Learn more at humanesociety.org. Celebrating Animals ......overcome these many roadblocks and make animals’ lives better, bringing vaccinations, training classes, and spay/neuter

Celebrating Animals, Confronting Cruelty

The Humane Society of the United States Annual Report 2010

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[ Table of Contents ]

Hero for Puppies: After seeing for herself the inside of a puppy mill and learning where her own beloved dog came from, Amanda Hearst helped raise $1 million for The HSUS’s campaign against mass breeding facilities.

Shutting Down Puppy Mills: Page 34

The Accidental Activist: When Cristin Tank and her family saw the cruel activities next door, they didn’t stay silent, helping bring an end to fox and coyote penning in Florida.

Protecting Wildlife: Page 22

Compassionate Farmer: Bruce Rickard, who pays special attention to animal behavior on his farm and lets chickens be free to express their “chicken-ness,” has joined the fight against extreme confinement practices.

Protecting Farm Animals: Page 8

348

10

22

—Food writer and New York Times

Magazine columnist Mark Bittman

Transformations: Underneath a mass of filth-caked, impenetrable fur, this dog, long confined to the garage of a Carriere, Miss., puppy mill, was all bones. Saved by the HSUS Animal Rescue Team, Boomer is actually not brown but a mostly white dog with gray patches. See more transformations in Rescuing Animals: Page 4.

Protecting Our Best Friends .......................14 Providing Sanctuary & Healing ...............38 Outreach ..........................................................................42

Ending Animal Fighting ...................................30 Advancing Humane Science ....................... 40 How You Can Help .............................................43

On the Cover: Responding to a request from the Fallon County Sheriff’s Office in Montana, the HSUS Animal Rescue Team removed nearly 100 animals, including this cat, from an overcrowded property in July. Taken to an emergency shelter, they were later transported to agencies around the country for adoption.

[ 2010 Key Accomplishments ] HSUS animal care centers provide emergency treatment and

sanctuary to nearly 16,000 animals, while our veterinary clinics and wildlife experts rescue and treat thousands more

Federal bills to strengthen shark finning ban and prohibit crush videos are signed into law

Five HSUS undercover investigations expose horrific abuses at industrial egg, pork, and turkey facilities

Humane Society International launches a ground-breaking initiative in Haiti, including spay/neuter, disaster response, and veterinary training programs

HSUS teams deploy to 51 emergency rescues, saving nearly 11,000 animals from puppy mills, animal fighting operations, and egregious neglect

Ohio agriculture leaders agree to a landmark set of farm animal welfare reforms

98 pro-animal state laws and regulations are enacted, including the nation’s first ban on the sale of whole battery cage eggs

Hellmann’s mayonnaise pledges to convert all 350 million eggs it uses annually to cage-free, while Kraft Foods, Walmart, Subway, Burger King, IHOP, and other major companies decrease their purchases of eggs from caged hens

The federal Truth in Fur Labeling Act is enacted, following years of lobbying, lawsuits, and exposés of mislabeled and unlabeled fur-trimmed garments by The HSUS

The HSUS combats Gulf Coast pet overpopulation through innovative outreach programs and funding assistance for three spay/neuter clinics

Florida prohibits fox and coyote penning operations in which packs of dogs are set loose on captive wildlife

“When I found out that the last remaining herds are being rounded up as we speak, this just seemed unten-able. I consider them the living symbols of independence and freedom—sort of what this whole country was built on.”

—Actress Wendie Malick, a supporter

of HSUS efforts to end wild horse

roundups and horse slaughter

“I was troubled to learn from my friends at The Humane Society of the United States about the practice of confining egg-laying hens in tiny cages. … Turning these defenseless

animals into egg-producing machines with no consideration for their welfare whatsoever is a degradation of our own humanity.”

—The Dalai Lama

“This is a subject that I am extremely passionate about. By working together, we can find good homes for millions of adopt-able, homeless, and abandoned pets.”

—Ellen DeGeneres, a longtime HSUS supporter

who worked with us to provide 1 million servings of

Halo pet food to shelter animals during the Postal

Service’s Stamps to the Rescue campaign

Exposed! If you’re not already anti-factory farming, this will do it: The Humane Society just released an undercover investigation. … The video pretty much leaves me speechless.

In Their Words

The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 32 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report

ur 2010 annual report is a compendium of the problems facing animals, but it is also a chronicle of our efforts to turn the situation around. It is painful to confront cruelty, but none of us

should be bystanders in the face of the current crisis for animals. We must do something about it, and The HSUS exists to exert the collective power of millions of people of conscience to show a better way for the whole of society. The task is immense because there are so many varieties of animal harm and exploitation—in the realms of agriculture, animal research and testing, fashion, and wildlife management, as well as in more modest areas of commerce and entertainment that involve the use of so many animals. Because the animals have no voice, we must act as their surrogates and call others to a more honorable and decent standard of care for creatures less powerful than ourselves. Our challenge is compounded by the resistance of our political adversaries, who are often not only wedded to the status quo but also well-equipped to defend their positions in the political domain. Only through determined, multipronged, and strategic action can we overcome these many roadblocks and make animals’ lives better, bringing us all, step by step, closer to creating a humane society. We must of course focus on the crises right in front of us, and we do. There’s no time to waste because animals are homeless, in distress, or in fighting pits right now. That’s why The HSUS has developed so many capabili-ties to provide hands-on care for animals in need—through our five animal care centers, our veterinary services programs, our disaster response work, and our emergency deployments in cases of cruelty and neglect. In 2010, we provided direct care and relief to about 100,000 animals, putting our assets to use in so many areas where local communities do not have the resources or the expertise to step in and provide relief where needed. But if that’s all we did, we would be failing in our mission. Our great charge must be to prevent cruelty. If we only come to the aid of animals already injured, left homeless, or otherwise in distress, we will expend all of our resources attacking the symptoms of the problem. We must expand our efforts to strike at the root causes of cruelty, so that animals don’t get in trouble in the first place. Take, for instance, our successful effort in Missouri to pass Prop B, a ballot measure to crack down on puppy mills. There are 3,000 mills in the state, with perhaps 200,000 breeding animals and up to 1 million puppies churned out each year by these large-scale breeders. If we just rescued the discards or came to the aid of extreme cases of cruelty, we’d be chasing our tail. We need to put all of the bad operators out of business through the force of law, and to set up humane standards of care for those breeders who decide they’ll play by the rules. It’s more efficient and, in the long run, it’s better for animals that we work on the front end—otherwise, we’d face a never-ending tide of animals and burn though all of our resources with no end in sight. Similarly, we also work at the federal level to combat systemic abuses of animals. Each year, 73 million sharks are killed globally for their fins, used as an ingredient in soup. By strengthening our federal law to ban finning, as well as working in international circles to curb the industry, we are helping to prevent the gruesome killing of so many of these creatures.

[ From the President ]

O

Wayne Pacelle, President & CEOThe Humane Society of the United States

Person by person, we are spreading the message—to young people in urban

communities, to people of faith, to law enforcement officials, to political leaders,

and even to corporate leaders involved in industries that must find a new

pathway to conduct their business.

We’ve not yet shut down Canada’s seal hunt, but we are methodically closing down markets for sealskins and diminishing the commercial value of the pelts, making the whole enterprise for the sealers and the government of Canada a losing proposition. Through these efforts, we are saving hundreds of thousands of seal pups every year, and we’ll not relent until the job is finished once and for all. So much of our mission involves exposing abuse and holding it up to the light of day, reminding peo-ple that the mistreatment of animals violates the stan-dards and ideals of our civil society. In 2010, The HSUS conducted five major exposés of factory farm-ing, investigating some of the largest companies in agribusiness and exposing their extreme and callous con-finement of animals raised for food. Factory farming is an example of human creativity and innovation divorced from conscience. We are reminding the American public about the need to sync our economic institutions and our com-mercial practices with our values and ideals. Last year, we also exposed the archaic practice of bear baiting in South Carolina, plus cockfighting in Texas and so many other cruel practices throughout the nation.

It’s part of our effort to throw back the curtain on animal abuse, and to call the good people of America to act on their conscience. And person by person, we are spreading the message—to young people in urban communities, to people of faith, to law enforcement officials, to political leaders, and even to corporate leaders involved in industries that

must find a new pathway to conduct their business or entertainment. There’s no group in the world like The HSUS. It brings more capabilities, more know-how, and more urgency to the fight for animals than any group ever has. As we press forward on so many fronts, we need your help more than ever.

We are grateful for all you do for us, and your continued support will allow us to expand our efforts to usher in changes for animals that we’ve worked so long to achieve.

VISIT WAYNE’S BLOG

humanesociety.org/wayne

Only through determined,

multipronged, and strategic

action can we overcome these many roadblocks and make

animals’ lives better, bringing

us all closer to creating a

humane society.

Building Humane Communities: In 2011, HSUS programs have continued to combat root causes of animal suffering. At a recent End Dogfighting in Chicago event, volunteer Angela Love-Bradford (right) helped owners sign their dogs up for free rabies vaccinations, training classes, and spay/neuter surgeries. At another April event, The HSUS worked with local church leaders to provide vaccinations and other services for pets of families in underserved areas.

4 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 5

11,000 animals are saved by the Animal Rescue Team in 51 emergency rescues involving animal fighting operations, puppy mills, hoarding cases, and other abusive situations

3,380+ reports are fielded by animal cruelty experts, who also advise law enforcement agencies in more than 365 cases

A $250,000 grant for large-scale animal rescue operations is awarded to The HSUS for being voted a top cause in the Pepsi Refresh online contest

1,300 animal protection professionals and volunteers participate in disaster response training

Humane Society International provides disaster relief for animals in partnership with local groups in Haiti, China, Mexico, and Chile

[ Rescuing Animals ]

After seeing the absolute squalor these people and animals lived in, you can’t help but feel anything but sorrow for both. But then you get to see the whole ordeal come to an end, and you see the compassion the animals get from the staff and the volunteers, and it really does make the overload of sights, smells, sounds, and emotions you’ve experienced over the last eight hours worthwhile.

—Photographer Bradly Boner on bearing witness to an HSUS rescue of 157

cats from a Wyoming home and their subsequent emergency careA month after saving this Montana cat and nearly 100 other animals, The HSUS’s Adam Parascandola headed west again for back-to-back rescues of about 250 more. “It’s probably the first time a lot of these cats have actually breathed outside air,” Park County prosecutor Bryan Skoric said during a Wyoming seizure.

6 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report6 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report The HSUS 2010 Annual Report | 7

When HSUS rescuers first laid eyes on the dog now known as Chunk, he was standing on a layer of feces and trash, in the front room of a bug-infested house in rural Mississippi (above, left). The floor was so deep in filth, it squished when responders walked on it. Throughout a long, rainy day, teams removed 181 animals from the property belonging to a hoarder masquerading as a rescue group. Many of them were malnourished and plagued by worms and skin infections. After a long trip north on the HSUS rig, Chunk was taken in and treated by the Washington Animal Rescue League. These days, he looks like a different dog (above, right)— “more basset-y in the snout,” says adopter Dan Metcalf, noting that when he and his wife first got Chunk, his face was swollen and misshapen from skin disease and medications. The dog’s affable nature has helped bring out the best in his new playmate, Daisy, a rescued boxer. “They balance each other out really well,” Metcalf says. “She was isolated; she was tied up in a backyard. … He’s very much a go-getter and friendly, and she’s kind of shy and jumpy, but they both sort of bring each other to the center.” Happy endings are common following rescues by The HSUS. Once chained at dogfighting operations, pit bulls like Abby will never have to fight again. Fostered by a Casa Del Toro Pit Bull Education & Rescue volunteer named Holly, Abby befriended Holly’s grandfather during his hospice stay. “Grandpa would have them mark on the calendar when Abby would come back for the next visit,” reports the group’s director, Laurie Adams. Now living permanently with Holly, the dog is enjoying her newfound purpose in life: as a family pet.

