According to their website, the Cooma-Monaro Shire Council is based in the country town of Cooma, New South Wales, perfectly situated only one hour from the Mountains, Canberra and the Coast, and only 4 hours to Sydney.
A regional location, it has a population of 6,587 people and a small animal pound. It would be easy for the management of this pound to kill dogs and cats while claiming they’re ‘too rural’ to run a rehoming program, and their farming-based community ‘too backward’ to care for their animals compassionately and ‘too ignorant’ to appreciate the value of rescue pets. They could even claim that country dogs were ‘less social’ than city dogs, or the breeds they dealt with were ‘not desirable’ so killing is unavoidable.
Cooma-Monaro Shire Council has achieved its highest rehousing rate of impounded stray dogs in five years.
During the 2009/2010 financial year 97 per cent of dogs impounded were successfully rehoused.
Of the 146 dogs seized 143 were released and three were euthanased, a six per cent improvement on 2005/2006 figures.
Of the 143 dogs released 20 were handed over the Cooma branch of the RSPCA.
President of the Cooma branch of the RSPCA Lil Frezza said a total of 41 dogs came into their care last year with 39 rehoused.
She believes the high rehousing rate is largely due to people who volunteer as foster carers for the animals while the RSPCA finds new homes for them.
“The number is good for a small country town,” she said.
“Council rangers are cooperative and the foster carers make a big difference.”
Mrs Frezza said initiatives such as increased advertising of abandoned pets and increased fund raising efforts had contributed to improved rehousing rates.
……
Last year, council seized a total of 17 cats and released 16 while one was destroyed.
Cooperation and marketing, not fire and brimstone. Foster care and innovation, not condemnation and killing. What’s more Cooma celebrated this fantastic achievement, by getting this positive story into their local press, further generating community goodwill.
There is no reason every regional council pound could not follow Cooma’s lead, and the lead of other shelters around the country, and implement the programs and services that make the killing of companion animals unnecessary. Many regional councils are not only still choosing to kill, but are often doing so by draconian means; shooting pets with firearms, or gassing them with car exhausts. And while defending the methods they’re using to kill as ‘humane’, they resist pressure to stop killing from their local community; the ultimate betrayal of the companion animals they are assigned with protecting.
Every council pound who refuses to work with rescue, every council pound who refuses to use foster carers, every council pound who instead looks to laws to punish their public and make it more difficult for people to keep their animals – chooses to kill instead of work with their community to save lives.
Cooma has shown that even a small population in a rural area has enough community goodwill to make their local council pound a safe place for pets, should the pound’s management choose to stop killing and instead open their doors to pet lovers. Every under-performing pound manager should now consider themselves now on notice.
Congratulations to the Cooma-Monaro Shire Council
and the community of Cooma, on your amazing achievement!
Australia and the United States are same-same, but different. And a challenge we face in bringing No Kill programs to Australia is a pretty significant language difference between the two countries.
Much of the US documentation refers to ‘shelters’ reclaiming their lifesaving role in the community. To us ‘shelter’ generally means a local, privately managed rescue. These can be large, open admission and have pound contracts, or small and selective… or anything in between. They can be No Kill, low kill or high kill, depending on who’s in charge. And they nearly always run primarily on the donations of the public, meaning donors (the local community) can dictate the organisation be both transparent and run those programs which save lives. Shelters, by large are the focus of Australia efforts towards No Kill.
However, in the US shelter means all of these things, but is also the generic term for ‘pound’. ‘Municipal shelter’ or ‘animal control shelter’ is the equivalent to our council pound. This oh-so-subtle language difference between America and Australia, lets the largest killer of our companion animals off the hook when it comes to No Kill initiatives.
While there are few that would argue that shelters are obligated to be running programs which save the lives of pets; council pounds continue to neglect and kill companion animals and work to block relationships with the community rescue groups that could save them. What’s more, animal welfare advocates often make excuses for pounds; “it’s unrealistic to expect them to change”, even though overcoming the often regressive behaviour of pound management is undeniably the biggest hurdle to any No Kill initiative.
I urge you to pick up your copy of Redemption or Irreconcilable Differences, and read each reference to ‘shelter’ as ‘pound or shelter’, as it was intended. It puts an entirely different spin on where we as No Kill advocates are headed and the future we need to create for pets.
It is not pet overpopulation that is killing animals when shelter pound or shelter directors wilfully refuse to implement lifesaving alternatives to killing; such as a comprehensive foster care program, as is too often true in pounds and shelters across the country.
