Rescue sheepdogs in demand
A leading Border Collie rescue charity has issued a warning over rehoming.
A national Border Collie rescue charity says there are hundreds of farmers waiting to rehome working dogs on their farms.
Mike Cooke from Border Collie Rescue said: “At the moment we have 40 dogs in care, we’ve rehomed 70 and still have 97 dogs waiting to come in. But we have 800 applications from farmers on our waiting list who want a dog – and the process of rehoming takes time.
“Many of the farmers who are handing a dog over are very distressed and they want to be assured that the dog is going to a working home,” said Mike.
“There have been a lot of rumours about farmers dumping 1,000s of dogs or dogs being shot by the farmers following the FMD crisis, but we haven’t been able to substantiate any of them.
“There have also been some instances of vets being asked to put some of the dogs down, although we understand this problem is not in large numbers.
“We have found that the real problem is the failed or unwanted pet. These numbers outstrip those coming from farms by six to one.
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” The run up to Christmas is not a good time to take a new animal into a home.”
” We would recommend that families do not take on Border Collie puppies or working dogs from farms – they can have strong working instincts, are very intelligent and can have strong bonds to humans.
The Border Collie Rescue centre is now running a government- approved rehoming scheme, which ensures all necessary disinfection and quarantine procedures are followed in the wake of FMD.
Until the programme ends, the centre is only rehoming dogs to work on farms
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