The good fight (opposite, clockwise from top left): Jean is one of many pit bulls The HSUS’s Chris Schindler has transported to safety. The efforts are “all worth it when you get those dogs loaded on the truck and out of there,” he says. Read more on animal fighting: p. 30.

A desperate scene: Spurred by the sight of starving animals, West Virginia state director Summer Wyatt fights for better laws. Her allies include Wayne County’s Gary Michels, who won a Humane Law Enforcement Award for prosecuting cruelty. Read more on equine protection: p. 20.

Inside a hoarding case: An HSUS collaboration with North Star Rescue and A&E’s Hoarders resulted in a poignant portrayal of the plight of 2,000 rats and their overwhelmed owner. Read more on HSUS outreach: p. 42.

Puppy factory: Opening the door to Gayla’s Poodle Palace engulfed White County, Tenn., sheriff Oddie Shoupe with a suffocating stench. “And that’s when I called for The Humane Society of the United States because I knew we had more than I could handle.” Read more on puppy mills: p. 34.

To The Rescue

8 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report

5 undercover investigations reveal endemic cruelties and food safety concerns at U.S. factory farms

California is first state to ban sales of whole battery cage eggs, while major companies such as Kraft Foods commit to dramatically increase their cage-free purchases

Ohio agriculture leaders agree to phase out or limit the worst confinement systems

A federal court rules against foie gras producer for Clean Water Act violations

The USDA announces stronger oversight of the federal humane slaughter law

Cruelty charges stemming from an HSUS 2009 investigation result in conviction of a former slaughterhouse co-owner and employee

[ Protecting Farm Animals ]

Industrial farms are not a step forward. Somewhere along the line, animals became machines, and cogs in machines. They’re replaceable parts; when a chicken dies in a cage, you pluck it out and stick another one in. Same thing with a hog. We don’t operate that way. We still practice traditional forms of husbandry. We know about animal behavior, and we have a long-standing relationship with these animals.

—Bruce Rickard, an Ohio farmer who has joined The HSUS’s fight against extreme confinement practices

The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 1110 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report10 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report

Locations: Winterset, Stuart, Guthrie Center, and Thompson, Iowa

Exposed: Second and third largest egg producers in the U.S.

“I’ve seen some terrible things in my undercover experi-ence, but nothing even begins to compare to these battery cage facilities,” says the HSUS investigator of the 25 days he worked for Rose Acre Farms and Rembrandt Enterprises. At four facilities, he documented the cruelty typical of factory-style caging systems. Countless animals suffered painful injuries and illnesses; many became trapped in cage wire and slowly perished. Survivors didn’t fare much better. After months of battery cage life, they were rendered “hollow shells” of birds, he says—scrawny, featherless, defeated creatures ground up for chicken byproducts or slaughtered for low-grade meat. Nearly 270 million chickens—more than 90 percent of egg-laying hens—in the U.S. are confined so tightly in barren cages that they can’t even spread their wings. Working with family farmers and other stakeholders, The HSUS is raising awareness and prompting many producers to shift to cage-free systems. Our investigators are the public’s eyes and ears into the conditions at the facilities of producers resistant to change, says senior director of investigations Mary Beth Sweetland. “They bring the suffering out in the open.” Says the investigator of the Iowa facilities, who spent weeks removing decomposing corpses from cages: “This isn’t in sync with how the public wants to get their eggs.”

Location: Waverly, Virginia

Exposed: Industrial pig breeding facility

owned by the world’s largest pork producer

At a massive pig breeding farm owned by a Smithfield Foods subsidiary, an HSUS undercover investigator documented the miserable lives of breeding sows virtually immobilized in gestation crates. Open pressure sores and untreated abscesses were common. Some animals showed compulsive swaying and head-bobbing; others chewed the cage bars until their mouths bled. Outside the crates, the animals were treated roughly—struck with iron rods or even thrown into a dumpster to die. The widely publicized video footage hit a public nerve, adding pressure on Smithfield and other pork producers to end the use of gestation crates. “If you’re not already anti-factory-farming, this will do it,” wrote New York Times Magazine columnist Mark Bittman in his blog. “… The video leaves me pretty much speechless.” Grist food and agriculture columnist Tom Philpott had a similar reaction, concluding: “Thank goodness we have the Humane Society acting as our eyes on the meat-factory floor.”

Location: Waelder, Texas

Exposed: Largest egg producer

in the U.S.

At Cal-Maine Foods’ million-chicken egg operation, two details were inescapable: animal suffering and filth. The fly infestation in one barn was so severe, says the HSUS undercover investigator who worked there in November, it was like “walking on Rice Krispies.” Hens and eggs were covered in chicken waste that rained down from the cages above. The exposé occurred in the wake of the nation’s largest egg recall, in which a half-billion eggs from battery cage facilities were deemed at risk for salmonella contamination. The HSUS ran ads reminding the public and policymakers that intensive confinement systems aren’t just cruel—they’re also a health danger. Citing numerous recent studies that show a clear link between battery cage confinement and salmo-nella contamination, The HSUS filed a complaint with the FDA about the Cal-Maine findings, asking the agency to amend the federal egg safety rule. Says The HSUS’s Dr. Michael Greger: “This is the science that the FDA cannot afford to ignore.”

Location: Willmar, Minnesota

Exposed: Largest turkey hatchery in the U.S.

Days before Thanksgiving, an HSUS investigation revealed the unappetizing reality behind industri-ally produced turkey products. Working at the Willmar Poultry Company, an investigator videotaped conveyor belts drenched in the blood of young turkeys whose toes, snoods, and beaks were cut off with no anesthetic. Sick and injured hatchlings fell from conveyor belts and flapped helplessly for hours on the factory floor—until the end of the day, when they and any surplus birds were tossed into a machine that ground them up alive. It was The HSUS’s first undercover exposé of the U.S. commercial turkey industry, which produces more than 250 million birds each year. Willmar and one of its customers defended the abuses as standard industry practices. Sadly, they’re correct: Federal animal welfare laws don’t apply to animals on the farm, enabling businesses to treat birds as mere production units. The HSUS is urging the industry to adopt higher standards, including more humane slaughter methods, and enlisting public support for reforms. “Investigations like this are shining a bright light on this very dark world of factory farming,” says The HSUS’s Paul Shapiro. “The more Americans learn about the routine abuses, the greater the demand for change.”

It makes me angry for people who buy these products in the grocery stores, where everything is bright and clean. The barns are not bright. They’re not clean. It’s not at all what it seems.

—An HSUS undercover investigator who spent a month at a Cal-Maine Foods facility in Texas, where four “house-keepers” were expected to care for 240,000 animals each

The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 11

Factory Farms Unmasked


Building MomentumIt was an achievement “that few people would have thought possible for Ohio even just a couple years ago,” says Paul Shapiro, senior director of farm animal protection for The HSUS: commitments by the state’s agribusiness industry in June 2010 to phase out tiny crates for veal calves and pigs and to place a morato-rium on new battery cage facilities for egg-laying hens. In one of the nation’s top agricultural states, where millions of animals suffer in factory farms, The HSUS had laid the groundwork for the agreement with successful legislative and ballot campaigns in seven other states since 2006. And as 2010 came to a close, Shapiro and his staff continued to build on these victories, gearing up for possible ballot initiatives in Washington in 2011 and Oregon in 2012. Overjoyed by the Ohio reforms was unemployed-salesman-turned-advocate extraordinaire David Meadows. While gathering signatures for an HSUS-led ballot initiative preempted by the negotiations, Meadows had encountered many voters angry about farm animal suffering, and he says that Ohio’s animal lovers will be holding the industry to its promises. “This is definitely something that we’ll keep up the pressure, and keep pushing for what is already happening in other states,” says Meadows, who was inspired by his volunteer experience to join the HSUS staff.

Justice for Abused CalvesThe calves being tormented at the Vermont slaughterhouse couldn’t walk or even stand. With the undercover camera rolling, the newborns—many with their umbilical cords still attached—were kicked, slapped, and repeatedly shocked with electric prods. Some were still conscious while they were skinned alive or had their throats slit or heads sawed off. In the months following its fall 2009 investigation, The HSUS filed a legal petition with the USDA to improve slaughterhouse calf-handling and oversight. In December 2010, the agency announced it would tighten rules requiring immediate humane euthanasia of downed cattle, plus appoint an ombudsman to hear inspectors’ concerns. In addition, the USDA is seeking public comments on an HSUS petition it tentatively granted to prohibit slaughter of downed calves. The HSUS also persuaded the Vermont attorney general’s office to prosecute the case. In his quest for justice, HSUS director of animal cruelty investiga-tions Adam Parascandola counted every kick and shock in the undercover video. A co-owner and one worker were convicted, the latter of felony cruelty—sending a message, Parascandola says, that “people care what happens to farm animals, and these cases can be successfully prosecuted and taken seriously.”

Appealing for Action“Humane” and “happy” are increasingly popular marketing terms—the next big thing after “organic” and “fair trade,” according to one consumer behavior analyst. Trouble is, they often don’t reflect what’s actually happening to farm animals. So in 2010, The HSUS took action against two of the most egregious perpetrators of consumer misinformation. In June, we filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission to stop Rose Acre Farms, the country’s second-largest egg producer, from making false and misleading animal welfare claims to consumers. And in November, The HSUS’s Animal Protection Litigation team helped represent an HSUS member in a class action lawsuit against Perdue, alleging that the company is unlawfully marketing its chicken products as “Humanely Raised.” The truth behind the foie gras served in fine restaurants isn’t pretty either, and last year The HSUS won a major victory in a lawsuit against Hudson Valley Foie Gras. A judge ruled that the company, which obtains its product by force-feeding ducks, had violated the federal Clean Water Act by polluting the Middle Mongaup River. Hudson Valley was ordered to fund a $50,000 environmental cleanup project, plus pay $25,000 to $30,000 for each additional day it continues to break the law.

Marketplace ReformFresh from an HSUS internship and heading into her junior year at Grand Valley State University, Lena Spadacene decided to persuade the Michigan college to go cage-free. In September, she began working with a dining services advisory group. Months passed and nothing happened. So in February 2010, Spadacene collected more than 1,000 student signatures and appealed directly to the head of campus dining. Within two weeks, the first cage-free egg was cracked on campus. “Students have way more power than they’ve been led to believe,” says Spadacene, who received The HSUS’s Student Leadership Award for her efforts. “Do something about it, because it’s possible.” With The HSUS’s encouragement, more than 100 schools began using cage-free eggs in 2010, along with more than 100 restaurants, including major chains like Subway, and well-known brands such as Kraft Foods, Hellmann’s, and Sara Lee. Along with prior commitments from thousands of additional establishments, thechanges help drive reduction in the number of products purchased from extreme confinement facilities. Humane Society International also continued its cage-free campaign abroad, winning the first pledge from a restaurant in Brazil. This year, HSI hopes to get the São Paulo city school system to go cage-free.

[ Protecting Farm Animals ]


67 state laws are enacted to address pet protection issues such as spay/neuter, humane euthanasia, and antifreeze poisoning

Federal ban on crush videos—fetish films where women stomp small animals to death—is signed into law

68,000+ spay/neuter surgeries result from Spay Day events in 39 countries

58,120 dogs, cats, and equines in developing nations and underserved regions of the U.S. are sterilized or given other lifesaving care

7,076 people receive guidance to prevent pet relinquishment through Pets for Life NYC

4,173 pets are brought to free vaccination clinics and spay/neuter outreach events in Southern states

550+ veterinary professionals receive training in spay/neuter, equine treatment, and field clinic operations

[ Protecting Our Best Friends ]

We’re all aware of the overpopulation of pets, plus with the state of the economy right now, it’s obvious that people are in need of help. The HSUS has a good reputation, so it was a way to reach out to the community with a strong organization and really do some good.

—Stephen Owen, associate pastor of Shallow Well United Church of Christ in Sanford, N.C.,

which cohosted an October 2010 vaccine clinic and spay/neuter voucher distribution “It’s important when you’re on a fixed budget,” said one pet owner who came for a spay/neuter voucher. “We have so

many dogs, we can’t afford to take them to the vet,” said another who came for

the rabies vaccines. The HSUS-sponsored event in Mississippi was one of many designed to help pet owners in need.

The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 1716 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report16 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report

Build it and they will come—a proposition validated by the early turnout at low-cost spay/neuter facilities opening in the Gulf Coast in the years after Hurricane Katrina. The HSUS and other groups helped fund the operations in response to findings that pet owners cite cost as the No. 1 barrier to spay/neuter in a region battered by high rates of poverty and shelter euthanasia. Though successful, the services weren’t reaching everyone, so The HSUS helped find new ways to promote spay/neuter beyond billboards and radio and TV ads. “There’s a huge segment of our population that is under-served and that doesn’t respond or have access to the traditional marketing,” says Amanda Arrington, HSUS manager of spay/neuter initiatives. “Those are the people that we really need to get the message and the services to. Cable TV is not necessarily going to do it.” Throughout 2010, the spay/neuter facilities and The HSUS held community outreach events to provide vaccines and microchips and talk to pet owners about the connection between unaltered pets and euthanasia. Promotional flyers were hung in grocery stores, laun-dromats, even check cashing outlets. In one community, mosquito control workers distributed information, while an event notice was printed on residents’ utility bills. The unconventional marketing tactics—and a strategy of holding the events in accessible locations—made inroads into untapped client bases. In Hattiesburg, Miss., only 1 percent of visitors to the Southern Pines Animal Shelter’s spay-neuter clinic are African American, even

though the demographic comprises about 45 percent of the area’s population. But when the clinic began holding outreach events, workers were excited to see a different clientele emerge, with young African American males showing up to get care for their pit bulls and other dogs. At each event, pet owners were receptive to the spay/neuter message, especially when accompanied by a voucher for free or discounted surgeries. “They’re willing to come out at 5 in the morning and stand in line for six hours on a Saturday, for a vaccine that costs $7,” Arrington says. “It just shows that they don’t have an option and they really want one.” In Jefferson Parish, La., free pet food was snatched up by 1,500 attendees. And at an event in Lafayette, La., partic-ipants included two roommates who had been preventing litters through constant juggling of their multiple dogs to keep the males and females segregated. “They shrieked with delight when they were given the spay/neuter vouchers,” says Cory Smith, director of the HSUS Humane Communities program. “They had wanted to get them fixed for so long and had not been able to afford it.” Such success stories bring hope to the shelter staff who struggle every day with the consequences of pet overpopu-lation. People like Debbie Hood, executive director of the Tupelo-Lee Humane Society in Mississippi, where about 72 percent of the animals are euthanized—close to the average for shelters across the state. “I can’t look in their eyes and not do something,” says Hood. “Maybe not today, but in the long run, we’ll eventually save a lot of lives.”

At first, some of the Haitians were skeptical. Like most veterinarians in developing nations, they’d been trained to treat agricultural animals, not sterilize dogs. And while eager to learn new skills, they worried that the knowledge would be worthless when the Westerners left and they wouldn’t have the necessary supplies to perform the surgeries. Dispelling such fears was just one of the challenges Humane Society International faced in 2010—the first year of an ambitious animal welfare initiative in a country that, even before the January earthquake, had not a single animal shelter, animal protection group, or low- cost veterinary clinic. HSI teams spent months assessing the situation, meeting with government officials and other NGOs, and mapping out a multiyear project with long-term sustainability. In partnership with Best Friends Animal Society, HSI laid the groundwork for the January 2011 opening of the Haiti Animal Care and Welfare Center, which includes a veterinary hospital, community workshop space, and veterinary training center. And more than 30 Haitian vets received hands-on training in spay/neuter surgeries and companion animal care—setting the stage for high-volume sterilization and vaccination clinics for street dogs and wellness clinics for working equines throughout the island. It’s a comprehensive, longsighted approach to improving animal welfare in developing nations. In the kingdom of Bhutan, HSI is leading the first-ever nation-wide street dog spay/neuter initiative. By the end of 2010,

the program had sterilized and vaccinated nearly 17,000 dogs, and it had begun training local veterinary professionals and others in the skills needed to keep the work going in the years to come. “Our staff are reaching into every corner,” says Sunil Chawla, HSI’s lead veterinarian in Bhutan, describing the thrill of visiting a remote area and finding a dog with the telltale notched ear borne by beneficiaries of HSI’s spay/neuter program. “They are doing very hard work.” The HSI street dog program caught the attention of animal lovers and government officials in other nations with large street dog populations. In November, the mayor of Cebu City in the Philippines signed an agreement with HSI to launch a two-year catch-neuter-release program for street dogs; other Philippine cities have expressed interest in doing the same. HSI has also helped address cultural mindsets that affect animal welfare. In Cuenca, Ecuador, we cospon-sored the first adoption fair for ARCA (Activism, Rescue, and Conscience for Animals)—promoting shelter pets in a country where adoptions aren’t common. Two cats and 32 dogs found new homes at the event, which attracted more than 200 people. In Haiti, the trickle-down effect on cultural attitudes is already apparent. “Now minds are changing,” says HSI program assistant Jean-Claude Cesaire, a Haitian native. “They are learning that animals are our neighbors, our friends; we’ve got to treat them better. The community is changing in terms of appreciation of the animals.”

Pioneering Spay/Neuter in Haiti and Bhutan

Talkin’ Spay/Neuter in the Gulf

In Tupelo, Miss., more than 300 pets received rabies

vaccines and free bags of food.

HSI sterilized and vaccinated nearly

17,000 street dogs in Bhutan in 2010.


A Roadmap for Shelters: Rural or urban, large or small, government-funded or private nonprofit, animal shelters face unique challenges. Everything from cage-cleaning protocols to building design to public relations ultimately impacts a shelter’s animals and its employees. To help shelters reach their highest potential, The HSUS’s Shelter Services program provides guidance, training, and on-site assessments, bringing the latest research and progressive solutions to shelters across the country. “I’m still astonished by all we learned,” says Karen Stimpson, executive director of the Coastal Humane Society in Maine, which received an on-site evaluation in 2010. Stimpson and her staff have already implemented many of the HSUS team’s recommendations— with noticeable results. Best of all, Stimpson says, her organization now has a five-year roadmap and HSUS experts to advise them. “Whatever’s coming our way, we’ve got the wisdom behind the report and follow-up and guidance if we need it.”

Pen Pals: When a temporary shelter in Gonzalez, La., filled to capacity with animals rescued from Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Dixon Correctional Institute officials offered to help. Soon, hundreds of animals were on their way to a converted dairy barn on prison grounds, where inmates walked dogs and even played Frisbee. “A lot of guys really enjoyed it,” says warden Steve Rader. “They said, ‘If you ever get dogs, I want to work with them again!’ ” Now, thanks to a $600,000 HSUS grant and help from the Louisiana State University School of Veterinary Medicine, the prison is the site of an emergency evacua-tion facility and animal shelter for East Feliciana parish strays. Providing training for prisoners as well as a refuge for homeless pets in a parish that previously didn’t have a shelter, the program reflects The HSUS’s ongoing commitment to assist pet owners in post-disaster recovery.

Foul-Weather Friends: Long engaged in post-Katrina rebuilding in the Gulf Coast, The HSUS was there to help when the Deepwater Horizon oil spill drove out-of-work locals to surrender more animals to area shelters. “Every room had dogs in it, kennels on top of each other. You could tell they were just struggling to get any dogs out,” recalls The HSUS’s Sarah Barnett, who in June helped transport animals from two Louisiana shelters to Washington, D.C., groups. “Knowing they’re going to a good place and a safe place, it took a load off the whole staff,” said a relieved Beth Brewster, director of the St. Bernard Parish Animal Shelter. Brewster’s shelter itself is a post-Katrina project come to fruition. Paid for with FEMA funds, insurance proceeds, and a $250,000 grant and other in-kind assistance from The HSUS, the new facility is “para-dise,” says Brewster—easier to clean, pleasant for staff and visitors, and, most important, more comfortable for the animals.

The Show Must Go On: What happens when you play a country song backward? Your wife comes back, your truck gets fixed, and your lost dog comes home. It’s an old joke, but it was in that spirit of reversing misfortune that The HSUS rolled ahead with Animal Care Expo 2010, in country music’s mecca of Nashville, Tenn.—only a week after the city experienced heavy flooding that left the orig-inal conference site 14 feet under water. HSUS conference planners and local partners kicked into high gear, relocating the entire meeting—which appropriately included workshops on disaster planning—to another hotel with less than a week to spare. More than 1,000 animal shelter and rescue staff and volunteers came to learn, network, and get inspired. The year 2011 will mark the 20th anniversary of Expo and helping shelters work better and smarter, toward the goal of ending the suffering and euthanasia of homeless pets.

Yes, They Had Some Chihuahuas: “When I first got him, they were calling him Dr. Death because he just looked so bad,” says Erin Long-Scott, who adopted the dog now known as Lovie. One of 158 animals removed from substan-dard conditions by The HSUS and Kern County Animal Control in California, the Chihuahua’s teeth were so decayed that a Sacramento SPCA veterinarian had to pull all but one. The SPCA is one of 100-plus organizations in The HSUS’s Placement Partner program, which care for victims of large cruelty cases investigated by The HSUS and law enforcement agencies. Partners like the Sacramento SPCA join a “collaborative effort that’s key to improving the lives of animals in our community,” says executive director Rick Johnson. Today, Lovie loves to chew on oranges in Long-Scott’s yard. During cold weather, he rushes outside to sit under the dryer vent for a warm-air “massage.” His jaw’s a little crooked, but he smiles a lot.

