An owner reportedly left a heavily-pregnant cat to die in a bin bag, an animal rescue centre has said.
Bosses at Little Paws Rescue, based in Clevedon, North Somerset, said an investigation has been launched after one of the “most horrific” incidents they have had to deal with.
They were called on Sunday after a member of the public found the dead cat on a popular walking route, called the 100 steps, in Hanham, South Gloucestershire.
Imogen Scofield, from Little Paws Rescue, said “heartbreakingly” the calico cat tried to claw her way out of the bag and went into labour after being dumped.
But due to the circumstances, none of the kittens survived, the animal charity said.
Ms Scofield continued: “It is the most upsetting thing we’ve had to witness, this poor cat didn’t deserve to suffer like she did.
“There is help out there and they could have contacted a rescue [centre] like ourselves who would have helped.”
Ms Scofield also confirmed the charity is asking people who live near the 100 steps to bring forward any CCTV from Sunday.
“The authorities are involved too, but we will do all we can to find out who did this,” she added.
PETITION
They Abandoned a Pregnant Cat in a Trash Bag. Then, She Went Into Labour.
A heart-wrenching and unimaginable act of cruelty has recently come to light in Hanham, South Gloucestershire. A heavily pregnant calico cat was abandoned in a plastic bin bag, left to die alone and in agony. Tragically, the cat went into labor before she passed, but none of her kittens survived. This poor animal suffered a horrific and unnecessary death – one that could have been easily avoided if the owner had sought the help and support that is readily available.
Sign this petition to urge local authorities to investigate this heartless act and to begin a public education campaign to inform the community about the options available to those with unwanted pets.
According to the organisation called to the scene, the cat attempted to claw her way out of the bag, desperate for life and a chance for her kittens. Sadly, her cries went unheard, and the kittens, who could have been saved, perished along with her.
This tragedy underscores the need for better public awareness. There are shelters and organizations that provide assistance to those in need, and no animal should ever suffer because of a lack of knowledge about these resources.
We need to ensure that people understand that they have options. No one should feel so desperate that they resort to abandoning a pet in this inhumane way. Sign this petition today to make sure that no more animals have to suffer like this again!
Wildlife groups have expressed serious concern about how individual koalas had been chosen for culling, because the animals are assessed from a distance
Published – April 30, 2025 09:00 am IST
A koala sits in a tree at a koala park in Sydney, Australia, May 2023. | Photo Credit: AP
Snipers in helicopters have shot more than 700 koalas in the Budj Bim National Park in western Victoria in recent weeks. It’s believed to be the first time koalas have been culled in this way.
The cull became public on Good Friday after local wildlife carers were reportedly tipped off.
A fire burned about 20% of the park in mid-March. The government said the cull was urgent because koalas had been left starving or burned.
ark in Sydney, Australia, May 2023. | Photo Credit: AP
Snipers in helicopters have shot more than 700 koalas in the Budj Bim National Park in western Victoria in recent weeks. It’s believed to be the first time koalas have been culled in this way.
The cull became public on Good Friday after local wildlife carers were reportedly tipped off.
A fire burned about 20% of the park in mid-March. The government said the cull was urgent because koalas had been left starving or burned.
Wildlife groups have expressed serious concern about how individual koalas had been chosen for culling, because the animals are assessed from a distance. It’s not clear how shooting from a helicopter complies with the state government’s own animal welfare and response plans for wildlife in disasters.
The Victorian government must explain why it is undertaking aerial culling and why it did so without announcing it publicly. The incident points to ongoing failures in managing these iconic marsupials, which are already threatened in other states.
Why did this happen?
Koalas live in eucalypt forests in Australia’s eastern and southern states. The species faces a double threat from habitat destruction and bushfire risk. They are considered endangered in New South Wales, Queensland and the Australian Capital Territory.
In Victoria, koala population levels are currently secure. But they are densely concentrated, often in fragments of bush known as “habitat islands” in the state’s southwest. Budj Bim National Park is one of these islands.
Over time, this concentration becomes a problem. When the koalas are too abundant, they can strip leaves from their favourite gums, killing the trees. The koalas must then move or risk starvation.
