odds ’n’ ends

NEW YORK:

Forty-six dogs were flown to New York from South Korea after being rescued at a farm where they were to be slaughtered for human consumption, animal advocates said Sunday.

The Humane Society International is responsible for saving the dogs that were fed barely enough to survive.

The animals arrived at Kennedy International Airport late Saturday and were headed to emergency shelters in New York, Maryland and Pennsylvania on Sunday.

The farm in Goyang, a city just north of Seoul, “was more like a dungeon, where there’s very little light, little to no ventilation, so the stench of ammonia would bring tears to your eyes when you walk through,” said Kelly O’Meara, who oversees the society’s companion animal-related international projects. “You’d see eyes peering at you, but it was hard to actually see the dogs themselves in the dark.”

An estimated 17,000 other such farms still operate in South Korea, said O’Meara. However, she said, it’s a diminishing industry in a society where demand for dog meat has been plummeting. Meat from about 2 million dogs still is eaten there each year.

In the United States, the rescued dogs will be available for adoption after the shelters evaluate their behavior and medical needs and make sure each one is ready for a new life in someone’s home.

In South Korea, O’Meara said, the dogs receive no veterinary care of any kind.

“They either get through it or they die in their cage and they receive just enough food to get by,” she said. (AP)

BILLINGS, Montana:

A new study disputes a widely-held view that livestock grazing is largely incompatible with a ground-dwelling bird that has suffered a dramatic population decline across its 11-state range in the US West.

Researchers said some grazing, particularly later in the growing season, could actually benefit the chicken-sized greater sage grouse.

Late-season grazing leaves in place for longer the grasses and other vegetation that sage grouse nest in, increasing their breeding success, researchers concluded. It also can stimulate the growth of vegetation that sage grouse eat, according to scientists from the US Geological Survey, Colorado State University and Utah State University.

The study was published in the scientific journal Ecological Applications. It focused on more than 700 breeding sites for sage grouse in Wyoming, one of the bird’s last remaining strongholds. (AP)