American Horses Are Still Being Slaughtered For Meat

The First Country With No Stray Dogs.
According to the World Health Organisation, there are nearly 200 million stray dogs worldwide.
Impressively, not one of them lives in the Netherlands.
It’s the first country in the world without any stray dogs.
Puppies are whisked around the city in bike baskets, most cafés and restaurants are dog-friendly, and small pets can ride on public transport for a reduced price.
( Freya Sawbridge, 27.01.2026 )  ..  dutchreview.com

Major Food Companies Ditch Chicken Welfare Pledge.
The bosses of Nando’s, KFC, Wagamama, Burger King and other major food chains have pulled out of their pledge to stop using fast-growing chickens.
Eight major food companies have faced backlash from animal welfare campaigners after walking away from a science-backed commitment to improve chicken sourcing standards.
The restaurant groups have left the Better Chicken Commitment (BCC), a framework informed by more than 150 independent scientists to drive higher welfare standards across the food industry.

At the same time, they have announced the formation of the Sustainable Chicken Forum (SFC), which they say will work to improve chicken welfare while balancing environmental concerns and pressures on supply.
However, the new forum does not include the BCC’s key policy to move away from sourcing fast-growing birds by adopting slower-growing breeds, which have a higher level of well-being.

Fast-growing meat chickens are often called ‘franken-chickens’ because they are prone to lameness, higher mortality rates and muscle disorders.
Campaigners said abandoning a commitment to source higher welfare birds is “letting down not only millions of animals but a nation of animal lovers”.

Claire Williams, campaigns manager at The Humane League UK, said: “Let’s be crystal clear about why the Sustainable Chicken Forum has been set up. Major food companies, with the combined worth of many billions of pounds, have decided that their profit margins cannot be threatened. The Better Chicken Commitment was designed by scientists to help animals, the Sustainable Chicken Forum is a welfare-washing, PR-stunt designed to deflect criticism, and let these companies claim they are doing enough. The result will be the continued use and abuse of hundreds of millions of birds who grow so big, so fast that often their legs are wracked with lameness, their organs collapse in pain and their bodies are burned black with excrement.”
( Eliana Nunes, 20.02.2026 )  ..  mirror.co.uk

Two Rare Marsupials Thought To Have Been Extinct For 6,000 Years Have Been Found Alive.
Two extraordinarily rare marsupials, believed to have been extinct for over six thousand years, have been discovered alive in the remote, Vogelkop mountain forests of the Bird’s Head peninsula in West Papua.
This remarkable rediscovery of the pygmy long-fingered possum and the ring-tailed glider was confirmed by Australian scientist Professor Tim Flannery, alongside a team of local indigenous experts and university researchers.
These species are rare examples of “Lazarus taxa”, animals who disappear from the fossil record only to be found alive centuries later.

Flannery noted that the likelihood of finding even one lost mammal was almost zero, let alone two.
The first of the resurrected species is the pygmy long-fingered possum.
This tiny, striped marsupial possesses an extraordinary evolutionary trait: an elongated fourth finger on each hand that is double the length of other digits.
The second species, the ring-tailed glider, features unfurred ears and a strong, prehensile tail used for gripping branches.
( Palm Oil Detectives, 07.03.2026 )  ..  palmoildtectives.com

Tens Of Thousands Of Dogs, Mostly Beagles, Are Tortured And Killed In Laboratories.
When you think of a factory farm, the animals that come to mind are probably pigs, cows and chickens.
But in the U.S. and elsewhere, a number of these operations also breed dogs for use in animal testing and research.

Ridglan Farms is one of the two largest facilities in the U.S. where beagles are bred for use in research labs.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, 42,880 dogs were held or used in research, testing, teaching or experimentation in 2024.
Several hundred of those dogs were used in a way where pain was “not minimised.”

In 2018, the animal activist organisation Direct Action Everywhere, or DxE, told The Intercept that some of the research labs are located at public universities in the U.S., including the University of Wisconsin, the University of Minnesota and some colleges associated with the University of California.

