Dog licences

You can view the complete RSPCA report on dog registration on the central website.

Playing devil's advocate for a moment; is there any reason why an austerity government shouldn't abolish dog wardens, and the requirement to hold stray dogs for at least 7 days, as a cost-cutting measure if we don't have some system of generating revenue that's specifically linked to dogs?

When the old dog licence system was in force the explanation popularly given for the different treatment of dogs compared with any other stray animal was that only dogs had a licence.

Given that (with a few exceptions) politicians fundamentally don't care about animals why should they spend taxpayers' money on keeping strays alive for 7 days? Several commentators on the Dogs Today blog have asked why, as responsible dog owners, they should pay to sort out problems caused by the irresponsible ones; unfortunately that argument applies even more forcefully to anyone who doesn't have a dog but pays tax under the current system.

There is already some pressure to give local authorities "fast-track culling powers for the Police in relation to the animals" in the case of dogs who have been seized under the Dangerous Dogs Act.

I certainly don't have any expectation that a dog license is a magic wand, but wouldn't £21 be worth paying if it meant:

• There would be somewhere safe where you could take a stray dog you found wandering on the road at 3 am on a Sunday without having to wait until 9am on Monday.
• If your own dog was frightened by something, ran off and was found straying it would be guaranteed that she could be taken somewhere safe and scanned for a chip.
• There were enough dog waste bins, emptied frequently enough not to be unpleasant to use.
• There were enough trained wardens to visit owners whose dogs were causing problems (e.g. constant barking) and give advice.

(Yes, I do realise that many people would say: "Those are your jobs; you should be doing all of those things for free already." In which case, please send us the £21 and we can open 24/7 animal homes and employ more Animal Welfare Officers.)

A few commentators seem to find something very sinister in the report's discussion of disease control in relation to dog registration. The most likely new disease involving dogs is Echinococcus multilocularis. This is actually a tapeworm, whose larval phase forms cysts which can be difficult and dangerous to remove. The phase which affects dogs is the adult worm, which can easily and safely be removed by effective worm treatments. If the disease became endemic in this country it would clearly be of benefit if regular worming could be enforced, but there would be absolutely no reason (and no benefit) from any kind of "cull" of infected dogs.

What about owners who don't get their dogs licensed?

In the US concerns have been expressed that introduction of policies intended to reduce the number of unwanted animals killed by shelters in fact have the opposite effect from what is desired because the sanction for non-compliance is seizure of the animal, which may then be put down if not adopted. 

This isn't what the report suggests should happen (The penalties envisaged seem to be rather on the lines of: "If you don't register your dog, we'll tell you to register your dog.") In Ulster, which does currently have a dog licence system, the cost of a licence is £5 and the penalty for failing to register is a £25 fine. With concessions for unwaged and for service dogs, there's no reason why a £21 registration fee would cause mass relinquishment of animals, particularly if the initial registration entitled the owner to free microchipping or some other benefit.

Missing Cat

Missing from Sweetpea way (off Woodhead Drive) in Cambridge. 20 year old black cat with white socks. She's a spayed female and looks thin because of her thyroid condition (for which she needs medication). She isn't normally allowed outside, but slipped out while the back door was open.

If you see a cat matching this description in the general area of Woodhead Drive, please email rosemary@rspca-cambridge.org.uk and I'll pass details on to her carers who are very worried.

July statistics

I'm very behind with these. August should be ready soon.

In July, our clinic treated 290 dogs, 109 cats, 6 rabbits and 3 miscellaneous "small furries".

The clinic neutered 15 dogs, 3 cats and one rabbit.

We rehomed five dogs, nine cats and three rabbits. One cat in branch care had to be put to sleep on veterinary advice because she was not responding to treatment.

Animals in branch care to end July 2010

A cruelty case in Oklahoma

The Bad Rap group have an extended piece (warning some very disturbing photos) about a recently-concluded cruelty case (BAD RAP Blog: Oklahoma style justice - the Newkirk dogs). From a British perspective there are several very interesting points:

• In the States the available penalties for cruelty are considerably heavier than they are here: it's possible to impose additional terms of imprisonment for each animal, and theoretically someone convicted of severe cruelty to multiple animals could serve several years in jail. In the UK the maximum penalty under the Animal Welfare Act is 51 weeks. 
• The actual penalties imposed may be a lot less.
• There was serious doubt about whether this case would be prosecuted at all—and animal welfare groups were impressed that the District Attorney involved took it seriously. If she hadn't happened to be an animal lover there would have been nothing they could do to force a prosecution.
• There was virtually no system in place to look after this number of dogs (or apparently any dogs) taken by the police in the course of a cruelty investigation. Nearly all of the 100+ dogs had to be put down on the scene and a handful were taken on by various rescue groups on an ad hoc basis. 
• Those dogs who were rescued were all successfully rehomed in spite of being bull-breeds and probably bred for dog-fighting (over here we'd probably classify at least some of them as Staffordshire bull terriers, but it's still impressive that they could be placed in normal pet homes.)