If fire or drought make these habitat islands impossible to live in, koalas in dense concentrations often have nowhere to go.
In Budj Bim, Victoria’s Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action and Parks Victoria have tackled koala overpopulation alongside Traditional Owners by moving koalas to new locations or sterilising them.
But Budj Bim is also surrounded by commercial blue gum plantations. Koalas spread out through the plantations to graze on the leaves. Their populations grow. But when the plantations are logged, some koalas have to return to the national park, where food may be in short supply.
Animal welfare groups say logging is one reason Budj Bim had so many koalas.
It’s hard to say definitively whether this is the case, because the state environment department hasn’t shared much information. But researchers have found habitat islands lead to overabundance by preventing the natural dispersal of individuals.
So why was the culling done? Department officials have described the program as “primarily” motivated by animal welfare. After the bushfire last month, koalas have been left starving or injured.
Why shooters in helicopters? Here, the justification given is that the national park is difficult to access due to rocky terrain and fire damage, ruling out other methods.
Euthanising wildlife
Under Victoria’s plan for animal welfare during disasters, the environment department is responsible for examining and, where necessary, euthanising wildlife during an emergency.
For human intervention to be justified, euthanasia must be necessary on welfare grounds. Victoria’s response plan for fire-affected wildlife says culling is permitted when an animal’s health is “significantly” compromised, invasive treatment is required, or survival is unlikely.
For koalas, this could mean loss of digits or hands, burns to more than 15% of the body, pneumonia from smoke inhalation, or blindness or injuries requiring surgery. Euthanised females must also be promptly examined for young in their pouches.
The problem is that while aerial shooting can be accurate in some cases for larger animals, the method has questionable efficacy for smaller animals – especially in denser habitats.
It’s likely a number of koalas were seriously injured but not killed. But the shooters employed by the department were not able to thoroughly verify injuries or whether there were joeys in pouches, because they were in the air and reportedly 30 or more metres away from their targets.
While the department cited concerns about food resources as a reason for the cull, the state’s wildlife fire plan lays out another option: delivery of supplementary feed. Delivering fresh gum leaves could potentially have prevented starvation while the forest regenerates.
Lessons for the government
The state government should take steps to avoid tragic incidents like this from happening again.
Preserving remaining habitat across the state is a vital step, as is reconnecting isolated areas with habitat corridors. This would not only reduce the concentration of koalas in small pockets but increase viable refuges and give koalas safe paths to new food sources after a fire.
Future policies should be developed in consultation with Traditional Owners, who have detailed knowledge of species distributions and landscapes.
We need better ways to help wildlife in disasters. One step would be bringing wildlife rescue organisations into emergency management more broadly, as emphasised in the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission and the more recent Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements.
This latter report pointed to South Australia’s specialised emergency animal rescue and relief organisation – SAVEM – as an effective model. Under SA’s emergency management plan, the organisation is able to rapidly access burned areas after the fire has passed through.
Victoria’s dense communities of koalas would be well served by a similar organisation able to work alongside existing skilled firefighting services.
The goal would be to make it possible for rescuers to get to injured wildlife earlier and avoid any more mass aerial culls.
Stop the Slaughter: They Shot Innocent Koalas From Helicopters.
The tragic culling of over 700 koalas in Budj Bim National Park in Victoria is a horrifying reminder of how our wildlife is being failed by shortsighted policies. This decision to shoot these beloved creatures from helicopters, after a bushfire ravaged their habitat, was not only a shocking act of cruelty but also a devastating loss to the ecosystem.
Sign this petition to demand the Victorian government stop culling koalas and implement humane, science-based solutions to protect these populations!
Some of the koalas killed were mothers with joeys, leaving helpless young behind to face an uncertain future. The culling fails to address the underlying causes of koala population pressure – namely habitat destruction from logging, fires, and inadequate wildlife management.
Rather than resorting to mass extermination, there are more effective and compassionate ways to address these issues, including habitat restoration and wildlife corridors.
We cannot afford to continue taking such drastic measures when more humane solutions exist. We must push the Victorian government to adopt long-term, science-based approaches to koala conservation that focus on preserving their habitats, rescuing those in need, and ensuring a future where these iconic marsupials can thrive.
