There are emails circulating around at the moment about all the galgos arriving at the Mairena killing staton, in southern Spain near Seville. I have not been sure what a killing station is exactly – except the obvious – it’s a place where they kill dogs! Is it the same as a perrera?
Mo Swatek, President of Pro-Galgo, has so much experience of the plight of the galgo in Spain, and this is her explanation of how a killing station operates.
‘A perrera is a killing station but either run by a private person who offers its services to the cities and villages or by a business, often the companies who remove the rubbish/trash also manage the perreras.
Some of the perreras are managed by animalists, but usually it’s a big business for the owners of the business; receiving huge money per caught dog, keeping the dog on the base of “bread and water”, and then destroying it the cheapest way possible. And you have to know that many killing stations are neither legal nor even known to the public.
We know that some small villages have a “dog catcher” and they just pay him to catch the abandoned dogs and nobody asks what he is doing with them…
The dogs in the pictures are in a killing station in Mairena, which makes a huge profit with the dogs extracted from there. They receive already from the town halls of each village and each city a “catching fee” for each dog taken in the streets of the villages that contracted their services; usually between 150 and 200eur per dog just for taking it in and keeping it for 14-21days, depending on the local laws, and then euthanasing the dogs if not adopted.
Now a lady is dedicating her time to sending those emails to hundreds of email lists but she is not a member of an association, although she is obviously a great animal lover and wants to help the dogs.
The problem is that, for most of us associations, it is first far to expensive to take dogs from there and second too far away, Mairena is in Seville.
The killing station asks 70 euro just to take the dog out, they say it’s for the rabies and microchipping, (actual cost of that 4 euro per chip and 4 euro for the vaccines, the rest they pocket in the killing station.)
The dogs then need to go to a quarantine kennel for anther 5-6euro per day per dog, 21 days minimum to legally move them into other European countries. That makes another 120 euro per dog minimum if you can rehome him immediately. If not, you can imagine how expensive it will be if the dog stays for 2 month or longer…, then the prices for the vet fees are extremely high there, so a dog would cost us an average of 500 euro until he could be with his new adoptant. For example PRO-GALGO can not afford such expenses as we have nearly 0 money donations and need to more or less autofinance the dogs with the adoption fees.
Our costs per dog are over 300 euros to prepare its European passport and transport it to, say, Frane or Germany.
I personally refuse to pay to those guys who manage the killing station in Mairena 70 euro per dog, money that they pocket directly. In other killing stations the dogs leave chipped and vaccinated either for free or max 25 euro per dog, that is reasonable but anything else is unaccaptable for us.
If we would take Mairena dogs, it would cost more than double of it because some vets and the killing station make huge profit on those dogs and we refuse to be emotionally blackmailed this way.
The Spanish shelters are completely overloadad because everybody wants to save dogs from the killing stations but it is a vicious circle because the shelters are sooooo packed, they can not take new dogs in, so all abandoned dogs immediately end up in the killing stations and to take dogs directly from killing stations is terribly expensive. (If they are not in the shape the ones were we took last Janaury, perfectly vaccinated before because I had sent the vaccines to the killing station) but in Mairena there is no collaboration desired, the management of Mairena only wants to have the money, they do not collaborate in any case.
So the pictures are made hidden, no character information of any dog possible, not even allowed to enter into the kennels. The lady who makes this cry for help is for sure a nice person but all she can do is distribute the pictures but not able to help in any other way.
A rescue should be made like this to exclude any people in perreras pocketing money:
1. the dogs should be always taken from shelters or killing stations managed by animalists, such as the one in Tudela where we take all the galgos out, because the shelters can prepare the dogs well and can tell us about the chracter and can socialize them. The stay is not as expensive as in bording kennels, also they usualy have vets who collaborate with reasonable prices
2. then when the dogs are adopted from the shelters, the shelter could take in new dogs either directly from the streets to avoid that the dogs end up in the killing stations or going to the killing stations and taking out dogs from there and prepare them for adoption
3. this way, less dogs end up in killing stations in the long run, and the killing stations make less money and the dogs taken in the shelters are better cared for, suffer less stress and also are causing less expenses when being prepared for adoption.’
Thank you, Mo, for your explanation. All that continues to come across is that the situation in Spain for the poor galgos is absolutely horrendous, and I expect it applies to all the other abandoned dogs of Spain.
‘
Comments
10 responses to “Mairena, Seville – What is a Killing Station? Pro-Galgo explains.”
Poor dogs. It makes me sick when people profit off these dogs while ruining their chances of getting rescued.
