RSPCA Bookshop 188 Mill Road

Bookshop at 188 Mill Road re-opening with great offers for students

20% discount on production of student card. Lots of books and also great posters and prints to cheer up your room.

Thank-You!

To the Friends of Histon Recreation Ground who collected £43.18 for us at their dog show. Much appreciated.

Bookshop at 188 Mill Road

This is a bit of an experiment. The bookshop is now taking "want" requests for books, so if you're looking for a favourite out of print author (or simply a cheaper 2nd hand copy of an expensive text), fill in the details to let us know and we'll keep an eye out for it as new donated stock comes in.

The permanent location for the form will be at www.rspcabookshop.co.uk/wantlist.html

Where our funds come from

Where the money goes

Branch photo mugs now available

£5 per mug. Available from our shop at 61 Burleigh Street now and shortly at 156 High Street, Newmarket and 188 Mill Road, Cambridge. These are a trial fundraiser and if they sell we'll have more printed with different photos of animals rescued by the branch

Bookshop closed for a week

Our 2nd hand bookshop at 188 Mill Road will be closed for a week from Monday 14th September for stock reorganisation. Re-opening Monday 21st September.

Volunteers wanted for Jumble Sales

Now that the Cambridge shops are fully up and running we are looking for volunteers to help us run a monthly jumble sale for items that are saleable but not good enough to go out in the shops. These will probably be held at Mill Road Baptist church, which is just a short way from our shop at 188 Mill road so there will be no need to use a vehicle to move the sales items.

We need:

• Someone willing to act as co-ordinator and deal with putting out posters, booking the hall, making sure enough people are available to staff the sales stalls and generally make sure that the burden of organisation doesn't fall on the busy shop staff.
• Strong people willing to carry stuff from 188 to the hall.
• Strong-minded people to staff the tables (jumble sales are vicious events!)

If you might be able to help, please email camshop@rspcabookshop.co.uk

Fantastic Saturday for E61

Andrew and his team of volunteers have worked like trojans this week and Saturday was their best result yet. We can now be confident that the branch investment in E61 is going to pay off in terms of providing a reliable regular income stream to fund our animal welfare work.

As we took on the lease towards the end of one of the three monthly rent periods, a full three month's rent falls due at the end of one month's trading, so money will be tight until October, because we don't want to draw on the Co-Op bond fixed-term investment and lose interest. After that, provided we can keep building on this wonderful start, we will have enough secure income to fund our animal clinic and boarding of rescued animals.

THANK YOU to everyone who worked so hard to make this possible, particularly to Andrew, Fiona, Wayne, Sharon and Ed. (and to all Claire's children who cheerfully gave up their Sunday morning to help move tons of "stuff" out of the basement at 188).

Rabbits!

Caroline who runs the Rabbit Residence has sent out an urgent appeal for homes as she needs to reduce her numbers to a more manageable level. Caroline works full time as a care assistant and runs the Residence in her spare time, so she really needs to get a speedy turnaround of bunnies who are fit and don't need special care, in order to be able to concentrate on the ones who need nursing. She also needs to keep rabbit numbers within the limits specified by Rabbit Residence's planning permission.

To view most of the rabbits now available for adoption from Rabbit Residence, go to the Rabbit Rehome website.

Animal welfare statistics for August

Not a brilliant month for rehoming as so many people are away on holiday, so only 3 cats, one dog and a guinea-pig placed, although several animals are reserved and should go out in September.

24 dogs, 25 cats and 2 rabbits were neutered and veterinary treatment was given to 270 dogs 151 cats and 26 rabbits. Treatments for the month were 90 animals up on August last year, possibly because of the credit situation, but more likely because of the general increase in the cost of treatment at private vets.

The case of the cat dumped in a box

I'm still wondering whether this was a bizarre practical joke or what.

At about 12.30 am on Saturday morning I had a call from the duty nurse at the Vet School to say they'd been phoned by someone with an injured cat claiming to have been told to contact them by the RSPCA National Control Centre.

This was odd in itself, because the University out of hours emergency number isn't available to members of the public; normally someone who found an un-owned injured cat would be told to take the cat to the nearest available private vet and that the RSPCA would pick up the cost of emergency first aid. The owner of an animal already registered with our clinic would have the branch mobile contact number on their registration card and is supposed to phone that, not the NCC nor the Vet School.

