January 13, 2010Comments are closed.customer service, shelter procedure
The annual rush of fireworks-spooked dogs is all we can talk about in January, with a New Years Eve rush and even more predicted from Australia Day;
New year sends dogs crackers in Wyndham
Lost Dogs Home shelter manager Sue Conroy said 161 dogs were brought into the North Melbourne pound from Thursday, December 31 to Sunday, January 3, after escaping backyards across Melbourne to flee loud noises.
“We had 3 1/2 hours of non-stop rumbling from the storms, which spooked dogs,” Ms Conroy said.
Many Whitehorse pooches flee fireworks, thunder
Spokeswoman Brenda Champion said 121 animals were taken to the Cormack Rd shelter last weekend, including many which had become frightened and run away during New Year’s Eve fireworks celebrations.
Dogs’ ears were battered with a double-whammy of thunderstorms and fireworks on New Year’s Eve that panicked dozens of our four-legged friends into running away from home.
The RSPCA’s metropolitan shelters picked up more than 110 stray dogs who went wandering to escape the noise.
Dogs go crackers in Whittlesea
Dozens of petrified dogs have fled their homes in terror during a spate of illegal fireworks and thunderstorms over New Year’s Eve.
Staff at the Epping RSPCA Shelter have been flat out since New Year’s Day trying to reunite owners with more than 45 animals that fled their yards amid the dramatic sound and light show.
She said 15 dogs remained unclaimed, including several maltese terriers, german shepherds, kelpies, jack russell terriers, pomeranians and a staffordshire terrier.
Which begs the question; if this happens every year, why aren’t we using the tools at our disposal to remedy it?
Remember, these dogs aren’t dumped – up until the first crack of fireworks they were living somewhere are someone’s pet. Now, they’re lost. So we need to make it incredibly easy for them to become un-lost.
Why don’t we have a national database of impounded dogs and cats, accessible online by the public, to which it is made mandatory for all pounds and shelters who impound, to upload a photo and basic description of every single pet?
Surely with the evolution of the interwebs (not too many shelters wouldn’t have access to a computer and digital camera now), this would be pretty straight forward, if all groups were dedicated to returning pets to their rightful owners as they claim to be.
Not the occasional, sometimes updated ‘found pet’ list buried somewhere in a council website (if the pet travelled two councils to the left and one up? How is anyone supposed to know?). Not the efforts of a shelter who’s taking pets from a number of councils, but leave it to the public to guess which ones.
But a mandatory, centralised database which sees every impounded pet have its photo taken and uploaded to a single website.
If pets aren’t impounded immediately (spending some time running or staying with a carer), then a saved database search can allow the owner of the pet to be notified when it finally does make their way to the pound.
With the new trend towards ‘super pounds’ which take animals kms away from where they were collected, we must make the effort to also build into the system easy ways for people to find their lost animal. If groups are going to take money for a council contract, they must be made offer a minimum level of service to pet owners.
And in 2010, a picture on the web should be considered indispensable.