[ Protecting Our Best Friends ]

Transforming Veterinary Medicine: Ontario Veterinary School student Erika Sullivan was disturbed that few classmates had chosen an ethical alternative to the school’s traditional surgical training on live animals who are later euthanized. As a student member of the Humane Society Veterinary Medical Association, Sullivan knew simulators, cadavers, and beneficial procedures such as spay/neuter are just as effective and are embraced by many U.S. veterinary schools. After graduating in 2005, she continued to return to her alma mater to promote alternative training. Now a professional HSVMA member, Sullivan helped persuade her school to elimi-nate terminal surgeries in 2010. Ending terminal surgeries is just one way that HSVMA helps animals through action, advocacy, and education. In 2010, members rallied for two crucial ballot campaigns—a puppy mill initia-tive in Missouri and Ohio’s humane farm initiative—and worked to ban the devocalization of dogs in Massachu-setts. HSVMA Field Services teams also provided $1.3 million in free veterinary care to more than 8,000 companion animals and equines in rural and under-served areas here and abroad.


White skulls and decaying bodies dotted the terrain, while the trees offered another haunting reminder of just how bad things had gotten on this decrepit Texas farm: The horses were so starved, so desperate, they had taken to chewing the bark off the trunks. In December, The HSUS stepped in and helped author-ities seize 43 horses from the property—one of several major rescues in 2010. More than 20 horses were placed in new homes, while 14 were sent to foster trainers and five to The HSUS’s new Doris Day Horse Rescue and Adoption Center in east Texas. The latter were expected to attend the center’s grand opening this May to partic-ipate in a “rescue makeover,” showing off just how far they’ve come. “That is the model that we’re seeking to perpetuate, that these horses aren’t old, broken down, worthless animals,” says Stacy Segal, equine cruelty specialist with The HSUS. “They just need the time and the knowledge to become good equine citizens and good partners for people.” The HSUS helped dozens of other horses find second chances in 2010. In May, a tractor trailer transporting 30 horses to slaughter overturned in Oklahoma when the driver fell asleep. HSUS Oklahoma state director Cynthia Armstrong described the scene: “We had Good Samaritan citizens who saw the crash, called their friends, got halters, corralled the horses safely, and got them off the

Delivered from Dangerhighway until authorities arrived.” The HSUS and Blaze’s Tribute Equine Rescue negotiated custody of the 17 survi-vors, later fostered by Blaze’s board member Desiree Walling on her Calumet farm. On the night of the spring equinox, a mare named Catori, who was pregnant at the time of the accident, gave birth. Named for the “super-moon” blazing in the sky that night, Moonstruck serves as “a symbol of hope and rebirth and the survival of all of these horses,” Armstrong says. Also last year, The HSUS assisted the Cabell-Wayne Animal Shelter with the rescue of 49 starving and neglected horses, mules, and donkeys from a West Virginia property. Seven months later, 114 horses were seized from the overrun Arkansas property of a horse trader and auctioneer. The HSUS and ASPCA devoted many resources to caring for the rescued horses at an abandoned livestock auction, as they awaited a final court disposition with hopes of taking custody and holding an adoption fair. A rancher later provided temporary sanctuary throughout the legal process. Beyond rescues and adoptions, The HSUS has found other ways to help horses, like teaming with the American Competitive Trail Horse Association for a weekend of benefit trail rides around the U.S. The group raised $70,000 from the event, then donated the money to The HSUS, which in turn awarded grants to horse rescue organizations.

Hal Bowden will never forget the sight.

When he adopted John Henry, the abused and under-weight Tennessee walking horse suffered telltale signs of soring—the cruel practice whereby trainers cause intense pain in an effort to exaggerate the breed’s high-stepping gait and thus gain an unfair edge in shows. For starters, John Henry’s heels had been cut out, and there were three lines of scars across his ankles. Fast forward three years, and as part of a lengthy rehabilitation process, Bowden had brought John Henry to a North Carolina show to see how the horse would react to the setting. Returning to the barn after dinner, he got his answer: There was John Henry, cowering, covered in a cold sweat. “To tell you the honest truth, I just cried, and I just went and held him for awhile,” Bowden says, adding: “I’ll never forget that big old horse, standing in the corner of that stall, trembling in fear.” Today, John Henry’s hooves have grown back to normal, he’s more trusting of people, and his adopter promotes walking horses’ naturally smooth gait. To bring justice to those who would cause such suffering, The HSUS has been pushing for better enforcement of a 1970 law against soring. In March 2010, a bipartisan group of 40 senators and 131 representatives supported President Obama’s request for the first-ever increase in funding for Horse Protection Act enforcement, from $500,000 to $900,000 during fiscal 2011. Although Congress ultimately did not pass the president’s budget, The HSUS will keep up the fight,

and President Obama has again requested the $400,000 increase for fiscal 2012—a request backed by more than 100 representatives. “We’re still seeing a lot of soring being detected in the field, and we’re still not seeing as many USDA inspectors attending shows as we would like,” says Keith Dane, HSUS director of equine protection. Changes announced in 2010 by the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service could help, including hiring, training, and licensing independent inspectors. The announcement followed a recommendation from the USDA’s Office of the Inspector General that APHIS abolish its current problematic inspection system. Among other horse protection efforts, The HSUS has continued pressing for more humane and effective treat-ment of wild horses and burros, who are viewed as foraging competition for livestock and other grazing wildlife. In February of this year, the Bureau of Land Management announced it was accelerating “fundamental reforms” to its system of rounding up the animals via helicopter and placing them in long-term holding facilities. Implemented on a two-year trial basis, the changes include increasing the number of mares treated with the fertility control drug PZP from 500 to 2,000, and reducing the number of wild horses removed annually from 10,000 to 7,600. The reforms have been met with mixed reviews. “We’re praising the BLM for the efforts that they’re making to change the status quo and to fix the broken program,” says Stephanie Boyles, wildlife scientist at The HSUS. At the same time, she says the organization will continue to push for even more use of PZP.

Progress for Horses

Once neglected and starving, these horses saved by the

HSUS Animal Rescue Team later moved on to greener pastures.


19 state measures are enacted against wildlife abuses such as poaching, the exotic pet trade, and captive shooting

National shark finning ban is strengthened

Arizonans uphold their right to launch citizen initiatives on wildlife protection issues

The Truth in Fur Labeling Act is signed into federal law

Florida prohibits fox and coyote penning operations

Deaths in Canada’s seal hunt plummet to less than 20 percent of government quota

Sea lion killings are halted and North Atlantic right whales gain protections

Proposals to lift the commercial whaling ban are defeated; trade protections are gained for elephants, tree frogs, and other species

[ Protecting Wildlife ]

These baby seals are subjected to unimaginable suffering. The sealing industry would like the brutality to remain a secret, for the killing to happen out of public view. But we can’t let that happen. The tragic deaths of these defenseless animals will ultimately bring down the industry. As the images of this cruelty are broadcast around the world, global markets for seal products are closing, and consumers are taking action to stop the slaughter.

—Humane Society International Canada director Rebecca Aldworth,

reporting live from the ice during her 12th year documenting the hunt


First Responders for Urban WildlifeCrisscrossing the Washington, D.C., area, The HSUS’s Humane Wildlife Services team last year rescued more than 1,300 urban animals from harm while providing homeowners with long-lasting solutions to wildlife conflicts. Staff united orphaned mallard ducklings with another mother’s brood, coached contractors on salvaging a wood-pecker nest cavity from a chopped-down tree, and persuaded a homeowner to postpone evicting a chimney-dwelling raccoon family until the babies were older. The team also saved a maternal bat colony at the historic Oatlands Plantation in Virginia. After the baby-rearing season, they climbed nearly 40 feet up ladders to install netting that allowed the bats to safely exit the roosting area but not return. These alternatives to lethal tactics and forced relocation are now being implemented on a large scale in the District of Columbia with passage of the precedent-setting D.C. Wildlife Protection Act. Testimony from our field team was critical in rebutting industry arguments that humane resolutions aren’t possible. Further afield, our wildlife specialists helped more than 30 commu-nities resolve conflicts with Canada geese, deer, beavers, and coyotes. In Maryland, staff partnered with a developer to move box turtles from the path of construction; hazing and other nonlethal techniques prodded animals such as foxes and woodchucks to move on their own. And The HSUS worked alongside advocates to protest a deadly goose roundup near the Madison, Wis., airport. Car parts salesman Nathan Phoenix started a Facebook group, enlisting pilots and long-time goose hunters in the birds’ defense. As HSUS Wisconsin state director Alyson Bodai notes, Phoenix is “a prime example of how effective people can be when they put their mind to something and get involved.”

2 | The HSUS 2010 Annual Report

Again and again, The HSUS’s Pierre Grzybowski helped undercover reporters scan sales racks to find coats with collars that resembled animal fur but labels that made no mention of it. Again and again, sales clerks assured them that the trim must therefore be fake. And again and again, Grzybowski—either in the parking lot or back at the newsroom—cut open the backs of the just-purchased coats to reveal pieces of an animal skin stitched together. It was real fur, after all. In December 2010, after an Emmy-winning investiga-tion by Los Angeles’ CBS2/KCAL and broadcasts by other local stations as well as Inside Edition, The HSUS achieved a major victory for fur-bearing animals. Culminating five years of undercover investigations that showed consumers being duped into buying clothes trimmed with fur from raccoon dogs, rabbits, and foxes, Congress closed a loophole in a 60-year-old labeling law that had exempted garments trimmed in fur valued at $150 or less. Now, consumers who want to avoid buying animal fur have the information to make the humane decision, as all clothing with real fur must show the species and country of origin. The Truth in Fur Labeling Act comes just in time, says John Bartlett, a designer who’s working with The HSUS to make the fashion industry more humane. While high-quality faux fur is more and more in demand by consumers who don’t want animals to be skinned alive or otherwise killed for clothing, animal fur has been reappearing on runways, he says. Some designers see it as a luxury material that will set their work apart.

Fur Disclosure

“They are not thinking about the reality of the carnage that’s involved,” Bartlett says. “Many designers don’t know where their fur’s coming from or even what kind of animal it’s coming from.” The new law, which took effect in March, forces them to find out, he says. Retailers are getting the message as well. In response to an HSUS lawsuit, companies including Saks Fifth Avenue, Bloomingdale’s, and Lord & Taylor agreed to reform their labeling and advertising policies. Saks and Bloomingdale’s also joined Macy’s and Andrew Marc in agreeing to endorse the Truth in Fur Labeling Act, while a judgment was entered against Neiman Marcus in the case. In September, a quick response by thousands of HSUS members—many of them fans of our Facebook page—helped persuade Talbots to reverse its decision to reintroduce animal fur after a decade of being fur-free. It remains one of more than 300 designers, brands, and retailers that do not sell fur, including Ralph Lauren, Liz Claiborne, Tommy Hilfiger, and Calvin Klein. With the passage of the Truth in Fur Labeling Act, that number should grow, says Bartlett. “Now the consumer will know more, and I think the design world and the retailers will be much more hesitant to buy something,” he says. “I think that they will ask questions.”

Teetering on the Edge: Persecuted by ranchers and big-game hunters as bloodthirsty predators, America’s gray wolves were once nearly hunted to extinction. In the years since they gained Endangered Species Act protection, The HSUS has successfully defended the animals in a series of lawsuits. In August 2010, The HSUS and 12 other organizations helped gain yet another court-ordered reprieve for the Northern Rockies population, staving off Montana’s and Idaho’s plans for public hunts. Judge Donald Molloy declared the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service could not remove federal protections in those two states while upholding them in neighboring Wyoming. In 2011, ESA protections for Idaho and Montana wolves fell victim to a provision slipped into a congressional budget bill by hostile interests. The HSUS will continue to monitor the situation closely and carry on the fight.

