimal Liberation Frontline ]

From the open publishing newswire: Thirteen foxes liberated from a fur farm in northern Virginia

From Animal Liberation Frontline

Thirteen foxes liberated from a fur farm in northern Virginia

On Saturday night, the ALF emptied a small fur farm approximately two hours from Washington DC. All 13 foxes on the farm were released. According to the communique posted by the North American Animal Liberation Press Office, the ALF also damaged equipment at the farm. The farm bordered Shenandoah National Park, where the foxes returned to their natural habitat.

The fox farm raided appears to be:

D & S Fox Farm
16671 Fox Farm Ln.
Elkton VA 22827-2739
540-298-9927
Owner: Dean Scott

The full communique reads:

"On the night of August 5, the Animal Liberation Front visited the only known fur farm in the state of Virginia, Scott Dean's D&S Fox Farm in Elkton. We opened every one of the few cages at D&S, giving thirteen beautiful foxes a chance at new lives in the nearby Shenandoah National Park. As we watched a few of them immediately scurry off to freedom, we damaged the machinery that allows Dean to continue his day-to-day operation confining and torturing these sensitive creatures. Dean, it appears that this is a hobby providing you only supplementary income - it is our commitment to free your prisoners and cost you more than you make until you shut down. To those nationwide who also seek justice for the innocent, your nearest fur farm is at most a state away. Take action for animals. -ALF"

From the open publishing newswire: Here is another workshop that we filmed this past April at the 2012 Law and Disorder conference in Portland, OR. In this video, lauren Ornelas (Food Empowerment Project) discusses social justice issue's involved in the food industry and how our choices affect them. lauren touches on slavery in the chocolate industry, produce worker rights, and environmental racism. This is a wonderful workshop to watch if you want to learn how your food choices, vegan, or not, still may be contributing to slavery on the ivory coast, or the horrible working conditions of produce workers in California.

 https://vimeo.com/45626814

We applaud lauren's efforts and her work with Food Empowerment Project. We urge you to check out their chocolate list to make sure you aren't eating chocolate from the ivory coast. We also urge you to contact Clif Bar and urge them to tell Food Empowerment Project where they get their chocolate!

 http://www.foodispower.org/chocolatelist.htm
 http://www.foodispower.org/takeaction.htm
homepage:  http://www.becausewemust.org/beyond-veganism-food-justice/

From the open publishing newswire: Rod Coronado, who is turning 47 this year, is a Yaqui Pascua Indian, a writer and poet, a father, lover of nature and animals, a felon and eco-anarchist. He's the kind of guy that could tell you all about the native flowers growing out of the cracks in the sidewalk and how to make rudimentary bombs...

In 1995 Coronado was convicted on felony charges for an arson attack on a Michigan State University animal research facility, part of a string of facilities targeted by the ALF in their campaign duly titled "Operation Bite-Back." He was sentenced with 56 months but the damages to the fur industry were substantial. Aside from the direct impacts of the action he was imprisoned for, he has been credited for research and inspiration which lead to many more actions, freeing thousands of animals -mink, fox, coyotes -who actually have a fighting chance to re-wild themselves and survive upon release. Not to mention millions of dollars lost to economic sabotage, dealing a crippling blow to the whole industry.

Much of Rod's early actions took place just before the eruption of intense FBI hunts for "domestic eco-terrorists," a fear mongering term elevated by State and corporate media following the rise of the ELF. But in a West rapidly laid bleak with concrete, undergoing an extinction crisis and climate convulsion, overcrowded with bland, consumerist culture and the boredom of timid human engagement, Coronado stands as a figure, all the more heroic, and absolutely quintessential to the promise of a re-Wilded West.

homepage:  http://earthfirstnews.wordpress.com/

From the open publishing newswire:

From Animal Liberation Frontline

:

This week, Bite Back received an anonymous communique from the Animal Liberation Front claiming responsibility for the liberation of four chickens from an Oregon factory farm. The ALF communique stated this was the same farm from which six hens were liberated in January.

