IFAW's Animal Rescue Blog

Australia's bushfire update - latest news

The latest news from Tania Duratovic who has just returned from nearly three weeks on the ground in Whittlesea.

Friday 6 March
(Photograph ©IFAW/T.Duratovic)

I am now back in Sydney – after a few days rest – but the situation down in Victoria is still not over – there are still a number of fires raging in the State and the IFAW team is on stand-by to re-deploy if we are needed.

Dr. Ralph returned for the final few days of our time in Victoria to help out. We travelled to Southern Ash Wildlife Centre run by wildlife carer Colleen Wood where the world famous ‘Sam the Koala’ is being cared for. We spent the whole day treating burns and changing bandages of the koalas Colleen has in her care. I have to admit I took a bit of a shine to Sam, who is actually a Samantha - she was so gentle and allowed us to treat her without batting an eyelid!

Incidentally, I spoke to Colleen last night and she now has 52 koalas at her place!!

We also travelled to another wildlife carer who was looking after the young wombat that was bought into us at Whittlesea which needed Dr. Ralph's expertise to treat an infected burn on it’s bottom - ouch.

Many of the carers who were based with us in Whittlesea had to return to their own homes at the end of last week – which were coming under threat with more bad weather reported.  But since returning home these carers are still receiving many calls and reports of injured wildlife which they continue to respond to – often having to travel great distances to get to the animals.

I’m too am receiving calls from carers with updates of the animals I helped to rescue and treat. Many are doing well and some have been released into safe areas. It is important to remember that these carers are now dealing with the long road to recovery and rehabilitation for these animals, which is some cases will take many months. continued......

Bushfire emergency in Australia - a message from Erica Martin

On behalf of everyone at IFAW I wish to express our deepest sympathies to those who have lost loved ones, homes and livelihoods during the terrible bushfires in Victoria.

In tough times, Australians have a reputation for banding together and helping those less fortunate and this crisis is proving to be no exception with the outpouring of support for people affected by the fires. With the many thousands of animals injured or now at risk from starvation our deep gratitude goes to all the wildlife carers and rescuers who are putting their own needs second to those of the animals.

IFAW is already rushing urgently needed aid to wildlife volunteers who are helping to save as many animals as they can and we are working with local carers and authorities on how best to help during the coming days, weeks and months. Information from the field will be updated on this blog and the IFAW website.

Erica Martin
Director
IFAW Asia Pacific

Read the most recent update from the bushfires.

Part Three at The Panyu Sanctuary - Elizabeth and Chu Chu, the youngest of them all

Elizabeth (Bebe) is the other female in our group. Her delicate face is shiny black with not a hint of brown that dilutes most black bear muzzles. Her grave eyes and deep furrows in the skin on her forehead give her little face a somewhat sad and earnest expression. She is a quiet, reserved bear, wary and cautious with her trust. Which is why, when she approaches to accept a treat from you, one’s heart wants to burst with the joy of her acceptance. For all her seriousness, though, one does catch her in goofy repose on a warm, drowsy afternoon, sunning her tummy and languidly twitching her nose for interesting aromas. She is famous for striking serene yoga poses and holding them while she contemplates the landscape or deep inner thoughts. Bebe often returns to the den in the evening with her fur bristling with long grass seeds, evidence of her long, exploratory forays into the far reaches of the enclosure. There she naps in the cool sanctuary of a hollow beneath the thick, long grass.

Chu Chu is our youngest bear, although the stiffness of arthritis is trying to age him faster than he deserves. We see arthritis in nearly all bears who lived on bile farms into adulthood. The bears are denied the fundamental right of any living creature to movement. They live crammed into cages no larger than their bodies where their joints freeze, their bones and muscles weaken and they suffer the relentless physical yearning for a chance to extend their limbs. Poor nutrition and the long-term inflammation from the gall bladder catheter accelerate the advancement of arthritic change in even young bears. Unfortunately, that progress is not reversible once it begins, and even the best veterinary and husbandry care can only slow its progress. But none of this can damp the spirit in Chu Chu. He wrestles with the other two boys whenever he can goad or trick them into it, the many scratches on his skin a testament to his boundless enthusiasm and happy nature. Even the beautiful moon bear crescent on his chest has little black spots in it, as though an ordinary blond crescent just weren’t cheerful enough for him.

Tomorrow read our last post from Panyu about Hong - all boy, impatient, clamoring and always at the center of action.

Part Two at The Panyu Sanctuary - Digger, the smallest at the Sanctuary

Digger is our smallest bear, weighing in at all of 126 kg.

