Join this campaign, please send a letter to your MEP. Here are the links to find your MEP. List of MEP 1 List of MEP 2
Below is a translation of the letter into Spanish for writing to your Spanish MEP
Below also is a translation of the letter into Dutch for writing to your Dutch MEP. Please copy and paste and send either by email or post.
Thank you to Consuelo and Lisa for the translations.
I wept when I received this story. 4 galgos,abandoned, starving and barely able to stand. A woman is leaving food and water but she can’t take them in, please can anyone help. Here’s the appeal I received (Google translation!)
A few days ago a woman called me crying, 4 dogs skeletal and more dead than alive. I went to see and do photos, and what I found on arrival was eerie. They are two males and two females. Of the males, one is very sweet and young, have white teeth, and let me pet him about looking for love. not too thin, and hits all the food (normal if starved), but it’s a terrific galgo and loves petting.
The perreras in Spain are full to bursting with abandoned dogs, especially galgos now that the hunting season is drawing to a close. Despite all the ones rescued from Jerez perrera, Cadiz, there are still more than a couple of dozen there, awaiting a painful death. At El Paraiso perrera, they are feeding the galgos, hoping someone will rescue them. Several have been taken to foster homes already, and two more were taken out last weekend. White ones, which were once regarded as THE most important galgo to the Spanish aristocracy.
A reader in the UK has taken up the plight of the galgos in Spain with her MEP. Derek Vaughan, one of the Labour MEP’s for Wales has replied that he ‘was very concerned about the problem and has tabled a Written Question to the Commission to bring it to wider attention and see what can be done to help end this unnecessary suffering’.
Derek Vaughan needs the support of as many other MEPs as possible. Please write to your MEP and ask them to support the Written Question. Below is a sample letter which is a variation of the one to the president of the European Commission already on Galgo News.
I’m putting out an appeal for podencos, for people to offer them forever homes. There are three at Galgos del Sol (scroll down to Anton and Freya, and Lucky is a new arrival today, 4 pages of them on the Galgos France website, Ibizan Hound Rescue has many deserving podencos, and let’s not forget SARA Lanzarote in the Canary Islands – poor Mozaga has never known life outside of the refuge. Podencos suffer terrible maltreatment on the Spanish Islands, both Canaries and Balearic. Mostly their only hope is to be rehomed on mainland Europe or in the UK. Pepis Refuge is another small British-run shelter with many delightful podencos among their dogs looking for forever homes. And Phoenix Association in Dordogne, France, has Roda and Mindy who arrived in November from SARA Lanzarote and who are looking for forever homes in France.
Please think of the podencos as well as the galgos.
The refuges and shelters are, as ever, swamped under the sheer volume of abandoned dogs, especially galgos – there’s been no let up all winter. And still the governments and authorities ignore the problem. Here’s another casualty of the galgueros. This is Charlie, 5 months old galgo pup, suffering from a viral infection in the Jerez killing station.
Update 8 01 2011 Sadly today Charlie gave up his fight for life. Thanks to everyone who donated to help the vet try and save him.
So many galgos are abandoned by the galgueros to take their chance on surviving as best they can. Hundreds of them starve, fearful of humans, their only chance of help being from someone who is able to catch them, before they are injured on the road. This is the story of Skinny, rescued and rehabilitated by Scooby Medina.
Thank you to Valarie Woolf who has kindly forwarded this interesting item up for purchase on ebay. If you scroll down the page, there is a translation from the Spanish into English.
Do you remember this boy? A rough-haired galgo badly injured in a road accident, taken to Los Infiernos refuge. He was left like this, in pain, for a few days and the owners of the refuge were going to have him euthanaised. Then Tina Solera found him (there’s 200 dogs at the refuge!) and immediately took him to the vet where he was operated on and went into foster care.
In November he travelled with two members of GRIN to the US where he is now in foster care, preparatory to him finding his forever home. He has a problem on his front elbows as a result of lying on concrete floors. They are called ‘hygromas’, and you will see the swellings in the photo.
