The SPA was shut today as it is not the first Sunday of the month, so there is no “hot off the press” news. However there is always something to talk about in the word of dog!
Yesterday I mentioned that we had some new volunteers. One of them could not join in the dog walking, as she is 15 years old, and for legal reasons we are not able to have unaccompanied minors at the SPA. She was disappointed, but quickly realised that there are many other ways that she can help until she reaches her 16th birthday.
We often talk about what is wrong with animal welfare, both in France and elsewhere. And what better way to change this than by influencing young people! There have been several outreach programmes into schools, both by the SPA, the Carcassonne Children’s Council and via other associations. This is a good way to inform and educate as well as to raise funds!.
But we must not forget that children and young adults are often extremely au fait with technology and are masters of social networking! Before the days of Facebook (or rather before the days when the SPA had a Facebook presence), publicising our dogs was so much harder. Now we have a team of volunteers and sponsors who post photos and create wonderful posters to attract people to certain dogs and cats.
This is one way that everyone, regardless of age, can help. And even if you are not creative or clever with computers, just a simple click to share an animal’s Facebook album can allow the animal to reach a whole new audience.
There is no better example of this than the recent adoption of Tigresse, who is not a dog, but a cat! Thanks to Facebook, she was homed on Friday after 6 years at the SPA. The way it works is simple; you share a photo on your wall, where it is seen by someone who has no other contact with the SPA. They then share it and soon the photo is seen by someone whose heart it touches et voila!
So share share share, people! And for the more creative of you, keep those posters coming!
Tigresse, adopted after over 6 years
And a poster promoting the six most urgent dogs at the SPA. This is also a Facebook event!
It’s not just the young we can influence but when some neighbours of mine whose cat had kitten after kitten and after many years of listening to me on the merits of having their cat sterilised they actually had their cat sterilised. I felt like l had won the lottery. The cat was pretty please too!!
Yes, anything is possible! You just have to keep on trying.
We obtained our first French dog (non SPA) from a rather dubious source – it was the mummy dog’s 4th litter in 4 years and needless to say she was not in a great state. In fact all of the pups from one of the litters had been drowned as there were no homes for them to go to!
Although our pup was ‘free’ we gave the owner a sum of money to put towards having her girl sterilised – not really believing she would get it done.
We saw her a few weeks later, by chance, and we’re thrilled to hear the sterilisation had taken place and the owner was delighted too – no more unwanted pups.
So just keep on keeping on!