Her long, thick ruff nearly brushes the ground as she pads around the enclosure, sniffing for treats. She is quick and bright and always a little suspicious of one’s intentions, as any self-respecting female bear will be. One cannot fool her into anything. If one wants her to enter the weigh cage, for example, or asks her to shift from one den to another, one has to give her a very good reason to do so and then plenty of time to make up her mind and don’t bother trying to rush her. But once she decides, she is there, lickety-split. Her poor little legs are so short that just to cross the little ledge between dens, she climbs onto it first with her elbows, wriggles her way over it, and then scrambles her little hind legs across.

Cute as this is to watch, it is a sad and permanent testament to the malnutrition and abuse that she suffered in the bear cage. Her blessed and forgiving bear nature doesn’t appear to hold anything against us, however, as she scurries toward the keeper offering oranges. And woe to one of the big boys if they stand in her way!

Digger is the little bear under the new playing structure in the picture above.

Working to Save Moon Bears in China

In 1996, The Panyu Bear Sanctuary, located in Guangdong Province, China, was established to house nine bears rescued from a bear bile farm.  This was the first rescue center of its kind, and signifies the initiation of a campaign to end bear bile farming in China.

Read more about bear bile farming and IFAW's work to end it.

Historically, bear bile was used in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in very small amounts as a supplement. However, more than 50 herbs are used today to treat the same ailments that benefit from bear bile formerly, many of them to greater effect. IFAW surveys in China (1989, 1990) have found over 80% of the Chinese consumers would reject bear bile on cruelty grounds and a significant number of TCM practitioners have moved away from prescribing bear bile on safety and quality grounds.

Currently there are five bears still living at the sanctuary - Xie Sheung, Digger, Elizabeth, Chu Chu and Hong.  At the time of their rescue by IFAW, the bears were emaciated, stressed beyond endurance, riddled with parasites, draining pus and pain from the gall bladder.

Over the next few days we will be bringing you the stories of these five bears...saved from a life of torture and now living in a safe and healthy environment for the rest of their lives.

Let me introduce you to Xie Sheung.

An Interview with Barbara Cartwright, IFAW Campaign Manager on eBay Global Ban on Ivory

As we reported on October 21, 2008 eBay annouced a global ban on the trade of ivory on all eBay auction sites.  That ban is set to take place starting January 1, 2009. 

IFAW is grateful to eBay for taking this important step forward for elephant conservation. By setting the bar with a global ban on ivory, eBay is proving to be an example for both governments and online dealers to also take a stand on one of today’s most critical wildlife issues – Internet trade.

Barbara Cartwright, IFAW's Campaign Manager from Canada sat down with eBay to talk about the importance of this ban and what it will mean to the world's elephant populations.  Here is an excerpt from that interview:

1) IFAW has been studying the on-line trade of endangered species for some time now. What prompted your interest in this issue, and what have you found?

IFAW has been fighting the illegal wildlife trade for about thirty years, using investigations, education, and advocacy to better understand and fight this damaging trade. Over the past ten or so years, we became increasingly concerned about the way the Internet could be used to facilitate the illegal wildlife trade. The web can link buyers and sellers through a lucrative and relatively risk-free channel for illegal trade. Current national laws aimed at regulating wildlife trade have not kept pace with the growth of Internet trade. And even where laws exist, enforcement is often inadequate or simply not focused on trafficking in wildlife.

In an effort to combat this trade, IFAW began actively monitoring common internet trade sites in 2004. We have published 4 reports that revealed shockingly high numbers of wildlife products traded daily on the web. IFAW’s most recent report, Killing With Keystrokes, detailed the results of an intensive investigation undertaken, in part, to better understand the scope and scale of the illegal wildlife trade. In the course of just six weeks, we were astonished to find more than 7,000 wild animals and animal products for sale online. This figure was all the more alarming because the survey was restricted only to trade in CITES Appendix 1 protected species —and even within this narrow group we only looked at primates, elephant, reptiles, large wild cats, rhinoceros, and birds.

2) Why is the ivory trade a problem for elephants when it is legal?

First, it is important to state that the ivory trade has been banned internationally since 1989 under Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (or “CITES”). It was made illegal after a decades long crisis in which elephants, slaughtered for their tusks, were driven towards extinction. With the proper permits, CITES allowed for the sale of antique ivory that was obtained before the convention came into place. Sadly, in 1997, and again in 2008, the total ban was further diluted, allowing a resumption of limited commercial trade in elephant ivory from Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe via two stockpile sales.

In effect, the commercial trade in ivory has created a tragic situation for elephant populations with many thousands being killed annually for their tusks. Since it is impossible for the human eye to distinguish between legal and illegal ivory, outlaws have taken advantage of the “loophole” of legal sales to target weakly patrolled elephant habitats to smuggle and launder ivory from poached elephants into legal inventories.

But whether the ivory was obtained legally or illegally, it comes at the price of more dead elephants – any trade in ivory drives more poaching. If elephants in Africa and Asia are to have a chance of survival, the trade in ivory must be completely prohibited both domestically and internationally.