Sign now to demand that the Victorian government stop the culling and put in place real protections for koalas and their habitats.
Published: 20:33 BST, 1 May 2025 | Updated: 21:43 BST, 1 May 2025
A Florida couple took their elderly cat with them on a hike in Utah, but after ignoring warning signs only one of them made it out alive.
The bodies of Matthew Nannen, 45, and Bailee Crane, 58, were discovered Tuesday by park visitors in Bryce Canyon National Park after they fell about 380ft below Inspiration Point, according to the Garfield County Sheriff’s Office.
The couple, who appeared to be living out of a U-Haul truck, are believed to have fallen to their deaths on either Monday night or early Tuesday morning, police said.
Although there was a railing at the top of the cliff, police said Nannen and Crane climbed over it. There was also snow in the area that made for slippery conditions.
When their bodies were located, authorities also found a female tabby cat inside a ripped and dirty black soft-sided carrier, the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary said.
The cat, who has since been named Mirage, appeared to have fallen with her owners but ‘seemed to have weathered the fall fairly well,’ the no-kill shelter told the outlet.
When Mirage was brought to the shelter, she was ‘matted and a bit sore,’ but during her examination she was very friendly.
Judah Battista, the chief sanctuary officer with the shelter, told DailyMail.com Mirage suffered two fractured canines and two fractured ribs from the fall.
Right now, the team there is focused on ‘getting her well and providing a safe and loving space for Mirage.’
When asked if they would put her up for adoption down the road, Battista said the shelter plans to see if any of the couple’s extended family would like to take her in first. If not, they plan to have her adopted.
Video and images shared by the shelter showed several employees taking great care of Mirage and nursing her back to health.
Battista said they have taken animals in before that have been a part of horrible incidents, but the shelter has never seen anything ‘quite as dramatic as this.’
Nannen and Crane had just made their way to Utah from Arizona and are permanent residents of Florida, authorities said.
The exact cause of the incident remains under investigation.
‘Detectives are considering all possibilities, but preliminary investigations have not been able to definitively determine the cause of the fall,’ the sheriff’s office told KUTV.
DailyMail.com contacted the Garfield County Sheriff’s Office and Bryce Canyon National Park for more information.
Inspiration Point is known to give spectators a ‘birds-eye view of the world’s largest collection of rock spires called “hoodoos” found within the Bryce Amphitheater,’ according to the national park.
News of this tragedy comes just months after a beloved and heavily-pregnant California school teacher died after falling while on a hiking trip in Greece.
Clara Thomann, 33, had been traveling through Plakias, Crete, with her partner Elliott Finn when she fell during a hike and died on December 23.
Thomann, from Santa Barbara, was six months pregnant at the time, according to SFGate. She was also a teacher at the Dos Pueblos High School.
According to The Greek Reporter, she had slipped and tumbled 50 meters down a gorge from a hiking trail near the Preveli Monastery in the Rethymno region.
The outlet reported that she was pronounced brain dead less than a week after the fall, which caused her to suffer major injuries to her skull and chest.
Tragically Thomann lost her unborn child in the fall, with 21 firefighters and rescue teams battling to reach her from what was described as an inaccessible spot.
Her family traveled to the country to visit her before her death, with Veronica Katz writing on her CaringBridge page, seen by SFGate, that she ‘loved helping and teaching others.’
According to her social media, she had worked as a physics teacher. Her family have announced they would be donating her organs.
Supporters claim trophy hunting helps communities and wildlife by putting money in local people’s hands and culling weak or old animals. But in reality, very little money — as little as 3%of trophy hunting revenue — reaches the areas where hunting happens, and trophy hunters often seek the biggest, strongest animals to kill.
Inside the problem
Trophy hunters kill for bragging rights and animal parts. Banning or restricting the transport and trade of hunting trophies from species threatened by trade takes away these motivations. In the U.S., state and federal laws and regulations can reduce or stop the trophy hunting of native carnivores.
