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World Animal Day: See the Forest Fires Through an Orangutan’s Eyes

Imagine carrying your baby to safety while the forest around you burns. 

The air is thick with smoke, the ground scorches your feet, and familiar routes to food and shelter have disappeared.

For orangutans in Indonesia’s West Kalimantan, this is a heartbreaking reality.

This year’s World Animal Day, on 4 October, carries the theme “See the World Through Their Eyes”. 

International Animal Rescue (IAR), based in Sussex, is urging us to do exactly that as its Indonesian partner, Yayasan Inisiasi Alam Rehabilitasi Indonesia (YIARI), responds to devastating forest fires.

IAR’s current appeal reports that YIARI has rescued 38 orangutans from the fires. Behind that number are individual animals, including mothers desperately trying to keep their babies alive.

Among them is Mama Penja, rescued with her infant after they were found weak and severely undernourished. She had serious burns to both feet, thought to have resulted from walking across burning peat soil. Veterinary staff administered oxygen and fluids before taking the pair to the rescue centre for intensive care.

Another mother, Mama Man, was evacuated with her baby after fires left them isolated, with nowhere safe to escape. Although she had no visible burns, her infant showed worrying signs of smoke exposure.

These stories bring the scale of the emergency painfully close. A forest is an orangutan’s home, food supply, shelter and network of safe routes. When it burns, all of those essentials can vanish together.

Animals driven into plantations and closer to communities face further dangers, including hunger, injury and conflict with people. Smoke adds another threat, damaging the lungs of wildlife and affecting the communities living nearby.

IAR chief executive Gavin Bruce says a mother orangutan’s world should be somewhere she can find food and protect her baby. Instead, rescue teams are finding mothers and youngsters surrounded by fire and struggling to breathe.

YIARI works with authorities and local communities to locate animals in danger. Emergency treatment is vital, but so is protecting the remaining forest and preventing further fires, giving survivors somewhere safe to return.

For That’s Green readers, World Animal Day offers a moment to look beyond the flames and recognise the lives caught within them.

If you can help, consider supporting the rescue appeal or sharing it with others. Compassion begins with seeing their world; action can help protect it.

Find out more and support the International Animal Rescue Urgent Fire Crisis Fund.

https://www.internationalanimalrescue.org/appeal/urgent-fire-crisis-fund

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Protect the ’Pods Campaign Calls for Stronger Animal Welfare Laws

Animal welfare charities have launched a new campaign calling for crabs, lobsters, prawns, octopuses, squid and other sentient sea creatures to receive stronger protection under UK law.

Crustacean Compassion and Compassion in World Farming unveiled the Protect the ’Pods campaign in Westminster, accompanied by a giant lobster and octopus. Colourful stilt walkers helped attract attention as campaigners carried their message across Westminster Bridge and towards Downing Street.

At the heart of the campaign is a striking inconsistency in animal welfare legislation.

Decapod crustaceans, including crabs, lobsters and prawns, and cephalopod molluscs, including octopuses, squid and cuttlefish, are recognised as sentient beings under the Animal Welfare (Sentience) Act 2022. However, they are not currently covered by the Animal Welfare Act 2006.

This means the law acknowledges that these animals can experience pain and suffering without giving them the same practical welfare protection afforded to many other animals.

As the Animal Welfare Act approaches its 20th anniversary, the two charities are urging the Government to “get their Acts together” and close this legal gap.

Dr Ben Sturgeon, chief executive of Crustacean Compassion, said recognition of sentience meant little while the animals remained outside the scope of the main welfare legislation.

“The Sentience Act says they can suffer. The Animal Welfare Act should protect them,” he told That's Green. “It’s time to close the gap, align the Acts and give these animals the protection they deserve.”

James West, chief public affairs manager at Compassion in World Farming, described cephalopods as extraordinary creatures and said scientific evidence concerning their sentience was clear.

“Recognition was an important first step, but now it must lead to meaningful protection,” he told us.

The campaign follows recommendations from the Animal Sentience Committee, which has called for the definition of an animal to be applied consistently throughout relevant legislation. It specifically suggested that using the definition contained within the Sentience Act for the Animal Welfare Act would bring decapods and cephalopods under its protection.

The Government’s Animal Welfare Strategy has also acknowledged that gaps remain in the treatment and protection of these animals.

Through Protect the ’Pods, members of the public are being invited to join the “Pod Squad” and ask the Government to extend the Animal Welfare Act.

The campaign’s message is simple: if the law recognises that an animal can suffer, it should also protect that animal from unnecessary suffering.

Two organisations have united behind one clear demand: it is time to put the ’pods in the Act.

http://www.crustaceancompassion.org

Volunteers Make a Difference on Historic Island I Vow

A dedicated group of volunteers has helped protect both the natural environment and the remarkable history of Island I Vow, near the northern end of Loch Lomond.

On 24 August, Friends of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs joined forces with the Elanvow Preservation Fund for a special Make a Difference, or MAD, day. 

The volunteers travelled to the island, situated opposite the Loch Sloy hydroelectric power station, to tackle non-native invasive plant species which were disrupting its natural ecosystem.

Removing invasive vegetation can give native plants a better opportunity to thrive while helping to protect the wider variety of wildlife which depends upon them. However, conservation work on Island I Vow must be undertaken with particular care because it is also an important archaeological site.

Archaeologist Fiona Baker was present to explain the island’s history and advise volunteers on how the work should be completed without damaging its historical integrity.

Island I Vow, also known as Elanvow or Ellan Vhow, contains the remains of a castle built in 1577 by Andrew Macfarlane, 11th Chief of Clan Macfarlane. Following his support for the future King James VI of Scotland and I of England at the Battle of Langside, Andrew was awarded a new crest and motto.

The crest showed a demi-savage holding a sheaf of arrows in one hand while pointing towards the royal crown with the other. This gave Clan Macfarlane its famous motto: “This I’ll Defend.”

King James is said to have later visited the island, a connection remembered in the Scottish proverb concerning “Macfarlane’s Geese”. 

Island I Vow became the seat of Clan Macfarlane after Inveruglas was burned by forces loyal to Oliver Cromwell during the mid-17th century. It remained the clan’s seat through the end of that century.

John Urquhart, chairman of Friends of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs, described the MAD day as another “huge success” for the charity. He also paid tribute to project officer Lloyd Weir, for whom the event was his final duty before leaving to explore new career opportunities abroad. Blair Wilson-Scott will replace him and help lead the charity’s work within the National Park.

Thanks were also given to the Ardlui Hotel for providing packed lunches and use of its marina, and to Loch Lomond Leisure for supplying a boat and skipper at a heavily reduced rate.

The Elanvow Preservation Fund works to study, preserve and maintain the island’s 16th-century castle, buildings and archaeological remains, alongside other sites connected with Clan Macfarlane.

https://www.lochlomondtrossachs.org.uk