Pet Rescue in Australia
This article is mostly relevant to Australian readers of this blog. That said, it is about a terrific idea to help pets and perhaps I can suggest that if you are reading this article in a country or area that does not have a similar service; that you consider what you might do to encourage or assist formation of a similar thing.
Currently tens of thousands of healthy pet animals are executed at various pounds or so called “shelter” type places across Australia. Not all such places participate in what is euphemistically called “euthanasia” however it is a common practice for dealing with “excess animal stock”. If in doubt, ask.
Personally I would never take an animal to meet its executioner and wrote an article about the issue in May of this year:
Why you should be careful where you take stray cats & dogs.
Executed and executioner are strong evocative words. Frankly I am fed up with the way the issue is clouded by sanitized words that tend to obscure the truth. Better I think to call a spade a spade. Can you imagine going to work in a job where you have to batch process death? I wonder if they line them up, or if they take them into the “chamber” one at a time? Next!
The simple math is that local councils (local government for non Australians) see unwanted cats and dogs as an issue which is solved by carrying out mass executions. They do not have the resources to house or rehome all the animals and cannot let them loose either. Yet, not all councils require mandatory desexing (except for exempt categories). To me that would seem a sensible first step.
Another cause of the “oversupply” problem is that animals today are often seen as a commodity, a household extra, whimsical purchase, fancy Christmas/Birthday/Wedding present, consumer product or a fashion item. Often easily disposed of at the local (death) shelter when moving home to a place where they can’t have pets for example (just get a place where you can have pets, or find some other way of re-homing your pet you creeps). Many unit complexes (low to medium level blocks of flats/condos – close density dwellings) or high-rises (tower blocks of flats/condos) do not allow pets in Australia, even cats and little dogs are banned. Ironically, values of these places would likely increase if they allowed pets because demand would rise significantly!
Recently I attended my vet Gold Coast Vet Surgery for an FIV vaccination (for the cat, not me!) and noticed a laminated poster created by the vet practice for re-homing a cat. The cat had been brought in to be killed by its distraught owner because she had been discovered with an unauthorized pet by the “Stasi” at her residential complex. The vet refused to kill the cat and instead went to a lot of trouble (including medical treatment) at his own expense to re-home it. I take my hat off to him.
Then there are the acts of unspeakable cruelty which are a regular and common occurrence in Australia, perpetrated by anyone from teenagers to grown middle aged men. I even know of a man who will try and deliberately run cats over when out driving, if he can.
Further reading:
The dogs dumped because they didn’t go with the sofa
Today I was very pleased to come across Pet Rescue. PetRescue is working with “animal shelters” to try and reduce the scale of deaths. Their About PetRescue page states that “every year over 160,000 unwanted pets are killed in Australia.”
PetRescue is a not-for-profit organisation which finds new homes for abandoned or unwanted pets. PetRescue is the largest online searchable directory of rescue pets in Australia and to date they have saved nearly 30,000 animals!
So, if you love animals head on over to the PetRescue site now and check it out.
If you are a webmaster, or own a website, please consider some of the suggestions on the PetRescue “Link To Us” page. Check out an example on my own business and personal website Cats page – scroll to bottom to view PetSaver widget.
Addendum 16th Dec 2008
At last…the RSPCA is planning to tell it how it is:
RSPCA to stun animal lovers in advertising blitz
Related Posts:
Category: Animal Welfare
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