Similarily, it is not pet overpopulation to blame when adoptions are low because the pound or shelter is not doing off-site adoptions.
It is not pet overpopulation when animals are killed because working with rescue groups is downplayed, discouraged, or these groups aren’t given access to animals facing death.
It is not pet overpopulation to blame when feral cats are killed because a TNR program is not in place.
It is not pet overpopulation when people aren’t helped to overcome behaviour, medical or environmental conditions that cause them to relinquish animals because effective pet retention programs aren’t implemented.
It is not pet overpopulation to blame when animals are killed because of ineffective and passive efforts to help reunite lost pets with their families.
It is not pet overpopulation to blame when shy or scared dogs are killed because a rehabilitation program has not been integrated into the behaviour assessment process.
It is not pet overpopulation to blame when adoptions aren’t steadily increasing because an effective public relations strategy and adoption campaign isn’t being coordinated, or the pound or shelter is not effectively competing with commercial sources of animals.
It is not pet overpopulation to blame when dogs go ‘cage crazy’ because volunteers aren’t welcome or allowed to socialise them, and then ‘cage crazy’ dogs are killed because behaviour rehabilitation efforts are not in place.
It is not pet overpopulation to blame when cats get sick because pound or shelter staff are not thorough in their cleaning and thoroughly reprimanded for failure to do so.
It is not pet overpopulation to blame when these sick cats are killed because the pound or shelter does not provide medical care or treatment.
And it is especially not pet overpopulation to blame when pets are killed despite empty cages, an all too common occurrence in pounds and shelters across the country that are killing and claiming to do so because of ‘lack of space’.
In fact, we could be a No Kill nation today. But we aren’t. And we aren’t for one reason and one reason only – pound and shelter managers find killing easier than doing what is necessary to stop it. Accordingly, we must reject the term ‘euthanasia’ to describe unnecessary pound or shelter killing. We must stop using the term ‘pet overpopulation’ when it does not exist. We must stop portraying the problem as the fault of the public when pound and shelter managers fail to implement the necessary programs. And we need to stop seeking laws that empower animal control to impound and kill more animals.
Irreconcilable Differences – Nathan Winograd
So what policies would a pound or shelter director need to implement to put their organisation on a No Kill path?
Dedication
A formal commitment by the pound or shelter director, management and staff to lifesaving programs and dedication to ending the killing of healthy, treatable and adoptable pets in their facility.
Desexing
High volume, low cost desexing services for their community, either through the engagement of local veterinarians, or the development of a community desexing clinic for low income and disadvantaged owners.
Foster care
A comprehensive foster care program for underage, traumatised, sick, injured and other animals and the commitment to offer all pets foster before them being killed, unless their prognosis is poor.
Adoption
An adoption program that operates during weekends, after hours when people have finished work, and includes offsite adoption venues such as pet stores, shopping centres and pet events.
Rehabilitation
Medical and behavioural rehabilitation programs for pets who have a common and treatable medical and behavioural problems.
Community Assistance
Pet retention programs to help solve medical, environmental or behavioural problems that cause people to relinquish pets, to instead keep animals with their existing owners.
Community Cats
The end to the policy of trapping or accepting feral cats, or lending traps to capture animals for the purpose of removing animals to be killed. Trap, desex and release programs and outreach to community cat care groups, for cats deemed too feral for rehoming.
Rescue Groups
Outreach to encourage community rescue groups to access pound or shelter animals, helping to rehome pets.
Volunteers
Volunteer programs to socialise animals, promote adoptions and help in the operations of the pound or shelter.
Second Chances
An end to owner-requested killing, unless the pet is deemed to be irremediably suffering and cannot be rehabilitated.
Getting rid of bad laws
The repeal of unenforceable laws which drive up intakes; mandatory desexing, bans on feeding strays and bans on specific breeds.
Returning Pets Home
Proactive strategies to help reunite lost pets with their families including door knocking the neighbourhood where the pet was collected, taking the pet straight home rather than impounding it and post the photo of any impounded pet promptly on the internet.
Disease Control
Thorough protocols, including vaccination on arrival, thorough cleaning and disinfection standards, isolation of new intakes and staff washing their hands between handling animals.
Final Checks
The requirement that before any animal is killed, that documentation is presented showing that all efforts to save the animal have been considered, including medical and behavioural rehabilitation, foster care, rescue groups, desex and release, and adoption.