Trump’s FDA and EPA are phasing out animal testing
Published April 13, 2025 11:47am EDT
The Trump administration is receiving an outpouring of support from animal advocacy groups, lawmakers and others for recent announcements to end animal testing within programs at the FDA and EPA.
“PETA applauds the FDA’s decision to stop harming animals and adopt human-relevant testing strategies for evaluating antibody therapies,” Kathy Guillermo, PETA senior vice president, said in a statement.
“It’s a significant step towards meeting the agency’s commitment to replace the use of animals – which PETA has worked hard to promote. All animal use, including failed vaccine and other testing on monkeys at the federally-funded primate centers, must end, and we are calling on the FDA to further embrace 21st-century science,” the PETA statement continued.
PETA’s statement followed the Food and Drug Administration announcement on Thursday that it is phasing out an animal testing requirement for antibody therapies and other drugs in favor of testing on materials that mimic human organs, Fox Digital first reported.
“For too long, drug manufacturers have performed additional animal testing of drugs that have data in broad human use internationally. This initiative marks a paradigm shift in drug evaluation and holds promise to accelerate cures and meaningful treatments for Americans while reducing animal use,” FDA Commissioner Martin A. Makary, said in comments provided to Fox News Digital.
“By leveraging AI-based computational modeling, human organ model-based lab testing, and real-world human data, we can get safer treatments to patients faster and more reliably, while also reducing R&D costs and drug prices. It is a win-win for public health and ethics.”
Dogs, rats and fish were the primary animals to face testing ahead of Thursday’s announcement, Fox Digital learned.
The phase-out focuses on ending animal testing in regard to researching monoclonal antibody therapies, which are lab-made proteins meant to stimulate the immune system to fight diseases such as cancer, as well as other drugs, according to the press release.
Instead, the FDA will encourage testing on “organoids,” which are artificially grown masses of cells, according to the FDA’s press release.
Environmental Protection Agency chief Lee Zeldin announced on the same day that the agency would reinstate a 2019 policy from the first Trump administration to phase out animal testing at that federal agency. The EPA said in comment that the Biden administration moved away from phasing out animal testing, but that Zeldin is “wholly committed to getting the agency back on track to eliminating animal testing.”
“Under President Trump’s first term, EPA signed a directive to prioritize efforts to reduce animal testing and committed to reducing testing on mammals by 30% by 2025 and to eliminate it completely by 2035. The Biden administration halted progress on these efforts by delaying compliance deadlines. Administrator Zeldin is wholly committed to getting the agency back on track to eliminating animal testing,” EPA spokesperson Molly Vaseliou told the Washington Times.
The EPA’s and FDA’s recent announcements also received praise from animal rights groups, including the White Coat Waste Project, which reported in 2021 that the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases spent hundreds of thousands of dollars under Dr. Anthony Fauci’s leadership to test beagle dogs with parasites via biting flies.
“Thank you @DrMakaryFDA for your years of advocacy & outstanding leadership to eliminate FDA red tape that forces companies & tax-funded federal agencies to conduct wasteful & cruel tests on dogs & other animals!” the group posted to X last week.
“White Coat Waste made historic progress under Trump 45 to cut wasteful and cruel animal testing at the EPA and FDA, some of which was undone by the Biden Administration,” Justin Goodman, senior vice president at White Coat, told Fox News Digital on Sunday.
“We applaud Administrator Zeldin and Commissioner Makary for picking up where Trump left off and prioritizing efforts to cut widely-opposed and wasteful animal tests. This is great news for taxpayers and pet owners as it sends a message to big spending animal abusers across the federal government: Stop the money. Stop the madness!”
Other animal rights groups and lawmakers praised the Trump administration for its recent moves to end animal testing.
“We’re encouraged to see the EPA recommit to phasing out animal testing – a goal we’ve long championed on behalf of the animals trapped in these outdated and painful experiments,” Kitty Block, president and CEO of Humane World for Animals, said in a press release. “But promises alone don’t spare lives. For too long, animals like dogs, rabbits and mice have endured tests that inflict suffering without delivering better science. It’s time to replace these cruel methods with modern, humane alternatives that the public overwhelmingly supports.”
