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- Maneka Gandhi
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India has given yet another order for military equipment to France, England and Russia. The cost of these weapons, which will probably never be used could have given us a road in every village and solar energy lighting in 6 lakh villages. It could give us food security by raising the prices for farmers. It could take care of the reasons that cause floods. But that is not as much fun as boys’ toys.
Are planes, guns, bombs and tanks the most effective weapons that humans have to wage war against each other? Apparently not. A nonfiction study called Six Legged Soldiers: Using Insects as Weapons of War by Jeffrey Lockwood shows how effective armies made of insects can be in times of war. Lockwood is an award-winning author and University of Wyoming professor. The book explores the history entomological warfare and bioterrorism.
Man has been weaponizing creatures for centuries. When we learned how to pacify bees with smoke, we used hives as projectiles. We turned the potent toxins of some insects into deadly agents. Now, having mastered genetics gives us the power to transform insects into entirely new carriers of diseases. I’ve often thought that if a genocidal genius thought of a way to transmit HIV through mosquitoes, we would all be dead in ten years.
For thousands of years clever generals have made insects their foot soldiers. There are three ways to wage entomological warfare.
Using poisonous insects, such as bees, to directly attack the enemy.
Infecting insects with a pathogen and dispersing them over the target areas. Any person or animal bitten by the insect gets infected.
A direct insect attack against crops using pests like locusts, borers, beetles to destroy agriculture and the economy.
Troops in the Middle Ages catapulted beehives and wasp nests into enemy strongholds. Roman historian Pliny the Elder records that, in the second century AD, inhabitants of the Middle Eastern fortress city of Hatra forced the Roman legions surrounding them to flee by dropping scorpions on them. In the 12th century, King Henry I of England ordered his men to launch 'nest bombs' into the middle of the Duke of Lorraine's army in Normandy. By the 14th century, some European armies had created a vast windmill-like device that propelled hives. Then came the machine that threw rotting human corpses of victims of insect-born diseases.
In the 14th century, 75 million people died of flea-borne bubonic plague. The Black Death arrived in Europe after the invading Mongols under Emperor Janiberg catapulted flea-ridden corpses into the port of Kaffa on the Black Sea. People fled, carrying bacteria, rats and fleas throughout the Mediterranean.
As recently as World War II Japan’s Unit 731 used plague-infected fleas and cholera-coated flies to kill nearly half-a-million Chinese. This was the greatest military success in the modern annals of biological warfare.
Yunnan Province had become a nuisance to the Japanese. This region fed China with the supplies and arms they needed to resist the Japanese. This route was an essential one for the Japanese leading from Burma into southern China On the 4th of May, 1942 Japanese bombers descended on the city of Baoshan and dropped a number of ceramic-shelled bombs.
The Yagi Bombs thrown by the Japanese did not explode. The casing simply burst open. Inside was a yellow waxy substance with live houseflies with a slimy coating of cholera bacteria which promptly dispersed into the city. Three more bombings happened on May 5th, 6th, and 8th. By June, cholera had spread into the Yunnan Province and the Chinese Army fled. The Japanese were free to divert thousands of soldiers to other fronts. Cholera killed 410,000 people, more than Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At the end of World War II, the General who organised this did not get prosecuted as a war criminal even though, before he left China, he released plague-carrying rats into the countryside. He was pardoned and invited as teacher to the US military. The US Government conducted research at their biological warfare laboratories at Fort Detrick in Maryland. During the Cold War, the US military planned a facility to produce yellow-fever-infected mosquitoes and produced an "Entomological Warfare Target Analysis" of vulnerable sites in the Soviet Union. In February 1952, during the Korean War, both China and North Korea accused the U.S. of bombarding their populations with insects infected with plague. In turn, the Vietcong wired boxes of scorpions to trip wires in tunnels during the Vietnam War at the end of the 1960s.
During the war both Germany and France reared millions of Colorado potato beetles for use their enemies. During the 1940s, the British Government, using the laboratory at Porton Down near Salisbury, began to look into the possible uses of salmonella food poisoning, carried by flies.
In 1989 the terrorists discovered the potential of insect warfare. A group calling itself 'Breeders' sent a letter to the mayor of Los Angeles claiming to have released the Mediterranean fruit fly in Los Angeles and Orange counties, and threatened to expand their attack to the San Joaquin Valley, an important center of Californian agriculture. They demanded that the state government issue a ban on pesticides failing which they would insure that California lost its fruit. The infestation was real – but it had the opposite effect, California doubled its pesticide spraying.
If terrorists wanted to kill people in the US, they could employ the West Nile virus or its cousin, Rift Valley fever. Discovered in 1931, this viral disease is spread by mosquitoes. In 1997 200,000 Egyptians fell ill, of whom 2,000 lost their sight and 598 died of encephalitis. An outbreak of West Nile virus which began in New York City in 1999 spread to 47 states in North America, killing 654 people and leaving 7,000 ill.
If they wanted to destroy forests the Asian longhorned beetle, and the emerald ash borer can destroy all of them. If enough orchards were destroyed entire economies would sink. According to Lockwood “For a terrorist group with patience, a slow-motion disaster in ecological time would be a perfect tactic against an enemy that thinks in terms of days or months, but would suffer across the generations. Anyone with a course in medical entomology could build a simple trap and conscript a bloodthirsty army Releasing Yellow fever laden mosquitoes in the swampier parts of the USA like the Gulf Coast. Consider that a person with $100 worth of supplies, a set of simple instructions, and a plane ticket from an afflicted African nation could introduce the disease to the United States with virtually no chance of being caught. “
One malaria, chikangunya, Japanese encephalitis or bubonic plague could bring India to her knees. Think about all the pandemics that have come out of nowhere: AIDs, H1N1 , Sars, dengue…
Could the weaponization of insects be the next chapter in modern conflicts? Insects are the most destructive weapons available. They are cheap, simple, easy to sneak across borders, reproduce quickly and can spread disease and destroy crops with devastating speed. It takes one cola can of infected fleas to kill a few hundred people with bubonic plague and cause a country to panic. One envelope of infected mosquito eggs dropped into the water of another country. Is any country prepared for an entomological attack? No.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Are planes, guns, bombs and tanks the most effective weapons that humans have to wage war against each other? Apparently not. A nonfiction study called Six Legged Soldiers: Using Insects as Weapons of War by Jeffrey Lockwood shows how effective armies made of insects can be in times of war. Lockwood is an award-winning author and University of Wyoming professor. The book explores the history entomological warfare and bioterrorism.
Man has been weaponizing creatures for centuries. When we learned how to pacify bees with smoke, we used hives as projectiles. We turned the potent toxins of some insects into deadly agents. Now, having mastered genetics gives us the power to transform insects into entirely new carriers of diseases. I’ve often thought that if a genocidal genius thought of a way to transmit HIV through mosquitoes, we would all be dead in ten years.
For thousands of years clever generals have made insects their foot soldiers. There are three ways to wage entomological warfare.
Using poisonous insects, such as bees, to directly attack the enemy.
Infecting insects with a pathogen and dispersing them over the target areas. Any person or animal bitten by the insect gets infected.
A direct insect attack against crops using pests like locusts, borers, beetles to destroy agriculture and the economy.
Troops in the Middle Ages catapulted beehives and wasp nests into enemy strongholds. Roman historian Pliny the Elder records that, in the second century AD, inhabitants of the Middle Eastern fortress city of Hatra forced the Roman legions surrounding them to flee by dropping scorpions on them. In the 12th century, King Henry I of England ordered his men to launch 'nest bombs' into the middle of the Duke of Lorraine's army in Normandy. By the 14th century, some European armies had created a vast windmill-like device that propelled hives. Then came the machine that threw rotting human corpses of victims of insect-born diseases.
In the 14th century, 75 million people died of flea-borne bubonic plague. The Black Death arrived in Europe after the invading Mongols under Emperor Janiberg catapulted flea-ridden corpses into the port of Kaffa on the Black Sea. People fled, carrying bacteria, rats and fleas throughout the Mediterranean.