When the alternative is killing healthy, adoptable pets by the thousands, we should accept nothing less than the comprehensive implementation of these minimum basic programs by every single pound and shelter director. In every way, our animal organisations should be working to get the pets in their care out alive and they must deem the death of every healthy, treatable pet to be a profound failure in their management.
A No Kill Australia is within our reach, but this will not happen without the community demanding it. The slogan for the conference was that we need more No Kill leaders – people who are able to drive their own initiatives on behalf of animals.
If you care about pets and want to become more involved, then check out the video ‘Strayed’ for a background on the No Kill movement and start getting involved in your own community. There are also resources from the conference here:
To download the Shelter Track materials, cut and paste the following to your browser:
http://www.nokilladvocacycenter.org/Shelter2010.zip
To download the Legal Track materials, cut and paste the following to your browser:
http://www.nokilladvocacycenter.org/Legal2010.zip
The only thing standing between us and a future where no homeless pet goes without a home, is our drive to save their lives.
Saving Pets is back! After a work v blog ’situation’, I needed to take some time away from blogging. And after this wee hiatus, I honestly can’t believe how much time I have to you know… do stuff!
But that’s all sorted now and Saving Pets is back to share the 2010 No Kill Conference. I arrived yesterday after plane hopping for nearly 35 hrs….
Perth > Sydney > LA > New York > Washington (hooray for discount plane tickets!).
The blogging starts on Saturday (that’s Sunday Aussie time!). Be sure to drop by! :)
You need to join forces with other rescue groups and hold a fee-free adoption event.
I know, right – but, hear me out.
Unfortunately, many non-profit organizations often seem to believe that there is a limited pie of resources out there and, therefore, they are in direct competition with other humane groups in the community. This is really more a matter of perception than reality. Animal lovers are amazingly generous, especially when they feel that groups are working together to get an important job done. And our community, animal groups and the general public have all pulled together to create one of the safest places in the country for homeless pets.
When 41 shelters and rescue groups across Alameda and Contra Costa Counties got together for the Maddies Matchmaker Adoptathon, offering would be adopters free pet adoption, they did so with the aim of emptying their shelters.
Shelters and rescue groups screened applicants as per their usual guidelines and used extended shelter trading hours, as well as PETCO, PetSmart and Pet Food Express stores to showcase their animals. The result? An overwhelming success;
Take a moment to consider that result – what would happen in your community if 1,500 pets were rehomed in a single weekend?
By co-oincidence, on the same weekend, New Zealand SPCA, offered a free-feline Friday. The Wellington, Wairarapa, Newtown, Waikanae, Levin and Masterton offered cats to the public with a waived fee over the weekend.
Within two hours of opening more than 20 people had called in for free felines and seven cats had been adopted.
”There have been more people than cats here this morning, we’ve been overrun,” she said.
There had been 30 cats rehomed out of the Masterton centre by Friday afternoon and 150 animals given away in their Wellington offices.
I’ve often argued that we should be increasing the value of our rescue pets, by promoting them as ‘better than free’ and I still believe that is true. Many in the community are turned off by ‘free’ – to them it says ‘faulty’, ‘common’ or ‘things nobody wants’ – which is why FTGH ads are usually so ineffective in attracting genuine adopters. I don’t want a free pet – I want a great pet. I’ll just pay for one thanks…
But these promotions are different. ‘Free’ is a talking point. ‘Free’ builds a buzz. ‘Free’ is a cue that tells you it’s a limited time only offer. Groups getting together and offering ‘free adoption weekends’ gets people excited about lots of pets to choose from and promises a fun, festival atmosphere.
Since everyone is getting their pet free that weekend, it doesn’t come with the same ’stigma’ usually associated with a free-rescue pet. And with studies showing no difference in attachment levels between pets where the owner paid a fee – or didn’t – there is no good reason to kill pets ‘for lack of homes’, rather than coordinate your own BIG FREE ADOPTION WEEKEND!
Since hubby and I are having a ‘dry’ June and going to the pub for lunch was out, we spent Saturday walking through the city. Along with bags of junk (the sales are on) and some retro fabric, a secondhand copy of Tim Low’s 2001 book ‘Feral Future’ jumped off the shelf and into my possession.
Now, I wanted to learn more about feral animals but I fully expected Feral Future to be frustrating anti-cat reading. But au contraire! It’s an absolute cracker, taking what could be a pretty dry topic and turning it into ‘the astounding history of Australia’ worthy of any Ripley’s Believe it or Not.
