Many of our shows deal with complex legislative and veterinary issues, so every once in a while we like to meet up with people on the ground, deep in day-to-day work with animals. This is one of those episodes. In it, we talk to:   Paul Collins, the Wisconsin state director for Animal Wellness Action. In his free time, he volunteers at a local rescue sanctuary, where he has befriended emus and become a master of cleaning goat stalls.   Alecia Torres, the operations director at Heartland Farm Sanctuary in Wisconsin. Heartland provides specialized care to rescued farm animals, offer ..read more

The past year was busy on the animal-wellness front. Not only did Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy see some major wins outside of Congress, we worked to set up major legislative victories for when the 118th Congress returns for its second and final year. In this podcast, Wayne Pacelle, president of the groups, and Jennifer Skiff, director of international, review those wins and set the stage for 2024. Victories include: The Supreme Court’s upholding California’s Prop 12 and affirming the state’s right to exclude from its markets products from animals kept in extreme ..read more

About 1.5 million kangaroos a year are shot, bludgeoned or left to starve to death or die of their injuries. This occurs because companies like Adidas and New Balance still pay hunters to head into the Australian wilderness to hunt the animals. The hunters make the kills, the kangaroos are skinned, and the skins are made into soccer shoes for affluent customers across the United States and other parts of the world.   That's right. The largest commercial slaughter of terrestrial wildlife is predicated on selling soccer shoes, or cleats, to pros, amateurs and kids who are willing to pay ext ..read more

Last May, Marielle Williamson was an anonymous teenager doing anonymous teenager things. Like her classmates at Eagle Rock High School in Los Angeles, California, she was busy preparing to graduate and to leap across the threshold into adulthood. The last thing on her mind was becoming the subject of countless news stories and being thrust into a debate about nutrition, animal welfare and the First Amendment. But that's what happened to her, and that's the topic of today's show. We were interested in Marielle's journey because it intersects with efforts to have Congress pass the ADD SOY Act. T ..read more

Don’t be a Dick’s.   That’s the message of a new campaign initiative by Animal Wellness Action and its sister organization, the Center for a Humane Economy. It’s targeted at Dick’s Sporting Goods, the largest sporting-goods retailer in the United States, and intends to call attention to the chain’s role in the largest commercial slaughter of land-based wildlife in the world.   Dick’s Sporting Goods remains a significant reseller of shoes sourced from killed kangaroos. Several models from Adidas, New Balance and other brands are marketed in their more than 750 physical locations and o ..read more

Animal Wellness Action is one of many organizations pushing for Congress to pass the ADD SOY Act, a bill that would require the USDA to make soy milk available as a beverage alternative to the 30 million children who are part of the National School Lunch Program.   Every year, about $300 million in cow milk is tossed into the garbage—much of it still in unopened containers—by children who don’t like the taste of it or, owing to lactose intolerance, cannot drink without suffering cramps, bloating, diarrhea, vomiting and more. But unless a school puts two cartons of milk on the tray, the sc ..read more

For decades, a wide range of man-made and environmental threats have endangered Southern Resident Orca—thinning the population in the Pacific Northwest to only 73. Today, they’re looking directly at extinction.   The urgency of the orcas’ plight cannot be overstated. While many agencies and organizations are working to save our orca through scientific research, mitigation programs, public policy initiatives, and political action, these efforts have fallen short and the orca simply can’t wait. The show is about how each of us can help make a difference simply by NOT ordering a particular i ..read more

Washington Wildlife First Resource Library: https://wawildlifefirst.org/resources-2/   State wolf planning materials: www.wolfplanning.org   New Yorker article: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/04/04/killing-wolves-to-own-the-libs-idaho ..read more

After numerous battles in lower courts, the National Pork Producers Council and others finally convinced the Supreme Court to hear their challenge to California’s Proposition 12. That state initiative, passed by a powerful majority of California voters, mandates that no producer may sell products sourced from pigs or chickens into the state unless the producers ensure certain humane standards are maintained for the animals.   No fair, said the plaintiffs—time and again, up and down judicial ladders across the country. And time and again, courts rebuked the challenges and upheld the right ..read more

Our special guest is filmmaker Ashley Avis, whose new WILD BEAUTY: MUSTANG SPIRIT OF THE WEST is available for pre-order on iTunes after earning multiple awards from film festivals across the country. The release date is May 12, 2023. You can watch the trailer here. The Winterstone Pictures production has been called "a sweeping, immersive journey into the world of wild horses that illuminates both the profound beauty and desperate plight they currently face in the Western United States.” Avis and her crew went on a multi-year expedition to uncover the truth before wild horses disappear foreve ..read more