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ESSENTIAL DESTINATIONS

MONTH: September 2007

Obituaries

 

Marjorie Goodness Kelley, 59, on August 4, 2007 "was on her Harley motorcycle, turning into her driveway, when a car struck and killed her," e-mailed White Mountain Animal League president Mickey de Rham, who credited Kelley with naming the League. "Marge was a board member and co-founder of WMAL in 1989," de Rham wrote. "For someone who promotes spay/neuter, I greatly admired Marge as a dog breeder. She had started a book about Apple, a red Doberman bitch, who was really something. I wish that book could have been finished. I just found out," de Rham added, "that Marge was writing a tribute to Bossie, our 'Old Man of the Mountain' cow, spokescow for the WMAL, ,who was euthanized shortly before she herself died." De Rham acquired Bossie, noted for markings resembling the "Old Man of the Mountain" rock formation that is the New Hampshire state symbol, at about the same time the White Mountain Animal League was formed. She was subject of a children's book, Hey Bossie, You're A Spokescow, by de Rham, illustrated by Leigh Gusterson, published in 2004 to benefit WMAL.

Rocky Spencer, 55, carnivore specialist for the Washington state Department of Fish & Wildlife, was killed on September 8, 2007 when he walked into a helicopter rotor while helping to move bighorn sheep from the Yakima River canyon. Wrote Ralph Thomas of the Seattle Times, "Cougars and black bears were his latest specialty. His job was to find ways to prevent them from coming into conflict with humans. What he and fellow researcher Brian Kertson were finding is that cougars are in our midst--hunting, mating and raising their young--far more often than we ever imagine. While some may find all of this alarming, Spencer and Kertson saw it as proof that, with proper precautions, cougars and humans can and do coexist without much trouble. Spencer and Kertson examined about 150 cougar kill sites," Thomas wrote. "Spencer said what they saw was that pets and livestock made up less than 2% of cougar prey in their study area. Mostly, he said, cougars feed on deer and smaller critters, such as raccoons and rabbits--animals often drawn to the suburban fringes by backyard gardens, garbage, and feeders. One surprise to the biologists was how often cougars feast on beavers."

 


Robert Henry Degroot, 67, died of cancer on September 16, 2007, his wife Carolyn notified ANIMAL PEOPLE. Degroot was a frequent contributor of information to ANIMAL PEOPLE for nearly 15 years. A former naval officer and retired IBM employee, Degroot founded the Maryland Alliance for Greenway Improvement and Conservation, after many years of involvement with the Sierra Club and a variety of environmental coalitions. He campaigned on behalf of protecting wildlife habitat and attracting wildlife to backyard habitat, and opposed wind power because of the toll that wind turbines often take on birds and bats, but his deepest interest was in establishing wildlife corridors. As Nathaniel H. Axtell summarized of one of Degroot's conference presentations in 2001, "He dreams of a day when eastern cougars can travel unimpeded by development from the mountains of Pennsylvania into the Maryland hill country and across the spine of Appalachia into Virginia and West Virginia-all without leaving the protection of forest." Degroot also dreamed of a day when coyotes would be properly appreciated and respected. "I hope the public officials responsible for killing these animals make a real effort to educate themselves, and learn why the coyote is important to our environment," he wrote in 2005. "In lieu of flowers the family requests that donations be made in Bob's name to the Humane Society of the U.S.," Carolyn Degroot said.