Other groups have come out and warned that there is not yet a high-tech replacement for animals within the realm of biomedical research and drug testing, and that humane animal testing is still crucial to test prospective drugs for humans.
“We all want better and faster ways to bring lifesaving treatments to patients,” National Association for Biomedical Research President Matthew R. Bailey said in a press release provided to Fox Digital. “But no AI model or simulation has yet demonstrated the ability to fully replicate all the unknowns about many full biological systems. That’s why humane animal research remains indispensable.”
Under his first administration, Trump took other steps to protect animals, including signing the Preventing Animal Cruelty and Torture Act into law in 2019, which made intentional acts of cruelty a federal crime.
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NIH Just Declared a Scientific Revolution! Here’s How PETA’s Been Leading the Charge
Published April 29, 2025 by Keith Brown. Last Updated April 30, 2025.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) just lit a fire under scientific research, declaring a fundamental change in its funding away from cruel and outdated experiments on animals and shifting both money and focus toward non-animal research methods. In short, what PETA has been working for and advocating for years.
This move cannot be understated. It is a fork in the road, a 180-degree turn, a tectonic shift with far-ranging implications for humans and other animals that will ripple through science and biomedical research for generations. Finally recognizing that humans will never kill enough animals to treat the panoply of human maladies will free time and billions of wasted taxpayer dollars to pursue human-based solutions to human problems.
Animals benefit. Patients benefit. Taxpayers benefit. But make no mistake, PETA has been offering NIH the matches and kerosene for this well-deserved bonfire for years.
PETA has called on NIH to abandon the cruel, invasive, and deadly use of animals in experiments—practices that are not only ethically indefensible but scientifically backward. Animal experiments have repeatedly failed to produce effective cures or treatments for humans, wasting billions in taxpayer dollars and delaying progress in medical research. This has been a boondoggle of the highest order.
But a boondoggle that appears to be close to an end.
“By integrating advances in data science and technology with our growing understanding of human biology, we can fundamentally reimagine the way research is conducted—from clinical development to real-world application,” said NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya. “This human-based approach will accelerate innovation, improve healthcare outcomes, and deliver life-changing treatments. It marks a critical leap forward for science, public trust, and patient care.”
We could scarcely have said it better ourselves. In fact, we have. Repeatedly, daily, loudly, and to anyone who would listen and many who would not. PETA scientists have been touting our Research Modernization NOW—a roadmap to phase out pointless and deadly animal experiments.
NIH has adopted several recommendations from Research Modernization NOW in the announcement, including expanding funding, training, and infrastructure for non-animal methods and mitigating bias towards experiments on animals in NIH grant review panels, a problem that PETA scientists recently exposed in a first-of-its-kind study.
NIH’s announcement ushers in a new era of science—one rooted in relevance, compassion, and innovation. It’s major progress for every person who cares about animals, values human health, and demands the U.S. lead the world in scientific excellence. PETA looks forward to supporting this transformative shift and ensuring it results in real, lasting change for both humans and other animals.
PETA understands that taking this bold stance will inevitably invite criticism from entrenched interests who have long profited from the misery and the failure of animal experimentation. PETA thanks Dr. Bhattacharya for his—our—conviction that the path forward is compassionate, scientific, and animal-free. It is.
There is still more work to do. One key step is to close the seven failed National Primate Research Centers have harmed and killed hundreds of thousands of monkeys and are an anchor on taxpayer dollars and science, failing to deliver promised vaccines or cures for 60 years.
There is a war being waged between the scientific establishment with its backers in politics and industry, and “us” – that is people who reject vivisection, or the use of non-human sentient beings for research – when it is forbidden to “use” humans for like experiments. The main reason why animals are used, of course, is their inability to prevent people doing it, and a legal framework – pretty much worldwide – that allows this.
We have covered this issue on the site many times.
https://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk is a UK organisation that lobbies the cause of the vivisectionists, big pharma, and who else profits from this, by pretending to further public understanding as to why this practice is necessary and continues to be so.
Lies lies lies. Naturally. Further evidenced by the picture library, where you see NOTHING of the horrors we know for a fact happen daily in labs – only think of HLS, in the UK.
World Animals Voice 