Once again it seems the Dept of Health is considering strychnine poisoning of our dogs. It is rumored this will happen this week. Seems a meeting was held to address the issue. Odd that again this may happen when our Village chair person Beto is out of the country, he would not let this happen. I spoke with the Health Inspector in San Pedro today and she confirmed the meeting and the possibility of the eradication's but said no definite plans had been made. We have contacted them on several occasions offering our help in a humane way to get problem animals off the street. We have humanly euthanized several troublesome dogs and relocated at our expense larger street dogs to homes on the mainland. We have struggled with getting our Police Department to even take dog complaints so we can deal with problem animals and progress is small if none. Our offers of help and humane euthanization at no expense to the Government seems to be being ignored in favor of strycnine poisoning at random.
Keep an eye on your dogs at least til Monday when Beto returns.
Another issue is that the Department of transportation posted this on T.V.
Anyone riding bicycles or golf carts with dogs on leashes will be cited and fined $25. OMG..we have been making some progress with folks keeping their dogs on leashes. Now the villagers are all letting them off the leashes due to this advertisement!!!! No dog on leash no fine. In respect to The Traffic Department what they meant to say was on or off the leash only in the Town center high traffic area, yet its still a big set back as that IS NOT WHAT THEY SAID!!!
http://www.cayecaulkerhumanesociety.com/

No wonda them want to kill the dogs because all of you in this so cal human society thing no doing nothing. you just all say unu wan help and da so much of you in the group and non of you are doing nothing. Every body on the isalnd watch uno just pass the dogs on the street an ignor them , why uno no take them to uno place, or uno house that uno so rich? When yo first started out a remember reading here that a woman donated 100 thousand dollars fu uno start a real human society, what happen to all dat moeny? Plus all the funraising uno du and all the people that live here soport uno? You all jus want the Glory , to look like uno di du sometin great , like you come to we country to show poor belizean how to live but you worst than we, you come from one place that have laws and you cant take you dog outside without leash and you come here to the island and leave uno own dogs on the street with no leash, what example uno setting? Stop di lie. You are lyers!!!!! Uno not doing nothing for we. If you mi doing we no me one have so many dogs and the govment no mi wan have to do what they want to do in first place. By the way not even the white man uno have at you place as the vet no what he doing every body that go to him he just want to tell them to put animal to sleep or that them have aids or other. Not even uno in the same group take uno dogs to him uno go to Belize because you dont trust him. Stop fooling us , we tired of you crop.

We never got $100 thousand dollars,that never happened. we spent over $1,500 last week alone on the community, we dont charge anyone for spay and neuter that cant afford it. Exams are always free at the Clinic. Your email sounds like you have an agenda, sounds a bit over DAH EDG....if you have animals and you need help come talk to us because it sounds like you have got some bad information. All day long we are giving out free Meds, running around checking on animals..I am so sorry you got such bad information. Please come by the Clinic this Saturday and talk to us.
People that can afford to pay are happy to pay as even then we charge so much less than anywhere else. In our effort to stop dog fighting and animal abuse we are going to make enemies and you sound very angry....
We are a small clinic and dont have the facilities Belize City does so when in doubt or in a case we are not sure about we feel better sending animals to Belize City, which many times we pay for.
I am so sorry for your misunderstanding,,,,

I'm so sorry to hear about this. When will the authorities open their eyes and realise that not only is eradication just a temporary solution, which has no long term advantages when it comes to controlling stray dog populations. Not to mention it is against WHO advice. Tourists get incredibly upset about it and some even refuse to visit Belize after hearing about it. It is one of those things that seems to be like pointlessly banging one's head against the wall. Ineffective, pointless and stupid - yet they persist. I very much hope that the humane society can find a way to work with the Town Board in Caye Caulker to find effective, humane and intelligent solutions to stray dog control. I applaud all the hard work done by your humane society and all of the humane societies around the country. Most don't realise that the humane societies are organised and run by volunteers, who receive no payment and who have taken the responsibility to find the funds to care for animals that have been abandoned, neglected and abused and also for those who belong to people who can't afford to care for them. If anyone is critical of humane societies, the best thing they can do is to be a responsible pet owner and to encourage those around them to do the same. Once all animals are responsibly kept, there will be no need for humane societies!

Oh gosh that is so terrible. I am so upset after reading this. I have been coming to Caye Caulker for several years and now I don't know if I want to continue coming if this is how animals are treated.

You are right eradication is not the solution its sterilization and I do not know in heaven's name why someone would say that the PAWS humane society is doing nothing. I have seen PAWS in action myself along with a lot of my friends who can vouched for this each year when we visit them.

PAWS humane society has been the first humane society to bring large charity vet groups such as World Vets and The Canadian Animal Assistance Team to Belize to provide all animals with free sterilization and free veterinary care, vaccines, you name it and PAWS Humane Society continue their efforts to offer free sterilization at their clinic and controlling the animal population of stray cats and dogs with their Trap , neuter and return program.

For someone to say that PAWS Humane Society is not helping the animals of Caye Caulker is a big lie. If anyone wants to witness the wonderful work they do themselves, they should visit them to see their clinic where they get their work done, and see all the lovely abuse animals that were rescued and given a second chance and now live there in their sanctuary haven.