The book starts with a seriously interesting premise;
World ecology is now locked onto the same trajectory as popular culture. Just as American pop music and blue jeans, burgers and Coke have displaced indigenous cultures and foods in every land, so too are vigorous exotic invaders overwhelming native species and natural habitats. Some biologists warn of a ‘McDonaldization’ of work ecology. The earth is hurtling towards a one world culture and (maybe) a one world ecosystem.
But what’s most fascinating in our ‘native loving’ society is that, for the most part, rather than these organisims ’sneaking in’, we’ve have been and continue to be complicit in bringing the non-native plants and animals to Australia.
The long list of ferals – they’re not what you think!
Rabbits are decended from domestic livestock gone wild and are just one of thosuands of purposely introduced ‘ferals’. Chickens, pigs, cabbages, wheat, apples, lemons, camels, rye, coffee, sheep, goats, radishes, perch, turnips, onions, salmon, red deer, carp peas, beans, strawberries, horses, coconut, trout, sisal, tea, figs, chillies, blackberries, cattle, ‘double gee’, olives, fennel, liquorice, grapes, buffalo, mango, donkey, banana, oats, pistacho, bream, and cashew were all brought in to feed people. Most of these have escaped and invaded forests and woodlands, replacing native species and forever changing the makeup of our natural environment.
Then there where the ’stowaways’ – diseases and parasites brought on plants and animals; blight, fleas, mites, snails, weed burrs, spiders, algae, kelp, grasshoppers, slaters, fungus, weevils, cockroaches, beetles, moths, flies, mosquitos, wasps, bees, worms and rats and mice.
The ones we introduced either because we were homesick, or to help farmers; sparrows, Indian mynas, buffel grass, prickly pear, boxthorn, cotton, mosquito fish, cane toads, pasture grasses and foxes.
And those we brought because we liked having beautiful gardens; thistles, hemlock, Paterson’s curse, water hyacinth, lantana, privet, camphor laurel, lavender, holly, cats claw, rubber vine, lawn grass and St John’s Wort.
Or to keep as pets; guppies, mystery snails, goldfish, cichlids, platies, swordtails, finches and dozens of water plants. Again, all have ‘gone feral’ and are now living wild.
Along with these examples is a chapter on how, having not learned anything from our history of unsuccessful introductions, we still bring in new pasture plants, garden plants and internationally bred pets into Australia every day.
So where do cats fit?
So, half way through the book and there’s been barely a peep about ‘feral cats’. But rest assured, they get their own chapter and here’s where it gets really interesting, because the chapter is entitled; Cats – Scoundrels or Scapegoats?
Suburban cats, because they dispatch lots of birds, are often condemned as major killers, second only to their feral kin in the bush. But the evidence is not convincing. Cats kill millions of birds in gardens, true enough, but ecologically there is nothing wrong with this – predation is a fact of life. Birds are killed in forests, too, by falcons, owls, quolls, dingoes, snakes, goannas, even spiders. Pet pussies are simply the urban equivalent of these killers. Hunting by pet cats only becomes a worry if the death rate exceeds their birthrate. By and large, this doesn’t seem to be the case. The birds caught by cats are usually abundant species that thrive on development. Some of them – including willie wagtails, crested pigeons, and magpie larks – are probably faring better today than ever before.
This is certainly true of the common garden lizards that cats like to kill. Some studies show that leafy suburbs actually support more birds than intact forests, despite all the cats, because gardens planted with berries and nectar- rich flowers produce more food.
If any species is threatening bird in suburbia it is probably the pied currawong, a vicious native bird that raids nests and devours chicks and eggs. Native noisy miners also make mischief by driving away smaller birds.
But what about true free-roaming cats?
Feral cats in the bush however, can be a serious problem, though probably not to birds, which they seldom eat. Studies of their diet have revealed what cartoonists have always known; cats prefer rats, mice and other mammals. Rabbits are often their staple diet; cats may be helping the ecology by keeping bunny numbers down.
Rabbits may have helped wipe our small outback wallabies and bandicoots by taking their food and grazing down their cover. They are possibly the worst of all our pests because of the extrodinary numbers they can achieve.
Black rats are rarely portrayed as killers, but as destroyers of island life they may rank higher than cats. On Lord Howe island they knocked off five bird species, and on Christmas Island they helped exterminate Maclear’s rat, a unique native rodent. They reached the island in 1899 by hiding in hay, and ten years later no Maclear’s rats remained. Trout, too have driven several species close to extinction, an achievement that cats, on hard evidence, cannot match.
