Our mission to create a nation of happy bunnies

Did you know that despite being one of the country’s most popular pets, rabbits are also one of the most neglected?

Sadly, RSPCA staff are looking after reams of rabbits who have been rescued from spending their lives cramped in cages, deprived of food and water and desperately lacking care and attention.

We’re inundated with thousands of neglected rabbits every year who are collected, rescued or seized by our inspectors.

In addition, more than 8,000 rabbits have been reported abandoned to the RSPCA since 2007 and a further 3,300 rabbits have been signed over to the charity by owners who can no longer look after them.

When I was growing up, I had a lovely pet rabbit who I called Cotton (my sister had already nabbed the name Cotton Tail!) He was a favourite member of the family and we regularly got him out of his huge hutch which my dad had lovingly made and let him hop around our garden and munch on the grass. If only all rabbits were treated in this way. Too many spend their lives living alone in cramped hutches with little opportunities to express their natural behaviour.

For example, rabbits need regular exercise. In the wild, rabbits could cover the space of 30 tennis courts in one day alone. Being stuck in a hutch doesn’t provide much opportunity for all this hopping around.

This week (May 23^rd-29^th) has seen Rabbit Awareness Week hop into action with RSPCA branches and clinics throughout England and Wales getting involved.

It is the first year that the RSPCA has been an official partner of the initiative and we’re calling on the public to get involved too.

There are lots of rabbit-related events taking place, including free health checks and educational events. And if you are lucky, you may catch a glimpse of the large inflatable bunny which is currently touring the UK where you can add your pledge to improve rabbit behavioural wellbeing.

To find out how to make your pet rabbits happy bunnies, log onto www.rabbitawarenessweek.co.uk or for rabbit care advice go to www.rspca.org.uk/rabbits

First the good news ...

Last week brought some good news and some bad news for animal welfare.

I was delighted to hear that a new EU ruling will mean that clothing and textiles made from real fur will have to be clearly labelled. The new law follows widespread confusion over whether fur on the High Street was real or fake. An RSPCA poll found that 93 per cent of people think products should be clearly labelled as real or fake fur, and more than half said it would stop them buying the item if it wasn’t labelled. A further 95 per cent said that they would refuse to wear real fur.

Having worked in fashion retail in the past, I know that price is not always a clue as to whether an item is made from real fur. It is a common misconception that cheaper items are going to be fake fur. In fact in the poll, 77 % of people asked thought price would be a big indication about whether an item was real or fake fur.
This is exactly how some items made from real fur have snuck onto the High Street. Consumers deserve to be able to make an informed choice about the items they choose to buy – I just hope there’s enough people out there who would refuse to wear real fur and therefore demand for such items may diminish.

However, the bad news is that the Government has decided not to bring in an outright ban on wild animals in circuses. Instead, a new licensing scheme will be introduced. Needless to say, this simply does not go far enough. We desperately need an outright ban and the RSPCA is furious that the Government has not brought one in – especially given that its own consultation found that 94% of people wanted a ban.

The RSPCA has been campaigning to make the use of wild animals in circuses illegal for many years and thinks that animals such as elephants, tigers and lions should not be subjected to the confinement, constant transportation and abnormal social groups associated with circus life simply in the name of entertainment.

The recent plight of Anne the elephant, who was the last touring elephant in the UK, illustrated the problem perfectly. After being rescued by groups including the RSPCA, she is now recovering and rehabilitating at Longleat safari park.  But, without a ban, animals like Anne could continue to suffer.

There’s no doubt about whether a ban should be brought in - the days when it was acceptable to haul wild animals around to be gawped at and to entertain with unnatural tricks are long gone.

 The Independent newspaper has launched its own campaign to encourage the Government to change its mind and the petition is being handed into Downing St tomorrow – please do lend your support by adding your name to the petition today. The Government needs to listen to public opinion and there’s a huge strength in numbers. Log onto http://www.petitionbuzz.com/petitions/circusanimals to help. Thank you xxx

Finally, as you tuck into your lunch today, you may want to think about what is filling your sandwich. This week is British Sandwich Week and we’re asking people to consider higher welfare choices for their sarnies. A YouGov poll found only one in ten people considered animal welfare when buying their lunch – despite more than half the people polled saying they did consider higher welfare items when doing their weekly food shop. More info at www.rspca.org.uk/fairerfillings

It's RSPCA Week!

RSPCA Week 2011 runs from 2 to 8 May we are releasing our annual animal welfare figures as a way of showing our valued supporters how they have helped us help animals over the last year.

