Today, we are pleased to announce that Wild-Animal Suffering Research (WASR) and Utility Farm (UF) are merging together to form a new organization focused solely on wild animal welfare — Wild Animal Initiative. Over the last year, we (Wild-Animal Suffering Research and Utility Farm) have become increasingly aware that our work overlaps significantly, and that our values are well aligned. Because of this, a merger seemed like the natural next step for our organizations. We drafted a merger plan, sought feedback from our teams and external members of the EAA community and our respective Boards. All were broadly supportive of our decision. This new organization will be better suited to coordinate research and academic outreach, and incorporates lessons that have […]

This evaluation looks at our progress during the second six months (“T2”) of 2018 and assesses the extent to which our activities have allowed us to make progress towards our strategic goals. As our team worked very few hours during this evaluation period, this document is considerably briefer than our previous evaluation.

This evaluation looks at our progress during the first six months (“T1”) of 2018 and assesses the extent to which our activities have allowed us to make progress towards our strategic goals. It also includes our most significant mistakes and issues as well as our priorities for the second six months (“T2”) of 2018.

Studies show that backyard bird feeding may lead to disease transmission. Over two years of a study, fed birds were more likely to experience transmissible diseases than unfed birds were.

This is the first of a series of posts exploring how different ethical systems affect how people should react to wild-animal suffering.

There is one simple action any cat or dog owner can do to help wildlife and the environment at the same time: keep their animals inside.

In mid-April, we ran our first online Q&A. The goal was to give our audience an opportunity to ask questions they had about our work, strategy, plans and mission.

A “crucial consideration”-- a term invented by Nick Bostrom-- is a piece of evidence that radically changes the value of pursuing a particular intervention or focus area.

The level of low-frequency ambient noise in the open ocean has doubled every decade since the 1950s; this increase in noise levels is primarily anthropogenic, associated with transportation, development, and resource extraction.

Seafood replacements products (which include plant-based products or those made from cell culture) are gaining popularity and traction across the world. Fish, meanwhile, are the most numerous vertebrates killed by humans.

We estimate we can use up to $161,205 for the next 18 months in additional funding to continue and expand our research.

The Wild-Animal Suffering Research (WASR) project is fundraising for 2018. This post outlines our plans for next year. If you’d like to support our work, help us fill our room for more funding.

A look back at our progress in 2017.

In the next two to three years, I intend to write a series of papers summarizing the evidence about a handful of broad areas of intervention into wild-animal suffering.

Wild-animal suffering is a problem of immense proportions. Unfortunately, we do not currently have viable large-scale solutions to it.

My personal interest in wild-animal suffering (WAS) research, and in spreading knowledge about WAS, is mostly in assessing existing wild-animal suffering.

Many people in the wild-animal suffering space think it would be a good idea to make a discipline of “welfare biology”.

Many people argue that suffering predominates in nature. A really simple form of the argument, supported by people like Brian Tomasik, is what one might call the argument from life history.

I sometimes see people claiming very confidently that wild-animal welfare is completely intractable and there are no cost-effective interventions we can do to improve wild animals’ welfare.

We’re very excited to announce that the Wild-Animal Suffering Research project has just launched its new website.