Do cats deserve all the attention?
Many conservationists treat cats as if they were our number one pest, but I believe foxes, rabbits, pigs, toads, trout and some weeds all pose a greater menace. Goats, donkeys, carp, mosquito fish, Pacific sea stars, green crabs, honeybees, bumblebees, and Amazonian earth worms concern me a great deal too. And worse than any of these is probably phytophthora, the dreaded fungal disease, along with the chytrid fungus killing our frogs. By saying this I don’t wish to exonerate cats, simply to broaden the debate.
Instead of heedlessly angering cat owners by vilifying their pets, we might look around us at all the other pests receiving less attention.
(highlighting mine)
No matter how many times the media shows an angry cat photo in defence of the latest cat cull (have you noticed the parallel to the media’s representation of pit bulls?), they are just one, amongst many animals and plants that are changing our landscape.
Cattle and sheep have probably contributed more to extinctions than foxes or rats.
As one university biologist complained to me, those people who rant about the cat should add ‘tle’ to the name and pursue a worthier rogue.
But we’re unlikely to see an anti-farming movement in Australia, nor an anti-aquarium pets, nor an anti-’flowers in the garden movement’; so it seems unfair to single out cats when we’ve no interest in solving any of the other issues that would halt the ‘Mcdonaldization’ Low speaks of in his book.
Arrogant acts
It is also not as simple as we would like, to just ‘turn back the clock’ and eliminate ferals and weeds.
In the feral future, natives and exotics will become more and more interdependent.
Low goes on to describe how non-natives and natives are now engaged in complex life-sustaining relationships. Marram grasslands feed wombats, camphor laurel forests sustain vast flocks of fruit pigeons and long-billed and western corellas live supported by farmland. The rare southern brown bandicoots use blackberry brambles as protection against foxes and the nearly extinct Norfolk Island Parrot lives almost entirely upon olives and cherry guava. Rabbits, black rats and mice now sustain a large proportion of birds of prey and in some places young rabbits make up 60 to 90% of the diet of local eagles, harriers, kites and falcons. House mice make up as much as 97% of the diet of barn owls, while in the cities, the endangered peregine falcons are growing plump on street pigeons.
In short, just like all the other animals and plants in Australia, a new balance has been created with each participant bringing positives and negatives to the evolving ecology. To arbitrarily decide that one established organism is not worthy of their position, is just as arrogant human mistake, as the one the first settlers made when they introduced new animals and plants to Australia.
With what we know about cats in Australia and modern management techniques, the idea that we’re still championing the catch and kill techniques that we have been using since the 70’s is inexcusable.
The case for humane cat management
The modern cat care approach should be thus – keeping pet cats inside either part or all of the time, is a seriously good idea and should be encouraged for both cat welfare and environmental reasons. But this constant drive by the media, cat welfare groups and cat haters to have them exterminated from the suburbs is both undeserved and cruel.
Programs which help those cats already living in the environment, keep others from winding up abandoned and support owners to make responsible pet care decisions are the key to effective cat management in Australia.
In today’s Sydney Sun-Herald, is a series of articles about the RSPCA and other animal welfare group’s efforts to have the sale of pets through pet shops banned.
> 250,000 healthy cats and dogs killed each year
> No homes for them
> Pet industry ‘needs regulation’
Tighter legislation is needed to regulate dog and cat breeders to stop the slaughter of more than a quarter of a million healthy animals in Australia each year.
Animal welfare groups backed by Sydney lord mayor and NSW independent MP Clover Moore blamed commercial breeders for producing too many animals, and pet shops for the unacceptably high death rate.
Working on the project Where Do Puppies Come From? I know there are enormous problems with the modern pet production industry. Companion animals living in a battery situation is not only wrong on animal welfare grounds, but because it sets dogs up to fail in their future lives as family pets. I get that puppy farms are a repulsive industry that needs to be booted into the history books. I really do.
But the idea that we can wipe out puppy farms through some inventive law, totally oversimplifies the issue. Certainly we can restrict the people who can breed pets, and we can ensure that the farms are clean, rather than dirty (see a related post ‘Should there be a ‘breeder permit’ system?‘), but the idea that banning pet shops sales will somehow lead to less pets killed in shelters, is simply false.
Banning the sale of puppy-mill dogs from pet stores will not stop people from buying puppy-mill dogs. It’ll just send them to the internet where the puppy mills have even less accountability (if that’s possible). Or to the newspaper to buy poorly-bred dogs that way from someone who won’t ask too many questions. KC Dog Blog
Until we are in a position to compete with pet shops in their own market – genuinely taking a share of their business – we cannot even begin to offer an alternative to pet shop purchases and this business will simply move from pet stores to internet and newspaper traders.
