Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)

Dear friends,

I saw this picture in one the emails that i received.

This picture actually speaks of all the agony, trauma, helplessness, solitude, fear, heartbreak and what not that a pet goes through when any one of the following happens :

ABANDONED, REHOMED or GIFTING PETS or pet left indefinitely on a BOARDING place.

We have spoken so much about pets being abandoned, but we rarely realise that there are other circumstances which are equal for the pet as to be abandoned.

Some people gift elder puppies/ dogs to a relative or friend when the pet has lived too long with the first owner.

Or most pet owners don’t realise before leaving for vacations that for the dog a boarding place is equal to being abandoned.

Every time a pet goes to a boarding, the time is like a hanging sword for the pet, because he/she is unsure if it is the last time he is seeing his owner. We know we are coming back, but they don’t know this because we haven’t told them. In fact i have heard some people tell me that the time they spoke to their pets that they would come back in so many days, the pet was much more comfortable during the stay, than when the owner just left abruptly. The boarding facility at Jeevashram in Delhi has a unique procedure for pets coming to them for boarding for the first time.

The owner is asked to come the first day and take the dog on a walk around the place for a couple of hours. Then the owner is asked to take the dog back home. The next day the owner leaves the pet there in the morning and comes back to pick him up in the evening. On the third day, if the pet is comfortable with the place, the owner leaves the pet overnight and picks him up the next day. Then the dog is left there permanently till the time the owner is out.

Once I got a phone call from the owner of a Labrador that since the time they had got him back from boarding, the dog had become aggressive, was growling, and had stopped eating. He was hiding under the dining table for three days and would not allow anyone to touch him. The owners had started fearing that the dog had contracted Rabies or some other problem. The vets were clueless. They were even considering PTS. After talking we decided to try out something. The owner went up to the dog and apologised.

They spoke to the dog for hours without touching him and told him that they would not leave him ever and go anywhere. They all patted him for many hours and let him growl and complain. To their surprise not once did he bite them but after a few hours of growling and petting, he went off to sleep. Once he woke up all members pampered him with his favourite food and kept insisting him to eat it every time he refused to eat. After a while he ate some of it. The scene was exactly like one would try to mend things with a human being. In two days he was a different dog and more attached to the family without any medication and to the surprise of their vet who had suggested medication for behavioural problems or PTS.

The family was patient enough to realise that it was their behaviour that needed treatment and not that of the dogs’. These may seem silly tantrums to some, but our pets understands what we are doing. They read eyes and our body language (even our verbal language) to know if their stay will be temporary or permanent in the shelter/ boarding facility. So the next time your dog behaves differently when he comes back from boarding, you know what to needs to be done.

Please take a print of this poster and paste it in as many places as possible (definitely vet clinics and hospitals) so that people think twice before ABANDONING THEIR DOGS  on the streets or outside shelters or even putting their pets up for re homing.

And the next time you leave your dog in a boarding facility, first spend a few days making sure the pet feels comfortable and not alienated. And please don’t forget to tell them in as many words that  – “You will be back for them very soon”.

For them waiting a month in human time scale is actually 7 months in dog years.

thanks

Rishi

Citizens For Animal Rights (CFAR),
New Delhi.

Filed under: Animals Requiring Adoption or Homes - Worldwide, CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional |