Big Thank-You to Shirley Community Nursery & Primary School

Just opened the post at our animal clinic and found a cheque for £203.42 from the Shirley Community School. The children raised it all themselves by selling cakes and biscuits and organising games and competitions, including a production of Oliver Twist.

THANK-YOU!

No-Kill Conference in Washington DC this weekend

The annual USA No-Kill Conference is running this weekend and you can follow it right now on the Pet Connection Blog or on Twitter via the #nokill hashtag.

From the point of view of someone in the UK one very major lesson is how incredibly fortunate we are to be working in a country where 14% pound euthanasia rates for dogs are regarded as something quite shocking instead of one where 30% rates are normal and much higher ones are not uncommon. It would be an absolute tragedy if all the hard work that got us where we are was simply thrown away as a result of combination of infighting, and ego-trips on the part of various people in the world of dogs.

It will be very interesting to compare the findings of the forthcoming Panorama program from Battersea Dogs Home.

Things we can learn:

Some rescue organisations have been successful in rehabilitating dogs seized during investigations of organised dog fighting - although I think there must remain questions about the possible risk to other dogs unless very highly competent, skilled and motivated adopters can be found.

The Internet and social networking can be very powerful tools for recruiting volunteers and spreading information. I'd say they can also be powerful forces for the spread of myths and disinformation: the amount of effort wasted on the "bonsai kitten" website is an example of the way effort can be diverted into "saving" fantasy animals and ignoring the real ones who need practical help right now.

Next Volunteers meeting

Our next volunteers meeting will be on Thursday 19th August at our shop, 61 Burleigh Street, Cambridge. Meetings are from 7.30 to 9.30 pm and are fairly informal, so don't feel you have to stay for the whole time. If you're coming by car, there's free parking after 7pm in the Adam and Eve car park close by.

We use the meetings as an opportunity to raise more funds as well as a chance for you to meet us and for us to meet you, and the shop will be open for shopping during the evening.

If you're interested in the work of the RSPCA but not particularly in charity shops, please still try to come. There are only eight committee members trying to run a branch covering a very large area and it is almost impossible for us to arrange individual meetings with all potential volunteers. Regular meetings make it possible for us to keep you up to speed with what's happening and are the only practical way  to organise fundraising events like our RSPCA week collections. 

It's just not possible for one committee member to drive round to every person to drop off a collecting tin and the only way we can make RSPCA week and other events work for animals is to have a central meeting point where everyone periodically gets together.

Our most immediate need is for more shop volunteers and volunteers to help collect donated items and transport them to the shops. 

We need to raise at least £120,000 each year to run an adequate animal welfare service locally.

Our shops and our animal welfare work

Our 2nd hand bookshop at 188 Mill Road

Some of the comments from visitors to our shops over the weekend made me realise many people don't really know how our fundraising activities relate to what we do locally to help animals.

All the profits from our shops (after we've paid the rent, rates etc.) go to pay the costs of running our animal clinic, providing care for animals that we've had to take in and other work to help animals in the local region.

We need to raise this money because there is no government funding to pay for the work we do.

At the end of each day, the staff and volunteers count up the shop's takings and pay them into the branch bank account. This money is then available to pay bills, such as the charges for boarding animals in kennels before rehoming and from vets for treating injured and sick animals. Fees paid by clinic users are paid into the same bank account and go towards paying the University's charge for providing qualified vets to treat animals at the clinic. We pay roughly half their charges using money we've raised by fund-raising activities such as our shops, and the clinic fees pay the other half. Periodically they send me their bills and I make out cheques to pay them. These are then counter-signed by a second member of the branch committee and posted off to the vets and kennels. I enter up the amounts in a spreadsheet to keep a record of how much we've spent each month and how low our funds are getting.

Last month we spent:

• £1,263 on boarding animals waiting to be rehomed
• £1,702 on veterinary treatments at private vets
• £13,786 on treatments at our clinic

Without the shops to pay part of the cost we would need to increase the clinic fees a lot and that would mean some of the very poorest pet owners probably couldn't afford to use it any more, so it is very important that they make enough profit to support the clinic.

The money we raise is also an essential lifeline for injured animals because it means that vets who have animals whose owner is unknown brought in to them can give at least some treatment rather than always putting them to sleep.

The money we raise isn't sent away to swell some "funds" elsewhere; it's used directly to provide help for animals locally.

Waterboarding Timmy Tiptoes

Rather horrifying to find how many people seem to see nothing wrong with cruelty to squirrels. As usual, Pete Wedderburn the Telegraph columnist, stands up for animals in a well-argued piece.

"Under the law, it’s perfectly legal to kill squirrels: they’re not a protected species. But the squirrels must be killed humanely. The law is absolutely correct in its view that drowning is not humane."

The recent prosecution for drowning a squirrel in fact has little to do with changes to the legal situation brought in by the Animal Welfare Act.