More squirrel weirdness

Did you know it is actually illegal to fail to report it to the authorities if you see a grey squirrel in your garden? (Um... guilty as charged yr honour).

Merlin's vet check-up

Merlin looking rather woebegone as he waits to see the vet

Merlin had his 9-day wound check yesterday and all looks good so far. You can just see the external fixator on his right-front leg in the photo. The green lumps are vetwrap self-adhesive bandage wrapped round the screws that join the splint to the pins which actually go below the skin and are attached to the leg bones, holding them in place so they can heal in the correct position.

There's a photo and diagram showing how external fixators work on the veterinary central website. Considering that the pins are essentially going into the leg through small open wounds which won't be able to close until the fixator is removed, animals are surprisingly unworried by them. The main risk is  the potential for infection, which is why the wounds need a periodic check.

Many thanks to all those who've donated to our shop recently

China, glassware and prints

Faux fur coat and evening dress

Tuesday off to new foster home this evening

Katie's back from her holiday, so she came round to collect Tuesday this evening. Tuesday was a little star, walking into her carrier like a seasoned traveller. The same could not be said of Merlin who howled: "OTHER KITTY BEING FED!" in the background the whole time, while my own Coco who has a bit of a nervous tum at the best of times, decided to mark the occasion by using the litter tray. Madly squirting lavender odour eliminator before answering the door didn't entirely help and poor Katie and her sister must almost have been knocked off their feet by the composite wave of "fragrances".

All I need is a good supply of filmy scarves to complete the "mad cat lady" effect.

There are good reasons why RSPCA HQ encourage branch volunteers to avoid taking on too many animals at once.

Beautiful photo of Tuesday in today's Cambridge Evening News which may help to trace her owners.

Tuesday and Merlin

The veterinary hospital that provides our veterinary services needed to free up the cage being occupied by Tuesday (another cat with pelvic fractures), so I now have two cat pens in what I laughably call my spare bedroom. 

I think it's still possible that Tuesday's original owner may turn up as she was wearing a collar when found, and she's very friendly. The vets think her fractures will heal without surgery provided she's kept on strict cage rest for at least 6 weeks (re-do the x-ray after 4 weeks to check on progress).

Merlin is all black and has a broken foreleg which has been fitted with an external fixator to keep the broken bones aligned until the ends knit together. He's quite timid and hadn't been neutered when he was brought in (the vets did the op. at the same time as they set his leg), so had probably been living rough for some time.

I was a bit concerned that having the two pens close together would agitate both of them and risk them damaging themselves, but so far all is peaceful and the shocking sight of Tuesday getting food and fuss before him seems to be bringing Merlin out of his shell.

Fortunately some of our other holidaying fosterers are due back later this week, so it will be a bit easier to cope if we get any more incoming cats this weekend. However we could still use more foster homes: if you might be interested in this, or if you would like to adopt a cat or dog, please email rehoming@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

Mob justice?

Why is it that the very unpleasant, but non-fatal "cat binning" incident has drawn such an enormous amount of publicity (1,230 news items reported in Google) in comparison with the much worse cruelty to more than 100 animals in Somerset (44 news items),  the awful drowning of a couple's pet terrier by unknown thieves in Lancashire (2 items) and the almost unbelievable callousness of the person who threw an English Bull terrier bitch into a river while she was actually in the process of giving birth (3 items)?

If even a small percentage of those expressing outrage about the wheelie bin incident took some practical action for the welfare of animals it would do a lot more good overall.

Kudos to the anonymous member of the public and the police dog handler who saved the Bull terrier's life at some risk to themselves.

More and more cats!

More and more requests coming in for us to take unwanted cats, as well as incoming injured strays. If you might be interested in fostering for the branch, please email rehoming@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

Most of the animals we place in foster accommodation are cats recuperating from injuries, kittens or puppies who need to be in a domestic environment for correct social development, or dogs who we think would benefit from training and assessment under home conditions.

Most of the adult cats need cage rest in order to facilitate healing of various injuries, so this might be a suitable option for someone who would like to have cats but cannot give them the run of the house.

This pic. gives some idea of the kind of pen we use for cage-resting injured cats

If a cat is having cage rest on veterinary instructions it is very important that the fosterer can resist the temptation to let  him/her out, because running or jumping may prevent a broken bone from healing, or even mean that it has to be operated on a second time to re-set it.