Neither the nurse nor I were at our best and brightest after being woken at that time of night, but we agreed that I should phone the cat's finder and the NCC to try to find exactly what was going on and how badly injured the cat was. If the owner wasn't known, there wasn't any way to find out whether the cat herself was registered with the clinic, so she'd have to go to a private vet in any case if she was in too much of a bad way to wait until the regular session on Saturday morning.

After midnight the surcharge on vet's fees goes up to £140 round here, so I was not a happy bunny. I phoned the caller first and established that he'd found the cat tied up in a cardboard box beside the road. He'd decided to call the RSPCA because she was limping and not interested in food or drink and was calling all the time, but she didn't really sound to me as though she was in such a desperate state as to justify spending the cost of a minor operation to get her seen immediately rather than in 8 hours time. I tried to explain this to the caller, who clearly wasn't happy about it, but left him with a promise that I'd contact the NCC again on his behalf and definitely arrange for the cat to see a vet even if not right now this minute.

Meanwhile the cat really was kicking up a racket in the background - sounding in fact suspiciously as if she was "calling" as in "on heat" rather than because she was hurt. Assuming the story about finding her in a box wasn't a leg-pull, being in season could explain why she was dumped if someone couldn't or wouldn't pay to get her spayed.

Phoned NCC as I was beginning to be suspicious that the cat finder had actually called some other organisation who were aware that the Vet School provide the inpatient care for our clinic and that was how he'd come to get their number. They didn't have any record of a call from the finder's address that night and confirmed to me that they would definitely have passed a call about a cat being dumped in this way to an inspector (an offence has clearly been committed) even if they'd advised the caller that they wouldn't be able to arrange for someone to pick the cat up before daylight.

I then phoned the finder back to see if he could confine the cat until morning so that one of us could take her to the clinic, only to discover she'd jumped out of the box, escaped out the front door, jumped the garden fence and legged it into the darkness. I suspect the final upshot will be a phone call a couple of months down the line about a stray cat having kittens in someone's garden.

1st Saturday at Emporium 61

Emporium 61 on its first Saturday's trading. It will look more "RSPCA-like" once we've got planning permission for the permanent sign to replace the rather weedy temporary one and finished the displays inside.

Until we've recruited more volunteers and a deputy manager, opening times will be:

Monday: closed

Tuesday: 10.30 — 5.30

Wednesday: 11.30 — 6.30

Thursday: 10.30 — 5.30

Friday: 10.30 — 5.30

Saturday: 10.30 — 5.30

Sunday: 12 — 4.00

Andrew and his team have now got the back room into shape and would be delighted to receive incoming donations. If you need to drop off something by car, please phone the shop on 01223 312 802 and they will arrange for you to unload at the back of the shop (from Paradise street). Good bric-à-brac, ornaments etc. are all very welcome as well as clothes.

Please, please DO NOT use dog flea treatments on cats

Ten minutes to midnight and wide awake after taking a call from the emergency 24 hour vet who has a client with no money whose cat is having seizures after being treated with over the counter flea powder intended for dogs. Treatment costs are likely to amount to several hundred pounds, all from an attempt to save the £10-20 it would have cost to get a safe and effective anti-flea preparation from a veterinary pharmacy.

The video below is from the Vetstoria site and gives more information about permethrin insecticide poisoning in cats.

Stray cats again: MICROCHIP!

Some of the most difficult situations we face happen because we don't have any way to find out the medical history of animals brought in because they appear ill or injured. Obvious traffic accidents are relatively straightforward, but it is much more difficult where the animal found is ill rather than injured. Even apparent injuries may not be what they seem, as it is possible for a bleeding tumour to appear like a partially healed and infected wound.

These are the other side of the debate about euthanasia; if you trawl the web you will find lots of people accusing the RSPCA of putting down animals who might have been saved, but very little discussion of the potential for suffering if we wait too long.

Nowadays, many vets don't have their own facilities for keeping inpatients over weekends and it is difficult and expensive to keep a terminally sick animal brought to us on a Friday for a reasonable length of time to give their owner a chance to locate them. If an animal has obviously hopeless injuries such as a broken back, there's no doubt that euthanasia is the right decision; the cases that keep us awake at night are the ones that might have a long-term condition that's normally controlled by medication.

