Belinda Irby, Keysborough Animal Shelter’s animal welfare coordinator, with one of the many thousands of cats that come through the shelter each year.
By Shaun Inguanzo
GREATER Dandenong residents are lining up to dump their pets – and responsibilities – at a Keysborough animal shelter.
The Australian Animal Protection Society in Keysborough this week said it was disturbed by the number of people who in the past two months had been giving their pets to the shelter for ‘frivolous’ reasons.
The shelter is already jam-packed with stray and abandoned animals, and shelter staff say they constantly fight back tears as they destroy about 2000 cats – many of them kittens – and 200 dogs each year.
Viv Williams, the shelter’s treasurer, said the Keysborough shelter allowed people to bring animals to it rather than dump them in the streets.
She said the rapid rise in animals had filled the shelter and staff were turning people away.
But she said staff were alarmed that people were willing to wait before handing over their pets.
The shelter now has a waiting list of 15 people, and that list is growing.
“Some of the reasons are doubtful,” Ms Williams said.
“Excuses like ‘I just haven’t got enough time’, or ‘I have got a baby now’ or ‘we are moving and going interstate’. Then why can’t the dog or cat go interstate with you? “Their reasons are frivolous and show no commitment to their pet, which we are not happy about at all.”
A victim of its owners’ frivolity was a 10-year-old Pomeranian, Darby, up for adoption on the shelter’s website. The shelter describes Darby as “a lovely little boy surrendered to us because his former owners were building a new house and they didn’t want a dog to be a part of it.”
City of Greater Dandenong mayor Peter Brown this week declared the dumping a symptom of a “throwaway society” and said the council would consider mandatory desexing of animals to prevent unnecessary breeding.
Noble Park North Ward councillor Maria Sampey, a self-confessed animal lover, said she would put forward a notice of motion this month urging the council to offer residents a one-month amnesty on pet registration for people who had their pets desexed.
Cr Sampey said increasing desexing would help stop the senseless destruction of cats and dogs.
The animal shelter is offering discounts this month on desexing to help control cat and dog populations.
Cat desexing costs $50 for males and $60 for females, while dogs cost from $90 to $140 depending on their size.
For more information about adopting or desexing animals, contact the Australian Animal Protection Society in Keysborough on 9798 8415 or visit the shelter’s website at www.aaps.org.au.
