[FurKids]

Kak Anum, good to hear your energising voice again, that means you are better already ...

Anum, our local kill-shelters kill the healthy animals that are dumped/rescued and handed over to them because they could not find adopters for them and could not afford to continue to house them.

Recognising that finding enough homes for these unfortunate creatures are an impossibility without aggressively pursuing TNR in the community, conducting education and awareness program targeted for the tough adults and setting up of stray colonies (especially cats, which do not have the stigma of being considered haram by our general society), the modern SPCA shelters of the world around us have finally won their battle to control and reduce the strays population in a humane and caring way.

These modern no-kill shelters are accepted the fact that there will never be enough land, $$$$, shelters, adopters if we do not aggressively pursue the 3 critical success factors in strays population control. They are also upfront in saying that the killing of healthy animals with the reason that they cannot house them is in fact inhumane and cruel especially when other options available besides adoption are not chosen. I saw much rays of hope for our own animals when I read these statements on their SPCA websites and they have been doing this for years and their stray population is dwindling and dumping of animals at their shelters have also reduced. Most wonderful of all is the fact that they no longer needed to kill any healthy animals that could not be adopted! How wonderful that is ... otherwise, why should we spend all our energy saving our animals, simply to be killed at a shelter?

Anum, it is now found that we must never offer an animals as a present because in most cases, these animals get dumped some time later. Having a pet is a big commitment and that needs to be a personal choice and commitment. If you wanna give someone a present, giving a teddy bear might be a better idea.

And Anum, I do not know which fights you are referring to but if it ever was the fight I was in several weeks ago and involved a guy called Khengteik, it was about the need to not keep following the adoption and school education program track but to follow in the footsteps of the modern SPCA shelters around the world which are aggressively pursing TNRs, adult education and awareness programs, setting up of managed stray colonies and to stop the killing of healthy stray animals citing lack of resources because it is cruel and inhumane. After analysing the results the their actions through the years, these modern SPCA shelters now see that killing of healthy strays did not reduce the population at all, in fact the population increased and the shelters could not cope even when they killed as fast as they could ... they simply could not keep up with the breeding ... and they felt very, very bad killing and termination all those lives ... and they explored other alternatives to let the animals live.

In our country, the dogs may pose a greater challenge, but I do not see why we cannot do the same for the cats.

Yes, it would be heaven to see more adopters, but genuine adopters who will really care for the animal and not dump it the slightest chance they get (ie. bored, tired of it, naughty, cause trouble, neighbour complain, have to travel, grew old and not cute anymore, gave birth already, sick, lost job, move to new apartment, mother in law tak suker, dah preggie ... you name, you have it!) are hard to find.

It is quite easy in fact to get an animal off you hands, but another matter whether it will get dumped at a shelter, pasar, warong, longkang, tong sampah very soon ...

Susah, Anum ... most of us dream of being to take care of these animals right in our neighbourhood or office area by setting up feeding stations without the animal hating people hurling abuses at us that we are attracting animals into the area (huh, as if we do the dumpings!) and that we should stop feeding them so that they will all die of hunger and thirst and the areas would be free of pesky animals insistant of wandering around disturbing their places (hungry and looking for basic necessity FOOD mah ......).

At school, their kids listen to SPCA say sayang the animals but when the kids feed or rescue some young or sick kittens from the garbage dump, at home, their parents scold them telling them it is the stupidest thing since Timbuktu and drive off and dump the kittens along some roadside in heavy rain (my neighbours actually did that!).