It inspired me so much that I wanted to take that enthusiasm and express it to my fellow designers.

—Fashion designer John Bartlett, describing an initial meeting

with HSUS staff that sparked his fur-free leadership



Ruthless “Recreation”: They couldn’t ignore what was going on in their state: dogs set loose on wild-caught foxes and coyotes trapped inside fences. So they rose up and joined The HSUS in persuading the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to take a stand. They were people like Cristin Tank and her family, who lived next to a fox and coyote pen, and Ron Wentworth, who promoted a ban to anyone who would listen. In September, commissioners unan-imously outlawed pens, with chairman Rodney Barreto noting, “I think Florida needs to end this and we need to end this now.” More than 50 pens had operated in the state at the peak of this inhumane “sport.” Footage of a different form of cruelty elicited outrage in South Carolina: hounds being released to harass a black bear chained to a pole before a large audience. Calls for a ban poured in while HSUS staff pushed state officials to act. Says The HSUS’s undercover investigator: “How can you not be disgusted by this spectacle?”

Curtailing a Cruel Trade: With their skins fashioned into home decor and their tusks carved into necklaces, some of the world’s most magnificent animals also face the gravest dangers. Every three years, special inter-ests conspire to further decimate the earth’s natural treasures during debates at the U.N. Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. But among the ivory carvers, fur traders, trophy hunters, and exotic pet dealers, a powerful voice has emerged: the Species Survival Network, a global coalition cofounded by Humane Society International’s Teresa Telecky. Last year the group gained or preserved protections for a range of species, including African elephants, Central American tree frogs, and great green macaws. Critically endangered Kaiser’s spotted newts have been poached for the pet trade, and professor Mozafar Sharifi’s proposal—the first by an Iranian scientist—prompted an interna-tional commercial trade ban. “It’s very exciting to see that your knowledge can be linked to practical conservation practices,” he says.

New Digs for Embattled Species: Under cover of pre-dawn dark-ness, HSUS environmental scientist Lindsey Sterling Krank embarked on an unusual series of moving days last July: the mass relocation of black-tailed prairie dogs into protected grasslands. Persecuted and decimated by disease, the species—and the other creatures who depend on it—faces significant threats to survival. So when a landowner near Wyoming’s Thunder Basin National Grassland wanted the two colonies near his property poisoned, a U.S. Forest Service biologist approached The HSUS for help. A groundbreaking partnership ensued, and 550 prairie dogs were moved (nearly 450 more were humanely relocated from two other locations in 2010). The humane solution sets the stage for reintroduction of the endangered black-footed ferret—a prairie dog predator—and future federal conser-vation efforts. Even the uprooted animals seemed relieved, popping out of freshly dug holes to chirp and “jump yip”—a call used to spread the news that the coast is clear.


Wolverine WatchWolverines have been spotted play-fully tumbling down alpine slopes—but can also win staring contests with grizzlies over food and scale mountains that would defeat the hardiest of humans. Author and Humane Society Wildlife Land Trust supporter Douglas Chadwick has noted their unlikely strength: “Trying to keep up with them amounts to constant adventure in a world of avalanches, blizzards, sheer cliff faces, patches of thin lake ice, sub-zero moonlit ski trips, marathon hikes, cliff walls with tiny handholds, and big silver-tipped bears,” says Chadwick, shown above in blue, helping to remove an anes-thetized animal from a humane trap. Partially funded by the Wildlife Land Trust, the multiyear Glacier Wolverine Project conducted by Chadwick and other researchers revealed that the little-studied animals are vulnerable to the warming of their Montana high-country home. Though the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service denied them protection in December 2010, the study—and Chadwick’s subsequent book, The Wolverine Way—should help make the case for the habitat connectivity and trapping restric-tions necessary for their survival.

Wild RevivalAs field ornithologists John and Sue Gregoire gazed over the barren terrain surrounding their new property in western New York, they were profoundly disturbed by the absence of native plants and animals. “You could see forever, from one end of the property to the other,” says John Gregoire. “It was that open and bare.” They set about on a mission to restore the setting to provide food, water, and shelter for wildlife. Over the next 25 years, they planted more than 10,000 trees and built a diversity of habitats. Their 60-acre property is now a vibrant wildlife sanctuary rich with regenerating fields, thick stands of pine trees for owls and other animals, and ponds offering gradations of depth and native vegetation. They’ve sighted more than 200 bird species there, as well as bears, deer, bats, coyotes, and other animals. But even as their forested property flourishes with life, the surrounding landscape bears evidence of the destruction caused by large-scale dairy farms. To feed their animals and reduce the amount of waste stored in massive manure lagoons, these operations raze natural habitats and spread manure over thousands of acres. The resulting monoculture of feed crops creates a stranglehold on biodiversity. To protect their property from such a fate and designate it as perma-nent wildlife habitat, the couple gained a conservation easement through the Humane Society Wildlife Land Trust in 2010, joining 103 other properties in the trust’s 15,000-acre portfolio. Known as the Kestrel Haven Avian Migration Observatory, the property has become an inviting migratory stopover and year-round sanctuary for birds and other wildlife. “I feel like we’ve really done something positive,” John Gregoire says. “And perhaps the most positive is knowing that it will always be that way.”


Stopping Reef Raiders: Some of Hawaiian diver Robert Wintner’s best friends are fish. He pleads for their protection with beautiful photos and passionate words. When he’s not underwater taking pictures of coral reefs, “Snorkel Bob,” who owns a chain of snorkeling equip-ment and rental stores, pushes for ending the commercial collection of saltwater fish for home aquariums. For years he got nowhere. Then in 2010, Wintner, other advocates, and The HSUS’s Hawaii office urged the Maui County Council to pass the nation’s first anti-cruelty laws regu-lating the aquarium trade. Now Maui-based collectors, wholesalers, and retailers must report the number of fish who die. And collectors are barred from piercing fishes’ organs with needles, withholding food for more than 24 hours during trans-port, and cutting their spines or fins. Humane Society International hopes to gain similar protections elsewhere, says Teresa Telecky, director of wildlife. “Many people in the trade see mortality as the way business is run.”

Going to Court for Sea Lions: Along the pristine waters of Oregon’s Columbia River, Cali-fornia sea lions are branded and then monitored for their salmon consumption. In 2008, wildlife officials began killing sea lions who they decided had eaten too many fish. A few were sent to zoos. Advocate Bethanie O’Driscoll remembers the fearful cries of two sea lions being removed last spring at the Bonneville Dam. “I had never heard them make that sound before—the way a dog sounds when it’s injured.” The basis for killing stemmed from the National Marine Fisheries Service’s conclusion that these federally protected animals had a significant negative impact on endangered or threatened salmon. But sea lions eat an average of 0.4 to 4.2 percent of the salmon returns, while fishermen are allowed to take up to 17 percent. In 2010, a lawsuit by our litiga-tion team and other plaintiffs prompted a federal appeals court to block the killings.

Shark Finning Out of BoundsTens of millions of sharks are killed each year to supply the market for shark fin soup. Many of them are victims of finning: Fishermen cut off the fins, then toss the bodies back overboard. Essentially paralyzed, the sharks typically die from suffocation, starvation, or predation. “It’s like cutting off your limbs and leaving you to bleed to death,” says Rebecca Regnery, deputy director of wildlife at Humane Society International. But the sharks in U.S. waters recently gained more protection from the brutal practice after President Obama signed the Shark Conservation Act into law. That measure, which requires fishermen catching sharks to bring them to port with fins still attached, closed loopholes in the coun-try’s previous ban on finning. It was a victory for the animals and their eco- system, where sharks play an important role at the top of the food chain. Just as important, it gave advocates a stronger hand in negotiating increased protections with the EU and nations such as Australia and Indonesia. As Regnery says: “It’s hard to try to convince other countries to clean up their act when you have problems in your own country.” State legislation passed in Hawaii last year went even further, after The HSUS and HSI worked with state Sen. Clayton Hee on a groundbreaking measure to ban the possession, sale, and distribution of shark fins in the Aloha State. “Legislation like that had never even been intro-duced anywhere,” says Regnery. Hawaii’s stance helped kick-start a trend. Washington State, Guam, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands have since passed similar measures.

Safe Harbor for Whales: It took the death of a SeaWorld trainer, but in 2010 the government and media finally started listening to arguments against the captive display of orcas. Naomi Rose, senior scientist for Humane Society International, gave congressional testimony in April, two months after Tilikum killed trainer Dawn Brancheau in Orlando. The orca was previously involved in the deaths of two other people. “No matter how big the tank looks, it’s a kennel to this large, wide-ranging predator,” says Rose. In August 2010, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued SeaWorld with a citation, which the company will appeal at a September hearing. Meanwhile, in March 2011, after 13 months in a back tank, Tilikum was brought out to perform again. Also in 2010, HSI successfully fought to maintain an International Whaling Commission moratorium on commercial whale hunting. And following litigation by The HSUS, the National Marine Fisheries Service agreed to propose expanding critical habitat for the 400 remaining North Atlantic right whales.


Seal Hunt Death Rattle: For more than a dozen years, Rebecca Aldworth, director of Humane Society International Canada, has documented the heart-break of Canada’s annual commer-cial seal hunt, when pups as young as 12 days old are shot and clubbed to death for their pelts. The only salve for the emotional wound is the knowledge that the relentless quest to end the brutal hunt is paying off. While the legal catch limit rises every year, the actual take is plum-meting: The Canadian government set the 2010 quota at 388,200 seals, yet 69,184 were killed and fewer sealers participated. Spurred by footage and persuasive arguments from The HSUS and HSI, the EU’s ban on seal products, which took effect last year, has driven pelt prices to a record low and saved more than half a million lives. An HSUS/HSI boycott of Canadian seafood—joined by 5,500 chefs, restaurants, and grocery stores worldwide—sends a clear message that the hunt’s days are numbered.

The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 3130 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 3130 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report30 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report30 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report

[ Ending Animal Fighting ] 5 states strengthen laws against animal fighting

6,389 animals are helped by The HSUS’s work on animal fighting raids and investigations

1,300+ law enforcement officials are trained in animal fighting and cruelty investigations

300 prosecutors and 100 judges attend seminars on the complexities of animal fighting and cruelty cases

835 calls are made to the animal fighting tip line; 24 rewards are paid for information leading to arrests

The End Dogfighting program—a comprehensive approach to combat urban dogfighting—launches in Philadelphia

470+ schoolchildren participate in an eight-week anti-dogfighting humane education course

—Lt. Jim Burriss, describing how The HSUS helped the Greenville County (S.C.)

Sheriff’s Office investigate and raid a notorious cockfighting pit

[HSUS teams] made it a lot easier and a lot less stressful to do this. [They were] a can-do, ‘we’re-going-to-get- it-done’ group of people. You could tell they were focused, they were interested in what they were doing, and it meant a lot to them to do it. And that’s what we’re looking at for people who are going to help us.

A bloodstained fighting circle, a crater full of dead birds, and 197 roosters on the day’s fight docket were among the horrors discovered in June at a South Carolina property. In August, The HSUS helped rescue nearly 200 fighting pit bulls in Ohio, sending them to rescues and shelters around the country (opposite).