We investigated almost 160,000 complaints of alleged cruelty in 2010 (159,686), which is more than a 10% increase compared to 2009 (141,280).

During 2010, the RSPCA:

·         Answered 1,163,240 calls

·         Investigated 159,686 complaints of alleged animal cruelty

·         Issued 86,354 animal owners with welfare improvement advice

·         Rescued and collected130,033 animals

·         Rehomed 64,086 animals

·         Treated and helped 210,970 animals in our hospitals and clinics

·         Spent almost £4m on veterinary care

·         Microchipped 67,388 animals, helping them to stay safe

·         Admitted 16,429 wildlife casualties into our four wildlife centres

The RSPCA had to rescue fewer animals in 2010, which could be good news in that people took our advice on board and were able to keep their pets rather than having to give them up. 

One of the animals collected by the RSPCA was Winter the cat.  Winter was found lodged halfway through a cat flap in Coventry with a broken leg.  The white cat was nursed back to health and was found a new home by the charity’s Coventry animal centre.

The four RSPCA wildlife centres admitted more than 16,000 casualties last year.  The RSPCA Mallydams Wood wildlife centre in East Sussex had almost 3,000 admissions – its highest in 50 years.

The RSPCA West Hatch wildlife centre in Somerset had a very rare visitor last year:  an extremely weak juvenile Leisler’s bat had to be rehabilitated for more than a month before he could be released.

Another wildlife rescue involved a fallow stag which had become entangled in a swing in Hook, Hampshire.  The deer was freed by two RSPCA inspectors who had joined forces with the fire and rescue service.  He was dazed but unharmed and wandered off into the woodland on his release.

To find out more about the work of the RSPCA please visit www.rspca.org.uk.  To find out how to support your local independent RSPCA branch during RSPCA Week and all year round, and for a list of your local events, please visit www.rspcaweek.org.uk Also, look out for RSPCA fundraisers at your local Tesco all this week too!

You can also Stand Up For Your Favourite Animal here - http://donations.rspca.org.uk/RSPCAWeek/Online.aspx (FYI rabbits got my vote, don't tell my cat Maverick!)

Follow RSPCA Frontline on Twitter (@RSPCA_frontline) for a live one-day tweet-a-thon today (Thursday 5 May).  RSPCA inspector Tony Woodley will be tweeting updates of animal rescues and cruelty complaints received throughout the day.

Hot hot hot!

We're all loving the gorgeous sunshine the country is currently basking in. But the RSPCA urging pet owners to make sure their four-legged friends do not frazzle in the heat after it has seen a huge rise in the numbers of calls about animals left in hot environments.

Between 1 and 26 April, the RSPCA received calls about 968 dogs and 281 other animals trapped in either hot cars, buildings or even gardens without shade.  This compared to 610 dogs and 81 other animals in 2010.

With the record temperatures over the Easter weekend and forecasts of more sunny weather to come, we're reminding dog owners not to leave their pets in cars, conservatories or caravans while they enjoy the sunshine.

All too often, owners make the mistake of thinking that it is sufficient to leave a bowl of water or a window open for their pet but this is not enough to protect your pet from heatstroke, which can have fatal consequences. 

Our message is: ‘Dogs die in hot cars. Don’t leave your dog alone in a car.’

As an example, the temperature inside a vehicle can soar to 47 degrees within 60 minutes when the outside temperature is 22 degrees.  Even in lower temperatures, if it is sunny or slightly warm outside, a vehicle can become hot very quickly.

Other dangers are:

Cloud cover can disappear quickly.

All dogs will suffer, but some dogs are more prone to heatstroke. For example, dogs that are old, young, short nosed, long-haired, overweight or heavily muscled are more at risk, as well as dogs with certain diseases.

Temperatures in air conditioned cars can reach the same temperature as outside within just five minutes of the air conditioning being turned off.

The most obvious sign of heat stroke in dogs is excessive panting and profuse salivation. Other signs include:

Overly red or purple gums

A rapid pulse

Lack of co-ordination, reluctance or inability to rise after collapsing, seizures, vomiting or diarrhoea

Coma or death in extreme instances

Owners who fear their dog may be suffering from heat stroke should act with great urgency. Pets should be moved to a cooler spot straight away before ringing your vet for advice immediately.

Douse your dog with cool (not cold) water. You could put your dog in a shower and run cool water over him/her, spray your dog with cool water and place him/her in the breeze of a fan. Never cool your dog so much that he/she begins to shiver

Let your dog drink small amounts of cool water

Continue to douse your dog with cool water until his/her breathing starts to settle and then take him/her straight to the veterinary surgery

And don't forget your sun cream too!

