The veterinary treatment crisis goes on...

Wood Green Animal Shelters are trying to publicise the dire situation of animals whose owners have no means of paying for necessary treatment:

Wood Green, The Animals Charity is being forced to turn away more than 14 pets in need of veterinary care every week because their owners have neglected to insure them.

The Charity is receiving daily requests to treat issues including broken legs, jaws, ear infections, skin disorders and dental problems of dogs, cats and rabbits because pet owners cannot afford the treatment.

We had a call this morning from someone in Sawtry (sadly well outside our clinic catchment area) who'd been given our details by Wood Green in the desperate hope that we could do something to help them, and another request via the shelter for help with neutering.

A collie was abandoned at another vet, almost certainly because her owners knew they couldn't possibly pay the cost of her treatment.

Personally I am haunted by some of the calls I've received where owners beg and plead for us to help their pets.

The bottom line is that we can't put the existence of our clinic at risk to help people who could have saved their pets by taking the minimal action of getting them registered and therefore making them eligible for low-cost out of hours treatment from our own veterinary provider.

Our of hours emergency treatment at private vets is now hugely expensive and we simply cannot currently afford even the comparatively small (£100-£150!) cost of emergency euthanasia if we're going to end up paying it two or three times each week.

Before we can consider reinstating help of any kind at private vets we have to raise enough funds to be certain of the clinic's long-term viability, and that means we have to build a proper fundraising team.

If you can help, please email volunteering@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

We're now gearing up for RSPCA week, which is our single biggest fundraising event of the year, when we have permission to collect outside all 7 major Tesco stores in our branch area. Every extra person willing to give a couple of hours to collect means £20-£40 raised to help suffering animals.

Please consider whether you can spare those hours this year.

Reactions to "Pedigree Dogs Exposed: Three Years on"

Pledge 2: saving homeable animals

Mention pet over-population and most people imagine huge numbers of healthy animals being put to sleep. The reality is different; at least in this country.

Animal shelters are under extreme pressure to take in more and more unwanted animals, but a lot of the time this is not straightforwardly because owners have lost interest (or, viewed more charitably, can no longer cope because of changes in their circumstances).

Many strays come into rescue because they are ill or injured and frequently the reason why an owner cannot cope is inability to fund veterinary treatment.

To live up to the pledge of saving all potentially rehomeable animals we do need to reduce the numbers of animals bred and taken on by people who are never going to be able to afford proper care, or who could cope with a few animals but not with five or six. The real crux, though, is to achieve a situation where we can always give owners of treatable pets the option of having them signed over to be treated and rehomed, or support to keep their animals if they are prepared to work with us to pay at least part of the cost.

The Five Pledges: Pledge 1

Please help us to raise funds so that our branch can continue to support this pledge by providing low-cost neutering, micro-chipping and veterinary care to the local community.

Pics from the Newmarket shop's 1st anniversary

Unfortunately Chief Inspector Mark Thompson was called away to an incident so was unable to attend the anniversary. However the customers, staff and volunteers thoroughly enjoyed it, including a fantastic cake baked by a local confectioner's shop.

This was the first time I'd had an opportunity to see the shop in action and I was very impressed by the way Lorna and her team have made use of every inch of sales space. This is essential as the Market St. shop has lots of storage in its basement, but a very compact sales area which depends on keeping a constant flow of items to fill up as donations are sold.

The cake!

Newmarket shop's first birthday

Our shop at 10A Market Street, Newmarket opened on 14th February a year ago, and the shop manager and volunteers will be holding a celebration on the anniversary next week. 

Our local Chief Inspector, Mark Thompson, cut the ribbon for us when the shop opened, and he will be there again to mark a year's successful fundraising.

Please go along if you can to support everyone who put so much effort into keeping the project running.

The official celebration will be at 10.30 (with cake!) but your presence (buying lots of things!) will be valued throughout the day.

MANY HAPPY RETURNS, NEWMARKET!

Tacking!

As a footnote to the previous post, take a look at this list advertising Shar Pei pups for sale. Scan down the list looking for "Tacking".

Then ask yourself how we ever got to a situation where it's considered normal to breed puppies who need their facial skin held out of their eyes by tacking it as if someone was taking up the hemline of a skirt.