Wild Animals are Not for Petting (Op-Ed)

Wayne Pacelle, President and CEO, Humane Society of the United States | December 04, 2013 06:37pm ET

Wayne Pacelle is the president and chief executive officer of The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). This Op-Ed is adapted from a post on the blog A Humane Nation, where the content ran before appearing in LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

Recently, a woman stuck her arm into a tiger enclosure at G.W. Exotic Animal Park — a notorious roadside zoo in Oklahoma run by Joe Schreibvogel — and had to be airlifted to a hospital to try to save what remained of her limb.

The HSUS investigated the facility with an undercover operative in 2011, and we found approximately 200 tigers and other dangerous exotic animals, public contact with these powerful wild animals, and an operation with unstable leadership waiting to go belly up. Indeed, earlier this year Schreibvogel filed for bankruptcy on behalf of his personal estate and the park (which continues to do business as the Garold Wayne Interactive Zoological Park).

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Why is a University Accepting Random-Source Research Dogs? (Op-Ed)

Wayne Pacelle is the president and chief executive officer of The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). This Op-Ed is adapted from a post on the blog A Humane Nation, where the content ran before appearing in LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

My colleagues and I have released the results of the latest HSUS undercover investigation, in this case, laboratory experiments on dogs and other animals at Georgia Regents University (GRU) in Augusta, Ga. The focus of our investigation was on the use of dogs for unnecessary — and terminal — dental experiments.

The dogs had been gathered and sold to the university by an unscrupulous random source Class B dog dealer.

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The World's Most Dangerous Band Promotes Shelter Pets (Op-Ed)

Wayne Pacelle is the president and chief executive officer of The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). This Op-Ed is adapted from a post on the blog A Humane Nation, where the content ran before appearing in LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

This has been a year of real progress in ending the use of carbon monoxide gas chambers in animal shelters. Texas banned chamber use on dogs and cats statewide; Mississippi and South Carolina have now closed what we believe to be their last working chambers; Michigan legislators are likely to pass a bill to outlaw chamber use; and Kansas is poised to promulgate regulations banning such chambers this fall.

Just last month, animal advocates closed two more carbon monoxide gas chambers in North Carolina and one in South Carolina, thanks to funding and support provided through The HSUS. We're working with every shelter and agency ready to shift away from carbon monoxide chamber use.

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As Wild Horses Swelter, Interior Secretary Must Act (Op-Ed)

Wayne Pacelle is the president and chief executive officer of The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). This Op-Ed first appeared on the blog A Humane Nation, where it ran before appearing in LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

Those of you who regularly watch our good friend Jane Velez-Mitchell's show on HLN may have seen me last Thursday in a brief segment talking about a potentially dangerous situation for 1,800 captive wild horses at a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) facility near Reno, Nev.

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