As recently as World War II Japan’s Unit 731 used plague-infected fleas and cholera-coated flies to kill nearly half-a-million Chinese. This was the greatest military success in the modern annals of biological warfare.
Yunnan Province had become a nuisance to the Japanese. This region fed China with the supplies and arms they needed to resist the Japanese. This route was an essential one for the Japanese leading from Burma into southern China On the 4th of May, 1942 Japanese bombers descended on the city of Baoshan and dropped a number of ceramic-shelled bombs.
The Yagi Bombs thrown by the Japanese did not explode. The casing simply burst open. Inside was a yellow waxy substance with live houseflies with a slimy coating of cholera bacteria which promptly dispersed into the city. Three more bombings happened on May 5th, 6th, and 8th. By June, cholera had spread into the Yunnan Province and the Chinese Army fled. The Japanese were free to divert thousands of soldiers to other fronts. Cholera killed 410,000 people, more than Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At the end of World War II, the General who organised this did not get prosecuted as a war criminal even though, before he left China, he released plague-carrying rats into the countryside. He was pardoned and invited as teacher to the US military. The US Government conducted research at their biological warfare laboratories at Fort Detrick in Maryland. During the Cold War, the US military planned a facility to produce yellow-fever-infected mosquitoes and produced an "Entomological Warfare Target Analysis" of vulnerable sites in the Soviet Union. In February 1952, during the Korean War, both China and North Korea accused the U.S. of bombarding their populations with insects infected with plague. In turn, the Vietcong wired boxes of scorpions to trip wires in tunnels during the Vietnam War at the end of the 1960s.
During the war both Germany and France reared millions of Colorado potato beetles for use their enemies. During the 1940s, the British Government, using the laboratory at Porton Down near Salisbury, began to look into the possible uses of salmonella food poisoning, carried by flies.
In 1989 the terrorists discovered the potential of insect warfare. A group calling itself 'Breeders' sent a letter to the mayor of Los Angeles claiming to have released the Mediterranean fruit fly in Los Angeles and Orange counties, and threatened to expand their attack to the San Joaquin Valley, an important center of Californian agriculture. They demanded that the state government issue a ban on pesticides failing which they would insure that California lost its fruit. The infestation was real – but it had the opposite effect, California doubled its pesticide spraying.
If terrorists wanted to kill people in the US, they could employ the West Nile virus or its cousin, Rift Valley fever. Discovered in 1931, this viral disease is spread by mosquitoes. In 1997 200,000 Egyptians fell ill, of whom 2,000 lost their sight and 598 died of encephalitis. An outbreak of West Nile virus which began in New York City in 1999 spread to 47 states in North America, killing 654 people and leaving 7,000 ill.
If they wanted to destroy forests the Asian longhorned beetle, and the emerald ash borer can destroy all of them. If enough orchards were destroyed entire economies would sink. According to Lockwood “For a terrorist group with patience, a slow-motion disaster in ecological time would be a perfect tactic against an enemy that thinks in terms of days or months, but would suffer across the generations. Anyone with a course in medical entomology could build a simple trap and conscript a bloodthirsty army Releasing Yellow fever laden mosquitoes in the swampier parts of the USA like the Gulf Coast. Consider that a person with $100 worth of supplies, a set of simple instructions, and a plane ticket from an afflicted African nation could introduce the disease to the United States with virtually no chance of being caught. “
One malaria, chikangunya, Japanese encephalitis or bubonic plague could bring India to her knees. Think about all the pandemics that have come out of nowhere: AIDs, H1N1 , Sars, dengue…
Could the weaponization of insects be the next chapter in modern conflicts? Insects are the most destructive weapons available. They are cheap, simple, easy to sneak across borders, reproduce quickly and can spread disease and destroy crops with devastating speed. It takes one cola can of infected fleas to kill a few hundred people with bubonic plague and cause a country to panic. One envelope of infected mosquito eggs dropped into the water of another country. Is any country prepared for an entomological attack? No.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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- Maneka Gandhi
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What do Egyptian mummies and Mc Donald’s Happy Meals have in common? Both refuse to decompose, judging by an experiment by New York artist Sally Davies who, in April 2010, bought a McDonald’s Happy Meal (MHM) and has since left it in her kitchen. Week after week she has taken and put pictures of the MHM on the net. Over six months later, the MHM has yet to even grow mouldy! ‘The only change that I can see,’ she records, ‘is that it has become hard as a rock, plastic to the touch and has an acrylic feel’.
The media are startled at the results. Yet the health industry has known for years that junk food from fast food chains doesn’t decompose. Len Foley’s ‘Bionic Burger’ features a Big Mac bought in 1989 that has not decomposed over two decades. The buyer has a museum of undecomposed burgers in his basement. (http//www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYyD…)
Joan Bruso, author of ‘Baby Bites-- Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater’, has been blogging the life of a MHM that she bought a year ago, “My Happy Meal is one year old today and it looks pretty good. It NEVER smelled bad. It did NOT decompose. It did NOT get mouldy. This morning, I took its birthday photo".
Nutritionist Karen Hanrahan still has a burger she bought in 1996.
Author Julia Havey shows her experiment on the Net: a naturally decomposed potato beside pristine looking McDonald’s French fries that are 4 years old!
The net is full of innumerable accounts and photos showing similar results Here’s a sampling:
“My son and I tried the experiment for school. We held onto a quarter pounder for over a year and the meat part still looked pretty good! We still have unchanged McDonald’s fries in a jar in our kitchen.”
“I ordered a cheeseburger, left it in the bag and put it in the closet. Two years later, it looks exactly the same as the day I bought it.”
“In Oct 2007 before taking my car to the dealer, I cleaned it thoroughly. Underneath the passenger seat was ¼ of a McDonald’s cheeseburger wrapped in the original paper. The burger piece was in perfect condition—no rot, no mould, no ‘melting’ and certainly no smell or I’d have noticed it earlier. The last time I ate at McDonald’s was in 2004.”
“I knew something was wrong when I was cleaning out my car and found McDonalds fries under the seat and they were still crisp!”
“Back in the 80s, a McDonald’s milkshake was left in the car when we went on an 8 day canoe trip. When we returned, it was still drinkable!”
“I actually have some 3 week old fries in my glove compartment right now from a McDonald’s in Germany! They look cold but still delicious.”
“A friend spent a couple of weeks crashing on our sofa. Two months later, we found a McDonald’s hamburger bun behind the sofa and it was still soft.”
“Having once spilled McDonalds fries in my old car and not discovering them for months, I can confirm they just dry out and do not get moldy at all.”
“We left a cheeseburger in a kitchen cabinet for 2.5 years to see what would happen and got the same result. Except for the bun being crusty, we saw no mould, no funky odours and the cheese still had that fresh-from-the-counter glisten to it.”
Real foods spoil very quickly. Natural cut potatoes would be in advanced stages of decomposition in two weeks but inedible in only 2 to four days. Fruit and veggies begin decomposing in a week. Fresh bread lasts two days. Dairy, one day.
So why doesn't fast food decompose?
Partly because it contains so many chemicals that insects, rodents and even fungus and mould won’t consume it.
Partly because McDonalds meat patties are loaded with sodium and salt is an excellent preservative. Most fast food burgers contain 20% ‘pink sludge’ which is the industrial term for meat treated with ammonia—the stuff we clean toilets with because it kills bacteria.
Partly because the French fries are double fried. Being starchy, potatoes lose all their moisture and absorb all the oil. No moisture, no mould. Hydrogenated trans fats gives any food a long shelf life.
Partly because many fast food companies irradiate their food to preserve it. Radiation kills all life and disrupts the molecular structure of food to delay its decomposition.
But the real reason why not an insect, bacterium or fungus will touch a McDonald’s hamburger is because it’s not food at all! It’s a chemical concoction that looks, tastes and smells of food without any nutritional qualities. You do not prepare a McDonalds burger in a kitchen but a laboratory.