Why people buy from pet shops
Pet shops are located in convenient places, where people go. Being visible the community attracts potential customers, while the animals are presented in clean, well lit and well ventilated enclosures, all at eye height to maximise impact.
They offer convenient opening hours, 7 days a week 9-5. The offer a ‘late night trading’ nights where they stay open 7pm and later. These extended hours attract customers who work, who have families (and money to pay for lifetime care!) and who are looking for a pet.
Staff greet visitors to the store when they enter, helping to determine the reason for the visit and offer assistance. The friendly, upbeat atmosphere and ‘regular customer’ discounts build a relationship that attracts repeat clientele, until eventually the person either returns to purchase a new pet, or simply can’t resist and takes a particular pet home.
500,000, or half a million, puppies are estimated to be sold in pet shops each year. The idea that there aren’t loving families looking for pets (overpopulation), is blown out of the water, when you consider that there is a constant stream of homes available to these pets. Even in the face of high pet shop prices ($400 – $1,500).
So while advocates complain that pets shops sell too many pets, while pounds are killing theirs – of the thousands of pounds and shelters across the country, only a handful do much to try and offer an equally attractive level of service to potential clients.
The move to internet purchases
If pet shops stopped selling pets tomorrow, this would be how puppy farmers would continue to represent their pets to the public;
And this would be how pounds show their available pets;
Or you might see one of these pics on their website:
…. Let see that again shall we? Puppy farm:
Pound:
Now might be a good time to point out that a photographer would often lend their time for an incredibly low rate, while a student photographer can often be sourced for free; so it’s not cost interfering with this process. There’s no excuse for every shelter pet not to get a gorgeous, engaging photo. Especially when it might save their life…
Overpopulation is a myth; we need to dig deeper
When you consider the hurdles to adoption, the out of the way locales of most pounds, the inconvenient opening hours and the difficulties in getting pounds to work with their communities, rather than against them – it’s a wonder that any pets get adopted at all.
Shelters need to stop worrying about ‘overpopulation’ and work on the real solutions to the homeless pet problem. Getting as many pets adopted as possible, educating the general public so that they understand the benefits of carefully researching your pet acquisition decisions and assistance in finding advice when faced with the realities of owning a pet.
Banning pets shops is noble, but ineffective in reducing shelter killing
Shelters need to be networking with like-minded local pet businesses, supporting our public, effectively promoting our pets and helping people adopt. It’s only when we stop complaining that pet shops are ‘out-selling’ us, and start taking responsibility for giving the pets we have the very best chance of finding (and keeping!) a new home, that we can finally start to address the real causes of shelter killing.
I’ve always considered PetRescue to be a very charmed project. My best mate JB is a technical genius and an all round nice guy. My shared-brain friend Vix and I both purchased wonky dogs at around the same time (hers from a pet shop, mine from a guy in a pub carpark) who would catapult us into the ‘dog world’, to discover rescue and the myraid of issues surrounding pet ownership. And six years ago around a pint of beer the idea for PetRescue was born.
We would go on to discover not only could we work together, but that our passion for pets would grow an enormous beating heart – the community all pulling together to get the PetRescue project off the ground and build it into one of the most successful animal welfare iniatives in Australia. Little did we know getting pets up onto the web would be the first step in a huge labour of love, working to turn animal sheltering into a little known and misunderstood industry, into one of the country’s most fashionable social movements.
JB, Vix and me! – PetRescue 2009
Capturing the love
Everyone who has a pet, understands the love of a pet. Harnessing that love and turning it into action has been key in bringing rescue pet adoption to the masses. Adoption adverts focused around blaming the pet’s old owner for its current predicament, or designed to shock or horrify the public had long been shown to be building a barrier between rescue groups and their communities. Potential adopters were actively avoiding rescue fearing they would feel sad or guilty after visiting their local shelter.
PetRescue banned all ‘death row’ style advertisements and stories of animal abuse. Recognising the need to promote the positives of animal adoption, the site became a place of happy stories with an emphasis on those things that build bonds between pet and owner. People should feel happy when they’re bringing a new family member into their lives!