Snap!

RSPCA Manchester and Salford says almost exactly the same thing as my previous blog entry but from a different perspective:

"Each time I have to say 'no' to someone who has exhausted all options the guilt weighs heavy on my mind. The situation could be an unwanted pet, a stray cat, a stray cat having given birth outdoors, someone who can't pay a vet bill, someone who wants a lift to the vets, someone who wants me to collect an animal - the list is just exhaustive. Few understand that the resources of most animal charities are extremely limited. My role at the branch is complex but I'm basically the manager and I have a member of staff who oversees the care of the animals and a pt staff member who does the day-to-day care. That's it.

What we can achieve rarely feels even remotely adequate enough and it's only at times like learning how an adopted animal is doing in their new home that you feel there is some sense of purpose to your role.

No one goes into animal rescue & rehoming to turn animals in need away, to say 'no' to desperate pleas of help or to have to put animals to sleep is not what any of us want to be doing. But what most people do expect is for animal charities like the RSPCA (whether locally or nationally) to have the answers to everything and help every single animal in need."

I think "exhaustive" is a freudian slip on her part. 

Why don't people come to meetings?

RSPCA Clwyd and Colwyn wonders why it's so difficult to get branch members to attend their AGM or other meetings. It seems to me that it's the same underlying set of problems that make RSPCA week less successful than it might be, and which I blogged about last year.

1. Individuals may genuinely believe the RSPCA doesn't have a pressing need for their support because we have enormous numbers of other members.
2. Most branch committees are run by very few, over-worked individuals. This means the people organising anything are generally also trying to do other things. Volunteers and new members may get the impression that things are disorganised and badly-run, and they may feel unappreciated if we don't answer calls immediately or if they want to do specific things (like walking dogs) and we want them to do different (and more boring) things (like fundraising or taking part in business meetings).
3. There's a knock-on effect from (2) when people who think we're inefficient actually do volunteer to join in and are very enthusiastic but want to start changing things immediately. Because we're already operating very close to the edge of not coping, what we need is people who are willing to help with existing jobs, not make more work, even if their intentions are good.
4. There seems to be a fatal tendency for people who are really keen on helping animals to set up new groups rather than supporting existing ones, particularly if the local RSPCA isn't doing something that they think it ought to be.
5. And, partly as a knock-on effect from (4), there seems to be a general disenchantment with the kind of local democracy that the RSPCA embodies, which depends on groups of people working together with set rules and majority decisions. In many ways there's a frustrating sense that internally we've won all the battles that are being waged by activists in Australia and the US but we just can't recruit the ongoing practical support we need to keep up the momentum and eventually we're simply going to run ourselves into the ground. It's interesting to contrast the 2010 no-kill conference with the ICAWC conference organised by the Dogs Trust, or with the RSPCA's  Animal Welfare Conferences for members. The viewpoint of the no-kill conference is very much of activists looking in whereas we're inside running the services and trying to keep afloat. Inevitably we spend an awful lot of time worrying about finances, simply because we're on a treadmill of recurring bills (kenneling, vets, rates, rent...) and the need to keep generating income to pay them.

Part of the "No-Kill Equation"

RSPCA Bury and Oldham have a mobile vet clinic that provides low-cost vaccinations, health checks, worming, flea treatment, and micro-chipping within the community, but there's been a furious debate on Facebook about whether people who can't afford the full cost of treatment should be allowed pets. 

Brent at KC Dog Blog in the US has an extended rebuttal of this kind of attitude:

As an animal welfare community, we have somehow gotten in our minds that we need to try to punish people for not altering their pets -- and consider them 'not worthy' of pet ownership if they don't. So instead of taking the time to educate, and to be part of the community and being people who want to help, we become the people trying to take their pets away.

And if the animal welfare continues to create a divide between itself and various communities, we will fail. As Donna notes in the post: "To decrease euthanasia rates and curb irresponsible ownership, we need proactive, cost effective solutions to embrace the human-animal bond, rather than tear it down."

Sometimes animals do have to be taken away from owners who can't or won't care for them properly even with support. Most low-income pet owners are not like that; they do love their pets and want to do the right thing. However if you really are short of cash the temptation is always to put your head in the sand and hope your cat won't get pregnant before you can save up the money to get her spayed, or that your puppy won't catch anything nasty if she's not vaccinated. If we simply decree that these people shouldn't have pets we're removing a huge number of homes where unwanted pets could go and creating more homeless pets from those they already own.

Animals are always going to be relatively cheap to acquire, because two cats, dogs or rabbits can produce more of themselves at little or no cost unless something goes terribly wrong medically (at which point it becomes hideously expensive, but it is TOO LATE to lecture the owners about their shortcomings). Attempt to ban ordinary, good owners from keeping animals and they will simply hope not to get caught.