The reason why its buns ward off microscopic life for over 20 years, is to be found in their chemical ingredients and preservatives listed on McDonald’s own website: niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, calcium sulfate, calcium carbonate, ammonium sulphate, ammonium chloride, sodium stearoyl lactylate, datem, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, diglycerides, ethoxylated monoglycerides, monocalcium phosphate, calcium peroxide, calcium propionate, sodium propionate.
Embalming fluid may be missing in a McDonald’s meat patty but you will find 1,1,1-trichloroethane, 1,2,4- trimethylbenzene, BCH, alpha Chloroform, chlorotoluene, chlorpyritos, DDE, p,p, DDT p,p dieldrin, diphenyl 2-wthylhexyl phosphate and ethyl benzene among a host of other chemicals.
Chicken McNuggets contain tertiary butylhydroquinone (TBHQ) -- a petroleum based product also added to varnishes, lacquers, resins and oil field additives plus dimethylpolysiloxane, an anti-foaming agent used in Silly Putty. Before 2003, McNuggets contained even more toxic chemicals, which so shocked a judge that, terming them “a McFrankenstein creation of various elements not utilized by the home cook’, he ordered them removed. The two mentioned above, TBHQ and dimthylpolysiloxane still remain.
Home fries need nothing but potatoes and cooking oil. Here’s what McD’s fries contain: potatoes, canola oil , hydrogenated soybean oil, natural beef flavour, citric acid, preservative, salt, sodium acid pyrophosphate and dimethylpolysiloxane.
McD’s ‘cheeses’ have been invented to last indefinitely without refrigeration. Even the pickle slice contains the preservative sodium benzoate.
Stripped of flavour and nutrients, processed foods use chemical flavouring to add taste. They also use an addictive chemical that keeps you hooked. Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) is not only addictive but causes weight gain and a host of health problems from migraines to depression and aggression.
There is only one species on earth that’s stupid enough to consider eating a hybridized, chemicalised, genetically altered, hormone and pesticide laden, mass produced hamburger that even fungi, which feeds on dog feces, won’t touch. Only one species that feeds its own children this poisonous rubbish. Little wonder it is suffering from skyrocketing rates of diabetes, cancer, heart disease, autism, dementia and obesity. If you are in any doubt as to what fast food franchises like McDonalds, Burger King, Pizza Hut and KFC can do to you, watch the documentary ‘Super Size Me’.
On the positive side, at least we know now what to stock up with in case of a nuclear war. Also film stars might consider injecting liquidized McD into their faces to halt the ageing process.
If it’s real food you’re after, stay away from stuff that doesn’t decompose. If food doesn’t break down naturally, how will it decompose in the stomach? And if it doesn’t decompose, what nutrients can it impart?
Forget the McDonald’s or any other Fast Food chain burger. Eat the box instead, it’s probably healthier and biodegrades faster.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
The media are startled at the results. Yet the health industry has known for years that junk food from fast food chains doesn’t decompose. Len Foley’s ‘Bionic Burger’ features a Big Mac bought in 1989 that has not decomposed over two decades. The buyer has a museum of undecomposed burgers in his basement. (http//www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYyD…)
Joan Bruso, author of ‘Baby Bites-- Transforming a Picky Eater into a Healthy Eater’, has been blogging the life of a MHM that she bought a year ago, “My Happy Meal is one year old today and it looks pretty good. It NEVER smelled bad. It did NOT decompose. It did NOT get mouldy. This morning, I took its birthday photo".
Nutritionist Karen Hanrahan still has a burger she bought in 1996.
Author Julia Havey shows her experiment on the Net: a naturally decomposed potato beside pristine looking McDonald’s French fries that are 4 years old!
The net is full of innumerable accounts and photos showing similar results Here’s a sampling:
“My son and I tried the experiment for school. We held onto a quarter pounder for over a year and the meat part still looked pretty good! We still have unchanged McDonald’s fries in a jar in our kitchen.”
“I ordered a cheeseburger, left it in the bag and put it in the closet. Two years later, it looks exactly the same as the day I bought it.”
“In Oct 2007 before taking my car to the dealer, I cleaned it thoroughly. Underneath the passenger seat was ¼ of a McDonald’s cheeseburger wrapped in the original paper. The burger piece was in perfect condition—no rot, no mould, no ‘melting’ and certainly no smell or I’d have noticed it earlier. The last time I ate at McDonald’s was in 2004.”
“I knew something was wrong when I was cleaning out my car and found McDonalds fries under the seat and they were still crisp!”
“Back in the 80s, a McDonald’s milkshake was left in the car when we went on an 8 day canoe trip. When we returned, it was still drinkable!”
“I actually have some 3 week old fries in my glove compartment right now from a McDonald’s in Germany! They look cold but still delicious.”
“A friend spent a couple of weeks crashing on our sofa. Two months later, we found a McDonald’s hamburger bun behind the sofa and it was still soft.”
“Having once spilled McDonalds fries in my old car and not discovering them for months, I can confirm they just dry out and do not get moldy at all.”
“We left a cheeseburger in a kitchen cabinet for 2.5 years to see what would happen and got the same result. Except for the bun being crusty, we saw no mould, no funky odours and the cheese still had that fresh-from-the-counter glisten to it.”
Real foods spoil very quickly. Natural cut potatoes would be in advanced stages of decomposition in two weeks but inedible in only 2 to four days. Fruit and veggies begin decomposing in a week. Fresh bread lasts two days. Dairy, one day.
So why doesn't fast food decompose?
Partly because it contains so many chemicals that insects, rodents and even fungus and mould won’t consume it.
Partly because McDonalds meat patties are loaded with sodium and salt is an excellent preservative. Most fast food burgers contain 20% ‘pink sludge’ which is the industrial term for meat treated with ammonia—the stuff we clean toilets with because it kills bacteria.
Partly because the French fries are double fried. Being starchy, potatoes lose all their moisture and absorb all the oil. No moisture, no mould. Hydrogenated trans fats gives any food a long shelf life.
Partly because many fast food companies irradiate their food to preserve it. Radiation kills all life and disrupts the molecular structure of food to delay its decomposition.
But the real reason why not an insect, bacterium or fungus will touch a McDonald’s hamburger is because it’s not food at all! It’s a chemical concoction that looks, tastes and smells of food without any nutritional qualities. You do not prepare a McDonalds burger in a kitchen but a laboratory.
The reason why its buns ward off microscopic life for over 20 years, is to be found in their chemical ingredients and preservatives listed on McDonald’s own website: niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, calcium sulfate, calcium carbonate, ammonium sulphate, ammonium chloride, sodium stearoyl lactylate, datem, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, diglycerides, ethoxylated monoglycerides, monocalcium phosphate, calcium peroxide, calcium propionate, sodium propionate.
Embalming fluid may be missing in a McDonald’s meat patty but you will find 1,1,1-trichloroethane, 1,2,4- trimethylbenzene, BCH, alpha Chloroform, chlorotoluene, chlorpyritos, DDE, p,p, DDT p,p dieldrin, diphenyl 2-wthylhexyl phosphate and ethyl benzene among a host of other chemicals.
Chicken McNuggets contain tertiary butylhydroquinone (TBHQ) -- a petroleum based product also added to varnishes, lacquers, resins and oil field additives plus dimethylpolysiloxane, an anti-foaming agent used in Silly Putty. Before 2003, McNuggets contained even more toxic chemicals, which so shocked a judge that, terming them “a McFrankenstein creation of various elements not utilized by the home cook’, he ordered them removed. The two mentioned above, TBHQ and dimthylpolysiloxane still remain.
Home fries need nothing but potatoes and cooking oil. Here’s what McD’s fries contain: potatoes, canola oil , hydrogenated soybean oil, natural beef flavour, citric acid, preservative, salt, sodium acid pyrophosphate and dimethylpolysiloxane.