Be able to use the power of the internet to reach a new audience was also vital to increasing awareness of just how many adoptable pets are available in rescue. It’s only when the public were able to see each single pet as an individual, most highly adoptable and simply lost, or homeless for one of the myriad of genuine and not-so-genuine reasons that see pets surrendered, that the public were able to make their own determination that shelter pets are in fact, simply pets who need a new home.
So from 2004 onwards, we set out to convince animal shelters that online pet advertisements were the way of the future, overcome fears that it would lead to hoards of ‘irresponsible’ owners acquiring and discarding pets and coaching them to write pet profiles that attracted people to adoption.
Later we would include ‘holiday promotions’, the use of video in pet profiles, effective use of traditional media and the huge different great photography can make in animal adoption.
Nearly 60,000 pets later, PetRescue’s online advertisements are still a testement to what positive attitudes and community engagement can achieve. Adoptions are up in 2010. The number of potential adopters visiting PetRescue has grown immensely this year and we are now seeing over 1,300 dogs and 750 cats finding new homes each month. In addition to those enquiries made by phone, every month over 3,500 email enquires are sent by our mail systems to our rescue group members and a staggering 150,000 pet listing alerts are sent to people looking to adopt a new pet.
Overcoming distance as a barrier to happiness
In 2007, PetRescue coordinated its first ‘interstate adoption’. A small, tufty-haired dog called ‘Penny’ had been taken into care by POOPS (Pets of Older People) when her owner passed away. She had been waiting for two months in foster care with no-one interested in adopting this well-mannered elderly girl.
After a plea for help from Penny’s carers, PetRescue enlisted the generous support of Virgin Blue and Jetpets to give Penny a second chance at life;
And so began Penny’s big adventure!
Penny was offered a free flight to Brisbane to meet up with a carer from Save a Pound Dog, who had a great new home ready and waiting. Penny traveled like a celebrity pet, with a personal pet travel consultant from Jetpets arranging her flights and door to door service to her new digs.
Now settled in her new home, Penny sends licks! and woofs! to the team at Virgin Blue and Jetpets for helping her find a fantastic new forever home.
But that was just the beginning. Jetpets generously went on to donate three free interstate flights for needy pets each month – that’s over 100 pets that have found new homes by flying across the country! By connecting rescue groups with like-minded groups in other states, a safety net can be created and opportunities to move pets from places of low demand, to places of higher demand are discovered.
The biggest boon for this program was in mid 2009, when PetRescue’s first ‘Jet Setting Kitten‘ rescue saw nine death row kittens moved from Queenslands, where they have a year round kitten season, to South Australia where they were adopted in just four hours! 54 kittens would go on to follow in their footsteps that year.
See Vickie waving goodbye to these kitties in this news video:
Getting pets out into the community
One of the easiest ways to overcome myths and misconceptions about rescue pets is simply to let people to meet them. That’s why in 2008, PetRescue developed an in-store adoption program that could be rolled out into pet store in the country. The program launched in 2009, in PETstock stores around the country, and now in 2010 is being expanded to all pet stores who’d like to offer the program.
Working with ethical pet stores nationwide, PetRescue’s In-Store Adoption Program brings pets out of cages and into the community. Giving adopters the chance to meet and interact with rescue pets, learn about responsible pet ownership and speak to an adoption adviser about how to choose the best pet for their family. Rescue groups are offered support that can help improve the client experience and resources on best practice adoption processes.
Redemption – how it changed everything
I remember reading Nathan Winograd’s Redemption and folding corners to highlight paragraphs I wanted to share – it completely blew me away! Finally, everything we had been working on made sense. Suddenly PetRescue’s belief that there was so much more we could be doing, wasn’t some naive dream. We did need more positive promotions, we did need to attract adopters and we did (and still do) need stronger and more dynamic leadership from the management of animal welfare groups in Australia.
But most importantly; we absolutely can adopt our way out of killing.
I was desperate for the plan in this book to become common knowledge. We contacted Nathan and asked if he would be willing to give our shelters a discount on bringing a bulk lot of books to Australia. He instead donated 400 copies; one for each of our shelter groups. We wrapped them in xmas paper and delivered them to every shelter in Australia.
PetRescue also invited Nathan to come and speak at the NDN Conference. His presentation can be seen here:
Being able to harness the momentum of the US No Kill movement has been a huge boost to rescue here in Australia. We are very blessed to have the amazing leadership of Nathan to help lead us into a better future for animals.