Helping the silent sufferers of domestic abuse

After five months of planning, preparing and planning some more, the day had arrived! Yesterday saw the launch of the PetRetreat nationwide appeal for fosterers.

RSPCA PetRetreat fosters animals belonging to people fleeing domestic violence.

All too often, women and men find themselves trapped in abusive relationships and feel unable to leave through fear of what may happen to their pets if they are left behind. Quite understandably, temporary accommodation and refuges tend to not allow pets.

PetRetreat looks after these special animals, who may have been victims of abuse themselves, until they can be reunited with their owners in a new safe and secure home.

Over the years since PetRetreat was launched in 2002, dedicated staff at PetRetreat have heard some harrowing tales. Take Petra, the loyal family dog, who had to have her leg amputated when it was left so badly damaged after being repeatedly abused by someone’s partner. Another lady who asked for our help said her dog used to put himself between her violent partner and their children to try and protect them.

This year has seen a record number of people asking for PetRetreat’s help with more than 100 calls being handled every week. On lots of occasions, people would like us to care for more than one animal so we have to try and find foster homes for hundreds of cats and dogs every month. But, this has become an almost impossible feat with a network of only 80 fosterers throughout England and Wales – only one being over the Welsh border.

So, after all the preparation, the media appeal for fosterers was launched on BBC Breakfast yesterday morning. The scheme was given wonderful publicity and it got our phone lines ringing. By Midday, nearly 400 people had applied which was an overwhelming response.

I can only say thank you to everyone who came forward wanting to make a difference to lives of people suffering domestic violence. With your help, we can help to stop them from living in fear and provide a new lease of life for their pets who are the silent sufferers of such tragic situations.

If you think you could open your heart and home and foster an animal through PetRetreat, call 0300 123 8000 or log onto www.rspca.org.uk/petretreat

Elephants Never Forget

The press has been awash with stories of Anne the elephant this week after covert filming by Animal Defenders International captured footage of her being badly treated by staff at the circus she has called home for several years. The shocking footage touched the hearts of many and I choked back tears when viewing it myself.

Organisations such as the RSPCA sprung into action to do anything that they could to help. We are thrilled that Anne's owner has now agreed that she can be rehomed to a place where she can spend her retirement feeling safe and secure. The team at Longleat Safari Park have agreed to welcome Anne to their venue so she can recieve the veterinary treatment she so desperately needs and her condition can be properly
assessed.

The team involved are going to be moving Anne as soon as it is possible to do so whilst minimising any stress and protecting her welfare and safety. I can't wait to see her happy and healthy in a new home.

The RSPCA has been campaigning for a ban on the use of wild animals in circuses for the past ten years under the Animal Welfare Act.

Wild elephants lead dynamic, socially-complex lives governed by their relationships with family members and the demands of finding and eating huge quantities of vegetation. By contrast, circus elephants’ emotional lives are sterile and their activity restricted by chains and pens except for when required to perform tricks which place unnatural strains on their joints and bodies.
The government is due to make an announcement in the next month or so and we hope this evidence will show that only a ban on wild animals can prevent such acts from happening again. If you feel as strongly about this as we do, you can also play a part by lobbying your MP to ask Defra to bring in a ban. For further information log onto http://www.politicalanimal.org.uk/area/westminster/wild-animals-in-circuses

Looking forward to Shrove Tuesday!

Ohhh this is my favourite time of the year! The mornings are getting lighter, the sun is shining (at the moment it is anyway!) and the daffodils are just starting to poke through the ground.

So with Spring just around the corner, that can mean only one thing – Pancake Day!

Here at the RSPCA, we’re urging people not to forget about animals when they are mixing up the batter.

The unpalatable truth is that many of the eggs available to make our pancakes come from hens that have lived out their lives in wire cages.

The good news is that latest figures from Defra show more people than ever are choosing higher welfare eggs. In fact, for the first time the UK is producing 50 per cent of eggs from cage-free systems!

However, this does mean that half of all UK eggs still come from hens kept in cruel battery cages, where the usable space for each bird (in barren as well as so-called ‘enriched’ battery cages) is less than the size of a piece of A4 paper.

That’s about 17 million hens kept in cages, unable to move around or move away from each other freely or express other natural behaviour properly.
Whether you decide to have yours with lemon and sugar, chocolate spread or syrup, please think about the hens too and make your pancake a higher welfare one.

Oh, and check out some great recipe ideas for Pancake Day and beyond here - http://bit.ly/dTULRp

Or to find out more about laying hens, log onto http://bit.ly/aCuyqu

Bon Appétit!! xx