The old Protection of Animals Act (1911) stated:

If any person shall cruelly beat, kick, ill-treat, over-ride, over-drive, over-load, torture, infuriate, or terrify any animal, or shall cause or procure, or, being the owner, permit any animal to be so used, or shall, by wantonly or unreasonably doing or omitting to do any act, or causing or procuring the commission or omission of any act, cause any unnecessary suffering, or, being the owner, permit any unnecessary suffering to be so caused to any animal ... such person shall be guilty of an offence of cruelty within the meaning of this Act.

The concept of unnecessary suffering would have been sufficient to establish the illegality of drowning squirrels instead of killing them humanely (and interestingly there have been no complaints about an almost simultaneous prosecution of two people for drowning a hamster).

It does point up the general confusion over the distinction between protecting animals from suffering and saving animal lives.

At one extreme, I suppose it would be possible to prevent any animals suffering by simply exterminating them all (which I hope no-one would see as something to be welcomed!).

At the other extreme, there are some belief systems which insist on the preservation of life even if it means the continuation of severe suffering.

Some campaigners reject the concept of the RSPCA's Freedom Food scheme, which aims to improve the welfare of farmed animals, because they believe humans should never kill animals for food and that farm animals should not be bred, but allowed either to go feral or become extinct.

Some people think we should have an entirely "open door" policy for RSPCA shelters—if necessary humanely killing animals that have not found homes after a certain period in order to make room for new admissions.

I guess the main practical outcome of all this is firstly that we evidently need to be very cautious about loaning out humane cage traps to anyone we don't know, and secondly that some of the people who would have drowned squirrels may try to put us on the spot by bringing them to us to put down. One of the comments below the Daily Mail article gloatingly promises to trap squirrels and bring them in to RSPCA charity shops; another treat in store for our put-upon staff.

Arguably, by analogy with Freedom Food, we ought to put down squirrels, if garden owners demand this, rather than risk having them killed by even more unpleasant methods. This was certainly the view of early animal campaigners who promoted the use of chloroform to put down unwanted kittens as a better option than allowing them to be killed by drowning. The present-day hangover of that is the way RSPCA clinic euthanasia statistics are recorded (because HQ wanted to know if it was still happening) giving rise to another bonanza for people who want to claim we put down thousands of healthy pets.

I'd much rather see a push for humane methods of control such as immunocontraception, and deterrence but we're not magicians. Some days it seems as though we've not brought the moral feeling of the country very far since the days of Humanity Dick. (Actually I don't think I believe the Quentin Letts article because unless the squirrel in question was ill or very badly injured it wouldn't have let a child get close enough to try to pet it.)

Squirrels are more interesting and intelligent than their reputation would suggest. Did you know they are able to learn by watching the behaviour of other squirrels; something that used to be considered only possible for primates? They're also capable of altruism and have individual personalities.

Access to our shop at 188 Mill Road not affected by road works

If you've been put off from visiting the shop because of the stories about Mill Road being closed, please don't be. Access from the town end of the road is completely unaffected by the works near the Perne Road junction and access from the Cherry Hinton end only needs a short detour via Coleridge road.

View Larger Map

Thoughts on prioritising admissions

Flis, not liking having her photo taken!

Tricky situation yesterday where a gentleman brought a stray cat to  a  local vet expecting that they'd be able to get the cat into a shelter for rehoming. Blue Cross, Cats Protection and Wood Green are all absolutely full of cats. Previously we'd have gritted our teeth and taken him as there's no-where else. However in our current financial state we just can't use funds that are already fully committed to board a cat who doesn't need to be in kennels.

Fortunately the finder was very good about the situation and agreed to take the cat back where he came from and monitor the situation. It's a young, friendly tom, so almost certainly does have a loose association with someone and at least is not going to give birth to kittens at any moment. From a welfare point of view leaving him in situ is really much more satisfactory than keeping him cooped up in a cattery or going down the route of putting down another cat in order to make room. 

Enrique Serra Prints

Two large Enrique Serra prints in very nice heavy wood frames for sale at our charity shop at 61 Burleigh Street.

£80 each or the pair for £150

Branch animal welfare statistics

Clinic use 2008, 2009, 2010

Comparing figures for treatments given at our animal clinic in the first 6 months of 2008, 2009 and 2010 shows there's been a fairly hefty (26%) rise since 2008 (with the rather odd exception of May which seems to have been unusually busy in 2008).

In the first 6 months of this year we rehomed fourteen dogs, thirty-eight cats, four rabbits and six "small furries". 

We provided treatments for 1,373 dogs, 599 cats, 60 rabbits and 29 small furries.

The huge excess of dogs needs explanation as my impression from sitting in my own vets' waiting room is that private vets must see more cats than dogs. I would guess it's partly that our clinic clients are more likely to be retired or unemployed than the general population, so they're more able to look after dogs. Possibly cats are less expensive to have treated at private vets so fewer people feel the need to use a low-cost alternative.

Cricketing Magazines

Back issues of "Cricket Monthly"

Back issues of "The Cricketer"

Our bookshop at 188 Mill Road has a large supply of old cricketing magazines, kindly donated by one of our volunteers.

