Weds 3rd Jan: New year, new dogs

This is the mother who will be coming with her 3 daughters

The year seems to have started with a potentially large intake of dogs at our Tai Po Homing Centre, four of which are being thrown out from one home and two from another.  There may be an additional black labrador depending on how that works out, and another possible returnee who was adopted as a puppy and is now a year old.   Abandoning elsewhere is often the preferable choice for these types of adopters who can't face the consequences of their actions and think they can get away with it, but the microchip is always there to expose them.

An Akita (3.5yo) and a mongrel (2.5yo), both male and neutered.

Their owners (a couple) are in debt and can no longer afford the house they’re living. 

There may also be some puppies from a breeder, cross-breed accidents, but I will hold back on posting any information on them as they may not materialise, as happens too often.  They are very young, too young to be away from their mother, but the breeders sell them at this age.  That's why so many of the breed dogs end up with all sorts of neurotic behaviour, including separation anxiety.

We have another small dog being returned after a couple of years, a poodle adopted as an older puppy and with the usual lack of contact between then and the sudden announcement of "can't train".  It's incredibly frustrating to offer the free services of a really top trainer (Cactus) who has so much experience in handling all sorts of behaviour and training issues, only to be completely ignored until the problem, real or imagined, becomes too much and the dog has to go.  For this poodle girl it will be easy to find a new - and much better - home, but for the mixed breed puppies who are returned as adults it's a totally different story.

One of the daughters of fuzzy mother

It's lucky for these larger dogs that we have agreed to take them in, even though we already have four hundred-plus dogs at our Tai Po Homing Centre.  It's far from an ideal situation and we can only hope that they won't have to stay with us for too long, or others will be adopted to create a bit more space. We're continuing to work on the site to create a more comfortable and interesting environment, and I hope everyone will start to notice the subtle changes taking place.

As I'm sure you all know, this coming Chinese New Year will be the Year of the Dog, and we've got lots of things lined up in February to celebrate.   I just hope the fact that it's a Dog Year won't result in people rushing to the pet shops to buy their lucky puppy, but I'm afraid this is bound to happen and we'll be seeing a lot of surrenders later on.