Baby prarie dogs have become increasingly common in the last year or two in pet stores as the latest exotic pet. Though some are raised in captivity, many are still removed from the wild to meet the demand and also to help turn PD-ridden fields into profit.
The Center for Disease Control is concerned that an outbreak of the rare but potentially fatal if untreated tularemia, or 'rabbit fever' could be spread through the animals after the deaths of wild caught animals at a Texas facility were traced to tularemia.
Prarie dogs from that distributor have been sent across the United States and overseas, so the CDC cautions anyone handling sick or dead prarie dogs in the last few weeks contact their local health department to determine if treatment is nessisary. Tularemia is very rare in the US and is usually caught by people handling wild rabbits. It is not trasmitted from humans to humans.

Now that we know that we're going to have a con this year, we can move forward with other things, such as the shirt preorder. You can take a look at Marci's unusual design here and follow the
link from there to the preorder form. We will be doing a Special Edition violet shirt again this year, which will be available via preorder only, so if you want one, now is the time! We must RECEIVE your preorder, with payment, by the end of this month, August 31st.

Being a bird brain has all but lost its sting in light of the most recient discovery in avian intellegence.
Previously, scientist had seen birds using problem solving to get food, and even tools (ravens, woodpeckers, and vultures all have done it) but now they've seen crows not merely using a ready made tool from the environment, but CREATING hooks to get food. This is not merely in the lab. In the wild, New Caledonia crows have been seen to make two different sorts of hooks to snare food, even with no previous exposure to someone bending a wire into a hook. Avians have shown again and again a propensity for calculating spacial relationships, understanding symbols and even, in the case of parrots, constructing and communicating in a verbal language that humans can understand.
Chimpanzees and other non-human primates, on the other hand, have never shown any indication of spontanious modification of an item to create a specialized tool.

1. Info From the Head MadHatters

Summer is in full swing and we couldn't have had a better turn out at our
annual picnic! Over a hundred attendees! FC hosts an annual picnic in the
San Francisco Bay Area each year to give fans that extra bit of fun and
community. From canoeing to horseback riding, our new location had it
all. In addition we tried something new for us, a Furry Campout.
Revolving around the picnic, one day on each side, campers enjoyed the
local outback as well as we could rough it only 30 minutes from Silicon
Valley. Nearly 40 furs enjoyed stories by the campfire and sleeping under
the stars. It was a hit! Many thanks to those who attended, and those
who couldn't make it ... there is always next year!

FC busted out their wares at AC again. Many thanks to everyone who
stopped by our table. And many thanks to Uncle Kage for putting on a
wonderful show. It was nice to meet all those new faces, both as first
timers as well as old guard. Many furs dont get the chance to cross the
country for a convention, so it's extra special to make their
acquaintance.

Please take a moment to glance over our Newsletter. We plan on many new
things for 2003 and dont want you to be left in the cold.

Hare's to seeing ya at FC2003, Furries in Wonderland.

Chairo (Lee Strom) - Chairman
Aetobatus (Michael Sawyer) - Vice Chairman

Cats might love mice, but they usually don't love the cats back, for good reason.Auan, a seven year old female cat in Thailand, adopted Jeena, a mouse, when he was a baby. Now she keeps him clean and protects him from threats. Awww!

Conifur Northwest regrets to announce that we are increasing some membership prices. Preregistration (must be postmarked by eptember 20th) will remain at $30. However, at the door memberships will rise to $40, and onattending to attending upgrades will be $25. One-day memberships will be $20 for Friday, $25 for Saturday, and $20 for Sunday.

Good news! Great news, in fact! ConiFur is moving, but only just a few miles down the road to a new hotel. We are very pleased to announce that we will be in the Sheraton Tacoma (www.sheratontacoma.com), located in Tacoma, Washington. The dates are still October 4th-6th, so come on out and visit the great Pacific Northwest!

Polymer chemist William Mallow, inventor of clumping cat litter and co-developer of Liquid Paper, artificially aged Scotch whiskey, and Disney robot dinosaur skin, died Thurdsay at the age 72 in San Antonio. More info via Reuters/Excite

Hi, everyone;

Although the big news right now is our programming schedule, we do have a few other news items to pass along as well.

In an effort to feel like I've actually accomplishing something with my life, I pushed ahead and finished my work from the last few months on updating and finalizing my sociological survey of Furry Fandom. Researched in 1997, 1998 and 1999, Written in 2000 and originally published to the web in 2001, I have finally compiled all my notes, edited my thoughts and put together the essay. It is now open for general viewing at:

http://www.visi.com/~phantos/furrysoc.html

Feral! 2002 is going to be damn cool. How cool -is- 'damn cool'? Oh, that's easy..

Guest of honour: Ginger (Jessica Willard), creator of Falstaff (intolerably cute).

Special guest: Uncle Kage (Dr Sam Kage v2.0 with Mohawk option)

Workshops: art techniques, writing, fursuit construction, sculpting + more.

Activities: Kayaking, wall climbing, swimming, high ropes, nature hikes, campfire sing-alongs, and ritual Teletubby sacrifices. Rargh.

on Saturday Night.. the Feral! Woodland Rave!: DJ Snowwolf, DJ Genki, Slay3r and Chris Pardus.

This isn't just a con.. this is Feral!

Or, if you're a dog person, you've known this all along.

A recent study has shown that dogs are able to do rudimentary math. In an experiement similar to one performed on monkeys, a dog was shown a pile of treats. Then a screen was lowered, obscuring the treats, and the treats were either left along, or a few were taken away. Then the screen was raised.

When a few treats were missing, the dogs stared at the treats for a few seconds longer than they did when the number of treats stayed the same, suggesting that they knew there were fewer treats.

From Radio Comics' website: "As some of you may or may not know, longtime Radio creator Jim Hardiman has been having health problems. Specifically, his diabetes has caused blood clots to form in his eyes. Thankfully, with some management and laser eye surgery, permanent blindness was averted. However, the surgery was very expensive, and like most comic artists, he doesn't have medical insurance. So we at Radio decided to sponsor a benefit book to help Jim with his bills! We asked our best and brightest artists to submit their take on Jim's popular Skunkworks characters and the response was overwhelming! Skunkworks: Reflections was born!"

The rare Dartmoor pony, famous symbol of wild Britain, is up for sale every year at local auctions. But the Freinds of the Dartmoor Hill Pony want the rare breed to go to places where they cost more than just a pint of milk. To popularize and preserve the rare horse, which numbers under 3000, they've started DartmoorHillPony.com to tell people internationally about this marvelous rare breed equine.
So if your parents never let you get a pony when you were little, here's where to look.

Less than three weeks to go until CACE! There are lots of reasons for you to attend CACE - for example, you can wield your powerful US dollar with impunity. (Canadian residents will be happy to hear that CACE will be accepting Canadian currency at par!) But if that's not reason enough, we have some excellent classes and programming lined up this year. Here is a sample to whet your appetite.