Penguins and Pandas

My husband and I watched March of the Penguins last night. I've always liked penguins and now I know why. This is a wonderful documentary, and I think even people who don't like documentaries would like this. What a tough life those little birds lead!

There is a great Animal Planet photo and article about the baby panda, Tai Shan, recently born at the Smithsonian National Zoological Park in Washington, D.C. Pandas are an endangered species as only "1,600 giant pandas survive in the wild, another 120 are in Chinese breeding facilities and zoos, and about 20 live in zoos outside China." Tai Shan will go to China when he is two years old.

HSUS Victories

I am on the action alert list for the Humane Society of the United States. They just announced two great victories in the fight for animals:

Victory for America's Horses. Our campaign to end horse slaughter in America secured a major legislative victory in the U.S. Congress -- one that will protect nearly 90,000 American horses from being slaughtered and their meat sent to Europe and Asia for human consumption. It was a tough battle, but in the end, the outspoken opposition to the slaughter by The HSUS and advocates like you finally led to federal protection of these majestic animals.

Trader Joe's goes cage-free! Just last month, after a concerted four-month HSUS campaign during which advocates like you sent tens of thousands of e-mails and letters and made countless phone calls, the grocery store chain Trader Joe's pledged that its own brand of eggs will now be entirely cage free. As a result, an estimated 380,000 laying hens -- who provide the more than 100 million Trader Joe's brand eggs sold each year -- will be spared lives spent suffering in battery cages, which confine the birds so much that they can’t even spread their wings.

If you would like to participate in the HSUS petitions or are simply interested in being informed of what they do, visit their site.