CHRISTMAS 2007 NEWSLETTER

On behalf of all the volunteers at Soi Dog Foundation we would like to wish all our supporters a very happy Christmas and hope 2008 is a wonderful year for you all. 2007 like every other year in our short history has seen its share of highs and lows.

On the ‘high' side nothing has touched us more than the support we have received from you, our friends around the world, without whose support we simply could not function. The response to our appeal to help with the new shelter was fantastic and building work is going well. We are also grateful to the Jeanne Marchig trust, the Wetnose Foundation and the Animal Protection Network in Sweden for their continued support.

This little dog was thrown over one of our Thai worker's fence. Now adopted.

We continue to spend more than we raise and funding is always our biggest problem. Our food and drugs bills are enormous and if anybody has links with pet food manufacturers or drugs companies that sell over here then donations in kind are just as valuable as monetary donations. We did receive a very substantial donation of food from the local distributors of Pedigree dog food a few months ago, but such donations are a rarity.

This young dog is learning to walk again. She came in with broken pelvis and spine damage. It looked at first as though we would have to euthanize her but there was some feeling still there, so we are persevering and she is now learning to walk again and the signs are good.

On the subject of the shelter, hopefully all of you received the letter explaining the circumstances of our having to leave the Government Dog pound and build a new shelter in Mai Khao. If you did not receive this, please contact us and we will send you a copy. It was of course never our intention to operate a shelter at all as it is a huge drain on our resources, and takes funds away from our main aim of sterilizing all the street dogs here. However with cruelty and persecution (including poisoning of dogs) on the increase, there has to be some sort of refuge for these animals.

Our policy is only to take in dogs who are under threat and literally have nowhere else to go and to re-home wherever possible. Building work is progressing well and we hope to be able to move in by the end of the year or early January.

This little dog was rescued by local people from being beaten to death by a security guards at a local Hotel run by the Swedish Sunwing group, who like many hotels here think by dumping or killing dogs that are near their hotel the problem will go away. In fact the problem inevitably gets worse as new, often wild dogs which they can't catch move in on their territory. Still frightened of people but getting better. Now sponsored.

At times the lows seem to far outnumber the highs and lead us all to question whether we can continue, and indeed many volunteers on the ground come and go very rapidly as they find the work just too stressful. Luckily Alan, who took over all the updates of dogs who live at the Centre from Gill, is still with us. However we know that without us there would literally be nobody to help the animals here. On Phuket there are certainly less strays now than when we first started, and the number of dogs on the streets in terrible condition has been cut drastically, though we still get many animals coming in who need sometimes weeks of treatment.

Old Black Mama has been with us since Gill and Ina treated her on the streets 4 years ago. Completely hairless she was one of our first shelter dogs after they found her again in the same state a year later. Front Legs broken and never repaired earlier in her life she is now a bit arthritic and will spend the rest of her life with John and Gill. See the before pictures here.

It is always heartbreaking to see a dog or cat who has overcome often horrendous injuries pass away from picking up some secondary illness, or see a dog who has been restored after weeks of treatment and returned to where they lived be poisoned a few weeks later. The secret people say is not to get emotionally involved, but at times that is impossible. Only today we have had to euthanize a lovely natured young dog who had been hit by a motor cycle. We kept her at the shelter in the vain hope that she could learn to walk again, and indeed Gill was talking of taking her home, but a visiting vet from Holland checked her again today and said that there was no chance she would ever walk again, and she would always have sores on her legs as she dragged herself around. We all had tears in our eyes as she was put to sleep. Euthanasia is always an emotive subject and thankfully not something that we have to practise often, but our policy is that if a dog has no chance of having any quality of life and is clearly suffering then sometimes it is the kindest option.

Back to the highs. We have seen a record number of dogs go overseas this year. Glory, who featured on the website as a before and after dog is currently coming to the end of her stay with Irene in France before starting a new life in England. Several dogs have gone to Switzerland and others have gone to Sweden, Germany and the United States. In addition dozens of dogs have been adopted locally by both foreigners and Thais.