The communique reads, in full:

During the second week of May 2012, two activists entered an egg farm located in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. 4 hens were removed from the premises and placed in good homes where they will live out the rest of their natural lives. This is the same farm where 6 hens were liberated last January.

This action was done to save these individual animals from the torture and misery intrinsic to industrialized egg production, as well as to demonstrate that although we may not be able to free every animal, we can free some. This was done in full solidarity with the anarchists and animal liberationists facing state repression here on the west coast and abroad.

From the open publishing newswire: The Portland police are continuing to use animals (horses) for tools in crowd control.
This is video footage from just one (1) incident in 2010 where these animals, are rammed into citizens protesting on a public sidewalk. The ramming of protesters with peaceful loving horses, is done until its realized (as seen in the video) that this abusive tactic is doing no good what so ever. This is repeated year after year.

Retire the Police Horses.

Free the Horses - Retire the police horses from crowd control - 2010
(3 min video)

From the open publishing newswire: Last week the government again authorized the killing of sea lions on the Columbia river. The traps are set. It has begun again.
Yesterday, monitors with the Sea Lion Defense Brigade made the annual pilgrimage to the dam. It was strangely silent. Even the hazers were standing down, as it was Sunday. We saw no California sea lions up there yet at all. We did see two Stellars playing in the current just below the dam, and at least two others resting in the slower water down by Strawberry Island. Despite the government's best effort to get the Stellars de-listed from their threatened and endangered species status, the gentle and gigantic Stellars are still protected this year, and cannot legally be killed. (They are not safe, though. Vigilante fishermen kill more sea lions illegally every year than the government killed last year. These huge, friendly animals make easy targets for their predations.)


We also saw two beautiful bald eagles, hunting fish from a tall tree just below the dam. Nature is beautiful. But irony stings: a friend, upon hearing about bald eagles eating salmon, remarked, "What are they gonna do, kill every predator on the river? Why can't they just stop over-fishing?!" Indeed.

From the open publishing newswire: Encourage Portland's Charter Commission to let Portlanders vote on banning horses and chemical weapons for crowd control.

Several of the proposals being considered by the Charter Commission are making city officials nervous, according to commission member Steve Weiss, quoted in a Portland Mercury article. The 20-member city council-appointed group is given the power to create proposals that (if 15 of them agree) are then placed on the ballot to be decided by voters. Housekeeping measures and an independent utility commission proposal were supported by the city council and mayor, but when the commission started considering other more radical ideas? like instant runoff voting and police accountability? the city leaders' nervousness began. Two votes are expected this week: Monday, February 27 on an independent utility commission proposal and Wednesday, February 29 on a proposals that would ban the use of horses and chemical weapons for crowd control... The major point made by those testifying at the police accountability subcommittee meeting was that pepper spray, tear gas and horses don't break up protests? they only make them more chaotic and dangerous. The commission asked for comments from protesters who have had to deal with horses and chemical weapons up close, so any comments based on personal experience would help inform their opinion. Would Portlanders ban horses and chemical weapons if given the chance to vote on it? Possibly. Should Portlanders be given the chance to vote on these issues? Definitely.

The possible vote on the police accountability proposal [took] place Wednesday, February 29th from 6 to 9 PM at Portland City Hall, 1221 SW 4th Avenue, 3rd Floor, Rose Room. For links and video visit: villageportland.com

Video of the Feb 22 hearing

From the open publishing newswire: reposted from green is the new red website:

Two activists with the animal rights group "Negotiation Is Over" (NIO) have been arrested at a protest in Florida. Group founder Camille Marino was arrested on an out of state warrant, and is awaiting extradition to Michigan.

In Michigan, NIO is campaigning against an animal experimenter at Wayne State University named Donal O'Leary, who uses dogs in heart experiments. One of the dogs, the Dalmation pictured above named Queenie, was forced to run on a treadmill with a device implanted in her heart, catheters protruding from her body, and open wounds leaking fluids. Doctors have urged the federal government to investigate O'Leary's violations of the Animal Welfare Act.