McD’s ‘cheeses’ have been invented to last indefinitely without refrigeration. Even the pickle slice contains the preservative sodium benzoate.
Stripped of flavour and nutrients, processed foods use chemical flavouring to add taste. They also use an addictive chemical that keeps you hooked. Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) is not only addictive but causes weight gain and a host of health problems from migraines to depression and aggression.
There is only one species on earth that’s stupid enough to consider eating a hybridized, chemicalised, genetically altered, hormone and pesticide laden, mass produced hamburger that even fungi, which feeds on dog feces, won’t touch. Only one species that feeds its own children this poisonous rubbish. Little wonder it is suffering from skyrocketing rates of diabetes, cancer, heart disease, autism, dementia and obesity. If you are in any doubt as to what fast food franchises like McDonalds, Burger King, Pizza Hut and KFC can do to you, watch the documentary ‘Super Size Me’.
On the positive side, at least we know now what to stock up with in case of a nuclear war. Also film stars might consider injecting liquidized McD into their faces to halt the ageing process.
If it’s real food you’re after, stay away from stuff that doesn’t decompose. If food doesn’t break down naturally, how will it decompose in the stomach? And if it doesn’t decompose, what nutrients can it impart?
Forget the McDonald’s or any other Fast Food chain burger. Eat the box instead, it’s probably healthier and biodegrades faster.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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- Maneka Gandhi
- Hits: 922
First dinosaurs ruled the Earth. They were erased by the Great Flood or whatever. Then came humans. Now, we expect the Great Flood again followed by the Great Drought – both in this century. Which species will be dominant after we are gone? It could well be the ant. There is little difference between us except that ants are smarter and more innovative. Like us they are city creators and dwellers, farmers, warriors, ruthless despots, engineers, teachers. They use tools, know about medicines, plan and think. If you came across them in Mars, we would know we had encountered an alien race that organizes itself into a complex society complete with social ranks such as nobles, soldiers, workers and slaves.
If the ants were still primitive hunter gatherers they would be just another species which goes when we go, but they have settled buildings and have been farming their own food for the last 50 million years. And they raise cattle. Therefore they have already tamed the Earth. All they need now is for us to get out of the way – which we are in the last stages of doing.
It is their farming that interests me. Ants are the only animal besides humans that farm food. All other creatures hunt or harvest their food where they find it and are dependent on nature for their survival. Wolves exhibit intelligence, cooperation and skill in hunting for food but they do not capture deer and breed them. Deer forage for grasses but have no thought of sowing grass seeds to ensure a permanent supply. Only man and ant have ever thought to keep their prey in captivity or to farm plants in order to feed themselves in the future.
200 known species of Attini and Acromyrmex ants cultivate fungus farms having discovered agriculture 50 million years before humans. They are known as Leaf Cutters.
The leaf-cutting ants carefully select leaves that can be made into funguses, scraping away the plants' antifungal defenses, such as the waxy coating on leaves and carry them to underground nests where they are chewed and planted in soil. With these leaves the ants put down fungal mycelia (like adding a little curd to milk to make it curd overnight) and spit out enzymes that break down the proteins and carbohydrates. As the leaves break down they produce blobs called gongylidia. The ants consume these gongylidia. The ants prevent the fungi from fruiting and clone the fungus. When a new colony of ants is to be created the queen tucks a pellet of the fungal mycelia into her mouth and then uses this to seed a new fungus garden in her new colony.
Like us ants weed out every plant they do not want and keep the garden free of pathogens and parasites. Instead of buying pesticides (I am sure they have shops inside their cities) the ants produce phenylacetic acid and b-hydroxydecenoic acid in their glands and these antibiotics act as pesticides.
The growing of the fungus requires a great deal of planning and forethought: an appropriate chamber must be constructed, the right leaves must be collected, waste must be removed so as not to choke the growing fungus beds, and the leaves must be seeded with the fungus spores. The spores do not grow naturally - the ants must collect them and bring them to the leaves. To understand that by contaminating a new leaf with the fungus spore, it will result in more food later shows the ability to think ahead.
But ants don't just farm, they raise and keep other insects for food, just like humans raise cattle.
They domesticate aphids and act like shepherds by taking the aphids to feed on different plants, while protecting them from other insect predators. The ants then "milk" the aphids by squeezing their abdomens and causing some digested plant juice to be released into the mouths of the ants which will then share this nutritious fluid with the rest of the colony. This closely parallels that of human shepherds and cattle breeders.
Atta and Acromyrmex ants form the most complex and largest animal societies on the planet. Their cities grow to a depth of 30 meters and 98 feet across with the smaller and radiating mounds which extends out to a radius of around 80 meters. These nests can hold around eight million ants. Atta nests have hundreds to thousands of gardens, discrete units, with an average garden size of about 30×20×20 cm. Each colony has both shallow and deep gardens. Shallow gardens are about 0.5 meters deep and depend on seasonal, climatic changes. Deep gardens generally are 1–4 meters deep and evade summer droughts and winter temperatures
In a leafcutter colony, ants are divided into castes that perform different functions - minims, minors, mediae and majors. Minims tend to the brood or care for the fungus gardens. Minors are slightly larger and are the footsoldiers that go out with the foraging ants as the first line of defense to attack any enemies that threaten the foraging lines. Mediae are the foragers, who cut leaves and bring the leaf fragments back to the nest. Majors are the largest worker ants and act as soldiers, defending the nest from intruders, clearing the main foraging trails of large debris and carrying bulky items back to the nest.
These ants bring fresh leaves and plant cuttings into their nests; these are further cut into smaller and smaller pieces and are placed in the fungus garden and treated with ant liquid. Fungus proliferates on these leaves and ants feed on fungus. The leaf cutter ants harvest about 470 kg per colony per year. Size for size no human can harvest and process such enormous amounts of plant material. While bacterial antibiotics like Streptomyces (Streptomycin) are used on the funguses, they are used sparingly and wisely and these substances are not found in the mushroom tissue that the ants eat nor has the fungus built up a resistance to them. The bacterium lives and grows on the skin of the ants. The bodies of the ants are pitted with "crypts" where glands secrete chemicals that in turn nourish the bacteria.
Like human farmers that do grow only single crops and clone them the ants too get into trouble with crop diseases. Human agriculture has problems with banana, sugar cane, potato, wheat for instance; however several defenses against diseases permit such long-term monoculture. First, the Atta workers dedicated to the tending and cleaning of garden monitor gardens intensively, controlling pathogens early during disease outbreaks before diseases can build up. Second, Atta ants sequester their gardens in underground chambers that shelter gardens against influx of pathogens and reduce cross-infection between gardens. The ants seal off an infected garden thus preventing an epidemic spread of a disease throughout a nest. As a last resort, Atta may even move an entire nest to a new location, moving all healthy gardens and leaving diseased gardens behind. Third, the cultivated fungus and the ant farmers secrete antibiotics that help suppress diseases in ant nests.
Ants originated 145 million years ago and have evolved to become the most dominant creatures constituting 25% of the total animal weight on Earth. They occupy every possible habitat found on land from forest canopies, underground tunnels, human walls, from mountain tops to the ocean shores. Next time you look at an ant, say hello to the next king of the world.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
If the ants were still primitive hunter gatherers they would be just another species which goes when we go, but they have settled buildings and have been farming their own food for the last 50 million years. And they raise cattle. Therefore they have already tamed the Earth. All they need now is for us to get out of the way – which we are in the last stages of doing.
It is their farming that interests me. Ants are the only animal besides humans that farm food. All other creatures hunt or harvest their food where they find it and are dependent on nature for their survival. Wolves exhibit intelligence, cooperation and skill in hunting for food but they do not capture deer and breed them. Deer forage for grasses but have no thought of sowing grass seeds to ensure a permanent supply. Only man and ant have ever thought to keep their prey in captivity or to farm plants in order to feed themselves in the future.
200 known species of Attini and Acromyrmex ants cultivate fungus farms having discovered agriculture 50 million years before humans. They are known as Leaf Cutters.