Regional Board Meeting

Really positive meeting with a lot of discussion on how branches can work together in region East. There are plans to set up a system for coordinating drivers over a wider area than individual branches to make it easier to move animals to centres where they may have a better chance of adoption. This could also be used within branches for transfers between kennels and vets and so on.

Basically the idea is that someone in the Regional HQ office will be given the job of holding a list of volunteers car drivers with details of how far they're prepared to travel and integrating this with the list of available paid drivers from the animal homes and Animal Collection Officers. Branches would still arrange their own routine animal movements within their own areas if possible, but if they were stuck or had a need to transport animals further afield they could contact the office and ask them to try to sort it out. This should minimise the use of AWOs and Inspectors (who shouldn't be taken away from casework and rescues except in dire emergency) and save money by speeding up rehoming and transferring animals from vets' surgeries as soon as they're fit enough to be moved so we're not paying expensive ward charges for animals who don't need it.

Useful information about the new HQ loan scheme for branches who need to fit out or refit shops: it looks as though it would not be a problem for us to open our proposed shop in Newmarket and put in a loan application to do an upgrade later in the year if the timetable worked out that way.

RSPCA governing council have restated their policy against sale of live animals in pet shops; aim is to encourage shops to realise that the real money is in sales of pet food/litter/equipment etc. and that they would not lose by working with rescue groups to promote rehoming rather than increasing the circulating pet population by purchasing animals from breeders for resale.

Discussion of the perennial problems of animals ending up at vets but branches not being told about it until the vet is half an hour away from knocking off for the weekend and wants them moved somewhere else right now. Most of the inspectorate staff will warn branches if they drop off animals, but when a member of the public is asked to take an injured stray to their closest vet for treatment no-one may think to contact the branch. As we're the ones responsible for continuing care after the initial first aid, this is a constant annoyance; to the vets as much as to us.

Cards, wrapping paper ... and singing candles

Many thanks to the generous donor of surplus stock and display units from a gift card shop which closed recently. The rotating units are ideal for our stock of paperbacks, and there are beautiful cards for all occasions at excellent prices.

Paperbacks for your summer reading

Candles that play Happy Birthday to You!

Fantastic cards at bargain prices

All at our 61 Burleigh Street charity shop now. Stock up and never be without a card for that  anniversary that just slipped your memory. 

Every pound you spend keeps our animal clinic running for another five minutes!

Frenetic week

Mare and foal looking for a cool spot under the bridge over the Cam

Took this picture of a mare and her foal looking for somewhere cool last week when I was cycling round all the Cambridge vets to ask them to display our volunteers meeting posters.

We got a reasonable amount of media interest in our appeal for more volunteers and donations to our charity shops, but I still feel there's a level of scepticism about whether we really need money. Answer: "Yes, we really, honestly do need money; we don't have some mystery source of funds and if we don't earn enough to pay our bills we will eventually close."

The volunteer meeting this evening did at least attract a few new people, some of whom are interested in helping in the shops. These have to be the highest fundraising priority at the moment because extra effort spent there immediately translates into more cash.

Holding the meeting at the shop meant we could use it directly as an opportunity to encourage everyone present to browse and buy, and we raised over fifty pounds. 

Next meeting will be Thursday 19th August 7.30-9.30pm.

RIP Snowy

Sad email from Karen who adopted one of our oldies to let us know that Snowy had to be put to sleep last week because she developed untreatable thrombosis as a result of her long-standing heart condition. However, the positive side of this is that Snowy had several years of good life after being adopted by Karen under our Elderly Animals Rehoming Scheme (EARS), whereby we agree to pay part of the cost for age-related problems of older animals adopted from us.

EARS is just another reason why we must manage to increase our income, because without it we couldn't rehome nearly as many older animals, yet if we don't rehome them they're costing money sitting in kennel places that aren't suited to offering the kind of TLC oldies really need.

Beautiful vintage wedding dress donated to our shop

Volunteers Meeting: Thursday 15th July

Next volunteers' meeting will be 7.30-9.30 pm on Thursday 15th July at our Burleigh Street Charity Shop (number 61, next to Primark). If you are coming by car, there is free parking after 7pm at the Adam and Eve Street Car park a few minutes walk away. (Adam and Eve street runs parallel to Burleigh st. and there's a pedestrianised link passage between the two.)

Anyone interested in the work of the branch will be very welcome.

We are particularly looking to recruit more volunteers to help in the shops; collecting donated sales items; fundraising and helping at events.

The Rescue Dog: A Guide to Successful Re-Homing

This is a really excellent little book which explains why rescue organisations have rules on rehoming which may seem needlessly obstructive to would-be adopters. Taking on an adult or nearly-adult dog who may have had bad experiences cannot be the same as starting with a pup who knows no other home than yours.

