World Wildlife Day 2021 “Forest and Livelihoods, Sustaining People and Planet”

The lovely art for World Wildlife Day, yesterday.

I marked the day with an animal behaviour lecture and ended it with a dialogue about conservation. Thanks to Jack & Rai who hosted a World Wildlife Day dialogue with Anbu (ACRES) and myself last Sunday night.

I am curently reading “Giants of the Monsoon Forest: Living and Working with Elephants,” by by Jacob Shell. A geographer who read widely and travelled to visited a complex array of South Asian and Indochinese (prominently in Burma) peoples who work with elephants. Pushed to the mountains by historical waves of lowland conquests in the region, the geography led to an evolution of elephant working cultures.

Shell sheds light on the co-dependency of elephant and man on forests, which are foraging and mating grounds for their elephants, and which suport the forest-based economies, logging and transport through seasonally flooded terrain. Roads, forest fragmentation and agriculture thereaten these areas but the dificul terrain is also the setting of some of the longest resistance wars which protect the forests.

I know very little about Southeast Asia, a tremedously complex region and the perspectives stitched together Jacob Shell, a geographer, are insightful.

Note: Marcus Chua shares what research reveals about Species Awareness Days tonight!

NUS PEACE Welcome Tea – the annual gathering for NUS students interested in animal welfare

NUS PEACE fosters the love and respect that all animals deserve through education, advocacy and action, by connecting with others in the community who care. They are also a platform for anyone interested in starting new programmes.

NUS PEACE includes three project groups:

• CatCafe (taking care of campus cats)
• Paw Friends (volunteers at local animal shelters)
• Therapy Dogs Programme (coordinating therapy dog visits to campus before exams)

Sign up at http://tinyurl.com/nuspeace2015

We’re halfway there! The fundraiser for Debby Ng’s Himalayan Mutts: wildlife, livelihoods and dogs

Last month, I blogged about “From Singapore with Love: Wildlife protection and an alternative to the desperate poisoning of dogs in the Himalaya” to raise awareness about my good friend Debby Ng’s effort to stop the cruel culling of dogs with rat poison and drowning in Nepal’s Himalaya. I thought she was in Australia for her studies at the time, actually but saw a Facebook post which revealed her to be right here in Singapore!

So after a flurry of emails, we got a talk setup with NUS Toddycats and NUS PEACE and it’s on for Wednesday. The fund raising is slow this year but at least we’ve reached the half-way mark!

Meanwhile, Debby has spoken on NewsRadio 938fm about the project which you can listen to here.

Join us at NUS LT34 this Wednesday evening an catch up with Debby and friends, register at tiny.cc/himalayanmutt!

We are halfway there!

Saving wildlife in an endangered habitat

NUS Cat Talk 2014 – “Cats in popular culture and our urban environment”

NUS Cat Cafe presents “Cats in popular culture and our urban environment”.

• Rebecca Ho (Lingcat Feline Services), “Cat myths and creating the ideal environment for indoor cat”.
• Samuel Isaac Chua (Cat Cafe Neko no Niwa), “Singapore’s cat cafe scene and the challenges of running one”.
• N. Sivasothi (NUS Dept. Biological Sciences), “Cats: A wild carnivore on our streets”.

Tue 14 Oct 2014: 6.30pm – 8.30pm
@ University Town, Town Plaza, Level 2, Seminar Room 9
Registration is FREE but you must sign up at tinyurl.com/nuscattalk2014.

Mon 04 Feb 2013: 2:30pm – Daniel Bender on “Animals of Empire: Singapore, American Zoos, and the Wildlife Trade, 1900-1940

“The Elephant Ivory Trade: To ban or not to ban?” Roadshow and Seminar by Project Wild-NUS PEACE, 31 Oct 2012 @ NUS

Register at tinyurl.com/peaceivory

Click for pdf

For more information, see the NUS PEACE blog.

Pulau Ubin jetty greeting!

Click for my route (recce for LSM2251 practical).

“Rescue, Rehabilitation and Responsible Animal Care” at the Animal Welfare Symposium this Sat 25 Aug 2012

Email I wrote my students in the first year biodiversity module, second year ecology module and third year life form and function module:

"Dear students, 

the student group NUS PEACE is holding an Animal Wefare Symposium at LT24 this Sat 25 Aug 2012. It is organised around three themes: Rescue, Rehabilitation and Responsible Animal Care/Pet Ownership and features an admirable group of people who work selflessly for the betterment of animals in Singapore. 

For details, see: http://blog.nus.edu.sg/nuspeacesymposium/

To register, please go toL http://www.tinyurl.com/NUSPEACE-AWS2012

This symposium is a great way to learn about the issues which most are poorly informed about, at a venue right at our doorstep. 

The organising group, NUS PEACE, consists of a bunch of undergrads from all corners of NUS, and include some of our very own life science students. If you are interested in joining them, see: http://blog.nus.edu.sg/nuspeace/

Hope to see you there!

Cheerio!

Sivasothi”

Singapore Animal Welfare Symposium and Public Forum on Animal Welfare Policies

http://acres.org.sg/events/2ndforum.html

AVA’s Responsible Pet Ownership Roadshow, 12-13 Nov 2011

Click for details

Besides the roadshow, explore the webpage to learn more about what this unit of AVA is doing for animal welfare education.

For example they conduct responsible pet ownership talks for primary, secondary and tertiary levels and educators can book a session.

There are workshop at their premises, ambassador programmes for schools, requests for AVA participation at community events, skit script complete with music a pet pals badge programme, a variety of library exhibitions, etc.