Animal Welfare

Re "L.A.'s deep pockets give creatures comfort," Dec. 19 I take issue with the derisive tone of The Times' article on animal welfare organizations and their donors. The piece focused almost exclusively on how lavish the fundraising dinners are, without mentioning that most nonprofit organizations (including ones serving humans) have rich donors and lavish galas.

The elephant researcher stood in the living room of the sleekly modern Pacific Palisades home perched high on a hill. Slides of an African preserve flashed by on a screen. Elephants "are so social, so communicative, so intelligent," said Joyce Poole, who has dedicated her life to documenting and protecting pachyderms. It is a task that takes money, and the admiring audience was ready to help. "I'd like to put up $25,000," businessman Gil Michaels said.

She spent years as an outspoken antiabortion activist, and that cause remains dear to her. But these days, Karen Swallow Prior has a new passion: animal welfare. She wasn't sure, at first, that advocating for God's four-legged creatures would go over well on the campus of Liberty University, a fundamentalist Baptist institution founded by the Rev. Jerry Falwell.

For the farmers of Kenya, life is a constant contest for grass and water between their herds and the wild animals that share the land. Now they are waging a new struggle, this time against the international animal welfare lobby. Pleading poverty, the farmers want to open their land to wealthy fee-paying hunters. The advocacy groups are firmly opposed.

We are clearly growing more aware of just how much animals must suffer before we can eat them ("Animal welfare issue boiling," July 2). However, we should make sure that we do not settle for some half-solution that appeases our conscience while failing to protect those we would eat. Although switching to "humane," "free-range" and "cage-free" products is admirable, animals will continue to suffer so long as we continue to mass-produce, confine and kill them. The only real answer is to go vegan.

Veterinarian Bud Stuart was delighted when he was given a live lobster by a client as extra thanks for saving a dog -- at least until the Santa Barbara seafood lover thought about cooking it. Stuart put the lobster in the freezer, expecting the chill would anesthetize it. Yet, when he later held it above a boiling pot of water, it was still alive and pinching. The crustacean was tasty, but he now vows "never to bring another live lobster into this house.

Re "Animal rights activist gets 12 years for arsons," May 25 Thank you for reporting the trial of Animal Liberation Front operative Kevin Tubbs and noting his connection with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. As a zoologist, I find animal rights fanatics' assumption that nonhuman animals are moral agents and their campaigns to turn us all into vegans and eliminate laboratory animal research ludicrous and childish. Experience suggests that fanatics like Tubbs are untrustworthy and are known for repeated attempts to infiltrate organizations truly concerned with animal welfare (including the Sierra Club)

Ed Boks says he runs the Los Angeles city department that "most people love to hate." Taking over as general manager of Los Angeles Animal Services a little more than a year ago, he became the fourth person in four years to oversee the care of thousands of animals in city shelters. The turnover rate alone illustrates the political pressure that historically hangs over the department as it manages the population of unwanted pets whose treatment people care about deeply -- even radically.

Patricia Guiver, a longtime Orange County animal welfare advocate who turned her love of animals into a series of mysteries featuring a tea-sipping pet detective, has died. She was 76. Guiver died Tuesday of complications from heart surgery at Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian in Newport Beach, said Chris Guiver, her son and sole survivor. She was divorced.

Actress Betty White has long been an unofficial animal ambassador, writing books about pets and working with welfare organizations.