The authors are possibly a bit over the top about the degree to which rescue dogs are likely to suffer from fearfulness or anxiety — many dogs who need rehoming are stout, cheerful characters who take life in their stride. However it may save lives by helping owners to recognise that their new dog is not being difficult or "challenging" and just needs help to settle in and feel safe.

The Badger (New Naturalist Series)

Just out and indispensable reading if you want to understand the facts behind the debate over badgers.

Another action-packed Saturday, and not in a good way

Day started at 5.20 am with a call from a clinic client whose cat was in labour. At least she was responsible enough to have got the cat registered, so it was possible to ask one of the night-duty vets to give her an advice call back. Judging from my side of the call I think mother cat was probably OK, but I suspect the kitten she'd had trouble delivering probably had some kind of congenital malformation and didn't make it.

Usual morning routine of washing cat dishes and bleaching litter trays, then to the shops to do the banking and on to Arbury Court greengrocer's shop to exchange their collecting tin. THANK-YOU to all the customers and staff who fill it reliably as clockwork every three months!

The view heading towards Arbury over the river

Nearly there when the mobile went off with a caller who didn't know his dog was pregnant until she had puppies two days ago. Two of them had died in the meantime, and the bitch was now so poorly that he didn't think she'd survive the weekend without treatment. Considering that she must have been ill first thing, WHY couldn't he have phoned three hours earlier when our clinic would still have been open? Finally agreed to cover first aid at a private vet (which we'll try to get him to pay back) and told him to get her down to our clinic on Tuesday, if she survives.

Got into the greengrocer and it rang again; this time an elderly gentleman with equally elderly Westie who IS registered at the clinic and had had a fit. Took their details and asked for him to be given a call-back from one of the vets to discuss if she ought to be seen that day as an emergency. Life would be a lot easier if all pet owners were more like him. At least the people in the shop had an opportunity to see their donations in action.

Back for some lunch, then to the shop for the rest of the afternoon. Either Bettina or Anne has used her initiative and produced a home-made A-board to increase our visibility.

Busy putting out more donations to fill up gaps as items sell, but hampered by ongoing phone discussion about a mystery cat with a bad leg, which seems to have been signed over to us for rehoming, but nobody knows why or who authorised this. Unfortunately it looks as though it is definitely Our Problem, so Janine will arrange collection and transfer to the kennels. The bad leg has apparently improved with no treatment other than metacam (for pain and inflammation).

Pretty vase donated to the shop this week

David Grant on Vetpulse.tv on the issue of Status Dogs

"Status dogs are just one part of the general social problems of the inner cities."

Talk given to veterinary students at the University of Nottingham, 20th May 2010

Fly Strike!

No apologies for returning to this horrid subject, but anyone of a sensitive disposition may prefer not to follow some of the links.

Hot and humid weather is perfect for carrion-feeding flies and there are lots of them about. Unfortunately they don't only feed on rotting substances—they will just as happily lay eggs on living animals who have open wounds, sores of any kind, or wet or soiled fur/skin. Rabbits are particularly vulnerable, but any animal which is having difficulty keeping clean or has matted fur will be at risk.

Sadly the rabbit brought to us late on Saturday evening had to be put to sleep because he was too badly damaged by maggots to be saved. Fatal maggot injury can occur within hours of flies laying eggs on an animal, which is why it is so important to check "at-risk" animals twice daily.

There are more details about preventing fly strike in pets and farm animals on the national RSPCA website (not upsetting) and a truly horrible report of a suffering cat in Kent online.

If you find fly eggs or maggots on any animal it is important to contact a vet immediately. Fly attack is a particular problem for rabbits and there are special veterinary products which can be applied to prevent eggs developing into maggots. Ask your vet about this when your bunnies go in for their Spring myxomatosis boosters.

I knew it!

More black propaganda from people who will not have to pick up the pieces if we go under.

When we got the original circular from HQ asking us not to include "beauty" classes in any official RSPCA fun dog shows I must admit I was apprehensive that it could be used against us. Of course if we did run classes where "cute" appearance was the main criterion, that could be used against us too. 

I'm not entirely convinced that the real problem with show dogs is judging by appearance so much as judging by distorted ideas of what is desirable appearance.

This picture is a modern Basset hound. 

This is one from 1915.

The older dog is much less exaggerated and has more normal back legs and less folded facial skin. That's no guarantee that he didn't have ectropion or any of the other ills that plague some  pedigree breeds, but I can't help thinking that selecting for dogs that looked more similar to him would be likely to improve the general fitness of Bassets.

I'm afraid we are seeing a pattern here.

The RSPCA is fundamentally a charity which provides services for animals (welfare law enforcement, veterinary treatment, rehoming etc.) and also campaigns on issues which affect animal welfare.

It's the services which make the campaigns credible: people with frontline experience of animal welfare work are likely to know what they're talking about and people who are putting unpaid effort into practical ways of improving animals' lives must genuinely care about animal welfare. The size and unified nature of the RSPCA probably impresses politicians with the likelihood that we're backed by substantial numbers of citizens with votes, but to some extent that's a secondary consideration.

