Galgo Puppy Nelson – saved by SOS Galgos, Barcelona – please help

Here is the story of Nelson, a 4-month old galgo pup, rescued and in the care of SOS Galgos.

Nelson, a galgo puppy needs your help.

Nelson got his name because he is a survivor. We found him at just one month old and almost dead. He had scabies, a broken rib, fractures at femoral, shinbone and calf, as well as osteoporosis due to his dehydration.

His conditions needed an immediate traumatological treatment. We need your help to pay the costs of the emergency aid and postoperative care and as well for possible complications.

Voluntary donations could be done under:
2100-0148-53-0200582650 (La Caixa)
IBAN: ES89 2100 0148 5302 0058 2650
Swift: CAIX ES BB; Telex: 97824 CAIX E

Or via PayPal to sosgalgos@sosgalgos.com. Please use the subject “Operación Nelson” for your donation.

You can read his full history under the following link: http://bit.ly/14fEUjV (below is a google translation)

Thanks a lot for your help!

Nelson was born and felt a kick. That was his first contact with the world. He weighed only a few grams and was not yet called Nelson. It was just a galgo. A galgo newborn. A month and a half old, Nelson, who had no name yet could not walk. He was dragged because he had a broken rib, a fractured femur and a tibia and fibula. Also suffered advanced osteoporosis, ie syndrome butter bones caused by malnutrition.

Someone, whose name we do not have, had played football and bad luck, Nelson had to be the ball. Abandoned as a cigarette butt, his star moved and he ended up in the arms of a voluntary association SOS Galgos, who named him Nelson.

This puppy went through surgery and finished with legs immobilized with six pins and six spiers. And with the wounds to the surface. For puppy Nelson, his future was in operation the machinery of SOS Galgos, a protector nonprofit Catalan dog rescue association.

So, dewormed and looking for a foster home, a house host. That first stop is always provisional, until you find someone qualified and trained to adopt permanently. And so, Nelson urgently came to the house of Manuela, a nurse who lives in New Batzan (Madrid) who listened to his story and was delighted to respond to SOS Galgos’ call to take charge of small galgo for six months.

There he healed inside and out, pampered him and renamed: puppy became Nelson, “for being a survivor.

So it is to be a galgo in Spain in the character implies it to be surviving. Realizing this, the French MEP Michèle Striffler, horrified at the treatment suffered by this race, especially in Spain and Ireland, prepared a draft for adoption in the European parliament. It demanded “an immediate end to the torture and mistreatment of greyhounds in Europe.” This initiative was accompanied by demonstrations in Strasbourg, Madrid and Barcelona,in which more than 2,000 people took part.

“But it was a failure.” Those are the words of discouragement of Anna, a Briton based in Barcelona who with her vet husband founded SOS Galgos twelve years ago. The July 13 deadline to approve the statement, a total of 220 MEPs supported Striffler’s law. Insufficient. To go ahead it needed 383 signatures.

The result came as a blow to the association and between greyhound lovers. “We had such high hopes of finally convincing the EU regulate in a way this situation … Spain is a country cruel to animals in general and especially greyhounds,” complained Anna.

Optimistic, cheerful and infectious laugh, the director of SOS Galgos came to Spain 20 years ago and fell in love with her veterinarian. Together they founded the shelter with the intention of saving the last 250 greyhound race track in Barcelona, which closed and left the dogs on the waiting list for euthanasia.

It was the beginning of a story full of determination, joy and some tears. Anna is not silent when speaking of hunting in Spain, which, she says, is part of “many of those who govern us.” With two million people with hunting licenses, the latest data from the Federal Protective Associations estimate that there are 300,000 hunters galgueros with packs of galgos in their possession. And they all leave or are killed each year between 50,000 and 60,000, especially in February when hunting season ends. A figure that is far from the Spanish government, which says that the main problem of galgos is not abandonment, but the theft.

“Many live in caches, behind bars and dark. They live like cockroaches. Worse, because hunters are not living things. This is reportable and how they dispose of them too. ” And it is Anna has had to pick up many of these dogs lying like a tool that stops working: “Abandoned, hanged, beheaded or thrown into wells. And all who miraculously still alive are malnourished and about to fail.”

In that situation they found Nelson, now, at Manuela’s, has become a three month old puppy playful, restless and alone of all the animals of the family who has the pleasure of getting on the couch. “I have spoiled him but he has suffered so much ….” Manuela apologizes, acknowledging that it is likely to grant him permanent visa to stay in her home. “When you take six months here … How am I going to get rid of him? But only if he digs up my garden,” she jokes with Nelson’s nose under her chin.

Because the dogs do not bark, they speak with the nose. He rests on the lap and asks timidly for some attention. So Pearl, a galga of seven who spent five years with Carmen, president of SOS Galgos. They live together in an apartment in Brunete (Madrid) and between them they created a special bond when she arrived. Pearl belonged to a hunter who handed it to the association because she was used to hunt. From eyes curiously round, elegant and very scary, “she is traumatized by something that happened”.

She is ok with humans in general but flees from men in particular. No matter how you approach her. “We found up to two houses with wonderful people who adopted her but she was returned because they were so scared she would jump a wall to escape,” says Carmen, who assumed that Pearl had chosen her and found with her the peace she needed.

The president of the shelter was first a fighter for women’s rights who was arrested in Marbella 50 years ago for bathing in bikini and, years later, she joined the cause of SOS Galgos by chance. “I found a galgo down the street and suddenly my life began to revolve around them,” she says as she smiles to hear the footsteps of Pearl. “She will come in fear and then curiosity,” says Carmen, who knows that her dog disappears from intruders. “I know that I will die before this changes,” she laments in discussing the result of the initiative of the MEP Striffler. But it was not asking much. To teach people that the galgo/greyhound is the perfect pet. And put more obstacles in the way to prevent a puppy getting kicked at birth.”