Filed under: Shopping Guide, Plants and Wildlife

Adopt an Emperor Tamarin! Photo: AFP/Getty Images

You may want to cop out and get an iTunes gift card for the animal-lover on your list, but don’t give up, there are so many options!

For the wild-eyed vegan activist, you have the entire PETA cruelty-free catalog. Highlights include the “Hug me, don’t club me” Save the Seals t-shirts, vegan chocolate, and everyone’s favorite, the “Help a Chicken” gift pack, which lets you donate $15 on behalf of an ethical-chicken-killing-advocate friend.

Is there someone on your list who tells you not to buy her anything, because she has everything? Believe her, and make a donation to Heifer International in her name. The organization gives livestock and husbandry training as a sustainable way to help people escape poverty. Your friend may not need a goat, but there is village in China that will be glad to accept it on her behalf!

Is your roommate always dropping hints about adopting a cat? Avoid arguments over the litter box and adopt a whole species through the World WIldlife Fund Gift Center. They have over 100 types of animals from which to choose!

Everyone is adopting polar bears these days, so maybe give some love to Darwin’s Fox or the impressively mustachio’d Emperor Tamarin. I’m also a big fan of their apparel with the classic WWF panda logo, if you must have something to wrap and place under the tree.

Like the adoption idea, but want something more aquatic? Check out the Oceana Adopt-A-Creature page, and give a loved one an octopus cookie cutter — plus the knowledge that they’re helping ensure that octopuses will continue have a home!

For my toughest-to-shop-for friends and family, I turn to the most reliable gift of all: booze. The Great Apes loving folks at Orangutan Outreach also love grapes, in the form of Red Apes Cabernet, Red Apes Chardonnay, Red Apes Merlot, Red Apes Cava, Red Apes Pinot Noir and Red Apes Sauvignon Blanc. At $20 a bottle, with $7 of every one purchased going to save the orangutans, you can get one for everyone in the office, plus a few for your own holiday cheer!

Green Gifts for Animal Loving Activists originally appeared on Green Daily on Thu, 17 Dec 2009 12:01:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: News, Polit-eco, Plants and Wildlife

Wow, just yesterday we discovered that the Rio Grande had been placed on the WWF’s Top 10 Rivers at Risk list, and then I find news that the US Border Patrol is going to hasten the river’s demise. After outcries to take bold action, the Border Patrol has announced plans to poison all plant life on a 1.1 mile stretch of the river in order to make it easier to find and apprehend drug smugglers, robbers, and illegal immigrants.

Here’s the rub: if it’s successful (meaning the bare patch deters smugglers and other villains) the Border Patrol may perhaps expand the tactic to another 130 mile section of the river. Crazy. It’s kinda hard to decide whether you want mission to succeed or not when its success means destroying all vegetation up and down a major river. According to reports, the poisoning could take place as soon as Wednesday the 25th. Is the government rushing this herbicidal rampage to beat the news that the Rio Grande’s now a heavily threatened river? Who knows?

To be fair, policymakers are in a tough spot as violence between drug cartels and the Mexican army is spirals out of control, and people on the US clamor for tighter security.

US Border Patrol to Eradicate Plant Life Along the Rio Grande originally appeared on Green Daily on Wed, 25 Mar 2009 09:00:00 EST . Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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