The leaf-cutting ants carefully select leaves that can be made into funguses, scraping away the plants' antifungal defenses, such as the waxy coating on leaves and carry them to underground nests where they are chewed and planted in soil. With these leaves the ants put down fungal mycelia (like adding a little curd to milk to make it curd overnight) and spit out enzymes that break down the proteins and carbohydrates. As the leaves break down they produce blobs called gongylidia. The ants consume these gongylidia. The ants prevent the fungi from fruiting and clone the fungus. When a new colony of ants is to be created the queen tucks a pellet of the fungal mycelia into her mouth and then uses this to seed a new fungus garden in her new colony.
Like us ants weed out every plant they do not want and keep the garden free of pathogens and parasites. Instead of buying pesticides (I am sure they have shops inside their cities) the ants produce phenylacetic acid and b-hydroxydecenoic acid in their glands and these antibiotics act as pesticides.
The growing of the fungus requires a great deal of planning and forethought: an appropriate chamber must be constructed, the right leaves must be collected, waste must be removed so as not to choke the growing fungus beds, and the leaves must be seeded with the fungus spores. The spores do not grow naturally - the ants must collect them and bring them to the leaves. To understand that by contaminating a new leaf with the fungus spore, it will result in more food later shows the ability to think ahead.
But ants don't just farm, they raise and keep other insects for food, just like humans raise cattle.
They domesticate aphids and act like shepherds by taking the aphids to feed on different plants, while protecting them from other insect predators. The ants then "milk" the aphids by squeezing their abdomens and causing some digested plant juice to be released into the mouths of the ants which will then share this nutritious fluid with the rest of the colony. This closely parallels that of human shepherds and cattle breeders.
Atta and Acromyrmex ants form the most complex and largest animal societies on the planet. Their cities grow to a depth of 30 meters and 98 feet across with the smaller and radiating mounds which extends out to a radius of around 80 meters. These nests can hold around eight million ants. Atta nests have hundreds to thousands of gardens, discrete units, with an average garden size of about 30×20×20 cm. Each colony has both shallow and deep gardens. Shallow gardens are about 0.5 meters deep and depend on seasonal, climatic changes. Deep gardens generally are 1–4 meters deep and evade summer droughts and winter temperatures
In a leafcutter colony, ants are divided into castes that perform different functions - minims, minors, mediae and majors. Minims tend to the brood or care for the fungus gardens. Minors are slightly larger and are the footsoldiers that go out with the foraging ants as the first line of defense to attack any enemies that threaten the foraging lines. Mediae are the foragers, who cut leaves and bring the leaf fragments back to the nest. Majors are the largest worker ants and act as soldiers, defending the nest from intruders, clearing the main foraging trails of large debris and carrying bulky items back to the nest.
These ants bring fresh leaves and plant cuttings into their nests; these are further cut into smaller and smaller pieces and are placed in the fungus garden and treated with ant liquid. Fungus proliferates on these leaves and ants feed on fungus. The leaf cutter ants harvest about 470 kg per colony per year. Size for size no human can harvest and process such enormous amounts of plant material. While bacterial antibiotics like Streptomyces (Streptomycin) are used on the funguses, they are used sparingly and wisely and these substances are not found in the mushroom tissue that the ants eat nor has the fungus built up a resistance to them. The bacterium lives and grows on the skin of the ants. The bodies of the ants are pitted with "crypts" where glands secrete chemicals that in turn nourish the bacteria.
Like human farmers that do grow only single crops and clone them the ants too get into trouble with crop diseases. Human agriculture has problems with banana, sugar cane, potato, wheat for instance; however several defenses against diseases permit such long-term monoculture. First, the Atta workers dedicated to the tending and cleaning of garden monitor gardens intensively, controlling pathogens early during disease outbreaks before diseases can build up. Second, Atta ants sequester their gardens in underground chambers that shelter gardens against influx of pathogens and reduce cross-infection between gardens. The ants seal off an infected garden thus preventing an epidemic spread of a disease throughout a nest. As a last resort, Atta may even move an entire nest to a new location, moving all healthy gardens and leaving diseased gardens behind. Third, the cultivated fungus and the ant farmers secrete antibiotics that help suppress diseases in ant nests.
Ants originated 145 million years ago and have evolved to become the most dominant creatures constituting 25% of the total animal weight on Earth. They occupy every possible habitat found on land from forest canopies, underground tunnels, human walls, from mountain tops to the ocean shores. Next time you look at an ant, say hello to the next king of the world.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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Yesterday I was at my shelter , the Sanjay Gandhi Animal Care Centre tending to a baby monkey which had had acid thrown on it, when a ginger cat jumped on to my shoulder and nibbled my ear. A great feeling of warmth and love swept over me. Puppies, lambs, chicks, baby buffaloes bring on my mother hormones, but cats of all ages do too.
Many of our superstitions have come from the West: a cat crossing your path is unlucky, for instance. None existed in India before the British came: in fact the Mughals were cat lovers. What is the Hindu attitude towards cats? I am happy to announce that we have not one but two celestial cats: one, Vishnu himself.
Biranchi Mishra, a former director of Orissa Tourism has written to me about a Cat god on Orissa. The place is Nrusimhanath in Bargarh district in Western Orissa. The cat is considered an incarnation of Vishnu as Bidala Nrusimha or Marjara Kesari (Bidala and marjara mean “cat”, and kesari means “lion”).
This is the story as told in Sri Krishna Kathamrita Bindu.
The Ramayana war was in full spate in Sri Lanka when Rama’s brother Lakshmana was felled by Ravana’s son Meghnatha’s arrow. As he lay dying, Hanuman was sent to get a herb from the Gandhamadana mountain. Since he didn’t have time to search, he brought the entire mountain. Afterwards, instead of putting it back in the Himalayan range, he parked it in Western Orissa.
The mountain became sacred for sages who performed their austerities there. One sage, Udanga, had a daughter named Malati and they lived on the banks of the Godavari river. One day, Ravana passed by, saw the girl and raped her. He threw her into the Godavari River.
The compassionate Godavari brought her to a shore. When Malati awoke she began searching for her father and crying loudly. Indura, the mouse carrier of Ganesh, heard her cries and offered to help her if she would let him have his way with her. The girl had no choice. From Ravana and Indura‘s seed, a demon was born named Mushika Daitya (“mouse demon”) and he was so ferocious that as soon as he came out of the womb he devoured his mother. He then began to perform austerities to please Lord Shiva and obtained the boon that he need not fear from anyone except for Lord Narasimha (Vishnu). Seeing his power and black deeds, the gods appealed to Lord Rama to rescue the universe. Lord Rama, an incarnation of Vishnu, chased Mushika Daitya right to the Gandhamadana Hill where the latter prayed to the mountain for shelter and then entered through a crack in the hill. When Lord Rama arrived, Gandhamadana requested him not to enter inside as the mountain would split. Lord Rama then assumed the form of Marjara-Kesari, with the head of a cat and the body of a lion and began guarding the area near the crack just as a cat sits by a hole, waiting for a mouse. Thousands of years later a tribal named Hari Kondh and his wife Yamuna lived near the Gandhamadana Hill and collected herbs. One day, Yamuna was digging when she saw blood coming from the ground. Frightened, she ran to tell her husband. When the couple returned they found milk pouring out. And heard a voice, “I am Narayana in my cat-lion form, waiting to kill the demon Mushika. Take me from the ground and build a temple to protect me.” They dug in that place, unearthed the deity, and informed the Chauhan king Baijal Dev, who built a temple for the deity in the 15th century.
Without anything else to offer the Lord, Hari Kondh and Yamuna are said to have given wild oranges to Bidala Nrusingha. To this day these fruits are offered to the Lord and are considered as sacred as water from the Ganga. Located by cascading waterfalls on the Gandhamadana Hills, the deity is a Cat made of black Chlorite stone.
