Consider the Source

Welcome to Consider the Source, a public education resource that is designed to provide you with useful and reliable information about animals!

Although you may never have considered the issue, the availability of sound information about animals is a scarce commodity in urban America today. While nearly everyone depends on animals for key aspects of their lives - for food, medical advances, companionship, recreation, assistance, education, entertainment and clothing -  Americans know very little about the husbandry issues their rural ancestors took for granted. This makes the public susceptible to all kinds of misinformation about the animals in our lives.

The sad reality is that where animal issues are concerned, propaganda dominates popular culture today, a situation that leads individuals and lawmakers to make bad decisions about a host of diverse issues ranging from wildlife management, to pet selection and personal dietary choices.   

And the misinformation comes in many forms:

• Personal beliefs, biases and attention-grabbing stories passed on as fact and promoted by the media for ratings;
• Pseudo scientists promoting dogma as scientific recommendations;
• Marketing campaigns that provide an unbalanced view aimed at selling a product, service or cause; and
• Fundraising campaigns that require distortions to manipulate emotions, create guilt, generate donations, and more.

Our mission is colossal; this is not something that can be accomplished overnight, but stick with us and watch us grow. If you like what you see, join in by contributing new information we can share.

Please stay tuned as we develop this resource.

We're starting small with a consumer guide for selecting the right family dog and will add information as we go along on subjects as diverse as dietary choices, livestock production, animal welfare, rangeland management, hunting and fishing issues, and more.