Veterinary support (with some strings and a requirement that the owner does contribute something towards the cost) are an essential element of an effective strategy to end killing of unwanted animals in shelters. 

Release locations needed for outdoor cats

Do you have a large garden or other land or stables where you would be prepared to have one or more outdoor cats? We periodically take in strays who have been living rough and are too shy of human beings to be easily placed in ordinary pet homes.

All cats would be blood-tested, neutered and vaccinated. You would need to have a building or shed where they could be confined for an initial settling-in period to avoid the risk that they would try to "home" back to their original location.

If you might be able to help in this way, please email rehoming@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

How not to do a home-visit!

Ouch! (I should say at once that the facebook page discussed in the linked article does NOT belong to any RSPCA facility in Britain).

We do ask potential adopters for a letter from their landlord confirming that it's OK for them to have pets, but I hope we would go about it a little more tactfully than that and this is where training is key.

The Librarian has some very relevant wise words about why the staff and volunteers of any organisation should beware the temptation to bad-mouth their customers on social media. Animal rescue groups are no exception to this rule; animal adopters are our support base and we need to remember this even when we most feel: "the more I see of human beings, the more I like dogs."

Everyone who adopts an animal from our branch normally has a pre-adoption visit to check that their facilities are suitable for the pet they want and to try to ensure any snags are dealt with before they cause problems. (For example our home-visitors will give advice on whether the adopters' garden fence is able to contain the dog they've reserved.)

It's important that home-visitors don't get the idea that their job is to catch out people who are going to be cruel to animals; it can cause enormous difficulties if they take it upon themselves to do subsequent un-announced visits or otherwise give adopters the impression that they are being treated as suspects. Follow-up post-adoption visits should always be by pre-arrangement with the adopter — realistically what are they going to cover up as a result of having a few days notice?

The vast majority of people who come forward to adopt do it because they love animals and want to help and it does animal welfare no favours if we insult or patronise them because that means they'll be less likely to help us with other things, like fundraising, in the future. Some of them do need to be encouraged to accept that standards of pet care have moved on since they were children (we wouldn't home a single rabbit to live alone in a hutch, for example), and some need a gentle steer towards animals that are suitable for their circumstances (for example a large dog in a flat with no lift is going to be a big problem when he gets elderly and finds stairs difficult).

Home visitors are essentially a point of contact between the adopter and the branch, and post-homing visits should be an opportunity to solve any problems and ensure the placement is a success, not a threat that the animal will be taken away.

In reality our biggest problem is not abusive adopters, but lonely, needy ones who would ideally like to have their home visitor popping back every weekend to check the pet is OK and help with flea treatments, nail trimming etc.

We always need more volunteers to do home-visits, as it's important that the visit is done as soon as possible after an adopter has expressed interest. If you might be interested in training for this, please email rehoming@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

Missing Staffordshire Bull Terrier

Chaos

Chaos went missing from his home in Oxfordshire in March and his owners have been searching for him ever since. It's possible he might have been stolen and then dumped, so he could be virtually anywhere in the country. If you find a dog looking like him, please call 07769 185 413 / 07968 351 154 

We are rubbish at identifying pedigree cats!

Suzie — now

Suzie - just after he came in

"Suzie" was brought in to us because she was abandoned. She is in fact a neutered male (in our defence the initial mis-identification of his sex wasn't us; we are not completely incompetent).

We thought he was possibly a British Shorthair, but in fact he's a Selkirk Rex. The fact that he would originally have been purchased for quite a lot of money makes it even more peculiar that he would have been simply abandoned.





Still, lovely to see he's found a wonderful home, and at least now we know why his whiskers look so beaten up; they have a natural wave.

Pip, Ben, Toby and Duffy all looking for homes

Duffy

Toby

Ben

Pip

Although Pip and Ben look rather similar we've got no reason to think they are related. Toby is only 8 months old and was adopted from us by a family who were unexpectedly posted abroad and had to return him. Duffy is a GSD x Rottie cross and only a year old, but was passed between a number of people before ending up with us, so needs a home where she can be given TLC and consistent handling and training.

There's more detail about each of them on our rehoming gallery If you might be interested in adopting them, please email rehoming@rspca-cambridge.org.uk

The stockroom at our charity shop

Thank-you, everyone who donated last week. Donations included this cute, but rather large, beanie baby(!) and an extremely realistic life-sized Old-English Sheepdog soft toy.

Don't forget our volunteers' evening is this Thursday evening at the 61 Burleigh street shop from 7.30-9.30.