They are located about a block away from the Atlantic Bank walking west toward the back beach. You will see a yellow with black spots painted cabana that looks like a Jaguar. For the people who want to contact them their site is www.pawanimalsanctuarybelize.com

I agree with collyk that a lot of people are critical of humane societies but this is why its good for people to visit to see the work for themselves.

For all the other humane societies in other parts of Belize that are doing such wonderful work, keep up the good work guys! We love you!!

daducho = TROLL
anyone who registers and writes a RAN T post looks suspect - in my opinion.

Really a shame there is never any NAMES of the people who persist in thinking poisoning is a solution. There is always offers of help for the problem that are more humane so why insist in such a cruel solution?

I live here and can see the positive effect of these humane societies. I'm not seeing sick, fighting dogs on the streets. I'm not seeing the amount of strays that we had in the past either. Yes, there are still stray dogs, but they are looking healthier and no packs of dogs running in the street anymore, from what I can see, these non profit organizations are really working.

AMERIADANDOLL
What on earth are you talking about? I have heard knowone saying anything negative about Madi or Paws..If its the animals we care about we need everyones help. We have invited Madi to our meetings have gone to help her when she gets Dogs as she is not equipped on dogs, well she is, but she does an amazing job with our Island cats,and they are not so happy about dogs, sadly the cats seem to be forgotten here so good for her. I just dont know where you read anyone thought poorly of P.A.W.S.
I get so sad that people as Scuba Lady says hide their idenity...Amerianandoll and daducho both registered right before thier post...personal agendas dont get the job done....I hate this kind of stuff...the more people involved in Humane Society activity the less hours we all have to work..Madi or another group that wants to come in...We need all of you.

It is interesting how a public service notice by the Caye Caulker Humane Society gets twisted into prompting such a negative response. While I am not day to day active with the Humane Society, I am involved enough to know that funds are difficult to raise; there are no huge donations, and that the money IS being spent on dogs. To the negative posters: Please visit the CCHS website http://www.cayecaulkerhumanesociety.com/
for current info on the most recent activities.

AND before you say that's "hype and bad info" I was there 11/27 and saw firsthand the dogs being vaccinated and the puppies being wormed. It is a true dog-hater who spreads filth and vile about something they know so little.

Beware, the wheel of Karma grinds slow...........but fine.

Excuse me? Now I am really confused! What are you talking about? I registered yesterday after seeing the post that the paws humane society posted about dogs that would be eradicated on the island and I wanted to respond to the posting of daduchi negatively speaking about paws humane society not doing anything to help the animals on the island. All the H.S. was doing is informing everyone what was about to happen. Read the daduchi posting again, don't it sound negative and critical of them? I don't understand why you don't see anything negative in that posting.

It's terribly negative. My point exactly. It is also mis-informed and very troll-like.

The confusion is that we are The Caye Caulker Humane Society, the only registered non profit on the Island and Madi runs P.A.W.S...basically a cat sanctuary, which is very well run and also hold clinics. She has camping seminars and is a great help to the community. We are not in competition with her but a separate organization with a goal of outreach and education to the community, holding regular weekly clinics and spay and neuter clinics, Sorry for the confusion, it sounded like somehow you thought we were slamming her as we have never had a post before confusing The Humane Society for P.A.W.S

O.K. So that was the confusion, I was wondering what was going on as I only knew one legally registered humane society in the times i have visited Caye Caulker and that was P.A.W. Humane Society & Cat Sanctuary. So happy to know that a second group formed and that you both have goals of outreach and education. Maybe now working together you guys can stop the eradication of dogs. There is more power in number! Good luck !

Back to the issue of poisoning dogs: is there an update on this? I'm horrified that it might happen, especially given the good, hard work of the humane society and hearing recently about them taking their efforts "on the road".

We are coming back in March and bringing our dog. I'm concerned about him being poisoned, concerned about dog corpses in the street, concerned about the cruelty of poisoning and concerned about how strychnine will affect people's pets and the wildlife on the island.

Did this happen?

Thank you.

Noelle

Noelle,
Our Village chairman was out of the country when this meeting was held on San Pedro. He is back now and his position is this will not happen here. The Caye Caulker Humane Society has turned over our reports on all our activities and services, sadly including euthanasia of problem animals on the island. However we have also been able to relocate some of these animals to farms and country homes on the mainland. We have cataloged over 150 animals..and so many we have not as they have no owners,or owners that care.
A meeting is being held tomorrow with the Health Inspector and again our assistance to her will be offered. I am at this point feeling very positive about it all.

http://www.cayecaulkerhumanesociety.com/

Three day wait to buy a gun in certian places...maybe new board members need a three day cooling off period before posting, these ambushes are getting old

That's all good news! Thanks for the update!

Scubado..I am not understanding your post as we have not ambushed anyone. PM or post if you like. Two years ago when The Dept of Health came through the Island unannounced in the middle of the night and poisoned 60 dogs some on private property our Chair Person was also out of the Country. I would have felt terribly negligent if I woke up to that again with out doing what I could. Especially since the discussion of eradication here was verified to me by The Health Inspector herself.
Posting on the message board does reach some locals.

I think Scuba-do was refering to the post by Daducho......

Daducho;;;
She was a troll and I forgot all about that post..apologies to scubado...I have been on a run a round lately...a bit of burn out..
Actually any replies to Daducho are sort of a waste of time as the real person knows better...agendas!!!
Thanks..MARKW

Right markw