Bloomingdales- Still Selling Fur!

Modern Death Camps

Animals such as mink and fox are kept in intensive confinement on fur farms. These genetically wild animals which normally have a vast range in nature, are confined to cages so small that they can barely turn around. This is designed to keep overhead costs down, while maintaining enough space to raise the largest number of animals possible.

As a result animals die prematurely from stress related diseases, cannibalize one another, and even mutilate themselves. This cost is offset by the savings made by cramming the animals into the smallest space possible.


Finally, mink are gassed or have their necks broken, while foxes are killed by anal electrocution. An average of 40 animals must die to make one fur coat.

Other animals are trapped in the wild with steel leghold traps. These traps rip tendons, tear flesh, and even break bones. They are banned in 88 countries, but the US still permits their use in all but 5 states. Most fur trim is derived from trapped animals.

Please help us stop this torture. You can help by boy-cotting stores that sell fur and fur trimmed products. Please write to Bloomingdales and demand that they stop selling fur, Tell them that you will not buy from their store until they stop killing animals.

Call today:
Century City Bloomingdale's
(310) 772-2100 x2103
Tell them to close the Maximillian Fur Salon in their store immediately.

Write to:
Manager,
Bloomingdales Century City
10250 Santa Monica Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90067

World Mink Production

World mink production has dropped 10% . while fox production has dropped 23%.

World mink production stands at 25,746,000 skins . World fox production for this year will be 3,668,000.

About 55% of mink production, and two-thirds of fox production took place in the Scandinavian countries.

A break down of production, by country, follows:

Mink

Denmark 10.5 million- down 12%
Finland 2 million- down 5%
Sweden 1.25 million- down 4%
Norway 275,000- down 11%
Iceland 175,000- unchanged
Holland 2.7 million- unchanged
USA 2.65 million- down 5%
Russia 2.4 million- down 30%
Canada 900,000- down 5%
China 700,000- unchanged
Baltic States 450,000- unchanged
Spain 300,000- up 15%
Germany 271,000- down 3%
Italy 235,000- up 2%
France 170,000- unchanged
England 165,000- up 37% (increase probably due to farms cutting back
production drastically by killing breeding stock and marketing them this
year, look for lot's of fur farm closings in Britain this December)
Belgium 140,000 unchanged
Ireland 130,000- down 10%
Argentina 120,000 down 14%
Poland 120,000 up 200%

Fox

Finland 2.1 million- down 22%
Norway 360,000- down 31%
Denmark 53,000- down 38%
Iceland- 19,000- down 25%
Sweden 15,000- down 25%
Russia 400,000- down 41%
China 400,000- unchanged
Poland 160,000- down 24%
Baltic States 70,000- no comparison
Canada 25,000- down 24%
Argentina 23,000- down 23%
Holland 20,000- unchanged
USA 15,000- down 25%

FUR COATS DON'T GROW ON TREES


When trappers refer to “a harvest", they're not talking about picking ripe fur pelts off bushes. They're talking about agony.

The fact is, there are only two ways animals end up on your back: they're either caught in the wild or they're "ranched." Either way, that coat is a product of unspeakable pain.

Trapped: If you're thinking about buying a fur coat made of beaver, coyote, ermine, fisher, fox, marten, muskrat, opossum, otter, rabbit, raccoon, skunk, squirrel, weasel , or wolf, think about this: Chances are your dream coat is the product of a nightmare called the steel jaw trap.

Here's how the nightmare works. The trap springs up from the ground, snapping onto the animal's leg like teeth. Startled, the animal bolts. The trap tightens, biting deep into flesh, grinding through tendons, exposing bone. The animal continues to struggle and thrash, but the trap holds, gripping the animal in pain and panic for hours, days, even weeks.

Many trapped animals, especially females with young off-spring, gnaw or twist off their own limbs in a frenzy to escape, only to stagger into the wild, where they die of their injuries. Others fall easy prey to predators, while still others die of thirst, exposure, drowning, or starvation.

Those unlucky enough to survive until the trapper arrives are usually clubbed to death. One common method, especially for fox, is for the trapper to stand on the animal's rib cage, concentrating his weight near the heart. He then reaches down, takes the animal's hind legs in his hands, and yanks. The animal dies of a crushed chest. The fur, however, is spotless.

Ranched: What about animals bred and raised for fur coats? You've probably heard of “ranched” mink and chinchilla, a term that conjures up images of carefree little creatures happily roaming the wide open range until their appointed hour, when they are gently herded together and tenderly "put to sleep. "

The facts paint quite another picture.

"Ranched" animals spend their entire lives - sometimes up to six years, if the animal is a "breeder", confined in wire cages that usually measure 10 x 11 x 24 inches- the size of a standard rural mailbox. In this claustrophobic environment they develop all kinds of grotesque behaviors. They- jerk their heads around, they chew on their own skin, they mutilate themselves.

Most of these animals have been bred for qualities like fur color and texture. The result is a gruesome array of genetic defects - deafness, blindness, internal bleeding, and de-formed sex organs.

And no one keeps an eye on how these animals are destroyed. Ranchers don't care, as long as it's cheap and doesn't damage the fur. In fact, on many ranches, workers wearing heavy gloves simply rip off the animals heads. Or they're electrocuted, gassed, stuffed into decompression chambers, or poisoned with cyanide or cheap drug injections. Sometimes these animals are merely dazed. Some-times they're skinned alive.

So think about it: Behind that luxurious fur jacket is a mink left to lie for days in its own urine. And behind that sexy fur cape is a fox caught in the wild, its paw trapped and mangled, its face contorted in pain.

It takes up to 40 raccoons, for example, to make just one fur coat. Multiply that by the thousands of coats sold each year, and you get a picture of the massive suffering that animals endure for the sake of human vanity.

What can you do to stop this suffering?

There is no Justice, Just Us!

Please direct any questions or comments to adlla@animaldefense.com