Sterilisation prevents animals reaching ‘unwanted’ list

Dear residents of the Ndlambe district,

Herewith our newsletter that highlights our sterilisation programme.

It is an extremely important aspect of our work, as it has, and continues to, save a vast number of animals being born, that would otherwise have been unwanted and homeless.

Our surgery was opened in 2014, after we received our one and only successful funding application from Lotto.

All our subsequent applications have unfortunately been rejected.

Since then, we have sterilised just under 4,000 dogs, cats, donkeys, goats and pigs. This equates to an average of 400 sterilisations per year, which is quite a remarkable achievement for a small SPCA. Animals are admitted on Tuesday mornings.

Pre-op and health/medical checks take place on Tuesday afternoon, and all sterilisations take place on Wednesday mornings.

It should be noted that we do not sterilise certain breeds owing to the expensive specialised drugs that are required for Yorkshire terriers, flat-faced breeds, German Shepherds and others.

Our dedicated team consists of former state vet Dr J Pistorius, community service vet Dr N Moodley, AWA’s Lisa Nyanya and volunteers Debbie Bohnen, Ronnie Steinhardt and Helen Clohessey.

Without them none of this would have been possible.

We work in partnership with a number of animal groups, PADS who cover Port Alfred, DCA who cover Kenton, Bushmans, Bokness and Cannon Rocks, NARF & BAR who cover Bathurst and FCPA who deal with the feral cats. We could not have achieved nearly as much as we have, without the dedication of the people from these organisations.

Our veterinary assistance services are primarily available to those households in our community with an income of below R10,000 per month.

Applications are made in person through our office at the SPCA.