Some animals in the world are treated badly, and vegans do not want to be a part of that. They do not use animals for food, clothing or fun. This is good for the animals, our health, and the environment.

Vegans are vegetarians. Some vegetarians eat cheese, eggs, honey, and drink milk. Vegans eschew all animal products.

However, vegans like plant-based foods, such as fresh vegetables, beans, grains such as rice, fruits and nuts. There is some delicious vegetarian fare out there, in restaurants and supermarkets, just waiting to be sampled.

Vegan is Love: Having Heart and Taking Action written and illustrated by Ruby Roth, 2011

Clothing - Fur, feathers, scales and animal skins are beautiful on the animals that they belong to.

Animal testing - You can buy cleaning materials that were not tested on animals and contain no animal ingredients. Animals that are used to test shampoos, soaps, etc. oftentimes get sick and die.

Zoos can be boring places for animals that do not truly replicate the experience of living in the wild.

Marine parks - Whales are social animals who live in pods in the wild. Living in captivity can be an isolating experience for them.

Circus - In the circus, animals often spend most of their lives in small cages, and they may be beaten into doing tricks.

Racing - Many animals are injured or killed in this sport. The training of race horses begins before their bones are sufficiently developed to withstand the stress of the strenuous workouts.

Hunting - There is nothing brave about slaughtering animals for fun.

Bullfights and Rodeos - People should not use animals as toys. It hurts horses to have painfully tight bucking straps on them, in more ways than one. They think that cougars may have jumped on their backs and are attempting to kill them. That is why the horses continue bucking even after the cowboys have fallen off.

Health - Most animals on the Earth are herbivores. We can be healthy and strong by eating plants. Vegans do not want to kill animals for food.

Pollution - Animal farms create much pollution. Pesticides can make us sick, and they can kill other animals as well when they leak into the water supply.

Organics is more sustainable method of agriculture for us.

World Hunger - Feeding grain to animals that are to be killed for food is grain that is not utilized to feed the people of the world.

Forests - Trees can be cut down to create cattle farms, which also decimates the wildlife that lived in the forests.

Oceans - Fishing has killed many of the fish in the sea.

Arctic - A cooler and less polluted planet will cause the ice in the Arctic and its wildlife to stay.

What We Can Do

1. Adopt a pet from a shelter, not a breeder or pet store.
2. Write letters to businesses and politicians to protect animals.
3. Recycle plastics, reuse materials, and reduce the amount of waste that you produce.
4. Donate or collect money to support saving the environment and animals.
5. Do not buy clothing made from animals, eat animal products or pay for animal entertainment. 

I was inspired to write this blog by my brother, who recently created a fantabulous vegan web site, VeganDandy.com.

This book is beautifully illustrated by the author, with a different color scheme for each subject. However, she does tend to anthropomorphize the animals a bit. Many nonhuman animals do not have as many facial muscles as humans, and her animals have surprisingly human-like facial expressions. 

• Vegan Action
• Vegetarian Resource Group's "Veganism in a Nutshell"
• Vegan Dandy 
• Books about veganism
• Books about vegetarianism