So the rescue from these poor galgos, brought to this perrera in Mairena which is not the dogs fault,has become a matter of money? And after they are killed, we sit pleased in our chair and say: “Good, we did not give in to this emocionally blackmail!” And then go to bed and sleep well? I don’t think so. Sometimes you have to give in to these kind of things without letting money become the most important thing. We, from Galgotrans, are happy to be able to pick up in our next transport,and for free, 7 galgos from the perrera from Mairena, after they have been rejected by 2 associations because they also think they are too expensive, but happily there is another Dutch association who thinks that their lives are more important than the dirt of the earth: money!
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Bonjour Cobie
Nice to hear from you and great to hear that you
have been able to rescue some of the galgos from Mairena, which I think is
probably much closer to you than it is to Pro-Galgo who are much further north
in Spain. I see that your first Galgotrans was in June this year, after I and
LEurope des Levriers had visited you at the refuge in Cordoba to bring some
galgos and podencos away for adoption in France. Now I know what you are
involved in, I shall for sure read your news on your website and put a link to
it on Galgo News. Good luck with the trip.
Beryl
http://www.galgonews.com
Helping to make
a difference
A person who has never known a dogs love has
missed a wonderful part of life. Bob Barker
The dog has no ambition, no self-interest, no
desire for vengeance, no fear other than that of displeasing.
Count of Buffon
Where is the animal liberation movement in Spain? Does it exist? Someone needs to eradicate these killing stations asap.
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Hi John
Thanks for reading GN and commenting. I
agree, it is unbelievable what a so-called civilised country gets away
with. There is nothing to stop any of the cruelty against animals which
goes on in Spain. There is an EU law for animal welfare – but it doesnt
apply to galgos, and in cases of animal cruelty the Seprona police are the ones
who can take action.(Read about Operation Harry y Clavijo on Galgo News)
But we get down to the age old thing, Spain is a big country, galgo
hunting goes on in very rural areas, no-one tells about his neighbour……..and
so it goes on and on every year.
The RSPCA International and other associations like
Pro-Galgo to name just two, do go round schools etc trying to educate the young
Spanish that one should respect animals. But how many generations will
that take and, in the meantime, how many animals will die in extreme pain and
trauma?
And it is not just the animals which suffer.
Every year the incredible Spanish volunteers deal with the abandonment etc of
over 50,000 galgos after hunting finishes in January – I cant begin to imagine
what they go through. Some of them eventually have to stop, simply because
of emotional breakdown. So the volunteers are also casualties, besides the
galgos.
At the moment I am researching Spanish Law relating
to animals – not an easy task – but in the meantime, Spain takes over the
revolving EU presidency from January 1 2010 for 6 months and I know there are
several organisations who are preparing campaigns to draw attention to what goes
on in Spain in relation to animal cruelty. I hope to publicise these
campaigns on Galgo News, and we hope to join as many people as possible together
to make a REALLY LOUD SHOUT. So, please keep reading, help wherever you
can, and join in the campaigns.
And please keep commenting
Beryl
http://www.galgonews.com
Helping to make
a difference
A person who has never known a dogs love has
missed a wonderful part of life. Bob Barker
The dog has no ambition, no self-interest, no
desire for vengeance, no fear other than that of displeasing.
Count of Buffon
Something has to be done about these killing stations we can’t just sit back and watch this go on. Isn’t there an animal rights group that can tackle them. i’m willing to give 100% support to them. This plight should have a petition on facebook
thank you so much for all of your hard work…. Deb in PA USA
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Thank you for reading Galgo News, for commenting
and for caring about the galgos and podencos. They need all the help they
can get to stop the atrocities committed against them.
Beryl
Why is the international RSPCA not going into these killing stations and having them closely monitored and getting them closed down. Educating young people alone is not enough, where are they and where are the animal rights groups in Spain
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Bonjour
I took the matter up with the RSPCA some years
ago. The International branch work on educating the young generations to
respect and care for animals. And where they have sponsored a van for
local people to catch abandoned dogs, the van has been trashed! Ive seen
it for myself!
If you read my book, the WSPA took up the cause in
2001/2 working with Fermin Perez at Scooby. A couple of years later they
dropped it. Ive asked IFAW and HSI and STILLnone of them do anthing
– but I keep on trying. Its sickening to know that these organisations
have the clout and the international voice to take action and do absolutely
nothing!
Please write yourself to these organisations, Ill
be interested to know how they respond to you too.
Thanks for caring and commenting.
Amities
Beryl