(An Oriya offshoot of this story says that Ravana was cursed by Udanga that if he raped another woman he would die, which is why Sita was never touched by him.)
The second divinity is the Cat of Shashthi, In the Brahma Vaivarta Purana, Goddess Shashthi is an aspect of Durga and the wife of Lord Kartikeya as Devasena or his mother as a Krittika. She is the Goddess of fertility prayed to when you want a child and the protector of children. Her worship is done on the sixth (shashti) day following a child's birth. The cat Marjara is her vahana (mount).
Jamai Shashthi in Bengal is celebrated in the month of June. It is dedicated to the son-in-law (Jamai) who gets a grand celebration in the house of his in-laws. There is a belief that those who observe Aranya or Skanda Shashthi (Nov-December in South India) will be blessed with children. Women observe a partial fast on the day and perform pujas in a forest. In western India, the cat is worshipped with Goddess Shashthi on that day.
The best known legend of Shashthi and the cat is a legend about a merchant named Saaya who had a loving wife, sons and daughters in law. The family was blessed with peace and prosperity. The merchant’s wife worshipped all the deities on the correct days.
On the day of Shashthi puja the mother and daughters in law rose early and worked untiringly to make the food and offerings. While waiting for the priest to come and do the puja, the mother in law called the youngest daughter in law to guard the food while they rested.
The daughter in law was pregnant and desired to eat some of the oblations. She did. When the mother in law returned and noticed that the food was missing the daughter in law claimed that a cat had jumped in and eaten them. The mother in law reprimanded the girl and sent her to her room.
Shashthi’s cat was listening and she was very angry at the disrespect shown to her goddess and the falsehoods spoken. So when the daughter in law delivered a son, she stole him. The daughter in law was inconsolable, the rest of the family was aghast. Six babies disappeared.
During the seventh one’s birth, the mother went into the forest, delivered the baby herself, placed him on her lap and kept guard the whole night. She saw the black cat approach and snatch the baby. She ran after it but the baby and cat vanished. The mother fainted.
The cat took all the children to Shashthi and told her the story of how she had been falsely accused of eating the oblations.
Shahsthi was very concerned and went to the girl in the forest who, when she awoke, saw the goddess standing there. The girl started crying and asked her why she was suffering. Shashthi said “You lacked respect for me. You ate the food for my worship and then lied about it.” The girl pleaded for forgiveness. Shasthi returned her seven sons. Worshippers of Shasthi make an image of the cat as well to protect their children.
Be kind to cats: The males are Vishnu and the females are part of Shashthi. Either way, they bring you blessings.
Maneka Gandhi
Many of our superstitions have come from the West: a cat crossing your path is unlucky, for instance. None existed in India before the British came: in fact the Mughals were cat lovers. What is the Hindu attitude towards cats? I am happy to announce that we have not one but two celestial cats: one, Vishnu himself.
Biranchi Mishra, a former director of Orissa Tourism has written to me about a Cat god on Orissa. The place is Nrusimhanath in Bargarh district in Western Orissa. The cat is considered an incarnation of Vishnu as Bidala Nrusimha or Marjara Kesari (Bidala and marjara mean “cat”, and kesari means “lion”).
This is the story as told in Sri Krishna Kathamrita Bindu.
The Ramayana war was in full spate in Sri Lanka when Rama’s brother Lakshmana was felled by Ravana’s son Meghnatha’s arrow. As he lay dying, Hanuman was sent to get a herb from the Gandhamadana mountain. Since he didn’t have time to search, he brought the entire mountain. Afterwards, instead of putting it back in the Himalayan range, he parked it in Western Orissa.
The mountain became sacred for sages who performed their austerities there. One sage, Udanga, had a daughter named Malati and they lived on the banks of the Godavari river. One day, Ravana passed by, saw the girl and raped her. He threw her into the Godavari River.
The compassionate Godavari brought her to a shore. When Malati awoke she began searching for her father and crying loudly. Indura, the mouse carrier of Ganesh, heard her cries and offered to help her if she would let him have his way with her. The girl had no choice. From Ravana and Indura‘s seed, a demon was born named Mushika Daitya (“mouse demon”) and he was so ferocious that as soon as he came out of the womb he devoured his mother. He then began to perform austerities to please Lord Shiva and obtained the boon that he need not fear from anyone except for Lord Narasimha (Vishnu). Seeing his power and black deeds, the gods appealed to Lord Rama to rescue the universe. Lord Rama, an incarnation of Vishnu, chased Mushika Daitya right to the Gandhamadana Hill where the latter prayed to the mountain for shelter and then entered through a crack in the hill. When Lord Rama arrived, Gandhamadana requested him not to enter inside as the mountain would split. Lord Rama then assumed the form of Marjara-Kesari, with the head of a cat and the body of a lion and began guarding the area near the crack just as a cat sits by a hole, waiting for a mouse. Thousands of years later a tribal named Hari Kondh and his wife Yamuna lived near the Gandhamadana Hill and collected herbs. One day, Yamuna was digging when she saw blood coming from the ground. Frightened, she ran to tell her husband. When the couple returned they found milk pouring out. And heard a voice, “I am Narayana in my cat-lion form, waiting to kill the demon Mushika. Take me from the ground and build a temple to protect me.” They dug in that place, unearthed the deity, and informed the Chauhan king Baijal Dev, who built a temple for the deity in the 15th century.
Without anything else to offer the Lord, Hari Kondh and Yamuna are said to have given wild oranges to Bidala Nrusingha. To this day these fruits are offered to the Lord and are considered as sacred as water from the Ganga. Located by cascading waterfalls on the Gandhamadana Hills, the deity is a Cat made of black Chlorite stone.
(An Oriya offshoot of this story says that Ravana was cursed by Udanga that if he raped another woman he would die, which is why Sita was never touched by him.)
The second divinity is the Cat of Shashthi, In the Brahma Vaivarta Purana, Goddess Shashthi is an aspect of Durga and the wife of Lord Kartikeya as Devasena or his mother as a Krittika. She is the Goddess of fertility prayed to when you want a child and the protector of children. Her worship is done on the sixth (shashti) day following a child's birth. The cat Marjara is her vahana (mount).
Jamai Shashthi in Bengal is celebrated in the month of June. It is dedicated to the son-in-law (Jamai) who gets a grand celebration in the house of his in-laws. There is a belief that those who observe Aranya or Skanda Shashthi (Nov-December in South India) will be blessed with children. Women observe a partial fast on the day and perform pujas in a forest. In western India, the cat is worshipped with Goddess Shashthi on that day.
The best known legend of Shashthi and the cat is a legend about a merchant named Saaya who had a loving wife, sons and daughters in law. The family was blessed with peace and prosperity. The merchant’s wife worshipped all the deities on the correct days.
On the day of Shashthi puja the mother and daughters in law rose early and worked untiringly to make the food and offerings. While waiting for the priest to come and do the puja, the mother in law called the youngest daughter in law to guard the food while they rested.
The daughter in law was pregnant and desired to eat some of the oblations. She did. When the mother in law returned and noticed that the food was missing the daughter in law claimed that a cat had jumped in and eaten them. The mother in law reprimanded the girl and sent her to her room.
Shashthi’s cat was listening and she was very angry at the disrespect shown to her goddess and the falsehoods spoken. So when the daughter in law delivered a son, she stole him. The daughter in law was inconsolable, the rest of the family was aghast. Six babies disappeared.
During the seventh one’s birth, the mother went into the forest, delivered the baby herself, placed him on her lap and kept guard the whole night. She saw the black cat approach and snatch the baby. She ran after it but the baby and cat vanished. The mother fainted.
The cat took all the children to Shashthi and told her the story of how she had been falsely accused of eating the oblations.
Shahsthi was very concerned and went to the girl in the forest who, when she awoke, saw the goddess standing there. The girl started crying and asked her why she was suffering. Shashthi said “You lacked respect for me. You ate the food for my worship and then lied about it.” The girl pleaded for forgiveness. Shasthi returned her seven sons. Worshippers of Shasthi make an image of the cat as well to protect their children.
