Greyhound Advice

JanW · Master

Greyhound Advice

bluesmumanddad · Master

I'm not suprised you're furious I was hopping mad just reading about it.

Did you happen to get the name of the cat and dog home? Perhaps a telephone call is in order, not to shout at them but to gently educate them of Gal's good work and dispell this terrible myth.

Maybe the cat and dog kennel could keep some Gal cards to hand out to those who are wanting greyhounds/lurchers. I know the Edinburgh cat and dog home told us about Gal when we got Blue from them.

JanW · Master

It was Cardonald Cat & Dog home, that's a great idea to give them some info on GAL. Does anyone have links with them at the moment? If not I'll pop in and offer them some posters & cards.

I actually took Ruby there to be chipped and they were very nice, although when I told her to sit for a biscuit the lady said "Greyhounds can't sit" just seconds before Ruby's behind hit the floor so they have already learned something new about greyhounds!

Suzanne · Guru

God how annoying is that Jan!! someone needs to get in touch with them asap with the gently gently approach (whilst muttering what eeejits they are under breathe)...

I was told about GAL from the Edinburgh Cat & Dog home too so at least they are doing there bit.

Dawn · Guru

Prior to getting Mac and in a moment of weakness I went into the Cat and Dog home at Cardonald....I live near it. They had about 5 Greyhounds. The young lady in charge of them seemed to be very nice, but said 'cat testing' was totally out of the question, as the 'resident' cat had died and they couldn't test the GH's on any of the cats they had in.

The girl who looks after the Greyhounds did say she would contact Denise soon with all the details of the GH's available, don't know if she ever did...that was a good few months ago now. So they are aware of GAL.

Teresa · Enlightened One

if ignorance is bliss, that lot must be in heaven !!!

Dave · Enlightened One

sadly some people have 'funny' ideas about Greyhounds, even sadder is some rescue centres have 'funnier' ideas about Greyhounds...nuff said and no, cardonald didn't get in touch with us about the greyhounds there, we are attempting to form a relationship with Cardonald (along the lines of the one we have at Bothwell) but it's proving very difficult....

Jan - cards in the post!

bluesmumanddad · Master

Must be very frustrating for you Dave. It doesn't sound asthough Cardonald are making things easy for themselves. Greys and Lurchers are hard enough to rehome with out people giving the public the wrong information on them.

You would think they would be greatful to have some help rehoming these dogs...........

greyflintstone · Master

Dawn wrote:

Prior to getting Mac and in a moment of weakness I went into the Cat and Dog home at Cardonald....

Like yourself, I had a moment of weakness and visited this place before we got Freddy (ok, if I'm honest I hadn't really heard of GAL up until that point!!). I asked if they had any greys in, they said they had one, called Shane, but he would need a very experienced owner. A few weeks later, we were at an awareness day at Bothwell, when we met a beautiful black & white boy called Shane - he'd been moved to Bothwell for the day. Guess what ..... he became Freddy that day and we've never looked back. We had no dog experience whatsoever and didn't find him to be a problem. I couldn't understand what Cardonald was on about!!

Whilst we were on holiday, we got talking to the son of the old bat who owned the cottage we stayed in (see other thread "pet friendly holidays - a warning" if you don't know the story!!). He had a 10 year old grey that he had rescued almost from being a pup. He said that when they were initially looking for a dog they were told by a greyhound rescue charity that the breed was no good to have with children!!! Fortunately he wasn't put off, went elsewhere and has had (funily enough) no probs with the dogs and his kids!! Makes you wonder, if the greyhound charities don't know what they're talking about ....... what chance do the others stand?!!!!

Dave · Enlightened One

Manda, it is very frustrating, basically they see us as wanting to do their jobs, somehow implying they can't do it themselves (ahem) it just seems it's very difficult for them to accept our offers of help...

Teresa · Enlightened One

when we first saw the Retired Greyhound Trust website, about adopting, most of their information about available dogs kept saying "experienced owner preferred" etc.......almost scared me off having one - so glad I ignored them cos we've had very few probs with dave and daisy (the only one being "the incident of the cat in the garden").

makes you wonder how committed they are to finding new homes.

denise · Master

Hi Folks,

Just to put you in the picture re the situation at Cardonald. I've spoken to the staff at Cardonald on a number of occasions about holding Greyhound Awareness Days there, the kennel staff especially are very keen. I've known some of them for many years. The problem seems to be the manager, despite leaving messages and even suggesting specific dates I am still waiting for him to get back to me with the ok to go ahead. If anyone is interested in volunteering for a day at Cardonald then get back to me on denise@gal.org.uk and I'll see what I can do.

Many, many moons ago GAL used to have volunteers at Cardonald at least once if not twice a month.

Unfortunately though that was all stopped when a local SSPCA volunteer group went to the newspapers about the conditions at Cardonald and the amount of dogs the being put to sleep. Since then no outside organisation have been allowed to go in and help home the dogs.

Sometimes they transfer the greys and lurchers to Bothwell. Sadly a brindle lurcher they transferred just before Christmas 'disappeared' upsetting many of the staff at Cardonald, so as far as I'm aware no dogs have been sent to Bothwell since. (At least not of the sight hound variety).

Denise.

Christine Young · GAL Newsletter Editor

It seems to me that the policy Cardonald has at the moment is that if they are unsuccessful in homing a dog, they'd rather put it to sleep, rather than ask a registered charity, like GAL, to help. I can understand why they would be wary of accepting help after the bad publicity they've had, but surely their first concern should be in helping animals find a home. And if that means putting pride and politics aside, well so be it! There must be lots of rescue organisations like ours who feel the same as we do.

Christine