Because of this credibility, virtually any person or organisation which wants to affect animal issues (whether to achieve change or prevent it) sees the RSPCA as a gatekeeper: government is likely to believe us if we say there really is a welfare problem, but it will also believe us if we say things are more complicated than other animal campaigners think. Many people who genuinely care about animals but have an overwhelming concern for one area, such as animal experiments, or factory farming, see us as the only thing which is stopping them from succeeding, because we're not giving unqualified support to whatever it is they want.

Add on those, like the kennel club, or foxhunters who see us as the organisation with enough clout to stop them going on doing what they like, and the result is that threats to our ability to provide the welfare services are used as blackmail to change the welfare policy. This is the, "I'll never give the RSPCA another penny and I'll tell all my friends unless you .... (abolish fox-hunting, bring back fox-hunting, say pedigree dogs are healthy, say pedigree dogs should be abolished—fill in the blank to taste)" route.

On top of this, we're never going to be able to provide the service level many of the public expect, so we have a constant background of genuine complaints plus spurious ones from people who are aware that the most effective way to strike at the RSPCA is to hit our ability as a service provider. None of this is helpful when we need to recruit volunteers to work at the fairly mundane jobs that are essential to keeping the services going.

More valuable alive — or dead?

Ethan turns out to be Felix!

We took in a ginger cat a little while ago after he was hit by a car and suffered head injuries. When he was fit enough to go to a new home we posted his details in our rehoming gallery. To everyone's delight, his owners recognised his photo and he's now reunited with them.

This shows the benefits of advertising our animals online, and also that, if you've lost an animal, one important avenue to search is local shelters' lists of animals in need of homes. Obviously you should also contact them direct, but a picture is much more easily identified than a description in words.

Anyway, nice to have a happy ending.

Rabbit open day final count

Over 200 people visited the rabbit open day  and the final total raised was £386.10.

This will be put towards supporting veterinary treatment and neutering of rabbits.



As an example of what this amount can achieve, it could:

• Fund 386 subsidised vaccinations at our clinic to protect rabbits against myxomatosis. 

Or

• Allow us to provide 50 veterinary consultations for rabbits at our clinic.

 Or

• Neuter 20 male rabbits at private vets. 

 Or

• Spay 10 female rabbits at private vets.

THANK YOU! to everyone who helped make the day such a success — particularly to Twigs and her partner Steve, but also to all the volunteers who baked cakes and to the local branch of dairycrest who donated cartons of milk and orange juice.


Some more pictures from the open day:

Peaches eating some hay

Hawthorn has climbed up a ramp onto the roof of his sleeping area to keep an eye on the visitors.
 

Masses of roses.

and more...

This shot gives some idea of the true size of the rabbits pens.

And here, with one of the rabbits to give a sense of scale. If you look very carefully you can see her eyes and nose are slightly scarred. This is because she had myxomatosis last year, but survived because she had been vaccinated so had a comparatively mild case of the disease. Without vaccination she would almost certainly have died.

Electric fencing to deter foxes (with unconcerned rabbit just below). The bungee is to stop the rabbits nipping through the fence with their powerful teeth when it is turned off during the daytime and they are let out. The current is not high enough to injure the fox, but just gives enough of a jolt to discourage them from climbing onto the pens and terrifying the rabbits. The pens are made from heavy-duty mesh which a predator would be unlikely to be able to tear.

Closeup of the electric strand. You can just see it running along the bungee.

 Mrs Tiggy-winkle, the bantam, helping to clean up any crumbs.

And more roses...

Pictures from the rabbit open day yesterday

These rabbits are not up for rehoming—they are permanent residents of the garden which Twigs Way kindly opens in aid of animal welfare charities each year.

As you can see from the photos it is a fantastic educational opportunity for the children who visit (as well as lots of fun) because it shows them how much space and effort is needed to keep rabbits properly.

Even visitors who were knowledgeable about rabbits were quite surprised to see how much use they made of all the platforms and ramps inside the runs. Some of the rabbits in the pictures are actually hopping up to ledges at human eye level so that they can make contact with their visitors. The children were given suitable green foods, such as dandelions and milk thistle so they could feed the rabbits healthy treats.

Visualising big numbers

I think one of the reasons why people seem to find it hard to think rationally about the RSPCA is the sheer scale of the numbers.

The National Control Centre takes over a million calls every year.

The national RSPCA's income is just over a hundred million pounds in the same period.

That means roughly £100 is available to deal with each incident. That's just enough to spay a large-ish bitch at a fairly inexpensive vet, to keep her in boarding kennels for 20 days, or to cover the consultation fee for out of hours treatment at an emergency vet. Usually when a dog needs help urgently all three of those will be necessary.

If each call represented a request to take in an unwanted animal there is no way that could be done.

Similarly with donations; which are probably the most likely to take a hit from the "I will never give another penny to the RSPCA and I'll tell all my friends" brigade. The National Society organises door-to-door collections asking donors to set up direct debits. Proceeds from this are split 50/50 between them and the individual branches, meaning each branch gets roughly £12,000 each year—usually representing around 10% of a branch's total income. 