The PEDIGREE Adoption Drive brings a new dawn for homeless pets
In PetRescue was blessed to develop a relationship with PEDIGREE® which launched as the 2009 PEDIGREE Adoption Drive. Incorporating TV, print and online media and featuring real-life homeless pets, the campaign was designed to highlight the plight of the thousands of dogs euthanased every year because homes aren’t be found.
In 2010 PEDIGREE has again made an enormous commitment too help support the animal rescue groups of this country. With guidance from PetRescue, PEDIGREE will be investing $4 million into an awareness campaign designed to pull on the emotional heartstrings of all Australians and bring adoption to the masses.
This year the PEDIGREE Adoption Drive will run from the 3rd June to the 30th July. Celebrity ambassadors Tom Williams and Myf Warhurst will launch ‘Yellow Dog Day’ which will see yellow dogs appear across Australian capital cities, officially kicking off the campaign.
Also, the campaign this year doesn’t only focus on awareness. For every person who joins the PEDIGREE Adoption Drive Facebook page, PEDIGREE will donate a bowl of food to a rescue group. They are also offering every single new adopted dog parent a free Adoption Kit. The campaign will also launch the Dog Adoption Index, a report into the issue of Dog Homelessness in Australia, in collaboration with PetRescue.
Foster carer save lives
With the majority of our members operating foster care networks, one of the ongoing needs is more carers. The PetFoster initiative will market pet foster caring to the mainstream, bringing community resources, skills and knowledge to our industry.
Designed to link new carers with foster care groups, provide resources to existing foster care groups and to help new groups develop a program based on the experiences of successful foster groups across the country, PetFoster aims to empower a community that helps save Australia’s homeless pets. The program will be launching this month.
See Vix talking about PetFoster here:
Caring for Cats
Cat ownership is in decline and we believe that this trend must be reversed. In 2010 PetRescue will be working in conjunction with PIAS (the Petcare Information & Advisory Service) to create the first of many programs and campaigns to elevate the status of cats in our society.
A campaign launched through PetRescue’s large email database and social media networks will use viral marketing to bring cats into the spotlight. These guys did a great campaign last year, naming cats Australia’s greatest ‘modern pet’. Check it out below:
What’s the ideal pet for busy people?
It seems these days we’re busier than ever. We work longer hours, there’s more traffic, we even work on weekends. In addition to this, we also seem to be living more than ever in high density living. So where do pets fit into our busy, modern lifestyle?
While, a favourite campaign of mine, the ‘Secret Cat Society’ aims to improve the welfare of free-roaming cats, by empowering carers with simple steps they can take to care for their Secret Cat.
With over 40% of cat owners feeding a cat they don’t own, a movement towards compassionate cat solutions exists through improved vet care, desexing rates and care for these misunderstood animals.
The changing face of communication
- A rescue group has a new litter of puppies, rejected by their mum. A post on Facebook connects them with their community and several foster care options are found within the hour.
- A YouTube video becomes a viral smash amongst supporters of a particular rescue. Within days a dog that had been languishing in the kennels for months, has two new families fighting for the privilege to take him home.
- A post on a rescue group blog about a dog with bad hips calls for donations to the fosters local vet clinic. Within the week, not only is that dog’s life-saving operation paid for, but a family has come forward to adopt the pet and offered to pay too.
All of these examples are real-life situations where clever use of the internet has meant pets who could have been killed, are instead saved.
The internet is changing everything. Things that seemed impossible, are not only happening, but the results are being spread so other groups can also engage in innovative ways. PetRescue is working to bring information from around the world to Australia, through blogs like this (Saving Pets), our informative internet videos and and PetRescue ‘Pet Rescuer’ educational newsletter.
See me speaking about all PetRescue’s projects here:
The modern rescuer; part of something enormous
PetRescue is the definition of a community initiative. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support over the last six years; we honestly couldn’t be fighting this fight, without you. We love getting your feedback, hearing about your successes and where we can, helping you to enhance the amazing work you do for the animals of Australia.
Together, we have come an awfully long way. Companion animal rescue has never been more needed, nor more relevant in today’s animal loving society. The community is coming together to help spread the word, distance has been eliminated as a hurdle to happiness, and homeless pets are being given a second chance by being seen out in the community through great positive promotions.
Advancements that once seemed completely beyond what we could have hoped for, are now gaining incredible momentum. Even those animals that were once deemed unworthy of a happy life, such as Pit Bulls and community cats, are being recognised as deserving of compassion. PetRescue’s programs continue to make this a reality.
With dedicated, fearless modern rescuers driving Australia to be a world leader in innovative animal sheltering, a No Kill future is a certainty
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