Be kind to cats: The males are Vishnu and the females are part of Shashthi. Either way, they bring you blessings.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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- Maneka Gandhi
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Someone from the royal family of Mankapur gave me my most prized possessions, a stone head found in his property of an old god. Dated as several thousand years old it has the face of a dog and beautiful rich necklaces round its neck.
Every time I hear of a municipality/an individual who has killed dogs, I wonder whether education is simply the ability to write your name or whether it is to refine your senses and honour your culture. Through the ages the dog has been worshipped. Today some dogs are “pet” and others are homeless “junglees”. Perhaps a quick history recap might change your perspective.
The oldest records are those of the Egyptians. The Egyptians treated dogs with great respect. They were buried in family tombs just as they buried humans with goods for the afterlife and family members would shave their heads in mourning. At Hardai (later called Cynopolis "Dog City"), the sacred city of the dog headed god Anubis there are many dog cemeteries. How sad that no city in India has one: the family pet is simply supposed to be thrown on the trash. Anubis represents Guidance, Magic, and he leads you into the afterlife. To throw him into the trash is to lessen the magic and wisdom in your own life and invite the same fate. Anubis weighs the souls of the deceased for truth and order. Socrates the Greek philosopher referred to Anubis when he swore to tell the truth "by the Dog of Egypt."
The Egyptians have more than one dog god Anpu is the god of orphans, the lost, wanderers. Wepwawet is the opener of the ways: he opens the way to victory, he is the army scout and he forms an integral part of royal rituals, symbolizing the unification of Egypt. He is also, in some Egyptian texts “Ra“ the Sun, the Opener of the Sky. The Pharaoh flag had an image of Wepwawet as he was supposed to carry Pharaoh into heaven after his death.
There is Set, god of the desert and the storm. Osiris, one of the most prominent deities of ancient Egypt, is sometimes portrayed as a dog together with Anubis who some say was his son. Another one of Osiris’ sons, Duamatef, also had a dog head.
The indigenous tribes of the Americas, lumped together now by the illiterate European settlers as Red Indians, revere the wolf, coyote and the dog. Most tribes were names after the wolf like the Mohican (wolf people) and the Pawnee. Most tribes had wolf divisions. While the ancient Egyptians called the star Sirius the "Dog Star," the Americas called it “Wolf Star." Both the Amerindians and the Inuit of Alaska regularly crossed their domestic dogs with wolves, blurring the lines between wild and domestic dog. The coyote (a small North American wild dog) was a god and creator of humans and the Milky Way. Dogs were treated like family members and were accorded burial and mourning rites. In many Indian tribes, people were named as the father, mother, brother or sister of such-and-such a dog...
In Central and South America, like Indian deities have animal vehicles/companions, they have the nahuali or animal twin for each human and god. The twin of Quetzalcoatl, the god of goodness and light, is the dog god Xolotl who guides the dead and the Sun and is the personification of the planet Venus, the most important Mesoamerican planet/star. The great Chichimec dynasty of Mexico means "of dog lineage."
Among most Turko-Mongol and Siberian peoples, the wolf and dog hold a very high place. One of the legends is the descent of the great Mongol conqueror Genghis Khan from the wolf. Many Mongolians have adopted his tribal name Borjigin, "the blue wolf." Till today Mongolians believe that people reincarnate from dogs so one should never hit a dog. Genghis called his four great generals -- Zev, Subedei, Zelme and Khubilai -- the "dogs of war" a very honorable title among the Mongols. In Siberia, many people claim the wolf and dog as ancestors
Turkic people like the Kazakhs, Uygyrs and Uzbeks consider the wolf as the mother of all Turks. Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, is known affectionately as the "Gray Wolf."
The Tibetans also believe that dogs are closest to humans in reincarnation and that high lamas often reincarnate as dogs. Tibetans used dogs as holy temple guards or charms for monasteries. The Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama kept dogs as pets and sent them as gifts to other kings. Two great sages in Tibetan and Mongolian Buddhism were intimately associated with dogs -- Kukkuripa and Kukuraja.
Bau is one of the three main deities of the Sumerian pantheon and the goddess of physicians. She is portrayed as a dog-headed goddess of healing and life. Dogs, her sacred animals, are found at her temples. In the latter religion of Babylon and Assyria, the god Bel-Merodach, king of all heavenly gods, had four dogs named Ukkumu (Seizer), Akkulu (Eater), Ikšsuda (Grasper), and Iltebu (Holder).
In the Greek pantheon, Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis, took the form of a wolf. Artemis was known as the "Wolf Goddess" and had a wolf on her shield. Both she and her Roman counterpart Diana were accompanied by dogs.
The Roman Goddess of death Hecate is closely linked with dogs. Her pet Cerebos, the three-headed dog, guards the entrance to Hades. Rome was built by Romulus and Remus, both suckled by a she-wolf who became the emblem of Rome.
The Norse supreme deity Woden (Odin) chose two wolves, Freki and Geri, as his companions.
Bhairava is a form of Shiva with dog companions. Khandoba, another manifestation of Shiva has the same attributes. These deities appear in Nepalese Buddhism as Yamantaka, a god who conquers death.
In Vedic literature Indra has as his companion Sarama. She gives birth to two sons, the Sarameyas, who become the companions of Yama, the lord of death.
In the Mahabharata the Pandava brothers and Draupadi set off on their final journey up the Himalayas. Ultimately only Yudhistira and his companion dog were left. As they neared the top, they were greeted by the god Indra in his chariot. The god bid Yushisthira board the chariot and the Pandava beckoned for his canine friend. Indra said that dogs were not allowed in his heaven. Yudhisthira said that he could not abandon such a faithful companion and declared he would rather stay on earth. Both were taken to heaven. Upon arriving the dog transformed into the god Dharma, the lord of the correct way of living.
Among Muslims the Saluki breed is proclaimed in the Koran no less as the "gift of Allah." The saluki was also known by such names as al-Hor "the Noble One," and al-Baraha "the Blessed One."
In China, from the Han Dynasty onward, dogs had royal status. The Emperor Ling Ti (156-189) bestowed royal titles to the palace dogs as imperial guards and viceroys. In fact, in the oldest known royal tomb -- that of Shang ruler Fu Hao (1250 BCE) in Anyang – archeologists found six dogs under the royal corpse. Stories about dog ancestors abound in the regions of China among the Hmong, Mien, Li, Shan, Shaka tribes of South China and northern Indochina . In the Mien version of this story, the Chinese emperor Pien Hung offers his daughter to anyone who can defeat the invader Emperor Kao Wang . The three-colored dog, Phan Hu, penetrates enemy lines and kills Kao Wang. Taking the emperor's daughter as his wife, they produce 12 children from which spring the twelve clans of the Mien.
In Africa, Nyambe, the Louyi creator god has a beloved dog. Nyamurairi, the supreme god of the Nyanga people of the Congo had a dog named Rukuba, who gave the gift of fire. The Yorubas have the dog-headed Aroui and Odudua, the mother goddess who is depicted with a dog, the animal sacred to her son, the war god Ogun. The deities Legba of the Dahomey and Nzassi of the Fjort have companion dogs. A number of tribes in West and South Africa claim a dog as ancestor including a prominent Bantu group in southern Africa . Other peoples who held such beliefs include the Kyrgyz, the Nicobarese, the Pomotu islanders, and groups in Myanmar , Papua New Guinea and Finland .
In the ancient Samoan religion, the dog was sacred the companion of many of the highest gods. The pan-Polynesian goddess Hina has dogs. In the Philippines , Kimat is the dog of the supreme god Kadlakan and is the personification of lightning. Among the Ifugao of the Philippines , the deities Wigan , Kabigat and Balitok all have dogs. The dog is considered sacred to Mithras the Persian god of the sun.