You can find a full copy of the Question and Answer session with eBay on their blog - ebay Ink.

The ban of ivory on eBay is a momentous step forward to protect elephants. As our campaign continues IFAW will continue to encourage other sites to follow eBay’s lead. Meanwhile, it is critical to improve the myriad of laws and enforcement that govern the illegal trade both on-line and on-the-ground.  IFAW will continue to work with international and national authorities such as Interpol, CITES and USFWS to both formally and informally provide information and data on the illegal wildlife trade. And, IFAW will continue to monitor and investigate the illegal trade in wildlife on the web.

An Elephant Ripped Of Her Freedom

IFAW has been working to end ivory trade and the illegal poaching of elephants for many years. Here is a story that depicts the realities individual elephants face who are impacted by poaching.

The elephant in this story, 'LaLa,' was a baby Asian elephant orphaned after her mother was shot twice by a poacher in Laos. After the mother dragged herself over to the China side of the border, with her baby in tow, she laid down and died. The baby stayed by the mother's side for quite a long time, trying to pick the mother up with her trunk, trying to lift up her legs to make her walk again, and rubbing up against her. People started to crowd around when word got out about what happened and the baby started to circle around the mother, as if protecting her. Eventually, the baby, exhausted by both fear and incredible sadness, lay down and curled up by her mother's side and fell to sleep.

Unfortunately, after the baby was rescued by local officials she was brought to a center that was completely unfit for elephants. She lived in a concrete room where she was chained to the floor. She eventually died here.

This is an example of the horrid reality individual elephants and family groups experience in the face of poaching. Unlike in other parts of the world, in China, if a baby elephant is orphaned, there is no place suitable for him or her to be taken. This is in contrast to India and Kenya, where there are elephant rescue and rehabilitation centers which IFAW supports that will take in orphaned elephants, hand-rear them, and eventually re-release into the wild.

Emergency Response Training in Indonesia

The following is a report from Tania Duratovic, the Emergency Relief Responder in the Asia Pacific office. Tania is in Indonesia with Dick Green IFAW’s Emergency Response Manager for Disasters, offering training to vets, students, NGOs and government representatives from across Indonesia and the Philippines on how to rescue animals in disaster situations.

I arrived yesterday after a pretty long journey from Sydney, which ended in a two hour bus ride from Surabaya, where my flight had been re-routed due to bad weather, travelling through the local villages which were preparing for the festival of Eid al-Adha, a traditional Muslim holiday.

Suspected rabies in tourist area of Bali, Indonesia - Update

The Indonesian Minister of Agriculture, Anton Apriyanto has officially declared Bali as rabies infected, marking the first time that Bali has lost its "rabies-free" status. As the island is now considered at risk, there is a temporary ban on the import or export of dogs, cats, monkeys and other animals until further notice.

According to various sources there has been at least one confirmed human death from rabies, while three others are suspected.

Although a large number of dogs - suspected of carrying rabies - have been culled, hundreds of pet dogs have been vaccinated by Yudisthira, the mobile vet clinic, which is working closely with the government. Every animal vaccinated is issued with a collar and card certifying their rabies-free status. The hope is that by acting quickly in the affected areas with vaccinations and public education that the outbreak will be under control within three months.

Read the original post here.

Suspected rabies in tourist area of Bali, Indonesia

In the tourist areas of Bali, IFAW funds a mobile vet clinic, the Yudisthira Bali Street Dog Foundation. This vet clinic treats thousands of dogs every year for skin disease, ticks, worms and malnutrition and carries out spay/neuter programs to control the dog population but now the dogs are facing a new threat.

Four human deaths in the Kuta region of Bali have been reported and officials suspect rabies, leading to some calling for a complete cull of dogs in the area.  At this point the cause of the deaths is currently undetermined but it is believed that two of the victims died up to two months after being bitten by dogs.

IFAW have contacted local authorities asking them to re-call their message of a mass cull and offering to work with them and Yudisthira to find a solution to the potential health risk. We have offered support in finding a more humane solution to the problem which will involve a mass vaccination program for the animals in the area, community education for bite prevention and management and access to human vaccination from local health clinics.

Contrary to popular belief, many of the ‘street dogs’ in Bali are actually people’s pets. The dogs are what are known as ‘owned roaming’ dogs – they have owners but are not fenced in and are let free to roam unleashed. Killing pets and street dogs alike is not the solution and mass culling has not been shown to be effective in the spread of rabies in the past.

Bali has been rabies free for many decades and IFAW understand the potential public risk but with the cause of the deaths currently unconfirmed, we are urging caution and restraint and offering our resources through Yudisthira to find solutions.   

Read an update on the situation here.