My own cat, Fern, is a perfect example of what might have happened if she hadn't been chipped. She is epileptic, but her seizures are well controlled so long as she has tablets morning and evening. A couple of years ago, she wandered off and, after two weeks without medication, she was continually fitting. She was very fortunate that someone saw her and took her straight to a vet, who was able to scan her chip, identify where she lives and what medication she needs.

If we're asked to help a stray having fits with no knowledge of any previous history or way to find their owner, then the prospect is much more bleak. Seizures are a symptom that can be caused by a variety of things, some treatable, some hopeless, and it's difficult for a vet to make a sensible treatment plan even without the problem of providing long-term hospitalization if that's what's needed. (If an animal with an owner has a fit at least the vet will usually know whether the animal ever had one before and how old it is).

If you have a cat or a dog with a long-term health problem, please treat this as an urgent reason to get them chipped.

Some pics from the preview evening

The carrier bags were actually hand-printed by some of the volunteers to a design by Andrew, our shop manager.

 

 

 

 

Opening date for Emporium 61

Emporium 61: our new charity shop at 61 Burleigh Street, Cambridge CB1 1DJ will open for business at 10.30 am on Friday 21st August. We hope you will think it has been worth the wait.

E61 will focus on high-quality vintage/retro fashion, kitsch, collectibles and accessories. A veritable Aladdin's cave.

Raising funds and awareness for the RSPCA Cambridge & District Branch.

The phone number for the shop is 01223 312 802.

View Larger Map

Our bookshop at 188 Mill road will continue to improve its offerings of second-hand and antiquarian books, prints and music now that more of its storage space is available to dedicate to shelving.

If you live closer to Newmarket, why not visit our wonderful shop at 156 the High Street.

Very nearly there...

The map below shows how to get to our new charity shop: "Emporium 61". Burleigh street is pedestrianised, but there's ample parking in the Grafton Centre car park if you're coming from outside Cambridge.

If you're planning to drop off donated items and need to unload from a car, you need to go to the unloading area in Paradise Street which runs parallel to Burleigh Street. If you're using a satnav device that uses postcodes, entering CB1 1DR should get you into Paradise street. At the moment we are still fitting out the shop, so it would be very helpful if you could wait another couple of weeks before bringing your donations.

We will be announcing the definite opening date very soon now...

View RSPCA E61 in a larger map

Building bridges with other charities?

There's a discussion on Petstreet about one member's experiences after winning a day shadowing an RSPCA Inspector. Also, see her fuller diary of the day. It's very interesting to see how we appear from "outside", in particular how difficult it is for other people to understand how the RSPCA's somewhat chaotic structure grew as the result of the decisions of local branches over a timespan of more than a century.

In our case we have a clinic, but no animal home purely because the branch committee of 50 years ago identified a welfare need for low cost pet care and negotiated a deal with Cambridge University to get cut-price treatments in return of use of the clinic for training new vets.

In the case of Stubbington Ark in Hampshire, the branch committee presumably decided they wanted a shelter and raised funds for one. HQ animal homes tend to be more strategically placed in that HQ will realise that there´s a problem with finding placements for animals in a particular region and build a home to fill that need.

Cambridge branch uses a combination of care at private boarding kennels, fostering by individuals and transfers to Block Fen which is our closest HQ funded shelter. The advantage of using private kennels is that (if we have the money!) we can increase the number of available spaces "overnight" rather than having a building with fixed limits. The disadvantage is that private kennels are not usually geared towards rehabilitating animals with behaviour problems etc.

Where there's a long-established HQ run home there is a tendency for the local branch to wither away because all the public interest — donations, volunteers etc. — tends to come to the home rather than the branch. In the long run that tends to mean that the branch can't afford to supplement the places provided by the home with fostering or spaces in boarding kennels. I suspect that having an active branch also improves relationships with other charities because they're more likely to meet us day to day. I certainly don´t get the degree of antagonism the Maidstone inspector seemed to find and we regularly come to arrangements with the local ferret rescue, Cats Protection, Blue Cross etc. if we have facilities & they don't or vice versa.

I´m afraid at the end it does come down to money. We've never yet been in a position where we were telling our inspectors to put down healthy animals, but a year ago we were very close to the point where we'd have had to. This is why it's so vital that we make a success of our new shop.