That the dog should have been elevated to high status by so many people throughout history should come as no surprise. The relationship between dogs and humans goes back a 100,000 years. It is believed that the domestication of the dog led to the domestication of other animals and was a turning point in the history of humans. To kill him is to kill your oldest and best friend.
Maneka Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Every time I hear of a municipality/an individual who has killed dogs, I wonder whether education is simply the ability to write your name or whether it is to refine your senses and honour your culture. Through the ages the dog has been worshipped. Today some dogs are “pet” and others are homeless “junglees”. Perhaps a quick history recap might change your perspective.
The oldest records are those of the Egyptians. The Egyptians treated dogs with great respect. They were buried in family tombs just as they buried humans with goods for the afterlife and family members would shave their heads in mourning. At Hardai (later called Cynopolis "Dog City"), the sacred city of the dog headed god Anubis there are many dog cemeteries. How sad that no city in India has one: the family pet is simply supposed to be thrown on the trash. Anubis represents Guidance, Magic, and he leads you into the afterlife. To throw him into the trash is to lessen the magic and wisdom in your own life and invite the same fate. Anubis weighs the souls of the deceased for truth and order. Socrates the Greek philosopher referred to Anubis when he swore to tell the truth "by the Dog of Egypt."
The Egyptians have more than one dog god Anpu is the god of orphans, the lost, wanderers. Wepwawet is the opener of the ways: he opens the way to victory, he is the army scout and he forms an integral part of royal rituals, symbolizing the unification of Egypt. He is also, in some Egyptian texts “Ra“ the Sun, the Opener of the Sky. The Pharaoh flag had an image of Wepwawet as he was supposed to carry Pharaoh into heaven after his death.
There is Set, god of the desert and the storm. Osiris, one of the most prominent deities of ancient Egypt, is sometimes portrayed as a dog together with Anubis who some say was his son. Another one of Osiris’ sons, Duamatef, also had a dog head.
The indigenous tribes of the Americas, lumped together now by the illiterate European settlers as Red Indians, revere the wolf, coyote and the dog. Most tribes were names after the wolf like the Mohican (wolf people) and the Pawnee. Most tribes had wolf divisions. While the ancient Egyptians called the star Sirius the "Dog Star," the Americas called it “Wolf Star." Both the Amerindians and the Inuit of Alaska regularly crossed their domestic dogs with wolves, blurring the lines between wild and domestic dog. The coyote (a small North American wild dog) was a god and creator of humans and the Milky Way. Dogs were treated like family members and were accorded burial and mourning rites. In many Indian tribes, people were named as the father, mother, brother or sister of such-and-such a dog...
In Central and South America, like Indian deities have animal vehicles/companions, they have the nahuali or animal twin for each human and god. The twin of Quetzalcoatl, the god of goodness and light, is the dog god Xolotl who guides the dead and the Sun and is the personification of the planet Venus, the most important Mesoamerican planet/star. The great Chichimec dynasty of Mexico means "of dog lineage."
Among most Turko-Mongol and Siberian peoples, the wolf and dog hold a very high place. One of the legends is the descent of the great Mongol conqueror Genghis Khan from the wolf. Many Mongolians have adopted his tribal name Borjigin, "the blue wolf." Till today Mongolians believe that people reincarnate from dogs so one should never hit a dog. Genghis called his four great generals -- Zev, Subedei, Zelme and Khubilai -- the "dogs of war" a very honorable title among the Mongols. In Siberia, many people claim the wolf and dog as ancestors
Turkic people like the Kazakhs, Uygyrs and Uzbeks consider the wolf as the mother of all Turks. Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, is known affectionately as the "Gray Wolf."
The Tibetans also believe that dogs are closest to humans in reincarnation and that high lamas often reincarnate as dogs. Tibetans used dogs as holy temple guards or charms for monasteries. The Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama kept dogs as pets and sent them as gifts to other kings. Two great sages in Tibetan and Mongolian Buddhism were intimately associated with dogs -- Kukkuripa and Kukuraja.
Bau is one of the three main deities of the Sumerian pantheon and the goddess of physicians. She is portrayed as a dog-headed goddess of healing and life. Dogs, her sacred animals, are found at her temples. In the latter religion of Babylon and Assyria, the god Bel-Merodach, king of all heavenly gods, had four dogs named Ukkumu (Seizer), Akkulu (Eater), Ikšsuda (Grasper), and Iltebu (Holder).
In the Greek pantheon, Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis, took the form of a wolf. Artemis was known as the "Wolf Goddess" and had a wolf on her shield. Both she and her Roman counterpart Diana were accompanied by dogs.
The Roman Goddess of death Hecate is closely linked with dogs. Her pet Cerebos, the three-headed dog, guards the entrance to Hades. Rome was built by Romulus and Remus, both suckled by a she-wolf who became the emblem of Rome.
The Norse supreme deity Woden (Odin) chose two wolves, Freki and Geri, as his companions.
Bhairava is a form of Shiva with dog companions. Khandoba, another manifestation of Shiva has the same attributes. These deities appear in Nepalese Buddhism as Yamantaka, a god who conquers death.
In Vedic literature Indra has as his companion Sarama. She gives birth to two sons, the Sarameyas, who become the companions of Yama, the lord of death.
In the Mahabharata the Pandava brothers and Draupadi set off on their final journey up the Himalayas. Ultimately only Yudhistira and his companion dog were left. As they neared the top, they were greeted by the god Indra in his chariot. The god bid Yushisthira board the chariot and the Pandava beckoned for his canine friend. Indra said that dogs were not allowed in his heaven. Yudhisthira said that he could not abandon such a faithful companion and declared he would rather stay on earth. Both were taken to heaven. Upon arriving the dog transformed into the god Dharma, the lord of the correct way of living.
Among Muslims the Saluki breed is proclaimed in the Koran no less as the "gift of Allah." The saluki was also known by such names as al-Hor "the Noble One," and al-Baraha "the Blessed One."
In China, from the Han Dynasty onward, dogs had royal status. The Emperor Ling Ti (156-189) bestowed royal titles to the palace dogs as imperial guards and viceroys. In fact, in the oldest known royal tomb -- that of Shang ruler Fu Hao (1250 BCE) in Anyang – archeologists found six dogs under the royal corpse. Stories about dog ancestors abound in the regions of China among the Hmong, Mien, Li, Shan, Shaka tribes of South China and northern Indochina . In the Mien version of this story, the Chinese emperor Pien Hung offers his daughter to anyone who can defeat the invader Emperor Kao Wang . The three-colored dog, Phan Hu, penetrates enemy lines and kills Kao Wang. Taking the emperor's daughter as his wife, they produce 12 children from which spring the twelve clans of the Mien.
In Africa, Nyambe, the Louyi creator god has a beloved dog. Nyamurairi, the supreme god of the Nyanga people of the Congo had a dog named Rukuba, who gave the gift of fire. The Yorubas have the dog-headed Aroui and Odudua, the mother goddess who is depicted with a dog, the animal sacred to her son, the war god Ogun. The deities Legba of the Dahomey and Nzassi of the Fjort have companion dogs. A number of tribes in West and South Africa claim a dog as ancestor including a prominent Bantu group in southern Africa . Other peoples who held such beliefs include the Kyrgyz, the Nicobarese, the Pomotu islanders, and groups in Myanmar , Papua New Guinea and Finland .
In the ancient Samoan religion, the dog was sacred the companion of many of the highest gods. The pan-Polynesian goddess Hina has dogs. In the Philippines , Kimat is the dog of the supreme god Kadlakan and is the personification of lightning. Among the Ifugao of the Philippines , the deities Wigan , Kabigat and Balitok all have dogs. The dog is considered sacred to Mithras the Persian god of the sun.
That the dog should have been elevated to high status by so many people throughout history should come as no surprise. The relationship between dogs and humans goes back a 100,000 years. It is believed that the domestication of the dog led to the domestication of other animals and was a turning point in the history of humans. To kill him is to kill your oldest and best friend.
Maneka Gandhi
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