The total amount raised by the collections is just over four million pounds—a very large amount; comparatively small once it's been spread across 174 branches, but a 10% decrease in funding would be a very big blow to a branch.

If the door-to-door fund-raising took a serious hit we'd have to make cutbacks—probably increasing the charges for treatment at our clinic and stopping help for owners who find even our subsidised rates very difficult to afford.

Our clinic treats roughly 2,000 animals each year, which probably represents around 4,000 families in Cambridge and the surrounding area who have their pets registered with our clinic at any one time. That's something like 2% of the population, and losing the clinic would mean extra financial hardship for these local people. Many, possibly most, of them would stop getting routine preventive veterinary care for their pets and just hope for the best until something catastrophic happened.

To give some perspective on the amount of money available to run the RSPCA as a 24/7 service for all of England and Wales:

The proposed NHS efficiency savings in the forthcoming budget would run the whole of the RSPCA for ten thousand years (yes - that's the figure for the savings, not their actual budget).

The Cambridge University's income from former students' donations (relatively small change from their point of view) would run the RSPCA for five thousand years. It has six times as many staff as the RSPCA.

These figures are so big that at some point most people's eyes just glaze over, but without trying to grasp them there's no way to think sensibly about the big animal charities which are providing services to the animal population.

The RSPCA saves 95% of healthy or treatable cats taken in to its shelters. It would be a tragedy if that record was destroyed by people who aren't capable of running the proverbial whelk stall.

AGM results and some thoughts on "governance"

A total of thirteen members attended our branch AGM yesterday, so we were comfortably quorate and everyone standing for re-election to the committee got in. However, thirteen people out of a branch membership of roughly 300 people is really not all that great, and a total membership of 300 isn't ultimately going to be enough to sustain services to 4,000-odd people long-term. Add in the wider population who expect us to be able to help with wildlife casualties, injured strays and so on, and it's just impossibly top-heavy.

The RSPCA is a very democratic charity—if you want to get rid of me, you can vote me out—but it depends on people being willing to participate, put in some work to achieve our goals and accept that majority decisions must be final. The idea of working within a structure of rules puts some people off because they think it's "bureaucratic" but without rules to decide who can make decisions and when a decision has been made the result would be chaos and nothing would ever get settled.

To participate in the decision-making processes of the RSPCA the first requirement is to become a member. Anyone with a genuine desire to help animals may join, although application from someone who wanted to use their membership for an ulterior purpose might be rejected (for example someone who joined in order to reverse the Society's policies against battery farming would have their application refused).

Three months after joining a member is entitled to receive voting papers for National Society elections and to attend their local branch AGM and vote in the election of the branch committee. They are also entitled to stand for election to their branch committee, but are not eligible to stand for election to the National Society's ruling council until they have been members for at least five years.

Branch elections do sometimes result in policy changes (although a lot of the time just getting enough people elected to form a committee is a struggle). Thirty years ago this branch did no rehoming at all, and this was only changed when a group of new people were elected to the committee. What happened wasn't exactly like a parliamentary election as members of both the old group and the new group were elected at the AGM (creating a much larger committee than before), but the new group formed a majority and put through the policy change. This kind of sudden shift is comparatively unusual and most of the time committees gain just a few new individuals each year.

This poses a problem in itself because new members are essential if committees aren't to wind up composed entirely of octogenarians, but being the only person who doesn't understand what's going on can make newly elected members feel the rest are forming a clique to exclude them. If you join a branch, be patient, and don't expect to understand everything immediately. Branches are complicated organisations, handling substantial amounts of money and requiring a lot of sustained work to keep them going. If you join in and help with existing activities you'll find it all gradually falls into place (and you'll have a wonderful command of acronyms—NCC, IET, RTA, RHQ—just like everyone else!)

Spread the word

Download it.

Open garden this weekend!

That Channel 4 programme

Grim shop meeting this evening at 188 Mill Road. It's now long enough since the Channel 4 anti-RSPCA "documentary" to assess some of its impact and donations have been hit significantly. At least one commercial house-clearance agent who regularly gave the shop old books it was too much trouble for him to sell has stopped because he now believes we've got plenty of money and aren't spending it on the animals. The antique centre round the corner in Gwydir st is apparently telling customers not to give to the RSPCA: "because they've got loads of money and don't care about animals".

I'm sure the Channel 4 programme makers thought they were very daring and anti-establishment—it would be daring and anti-establishment to cut NHS funding (after all it's got a million times as much cash as the RSPCA) and just let sick people die, but that wouldn't make it a good idea.

Ironically Dogs Today this month is featuring the Animals Count party as "the political party that wants an NHS for dogs". It would be more useful if they hadn't done their level best to destroy the closest thing to an animals' NHS that exists, although I respect Beverley Cuddy for being willing to allow honest discussion in the comments of her articles.

