Sat 12th Nov: Is it summer again?

Austin and Aaron are happy at the Homing Centre

 Just when it seemed the cooler weather was here to stay the sun came out again, perfect for the Puppy Party at Whiskers N Paws on Sunday, 2pm to 4pm.  Take a look again at last week's photos Puppy Adoption Day 6th Nov 2022, although two of the puppies shown won't be going back this week because they just find the whole thing too terrifying.  It's the only reason why Aaron and Austin haven't found homes yet, even though they're lovely as well as being smaller sized (Aaron in particular), but hiding behind a rock for two hours doesn't attract adopters.  With puppies like these we're looking for homes where they can have a more confident dog friend to show them the way, and to teach them that life isn't scary if you give it a chance.   I should also mention that we don't home shy puppy like these two boys to homes where there are young children, because they find the noise and high energy too much to handle.

I finally have a photo of the golden retriever Kuki, who passed through HKDR's system without even coming in through the door.  As it happened, the very first application to adopt that I received after posting the details was perfect for this lovely boy, so it was easy to say yes.

I'm sure everyone has noticed that the cost of living has been rising sharply, and everything suddenly costs a lot more than before.   We've also been affected at HKDR with the increased cost of food, vet bills (which were already huge) and even fuel for the van, so while our adoption fees have remained static for many years we have had to increase them very slightly.  This means that the adoption fee for a puppy will now be $1200 (rather than $1000), a desexed adult dog will be $2000 (rather than $1700), and slightly higher for dogs over 30kg.   In fact, these fees still don't cover what it costs us to have the dogs health checked, vaccinated and desexed, and in many cases there are other surgeries and treatments  that put our costs way higher that we ask from the adopters.  It's difficult to balance the realities of finances with the need to find good homes for our many hundreds of dogs, but I'm sure everyone will understand the need for  this slight increase in adoption fees.