Beagles are the most common breed used for animal testing due to their docile nature.
They are used in biomedical research, cosmetic and pharmaceutical testing, as well as toxicity testing, to assess the safety and toxicity of new drugs, chemicals and consumer products.
Tests can be invasive, painful and stressful, and often end with the dog being euthanised.
( Jessica Scott-Reid, 19.03.2026 )  ..  sentientmedia.org

Morons Who Enjoy Killing Seabird Chicks.
The Guga hunt, the annual killing of Gannet seabird chicks on the Scottish island of Sula Sgeir, was written into law in the 1950s when wild birds were given legal protections, but the hunt still provided a legitimate food source to islanders during harsh winters.
This “human consumption” defence is what underpins the legality of the hunt today.
But of course, we know nobody has to club seabird chicks from their nests for food these days.
NatureScot is the public authority who gives out licenses for the hunt.

The hunters enjoy killing Gannets and feel entitled to do so.
They believe this is their birthright, and NatureScot keeps rubber-stamping it with taxpayer money.
Any notions of this being a genuine subsistence-based hunt is over.
It is about maintaining a ritual that they feel entitled to continue, regardless of the cost to wildlife.
Seriously, how have we got to the point where hunters are sending smug thank you emails to Scotland’s Nature Protection Agency for allowing them to kill native seabirds, in an internationally important nesting site, designated as a Special Protection Area?
( Devon Docherty, 26.02.2026 )  ..  protectthewild.substack.com

Captive Tigers In Thailand Have Died From Highly Contagious Virus.
A devastating virus outbreak killed 72 tigers at two popular tourist attractions in the northern province of Chiang Mai in Thailand.
The tigers, who died between February 8 and 19, tested positive for canine distemper virus (CDV).
They were among more than 240 tigers living across two parks operated by Tiger Kingdom.
CDV is highly contagious, spread through respiratory secretions and bodily fluids, and so campaigners fear the animals’ close living conditions contributed to the sheer scale and speed of the outbreak.
The deaths have raised concerns about the risks of breeding and keeping large numbers of wild animals in confinement.
( Michael Healey, 28.02.2026 )  ..  speciesunite.com

American Horses Are Still Being Slaughtered For Meat.
Nearly two decades ago, the United States effectively shut down domestic horse slaughter operations with a change to federal funding rules.
The North American horse-meat industry has since declined, but it’s not gone entirely.
While horse slaughter has ceased within the United States itself, the slaughter of American horses for meat has not.
It has simply shifted across borders.
Today, thousands of U.S. horses, including pets, workhorses, racehorses and rodeo horses, are still purchased at auctions and shipped to Canada and Mexico for slaughter, according to a report by the advocacy groups Animal Wellness Action, Center for a Humane Economy and Animals’ Angels.
( Jessica Scott-Reid, 05.02.2026 )  ..  sentientmedia.org

Australia Hands Out Longest Ever Prison Sentence To Wildlife Trafficker.
The seizure of dozens of live Western blue-tongued lizards, bearded dragons and spiny-tailed skinks covertly packed into popcorn bags, biscuit tins and women’s handbags have led to the longest prison sentence ever doled out to a wildlife smuggler in Australia.
On February 13, 2026, a New South Wales District Court sentenced 61-year-old Neil Simpson to eight years in jail for attempting to export 101 Australian reptiles to Hong Kong, Romania, South Korea and Sri Lanka.
They were intercepted soon after being mailed, and investigators recovered several hundred more during subsequent searches of Simpson’s home.

In addition to Western blue-tongued lizards and multiple bearded dragon and spiny-tailed skink species, Simpson trafficked shingleback lizards, Centralian blue-tongued skinks, desert skinks and narrow-banded sand swimmers.
They were concealed in post packages shipped to international buyers.
Each of the confiscated species is classified as a “regulated native specimen.”

Australia is home to 10% of the world’s reptile species, and 90% can be found nowhere else in the world.
The Australian government is cracking down on wildlife trafficking, with arrests tripling from mid-2023 to early 2025.
During that period, authorities seized more than 200 parcels at the border containing 780 native species.
( Gloria Dickie, 25.02.2026 )  ..  mongabay.com