The Law on Our Side When John Goodwin recalls the June 2010 raid of a suspected cockfighting operation in Tennessee, what stands out in his mind even more than the 100 people charged and the 150 birds seized is the image of a little girl crying amidst the chaos. “Her sorry dad brought her to a cockfight that got raided, and then he started just yelling at her and chastising her for being upset,” says Goodwin, HSUS director of animal cruelty policy. Last year, Goodwin and fellow HSUS experts helped law enforcement officials bust 33 animal fighting operations, while their advocacy work focused on preventing cruelty in the first place: Minnesota and Nebraska banned animal fighting paraphernalia, Delaware increased penalties for animal fighting participants and spectators, Illinois strengthened penalties for dogfighting near schools, and Louisiana outlawed attendance at a cockfight. The immediate rewards of the campaign and investigative work—animals freed from suffering and perpetrators facing heavy fines or even jail time—are significant, but the long-term effects are equally important, says Goodwin: “These people have to be shut down because they’re teaching a whole generation that it’s OK to be cruel.”

Out of the Ring, Into Loving HomesWhat started as a narcotics bust at a southeastern Ohio home soon turned into one of the largest seizures for alleged dogfighting ever documented on a single property. Last August, when The HSUS was asked to assist law enforcement with an investigation involving nearly 200 pit bulls, teams arrived to find more than 500 animals, including chickens, roosters, boars, hawks, and the desiccated remains of starved-to-death snakes. Weighted down by logging chains attached to buried car axles, many of the dogs had no shelter and suffered from mange, ringworm, infected wounds, and broken bones. Help came from volunteers, including more than 30 from Pittsburgh-based Hello Bully. The HSUS’s new mobile crime lab served as a space for treatment and evidence collection. A horse arena served as a shelter for nearly three months as the dogs were readied for adoption. “These dogs never had any normal companion dog experiences,” says HSUS manager of animal fighting law enforcement Chris Schindler (shown above), who often lay in a horse stall with a dog named Delilah because she refused to move or even eat. “A lot of them were so scared.” Now eating and in a foster home, Delilah is one of nearly 6,400 animals helped by The HSUS’s work on animal fighting raids and investigations in 2010.


“This program is about the dogs,” says Ralph Hawthorne, community organizer for The HSUS’s End Dogfighting program in Atlanta. “But it’s just as much about the people, and helping them through the life changes that they experience while we’re working with them.” In 2010, The HSUS continued reaching out to communi-ties plagued by dogfighting, working to bond owners and pit bulls and change perceptions of a misunderstood group of dogs. The End Dogfighting program expanded its work in Chicago and Atlanta while launching in a third location, the Hunting Park neighborhood in North Philadelphia. “It’s a city that’s very much in need, as are most of the large cities across the country,” says Amanda Arrington, asso-ciate director of The HSUS’s Building Humane Communities Program. In more than a dozen other cities, The HSUS helped groups plan their own End Dogfighting programs. In Atlanta, one success story was the transformation of DeAndre Weaver. He’d fought pit bulls for four years, since age 16, until a dog he had grown close to was killed in a fight. “That’s what really opened up my eyes,” remembers Weaver. The day he learned about free dog training classes through The HSUS, his interest was piqued. And with Hawthorne encouraging him to stick with the weekly

The Good Fightsessions, Weaver and his dog, Champ, made such a strong impression that he was hired last summer to serve as an anti-dogfighting advocate. Nowadays, Weaver recruits students for the program by walking the streets and speaking at schools, the YMCA, and Boy Scout meetings. With his two well-behaved dogs in tow, he’s a model for young people who’ve previously only viewed their pit bulls as fighting dogs. “They don’t know exactly what to do with the dogs … so what they do now is they’re fighting just for the heck of it,” Weaver says. But the agility and obedience skills learned in HSUS classes provide options: “They want to impress people with their dogs, so now we have a positive way to impress people.” The training sessions are just one aspect of a campaign that also includes humane education and community outreach focused on pet wellness and spay/neuter. Canines & Communities, an eight-session anti-dogfighting curriculum featuring mock game shows and field trips to animal shelters, reached more than 470 Chicago and Atlanta youths in 2010. At a summer camp, 19 kids helped produce In the Company of Dogs, a video featuring a rap song written by 15-year-old Demetrius Ware about canine care and approaching dogs safely.

[ Ending Animal Fighting ]


We are gratified to serve as the emergency shelter and headquarters for the rescue. I can’t say enough about the HSUS staff who made it happen. With poise, power, and grace, they harnessed and coordinated a fairly darn complex set of logistical, legal, and communications issues. Pets Alive performed spay/neuter surgeries yesterday on nine of the rescued dogs. They will never be forced to breed again.

—James McNamara, former executive director of the Pets Alive spay/neuter

clinic in Indiana, which helped The HSUS with a December rescue

3 states that produce more than half the puppies sold in U.S. pet stores—Missouri, Oklahoma, and Iowa—enact laws to crack down on abusive commercial breeding operations

677 dogs and 9 other animals are saved from squalor and neglect by HSUS teams deployed to puppy mill raids; staff assist local authorities in an additional 4 raids involving 544 dogs

A 1,000-store milestone is reached when hundreds more retailers take the Puppy Friendly Pet Stores Pledge not to sell puppies

[ Shutting Down Puppy Mills ]

While most dogs at a fly-infested, feces-covered Carriere, Miss., puppy mill shrank in fear, a few sought

attention from their rescuers. “Every time I bent over to get another dog,” recalls The HSUS’s Michelle Cascio

(above), “one of the terriers would come up and lick me on the chin.” Rescued animals are brought to

emergency shelters on their way to new homes (at left).

The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 3736 The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report The HSUS | 2010 Annual Report 37

Newfound Friends: Finn is a little brown dog who carries a big stick: His best friend happens to be Amanda Hearst of the Hearst publishing family. She purchased Finn from a Manhattan pet store, unaware that he was born to a puppy mill mother who had probably never left her filthy cage or felt a loving touch. Shaken when she learned this, Hearst visited HSUS-rescued puppy mill dogs and saw for herself the results of chronic neglect and abuse. “It’s shocking that anyone can rationalize that,” she says. Hearst founded Friends of Finn, asking her other best friends, including Georgina Bloomberg, Dylan Lauren, Kick Kennedy, and Annie Churchill Albert, to join her in putting puppy mills out of business. Selling tables and soliciting auction items for The HSUS’s Make History Gala in New York City, Friends of Finn helped raise $1 million to support our campaign to shut down puppy mills.

Who Rescued Whom?: The treatment of dogs at the hands of puppy millers “hurt my heart and my feelings,” says 12-year-old Micah Staub, who has made it his mission to help care for those rescued from cruel mass breeding operations. Micah’s learning disabilities have often led to teasing from other kids, but he found acceptance and fulfillment working with 30 of the 122 dogs removed from nightmare conditions by the HSUS Maddie’s Fund Puppy Mill Task Force in December. In recognition of his hard work, Micah was made an honorary task force member. His pride was a boon for a boy who “gets so few things that he can be proud of,” says his mother. In addition to the Bloomfield, Ind., raid—described by one participant as “three days of … animal welfare shock and awe”—the task force took part in four other puppy mill raids in 2010, saving 677 dogs from misery.

No More Business As Usual: Pam Sordyl of Clarkston, Mich., has made a name for herself by hitting puppy millers where it hurts most: in the wallet. Sordyl’s “Adopt, Don’t Shop” pet store protests have been instrumental in the closure of three Michigan Petland stores. The number of the chain’s stores nationwide has dropped from 140 to 95 since the 2008 release of an HSUS investigation into its dealings with puppy mills. Sordyl also singlehandedly recruited 90 pet stores to take The HSUS’s Puppy Friendly Pet Stores Pledge to never sell puppies—a feat that helped The HSUS sign up 1,000 before the end of the year. For Puppy Mills Campaign outreach coordinator John Moyer, the milestone had become a personal mission requiring nonstop emails and phone calls. On Dec. 24, Moyer received a message from a chain saying that all 38 of its stores would take the pledge. He’d beaten the deadline. On to the next 1,000.

Feet bloodied from wire cages. Rotten teeth. Skin and eye and ear infections. Parasites. Bones protruding. And in the case of Tessa (shown below), hair so matted that her back legs were snarled together, toenails so overgrown they curled into her foot pads, and gum disease so severe that all but one of her teeth were eventually pulled. These are the symptoms of weak laws that allow the puppy mill industry to flourish unchecked. The cure is clear—better laws to regulate the 10,000 mass breeding operations across the nation. But getting those laws approved is a state-by-state battle. In 2010, The HSUS won one of its greatest victories: citizens’ approval of a measure to require breeders in Missouri, the state with the most puppy mills, to keep no more than 50 breeding dogs and give them adequate food, water, shelter, space, exercise, veterinary care, and rest between breeding cycles. Winning passage of the new law involved collecting more than 190,000 signa-tures to get the measure on the ballot and combating a smear campaign by the Missouri Farm Bureau. As soon as Proposition B passed in November, state legislators set about trying to undo it; five months later, Gov. Jay Nixon signed a repeal bill and enacted what he termed “compromise” legislation that dramatically weakened the original provisions of Prop B. But The HSUS isn’t going away without a fight; we plan to strengthen the surviving Prop B protections, hold officials accountable for their stated support of strong enforce-ment, and launch a 2012 ballot initiative to preserve citizen-approved laws.

Missouri: The Most Important Battle Yet “When the people vote on an issue, the majority rules, and the elected officials should respect that,” says Michael Markarian, chief operating officer for The HSUS. Major milestones in the campaign against puppy mills were reached outside Missouri. Legislatures passed similar laws in Oklahoma and Iowa, the states with the second and third largest numbers of mass breeding facilities. Hawaii and Louisiana also strengthened regulation, bringing the number of states passing such laws to 16 since 2008. Meanwhile, The HSUS’s Puppy Mill Task Force, supported by Maddie’s Fund, drove truckloads of rescued Missouri dogs to Illinois, Colorado, and the East Coast for adoption. Relinquished by high-volume breeders who were closing down their operations, they included breeds ranging from shih tzus to Labrador retrievers. When first rescued, the dogs had matted fur, fearful demeanors, and sad eyes. One very skinny animal died almost as soon as she arrived at the emergency shelter. Inside her stomach was string and a ball of foil, trash that bore witness to slow starvation, says task force manager Justin Scally. “The dog was obviously foraging on whatever she could find.” Tessa was luckier, surviving six years of hellish confine-ment before being rescued by the Humane Society of Missouri. Now the “spoiled rotten” Yorkshire terrier leaps onto the bed for a kiss every night, says owner Marva Bulva. “They’re not taking care of these dogs,” Bulva says of puppy mill operators. “I don’t care whether it’s a German shepherd or a Mexican Chihuahua; you just don’t do animals that way.”