Reminder: Branch AGM this Thursday

Just a reminder that the branch AGM is this Thursday, 17th June at the Friends Meeting House, Jesus Lane, Cambridge. Meeting starts at 7.30 pm. Anyone interested in the RSPCA is very welcome to attend, but only adult members of the Society can vote in the election of the committee.

If you are a member, please do try to attend as we need to have enough qualified voting members present for a valid election.

Map  below. There is parking close to the hall in the multi-story car park nearby in Park Street.

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Better to light a candle than curse the darkness...

But it is b. annoying when someone is trying to knock the matches out of your hand.

It is truly terrifying that this was apparently written by a fairly senior politician.

He says:

"Now I gather the RSPCA like other animal welfare charities receives no government funding which makes this policy change even more bizarre"

Why is it bizarre that the RSPCA needs to make choices about which animals are in greatest need because we depend on donations and fundraising instead of being able to raise income from taxes?

He says:

"we have had both cats and dogs from their branch at Radcliffe on Trent - and was never happy that they only housed animals for 7 days before putting them to sleep, but now to just shut their doors is shameful."

If he had looked at the Radcliffe's website he would have seen that many of the animals advertised for rehoming had been in their care for many months and the "only 7 days" claim is just not true. If he had bothered to read the main RSPCA website he would have seen that the RSPCA is not "shutting its doors"; we are giving the most needy animals priority so that they are guaranteed a safe place.

He seems incapable of understanding that reducing donations to the RSPCA will mean fewer animals can be helped and he has no idea that the Radcliffe home is run by volunteers, or indeed what a very large part of the RSPCA is run by volunteer trustees who are permanently worried about raising funds to carry on. Judging from his Twitter feed he doesn't see any reason at all why someone like me should be upset—after all I am only a volunteer. He doesn't appear to know or care about the very low-income families who use RSPCA clinics and hospitals for their pets.

 

It's the irresponsible, campaign mentality that's so terrifying. He really does think all he needs to do is to put enough pressure on us and we'll magically do everything he wants out of a bottomless pit of funds. I don't think it much matters which political party is in power—only that the people at the top should have experience of running something productive themselves, not predominantly campaigning.

Branch animal welfare statistics so far this year

Rehomed: 13 dogs, 23 cats, 4 rabbits and 6 miscellaneous animals.

Veterinary treatments given: 1,110 dogs, 505 cats 46 rabbits and 26 miscellaneous animals.

67 dogs and 57 cats neutered, 44 dogs and 52 cats microchipped.

Spitting tacks!

Why do people who can't afford any veterinary treatment choose to keep big dogs and breed from them without making any effort to find out beforehand whether any help is going to be available if things go wrong?

Yesterday our clinic had a phone call from an owner saying his dog couldn't stand up and he wanted one of our vets to go out to see her. The reception staff on duty persuaded him to find someone who could bring her to the clinic and fortunately he managed this before the duty vets were due to leave. It turned out that she had mastitis and high fever, which hopefully can be treated with antibiotics, but if he'd left it any later she'd very probably have died. We don't know the status of her puppies.

It's one thing if an animal has an expensive accident out of the blue, but to breed a bitch knowing that you can't afford to take her to a vet in normal surgery hours if she gets an infection and not make any effort to find out whether there is an RSPCA or PDSA clinic locally, or how to go about registering there, really takes the biscuit.

Re-homing widget

If you click the "get widget" button, you can share the widget on facebook, myspace etc. If you have accounts on any of these, please share it, so that our most recent pics of animals looking for homes are shown as widely as possible. Thank you in anticipation.

Screening prospective adopters

There's a lot of argument about how far rescue organisations should go in screening potential animal adopters. On the one hand, it's possible that good homes might be lost if the procedure drives away prospective adopters who feel it's too intrusive or if the criteria are too rigid. On the other there are a few people who are not "abusive" but who simply will not go along with reasonable safety instructions (such as keeping a new cat indoors for long enough to ensure bonding to a new house, or not letting dogs out in the street alone).

Arguably anyone who is rejected can always go out and purchase an animal, so that being excessively fussy about adopters simply denies homes to animals in need without actually saving any from incompetent owners. I'm not sure this is entirely valid, because owners who couldn't cope with a large adult dog in need of training might well not have any difficulties if they purchased a puppy belonging to a small, docile breed. If they're not capable of understanding that an adult shelter dog won't be bonded to them initially and almost certainly will run off and get lost if they simply let him out in an unfenced garden or off the lead in a public area they may be perfectly fine with a pup who more obviously needs constant attention.

Some animal rescuers may not have ideal personalities to front rehoming drives if they love animals but can't get along with people, or if they're unwilling to accept that adopters may have differing views about some aspects of caring for animals. These are the kind of people who are so obsessed with pet overpopulation and the need for neutering that they absolutely will not rehome a spayed bitch to a home with a resident dog who hasn't been castrated, or who won't believe an adopter might be telling the truth when she says she's arranged a dog-sitter to call in while she's out at work. These same people may well be the ones who are prepared to put in 80 hour weeks for the rescue and it can be very difficult and traumatic to get them to take more of a back seat with rehoming, especially if they genuinely believe that altered policies are going to result in animals they've devotedly cared for being hurt or even killed.

