Pro Animals -news
 

Life in Tg-Jiu

I’ll write to you about some of the events Patricia has managed to inform of despite the hurry.

The same day Dona was stolen from Carmena’s yard and Patricia was returning from the police station to the shelter in the evening, she saw from a long way that a horse had been lying on the ground in front of the warehouse of the shelter in severe pain. At first Patricia had thought that it was Dona and almost crashed her car. However, the horse wasn’t Dona but a mare that had been badly struck by a large vehicle and injured severely. People had gathered around the horse but no one did a thing to help it. Patricia had called the vet and asked him to come and put down the horse. The vet had arrived about an hour later and while waiting for him, Patricia had tried to calm the horse down alone by stroking its head gently. The horse had a chip so Carmena and Patricia have tried to find the owner of the horse to report of the case to the police authorities. As you can see, the women do most of the work the authorities are supposed to.

The free roaming of the horses e.g. on the busy road in front of the shelter has terrified us already for many years. It’s a miracle that accidents happen rather seldom though every day there is the danger of getting hit. It’s very common to let horses run around free like this, especially among the Romani, and it seems impossible for authorities to get this under control. Pictures of horse traffic.

The next evening Carmena was called from a village 50 kilometres away and told that a man nextdoor is beating puppies to death with a stick, please, come to rescue! It was impossible for Carmena and Patricia to leave right at the time and of course, the police wasn’t even slightly interested in doing anything. Early the next morning Carmena and Patricia managed to go to the spot and found the killed puppies on the yard of the neighbour in question. Carmena and Patricia took a statement from the person who reported the abuse and they will do a report to the officials of the case so the man who killed the puppies would be punished. Patricia told that it’s very rare that a person reporting of animal abuse is even willing to give a statement. Without it, however, it’s nearly impossible to hold the abuser responsible for his or her actions. Pro Animals Romania is in no way authorized to give punishments but they are usually the first ones to arrive on the spot when there is animal abuse. They alone have to make the official reports to the authorities.

About a week ago a man had come to the shelter. He had wanted to offer himself for a job for a couple of days a week. A couple days ago Vasile had taken the day off and this man was covering for him. In the afternoon Carmena and Patricia had been forced to take care of the case relating to the killed puppies and this new worker had been left to the shelter alone for an hour. When the women had returned the man had claimed that he had fed some of the dogs of the shelter. Of course, Carmena and Patricia had immediately noticed that the man was lying. Patricia had gone to check the caravan and found syringe bags missing. When Carmena had asked the man to help feed the dogs he had run to his car and driven away. Apparently he had thought that the women would search his car. Anyway, it was already four in the afternoon and in an hour it would have been dark already. The women had to feed all the dogs by themselves and when they had finished giving the food and putting dogs to their cages, it was already 8 pm. The daily feedings are a demanding and time-consuming task itself let alone when time gets wasted on the difficult and stiff locking systems of the gates of the cages. Some of these cages must be closed using wires since some of the dogs know how to open latches. You also have to remember that in the evenings in a completely dark shelter yard the women are very defenceless and anything could happen.

In addition to all, Patricia takes female dogs to be spayed every week and of course, the recovering dogs must be regularly checked and kept in isolation for days. Every week abandoned puppies are found in front of the shelter and they need a lot of care. And we must not forget the injured and other ways sick dogs that Carmena and Patricia end up getting under the care. Here are some of the latest abandoned dogs needing special care.

 
On the left-hand photo, an abandoned puppy suffering from skin diseases. On the right-hand photo, an abandoned dog having an injure on its leg.

Below, a dog injured from its hind legs. The dog was found 50 kilometres away from a ditch and the man who brings straws to the shelter brought the dog with him. The prognosis is good though rehabilitation will take time and resources.

A puppy that had been hit by a car. The puppy has almost completely recovered after getting proper care on time.

Some of the smallest inhabitants of the shelter.

Closeness means security.

A little more exotic patient found its way to the shelter for a while. This beauty is now recovering in a private home and will be set free as soon as her both wings are healed.

Soon it’s Christmas again

Soon it’s time celebrate Christmas again. A good way to catch the holiday spirit is to come to Eettiset joulumarkkinat (Ethical Christmas fare) on the 6^th to 7^th of December in Vanha yo-talo (Old Student House) of Helsinki. PAFi will be there and we will be selling the handiwork of our hardworking team gnomes among other things. You are welcome to stop by and say hello and shop for the dogs of Tg-Jiu shelter. More information here (in Finnish) .

PAFi has also immaterial gifts and we hope you will give them to your friends and close ones at Christmas as well as throughout the year. Immaterial gifts .

Correspondence with EU

We have managed to get in contact with a certain Finnish member of European Parliament in animal protection issues. The person has been very interested in exploring e.g. Romania’s way to handling these issues. Although our work is mostly based on the situation of the dogs and horses in Romania, surely we will take into consideration the meaning of animal protection in wider prospect while exchanging views and pondering ways to help. Let’s hope that this channel will lead to something that will really help the animals! Big thanks to Maria for her help in opening the discussion!

Questions relating to volunteering are gladly accepted!

It’s been a few weeks since Inkeri and Tuuli returned from the volunteer work at Tg-Jiu shelter and we thought that it would be wonderful to get a multifaceted “questions and answers”-section in PAFi’s website. In this section Inkeri and Tuuli would answer to your questions relating to their interesting two-months-work in Tg-Jiu.

All in all we are aiming at producing a so-called “survival guide” for people who would like to volunteer to the shelter for a time longer than just a few days.  You can send questions by emailing This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Don’t hesitate to ask on everything there is to ask about Tg-Jiu!

- Kiia -