How to prevent abandonment

A better education of the proprietors

The number of abandonments in Spain continues increasing year after year. More than 120.000 dogs they have suffered this injustice during the 2004. This figure maintains far Spain of the rest of European countries, where abandoned dogs hardly exist and the population is much more conciente of the respect that these deserve.

The annual surveys to municipalities and protectors that the Foundation Affinity carries out put of relief that the main cause of the abandonment is not the thoughtless purchase but the excess of animals born by negligence.

Many proprietors are not concientes of the damage that causes to the society that their dog or cat leaves pregnant to females in a fortuitous way. These females finish having puppies that the family cannot welcome and that it is very difficult that are adopted. At the end, the puppies end up abandoned in the street or in municipal kennels where they will be sacrificed or they will dissipate the rest of their lives. 100% of the street cats comes from cats or litters that were abandoned in its day.

Eliminating the fortuitous cubriciones would be possible to reduce the abandonments in 99%. For the Foundation Affinity, the education is the only guarantee to prevent the abandonment. In and of itself, it recommends the following advices:

Basic advices:

• Being conscious that a company animal is not a toy. It is an alive being to which we should respect and to take care.
• Each animal has a different character that he comes determined by the race, the age and the education that give him his proprietors.
• Deciding reflexively if we want a dog or a cat.
• If you are thinking in short of a race, informed yourself on what characteristics has that race: it is not the same thing a dog of great volume that one of small, a male that a female, etc.
• Make sure that you will be able to satisfy the physical and emotional necessities of the animal. Check that you have space and time to dedicate him (to walk it, to clean it, to play with him, etc.)
• The dogs and the well socialized cats, that is to say that have cohabited with animals and people during the first 10 or 12 weeks of their life, have a better character.