I think we need to discuss what is or isn't reasonable to expect of adopters. It ought to be reasonable to expect them to be normal, good, animal-loving pet owners. It probably isn't reasonable or sensible to insist that they love animals as much as those of us who've re-arranged our lives to a frankly bonkers extent in order to care for them. So, it probably is reasonable to insist that adopters should keep up vaccinations and either insure their pets or be in a position to register for treatment via the RSPCA, PDSA or Blue Cross. It isn't reasonable to insist that they should be willing to spend all their savings on veterinary treatment.

If you think a rescue organisation has unreasonable adoption policies and want to get them changed, please do a bit of research before you start.

• Are the policies actually being set by the organisation's governing body, or is a single individual being unreasonable or excessively rigid?
• Do you know for sure that lots of adopters are being rejected for no good reason, or are the complaints from isolated people?
• Does the organisation actually have suitable animals available? It may be that adopters are being turned away simply because they want a particular type (e.g. poodle) and the rescue doesn't have any.
• If you volunteer your help to improve the rate of adopting, is it accepted?

If you just dive in and start a public campaign to force the organisation to change its policies you may be doing harm by discouraging adopters and you will certainly put everyone in the organisation on the defensive. If you are wrong and the organisation isn't being unreasonable about the people it screens out, you will have diverted effort that should have been spent helping animals into countering your campaign.

The PEDIGREE Adoption Drive website includes a neat "Dog Adoption Tool" which encourages potential adopters to think through what kind of dog would fit their lifestyle.

Cheering news all round

Still short of cash but animal related things are looking up a bit. The rottie who was vomiting blood stayed in overnight on a drip and hopefully will be fit enough to go home tomorrow. Being a sizeable adult she's got much more reserves to draw on than a tiny puppy would. 

Her owner spontaneously phoned to thank us for our help and to make arrangements to pay us back, so I'll forgive him for being a royal pain for much of the morning texting me at work to find out how she was. The branch contact phone is my own mobile and while I'm at work I switch it over to our chairman who works from home so isn't disturbing other people if she takes RSPCA-related phone calls. Unfortunately this only works for voice calls, not texts, so I still get the occasional  RSPCA client whose finances are in such a state that he doesn't have enough credit on his phone to make voice calls. It's quite difficult for people to understand that the branch is run by volunteers who have their own livings to make and that we're not actually inside the veterinary hospital, so we can't give updates on animals by popping down and taking a look at them and we don't have time for hugely involved conversations.

From a personal point of view, the other major good news is that Fern's biopsy results came through today and her thyroid tumour isn't malignant. She's still got a combination of problems which will mean she'll have to be on medication for the rest of her life, but anything more drastic seems to be out at least for the moment.

Poorly rottie

Absolutely fantastic, but exhausting, flat clearance, which we finally completed at 10pm today. I just hope I am as mentally alert at 90 as the gentleman who previously owned it, as he obviously kept up his varied interests right up to the point where he went into hospital with his final illness. His collection of books and DVDs will keep both the Cambridge shops well-stocked for several months at least.

Much less welcome was a series of increasingly frantic phone calls from the owner of a rottie bitch registered at our clinic and suddenly very ill with vomiting and diarrhoea containing blood. He lives about half an hour's drive from Cambridge and doesn't have a car or any money. The lack of money was fairly moot given that no taxi firm is likely to be happy to transport a large vomiting dog. Getting a vet out to him on a Sunday would have been astronomically expensive, and probably not a solution as the dog was ill enough to need inpatient treatment which would be even more astronomically expensive done privately.

Finally organised the Pet Taxi to drive the dog to our emergency care provider on the promise that the owner will pay us back by installments. 

I do wish potential pet owners with no funds would consider the charms of the Jack Russell! At least they are portable and the majority have cast iron stomachs capable of digesting the most horrible things.

So, enormous gratitude to the family whose generosity gave us so much stock to raise the funds we so badly need today.

Another injured stray

Royston Vet Centre have just phoned to let me know that an injured stray cat was taken in to them last night on an RSPCA National Control Centre log number. He's got a broken leg and jaw, but they think the injuries are at least several days old as he's coping well and eating ravenously in spite of the jaw injury.

They scanned him for a chip and found one, but it looks as though the owner may have moved and not updated the record as there's been no response to any of the landline, mobile or email contact registered in the PetLog database. For the moment we'll have to treat him as an ordinary unowned stray and organise continuing care and fracture repair via our clinic. The Royston vets have kindly volunteered to contact other local vets in their area in case he's been transferred to another practice or possibly rehomed to another owner.

If your pets are chipped, please remember that it's essential to update your details if you move or change your mobile or email providers. If you're going on holiday for a significant length of time and leaving the cat to be fed by neighbours make sure you remain contactable in an emergency.