A 42-YEAR-old woman will appear in Perth Magistrates Court today over allegations she poisoned an eight-month-old shih tzu. The Belmont woman was charged by the RSPCA with one count of animal cruelty under the Animal Welfare Act 2002. The RSPCA alleges that on December 16 last year the woman pushed small cubes of meat [...]

Shipments of Australian cattle to Indonesia could resume next week, with livestock giant Elders expecting an export permit approval in days. Elders is the only Australian company to formally begin the notice of intention to export process with the Federal Government, putting its application in nine days ago. Managing director Malcolm Jackman said he expected [...]

The vast majority of submissions to the Senate inquiry into Australia’s livestock export trade demand an end to live exports. Of the submissions so far published on the review’s website, about 90 per cent are from people wanting the trade closed down. It’s expected more submissions will be published in the next few days. Meanwhile, [...]

A PLAN to make stunning of animals compulsory before slaughtering has been deferred for three months. A meeting of federal and state agriculture ministers in Perth yesterday rejected a South Australian bid to institute national mandatory stunning immediately. SA Agriculture Minister Michael O’Brien had moved for the national policy, saying it was hypocritical of Australia [...]

Federal and state agriculture ministers meeting in Perth have collectively stated their support for Australia’s live animal export trade. West Australian Agriculture Minister Terry Redman says he’s pleased with the outcome of Thursday’s meeting in the wake of the Indonesian live cattle trade ban imposed by Canberra. He said that federal Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig [...]

THE developer behind a port proposal for Kwinana says there will be no livestock holding yards at its port if the live export industry is moved there. James Point Pty Ltd (JPPL) Chairman Chris Whitaker sent a public letter to City of Rockingham Mayor Barry Sammels this week after Cr Sammels said in the Weekend [...]

An animal welfare expert says kangaroos are being tortured as a form of “entertainment” in urban bush south of Perth, with one kangaroo allegedly being ripped in two after it was tied to two cars and pulled apart. Mandurah-based fauna relocator and biologist Allison Dixon claims bush near Meadow Springs golf course just north of [...]

THE live sheep export industry has been warned to lift its game or be the next to face a backlash from the Australian community. RSPCA Australia chief executive Heather Neil said the live sheep trade had already had 30 years to get it right. “But they haven’t got it right yet, and so they better [...]

CATTLE industry heavyweight Paul Holmes a Court has come out in support of the Federal Government’s suspension of Australia’s live cattle trade with Indonesia. His Heytesbury Cattle Co has six stations across Australia’s north and is one of the largest exporters of live beasts to Indonesia, sending around 25,000 head a year. The suspension of [...]

A SATELLITE tag has been successfully attached to a whale tangled in fishing gear off Rottnest Island, enabling authorities to plan its rescue. The Department of Environment and Conservation plans to monitor the whale, an 11m humpback, overnight. If weather conditions have improved tomorrow, the DEC will try to relocate it and free it from [...]

IT SOUNDS like science fiction, but it’s not. Synthetic meat and milk could provide the solution to feeding a growing global population with limited natural resources. And according to Beef Co-operative Research Centrechief scientist Professor Mike Goddard, synthetic proteins have the potential to change meat and dairy production in the same way the rise of affordable [...]

Up to 500 wallabies have been marooned on an island in the middle of Lake Argyle in the east Kimberley. The animals, known as agile wallabies, became stranded late last week while trying to seek refuge from record rains and flooding in the region. The Department of Environment and Conservation’s Daryl Moncrieff says the Kimberley [...]

DOZENS of wallabies stranded by floodwaters have died from heat stress and about 200 are surrounded by crocodiles. The animals are trapped on three small islands because of Lake Argyle’s rising water levels near Kununurra. Food drop for animals | The Department of Environment and Conservation said yesterday that the wallabies could be stranded for [...]

The maximum penalty for serious animal cruelty will be tripled in Queensland following a spate of attacks. The state’s criminal code will be amended to create a new serious animal cruelty offence carrying a maximum seven years’ jail, increasing the penalty from the current maximum of two years’ imprisonment, Premier Anna Bligh said on Monday. [...]

THE Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) has attributed a recent spate of turtle deaths in suburban lakes to Perth’s long, hot summer. Eight turtle deaths have been recorded at Woodlands’ Jackadder Lake during the past five weeks, with deaths also reported in Mt Pleasant, Bibra Lake, Kewdale, and the Perth Hills. The DEC has [...]

PEOPLE should think twice before helping turtles that appear distressed in dried-out lakes. The Department of Environment and Conservation has received many calls to report sick oblong turtles in suburban lakes. DEC wildlife officer Matthew Swan said while dry weather was having an impact, the oblong turtle was a common and adaptable native species. “The [...]

A vegetarian couple on the Greek island of Crete have been barred from adopting a child because of doubts about their diet, a local social welfare official said. The decision was taken because the would-be adoptive parents, who have gone to court to overturn it, eat no meat or fish and officials feared this regimen [...]

EXPERTS say that record temperatures and low oxygen levels are to blame for dead fish being washed up on riverbanks and beaches across WA. Dead fish, eels and crayfish have been found on shores with the coastline of Green Head, some 290km north of Perth, being covered in washed up carcasses. Green Head resident Rod [...]

VICTORIA’S ban on processing kangaroos is robbing the state’s agricultural industry of more than $13 million a year, according to the Kangaroo Industry Association of Australia. The association recently presented the Victorian Farmers Federation with a management plan to put to the State Government. It argued handing shooting rights to commercial harvesters rather than amateur shooters [...]

We are thrilled to announce that after more than 40,000 supporters of PETA and its affiliates around the world sent e-mails urging Unilever to stop testing tea on animals and after representatives from PETA and our affiliates in India and Europe flew to London to meet with Unilever—the world’s largest tea maker, which makes the Lipton and [...]