[ Shutting Down Puppy Mills ]

Tessa in a puppy mill, 2009 Tessa in a loving home, 2010


Providing Sanctuary & HealingOrphaned fox kits. A mule on the edge of starvation. A pygmy hippo scarred by neglect. A chimpanzee retired from a research laboratory. A swan suffering from lead poisoning. A horse rescued from slaughter. Different species with different stories, but all with the same happy outcome: cared for by skilled, loving hands at one of The HSUS’s five animal care centers. Each year, they arrive by the thousands. Some are rescued from abusive or neglectful circumstances, while others have fallen victim to urban dangers—hit by cars, wounded by flying into windows—or have been suddenly orphaned. At the centers, they receive the highest level of treatment from expert staff and volunteers. Once nurtured back to health, they embark on the next leg of their journey, whether that’s a release back into nature, or a lifelong home at the sanctuary or with an adoptive family. Staff at our care centers give these animals the life and dignity they deserve, while our campaign staff work toward ending the intentional cruelty and accidental suffering that brought them to us in the first place. There are so many successes, and we celebrate each one.

South Florida Wildlife Center

Piecing Them Back Together: Veterinary student Alycia Monopoli went to Home Depot to buy screws for a remodeling project—repairing a turtle’s broken shell. Hit by a car, the turtle would have suffered a slow, painful death if she hadn’t been brought to The HSUS’s South Florida Wildlife Center. Wildlife veterinarian Stefan Harsch used screws and plastic cable ties to hold the pieces of her shell together until new tissue grew in. Swimming was prohibited in the meantime to prevent infection, but finally the day came when she could be released to the center’s enclosed pond to continue her recovery. Species from squirrels to opos-sums to herons to ducks recuperate at the facility. Last year, more than 12,500 animals enjoyed the center’s hospitality on their way to a second chance.

Cape Wildlife Center

Love at First Flight: Staff at The HSUS’s Cape Wildlife Center put on their matchmaking hats when treating a mute swan who’d been found on the side of a road, flapping his wings to protect his gravely injured mate. His partner couldn’t be saved, but antibiotics helped the male swan recover from a joint infection. Staff intro-duced him to another female mending at the Barnstable, Mass., facility, and the pair bonded, even calling to each other when separated. On a cold, clear day in January 2010, they were released together, swimming a lap around Barnstable Harbor before lifting into the sky. Birds account for more than half of the animals treated at the center, located along a major migratory route. In 2010, more than 1,400 orphaned and injured creatures from all over Cape Cod were cared for by our dedi-cated staff.

[ Animal Care Centers ]

The Fund for Animals Wildlife Center

Creature Comforts: Samson the lion tackled his toy, pinning it between his great front paws and uttering satisfied roars. It was fall in Southern California and staff at The HSUS’s Fund for Animals Wildlife Center in Ramona had rolled out pumpkins for the big cats—an ongoing strategy of letting them chase, pounce, and chew unexpected treats. Last year, center staff cared for nearly 400 injured and orphaned wild animals, in addition to perma-nent residents like Samson, a victim of the exotic pet trade. Among the long-term guests are 44 feral cats from San Nicolas—animals who would have been killed if The HSUS hadn’t relocated them from the federally owned island. As staff try to train and adopt them out, the animals roam a 4,000-square-foot enclosure with trees, rocks, logs, and plank walkways: not the wild, but close.

Cleveland Amory Black Beauty Ranch

Saved from Starvation: Deputy Eric Ward had never before seen an animal cruelty case involving deer—until last January. A 19-year-old man had been keeping five deer on a Henderson County, Texas, farm as part of a school agricultural project. But after he began neglecting the animals, police were contacted. “They looked like they were starving to death,” Ward says, “and they were.” The deer were removed from the property and eventually sent to the Cleveland Amory Black Beauty Ranch, a 1,250-acre HSUS sanctuary in nearby Murchison. The doe was so malnourished that she died before the transfer, but the buck and three fawns now live together on a 35-acre plot at the ranch—four of the more than 1,200 animals, from chimpanzees to an ostrich, to receive care at the facility in 2010.

Duchess Sanctuary

Tranquil Refuge: At 5 feet 6 inches, she’s one of the tallest “girls” living at The HSUS’s 1,120-acre Duchess Sanctuary, a friendly draft horse who, despite growing up untrained, is easy to handle. Like many of the 185 other formerly abused or abandoned horses on the Oregon property, 9-year-old Allie came very close to becoming meat. She once lived on a Canadian farm, kept so her urine could be collected for a hormone used in a drug called Premarin. When demand for the drug dropped, Allie was nearly sold for slaughter. Rescued in 2005, she was one of the original horses sent to Duchess at its opening in 2008. On hilly pastures, mares from the Premarin farms graze with their equine companions. In 2010, the young sanctuary built its second winter shelter.


Say No to Suffering: They’re not the kind of incidents that universi-ties publicize: the mice found alive in freezers after botched eutha-nasia attempts. The animals who’ve overheated and died when anti-quated temperature regulation systems failed. The monkeys who’ve languished in extreme pain for weeks during virus studies. Poring over government records and published studies, The HSUS is prying open the closed doors of university research labs—and uncovering countless examples of animals who suffer and die needlessly. By the end of 2010, more than 60 universities and colleges had responded to our campaign urging them to adopt policies that prohibit severe animal suffering. For the holdouts, we’re mobilizing students, faculty, alumni, and other stakeholders to press for change. “They don’t need to have an animal suffering severely to learn what they are seeking to learn,” says The HSUS’s Kathleen Conlee. “This is a commonsense thing we’re asking institutions to do.”


For chimpanzees in research labs, life is a cage lacking natural light, with loud sounds amplified by concrete walls, the smell of chemical cleaners, and brief episodes of terror when researchers do experiments. No amount of “enrichment”—toys or treats—can make up for the boredom, loneliness, and fear of existing in the equivalent of a prison cell. “The lab environment is an insult,” says Rachel Weiss, who used to work at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center in Atlanta. “It’s not OK, and there’s no way to make it OK.” In 2010, The HSUS continued pushing to have the nearly 1,000 chimps in U.S. labs moved to sanctuaries, where they can live in conditions simulating their wild forest homes. In a significant victory for animal protec-tion groups, the National Institutes of Health reversed a plan to bring approximately 190 chimpanzees at New Mexico’s Alamogordo Primate Facility out of semi-retire-ment. Following the delivery of 25,000 letters from HSUS supporters, plus HSUS president and CEO Wayne Pacelle’s appearance at a press conference with New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, agency officials announced the animals would not be used for invasive tests until a review of chimpanzee research is completed. At the same time, The HSUS released additional find-ings about the New Iberia Research Center in Louisiana, where a 2009 undercover investigation revealed more than 300 alleged violations of the Animal Welfare Act.

Securing Their RetirementIn 2010, after discovering the center appeared to be violating an NIH ban on breeding federally owned chimpanzees—with 14 of the infant chimps born there mauled to death—The HSUS petitioned the federal government to stop this taxpayer-supported breeding. “I was sick,” says Jan McDaniel of her reaction to the undercover video taken at New Iberia. And when the Athens, Texas, woman gets angry, she doesn’t just stew about it; she acts. So she called The HSUS and ended up pledging $100,000 to the Chimps Deserve Sanctuary Fund—half to be used for policy work and half to help pay for chimp retirement. “This will be well-spent if it will free those apes so they won’t have to suffer at the hands of humans,” she says. “If it will free those innocents.” A federal bill originally introduced in 2009 would require their freedom by retiring the 500 federally owned chimps to sanctuaries. After receiving the support of 167 cosponsors in Congress, the proposed law was introduced again in 2011 as the Great Ape Protection and Cost Savings Act. “We have a lot of public support,” says Kathleen Conlee, HSUS senior director for animal research issues. “It’s not a matter of whether it’s going to pass; it’s when.” The HSUS also worked to get companies that have tested on chimpanzees to pay for their care when they are moved to sanctuaries. Using its weight as a shareholder, The HSUS gained a pledge of retirement funds from Abbott Laboratories.

[ Advancing Humane Science ]

A Revolution in Chemical Testing: People are exposed to as many as 100,000 chemicals in the modern environment. Maybe 4 percent have been adequately tested for safety. That’s primarily because conventional methods—using animals—are slow and expensive. They’re also inhumane, likely causing the suffering and deaths of millions of animals each year in the U.S. alone. In November 2010, The HSUS and partners gathered govern-ment, academic, and industry experts in Washington, D.C., to build support for a proposed 15-year, $2 to $3 billion Human Toxicology Project. Modeled on the Human Genome Project and based on recommendations from a National Academy of Sciences’ report, the massive animal-free undertaking would focus on high-speed automated tests on human cells and tissues. These techniques would provide quicker, more accurate results. Thomas Hartung, director of the Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing at Johns Hopkins University, says the project would be a watershed for science. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

EU Reforms Accelerated: Animal testing alternatives jumped on the fast-track with the 2010 launch of a groundbreaking collabora-tion between Humane Society International and leading scientists. The AXLR8 initiative is helping to spur a worldwide transi-tion to animal-free safety testing using state-of-the-art human cell systems, robotics, and computer modeling, says HSI’s Troy Seidle. HSI also helped secure EU approval of animal-free tests for detecting contaminants in shell-fish, which will spare hundreds of thousands of animals from lethal poisoning tests. And years of work paid off in September when the EU passed new lab animal legisla-tion that extends protections to more species, promotes alterna-tives, and requires a higher level of ethical review. As 2010 came to a close, HSI enlisted celebrity support for its Cruelty-Free 2013 campaign: Sporting an “End Animal Testing” temporary tattoo, singer Leona Lewis urged EU politicians to keep their promise to ban the sale of animal-tested cosmetics in 2013.


Starring Roles: Winning an HSUS Genesis Award was “more valuable to me than winning an Oscar,” says Louie Psihoyos. His documentary The Cove exposed Japan’s dolphin slaughter and “catapul-ted this issue onto the world stage,” says Beverly Kaskey, senior director of the HSUS Hollywood Office. Family Guy and The Ellen DeGeneres Show were also among the winners in the annual ceremony. Comedian and actor Hal Sparks stole the lime-light at The HSUS’s 2010 Taking Action For Animals conference. Peppered with cutting jokes about factory farming, his monologue was cheered by hundreds of activists who’d come to learn the latest campaign strategies and recharge their batteries. It may have been an odd topic for a funnyman, but the committed advocate takes the subject very seriously. “I can’t find an angle on it, and I dare anyone else to, that actually supports it in any way,” he says.

A Higher Calling: Megachurch pastors, best-selling authors, seminary professors—even CEOs like Michael Flaherty of Walden Media, which produced the Narnia movies—came together for a 2010 summit in Washington, D.C. After the meeting to introduce Christian leaders to The HSUS’s Faith Outreach Campaign, Flaherty was inspired to teach his children about animal protection, using the story in Charlotte’s Web. “They loved Charlotte’s bravery and sacrifice and pledged they would have done the same,” Flaherty says. “I told them that The Humane Society was full of two- legged Charlottes, people who understood the blessing of protecting animals.” The campaign also produced a guide to animal protec-tion ministries, such as attracting wildlife to church grounds and running low-cost pet care clinics. The guide’s writer, Lois Wye, is an attorney by day and a theological student by night. “We are called to be compassionate and merciful to our fellow humans,” she says. “We are likewise called to be compassionate and merciful to animals.”

12,101,729 members and constituents support The HSUS’s work

7,634,509 people visit The HSUS’s website, 466,134 are our Facebook fans, and nearly 1.5 million online advocacy actions are taken

HSUS videos receive more than 4 million viewings

2,341 advocates attend our Animal Care Expo and Taking Action for Animals conferences

[ 2010 Outreach ]

[ How You Can Help ]Every gift you give, no matter how large or small, helps The HSUS protectmore animals. Simply choose the method of support:

Make a Kindred Spirits memorial donation, or a gift donation to celebrate a special occasion.

Donate monthly through your credit card or bank account.

Participate in your office’s workplace giving, matching gift, or United Way campaigns.

Make a non-cash gift of vehicles, stocks, bonds, or timeshares; dedicate eBay proceeds to The HSUS; or create an I Do Foundation wedding registry benefiting us.

Leave a legacy through charitable gift annuities, bequests, or insurance policies.

To find out more—or to reach a regional Philanthropy officer about making a larger gift or supporting a specific program—call 1-800-808-7858, email [email protected], or go to humanesociety.org/gifts.

[ State by State ]

The HSUS’s state directors stand up for animals at their state capitols, network with grassroots campaigners, assist local shelters, and help with The HSUS’s field rescues. For more information, visit humanesociety.org/statecontacts.

Alabama, Mindy Gilbert

Arizona, Kari Nienstedt

California, Jennifer Fearing

Colorado, Holly Tarry

Connecticut, Annie Hornish

Florida, Jen Hobgood

Georgia, Jessica DuBois

Hawaii, Inga Gibson

Idaho, Lisa Kauffman

Illinois, Kristen Strawbridge

Indiana, Anne Sterling

Iowa, Carol Griglione

Kentucky, Pam Rogers

Louisiana, Julia Breaux

Maine, Katie Lisnik

Maryland, Tami Santelli

Massachusetts, Alexis Fox

Michigan, Jill Fritz

Minnesota, Howard Goldman

Mississippi, Lydia Sattler

Missouri, Barb Schmitz

Montana, Wendy Hergenraeder

Nebraska, Jocelyn Nickerson

Nevada, Holly Haley

New Hampshire, Joanne Bourbeau

New Jersey, Kathy Schatzmann

New York, Patrick Kwan

North Carolina, Kim Alboum

Ohio, Karen Minton

Oklahoma, Cynthia Armstrong

Oregon, Scott Beckstead

Pennsylvania, Sarah Speed

South Dakota, Darci Adams

Tennessee, Leighann McCollum

Texas, Nicole Paquette

Vermont, Joanne Bourbeau

Virginia, Laura Donahue

Washington, Dan Paul

West Virginia, Summer Wyatt

Wisconsin, Alyson Bodai

Wyoming, Heidi Hopkins

“He was just skin and bones. I think he would have died that night or the next day if we hadn’t been there,” says The HSUS’s Adam Parascandola of the tiny black kitten removed with more than 150 other cats from an overcrowded Wyoming home in August. Powell was nursed back to health (above) at the Billings Animal Rescue Kare shelter. Your continued support will help many more animals like Powell in the coming year.

HSUS Faith Outreach Campaign director Christine Gutleben (left)

The Cove’s Louie Psihoyos

[ Board of Directors ]

Jeffrey J. Arciniaco, Boca Raton, Fla.

Eric L. Bernthal, Esq., Washington, D.C.

Barbara S. Brack, Greenwich, Conn.

Jerry Cesak, La Jolla, Calif.

Anita W. Coupe, Esq., Biddeford Poole, Maine

Neil B. Fang, Esq., CPA, Hewlett Neck, N.Y.

Jane Greenspun Gale, Las Vegas, Nev.

Jonathan D. Kaufelt, Esq., Santa Monica, Calif.

Paula A. Kislak, D.V.M., Santa Barbara, Calif.

Jennifer Leaning, M.D., S.M.H., Lincoln, Mass.

Kathleen M. Linehan, Esq., Washington, D.C.

John Mackey, Austin, Texas

William F. Mancuso, Brookfield, Conn.

Mary I. Max, New York, N.Y.

Patrick L. McDonnell, Edison, N.J.

Judy Ney, New York, N.Y.

Sharon Lee Patrick, New York, N.Y.

Judy J. Peil, St. Louis, Mo.

Marian G. Probst, New York, N.Y.

Jonathan M. Ratner, Shaker Heights, Ohio

Joshua S. Reichert, Ph.D., Washington, D.C.

Walter J. Stewart, Washington, D.C.

Andrew Weinstein, Washington, D.C.

Jason Weiss, Pacific Palisades, Calif.

Persia White, Burbank, Calif.

David O. Wiebers, M.D., Overland Park, Kan.

Lona Williams, Los Angeles, Calif.

[ National Council ]

Roberta Ashkin, New York, N.Y.

Susan Atherton, San Francisco, Calif.

Howard Berk, Scarsdale, N.Y.

James Costa, Los Angeles, Calif.

Jennifer Faga, Montauk, N.Y.

Linda Goddard, Essex, Conn.

Frances Hayward, East Hampton, N.Y.

Cathy Kangas, New Canaan, Conn.

Peggy Kaplan, Columbus, Ohio

Jessica Moment, San Francisco, Calif.

Ardath Rosengarden, Boca Raton, Fla.

Cheri Shankar, Beverly Hills, Calif.

[ Officers ]

Anita W. Coupe, Esq. Chair of the Board

Jennifer Leaning, M.D., S.M.H. Vice Chair of the Board

Eric L. Bernthal, Esq. Second Vice Chair of the Board

Walter J. Stewart, Esq. Board Treasurer

Wayne Pacelle President & CEO

Michael Markarian Chief Operating Officer

G. Thomas Waite III Treasurer & CFO

Andrew N. Rowan, Ph.D. Chief International Officer

Roger A. Kindler, Esq. General Counsel & CLO

Janet D. Frake Secretary

[ Financial Operations Report ] For the Year Ending December 31, 2010

COVER: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. INSIDE COVER, CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: PAUL VERNON; MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS; ANNE MARLEY; THE HSUS; MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS. PAGE 1, FROM TOP: FRAzER HARRISON/GETTY IMAGES ENTERTAINMENT/GETTY IMAGES; DIBYANGSHU SARKAR/AFP/GETTY IMAGES; KRISTIAN DOWLING/PICTURE GROUP. PAGE 2: PAUL MARKOW PHOTOGRAPHY. PAGE 3, ALL IMAGES: SALLY RYAN. PAGE 4: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. PAGE 5: BRADLY J. BONER. PAGE 6, FROM LEFT: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS; MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS. PAGE 7, CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS; KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS; ALEx GALLARDO; KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. PAGE 8-9: PAUL VERNON. PAGE 10-11: THE HSUS. PAGE 12, FROM LEFT: STEPHAN zABEL; SARAH RICE. PAGE 13, FROM LEFT: BABUR SAGLAM/ISTOCK; KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. PAGE 14: MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS. PAGE 15-17: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. PAGE 18, FROM LEFT: COSTANzA/THE TIMES-PICAYUNE; KATIE CAMPBELL; M.J. MASOTTI JR./CORBIS. PAGE 19, FROM LEFT: MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS; TIM MUELLER; WENDY MEYER/SACRAMENTO SPCA. PAGE 20: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. PAGE 21: MELISSA FARLOW/NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC STOCK. PAGE 22: MICHAEL BERNARD/HSI. PAGE 23: FRANzFOTO.COM/ALAMY. PAGE 24: THOMAS LAzAR/NATUREPL.COM. PAGE 25, FROM LEFT: M. WATSON/ARDEA.COM; HUMANE WILDLIFE SERVICES. PAGE 26, FROM LEFT: JAMES HAGER/ROBERT HARDING WORLD IMAGERY/GETTY IMAGES; ANNE MARLEY; NATPHOTOS/PHOTODISC/GETTY IMAGES. PAGE 27, FROM LEFT: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS; ALEx J. HASSON. PAGE 28, FROM LEFT: GRAY MITCHELL/HSI; BRANDON COLE. PAGE 29, FROM LEFT: BRANDON COLE; SNORKEL BOB; NORBERT WU/MINDEN PICTURES. PAGE 30: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. PAGE 31: MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS. PAGE 32: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS. PAGE 33, FROM LEFT: KATHY MILANI/THE HSUS; MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS. PAGE 34-35: MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS. PAGE 36, FROM LEFT: MIKE BIzELLI; HUMANE SOCIETY OF MISSOURI. PAGE 37, FROM LEFT: PAT PORTELL; WHITNEY CURTIS; JONATHAN BECKER. PAGE 38, FROM LEFT: RAY EUBANKS; VINCE DEWITT. PAGE 39, FROM LEFT: STEFAN HARSCH/THE HSUS; HOLLY SHAW/THE HSUS; JENNIFER KUNz/THE HSUS. PAGE 40: MICHELLE RILEY/THE HSUS. PAGE 41, FROM LEFT: ANNI BETTS; LCULIG/SHUTTERSTOCK; CHRISTOPHER AMERUOSO. PAGE 42, FROM LEFT: ANDREA J. WRIGHT; TIM LONG/LONG PHOTOGRAPHY. PAGE 43, FROM TOP: PAUL RUHTER; BRADLY J. BONER. PAGE 44: YANICK VALLÉE/FOTOLIA.

Assets

Cash and cash equivalents 23,757,952

Receivables 17,335,335

Prepaid expenses, deferred charges, and deposits 696,638

Redeemed Securities 12,829,601

Investments, at market value 156,352,256

Property and equipment, net of depreciation 20,296,130

Total Assets $231,267,912

Liabilities $26,161,712

Net Assets

Unrestricted 134,979,635

Temporarily restricted 36,365,535

Permanently restricted 33,761,030

Total Net Assets $205,106,200

Total Liabilities and Net Assets $231,267,912

Consolidated Statement of Financial Position

Consolidated Statement of Activities and Changes in Net Assets

Unrestricted Temporarily Restricted Permanently Restricted Year Ending Dec. 31, 2010

RevenueContributions and grants 106,991,568 21,475,287 2,116 128,468,971

Bequests 22,342,970 4,478,107 53,226 26,874,303

Investment income 1,778,573 1,815,575 454,472 4,048,620

Other income, net 1,055,766 (391,450) - 664,316

Total Revenue $132,168,877 $27,377,519 $509,814 $160,056,210

Transfers (net assets released from restrictions) 37,496,782 (37,496,782) - -

Revenue and Other Additions $169,665,659 $(10,119,263) $509,814 $160,056,210

Expenses and Other Deductions

Animal protection programs

Research and education 21,760,202 - - 21,760,202

Cruelty prevention programs 22,594,000 - - 22,594,000

Direct care and service 27,221,847 - - 27,221,847

Advocacy and public policy 52,743,174 - - 52,743,174

Supporting services

Management and general 6,366,563 - - 6,366,563

Fundraising 26,263,566 - - 26,263,566

Total Expenses and Other Deductions $156,949,352 - - $156,949,352

Change in net assets from operations 12,716,307 (10,119,263) 509,814 3,106,858

Realized and unrealized gain on investments 10,043,690 51,430 - 10,095,120

Change in Net Assets Before Postretirement Benefits $22,759,997 $(10,067,833) $509,814 $13,201,978

Postretirement benefits adjustment 523,496 - - 523,496

Change in Net Assets $23,283,493 $(10,067,833) $509,814 $13,725,474

Net assets at January 1, 2010 111,696,142 46,433,368 33,251,216 191,380,726

Net Assets, End of Year $134,979,635 $36,365,535 $33,761,030 $205,106,200

The audited version of this report had not yet been released at press time. The figures will be updated, if necessary, at humanesociety.org.

Documents

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