Along the road in the Search for Clarity

Researching the backstory for the Rescues Without Borders thread has definitely had me digging into some dark and dirty corners ... and sadly not all of those grubby little places were south of the border.
We've been pretty pleased with ourselves because the society finally pulled out all the stops to ensure that the CB branch stopped using the gas chamber this year.... the actual announcement this year triggered the blog post ... Its Already an incredible day
One of the other research projects that I've been working on it to try to compile accurate statistics with respect to the homeless pets in this province. There is no difficulty obtaining the society stats ... in their newfound spirit of transparency the provincial branch has been publishing them online ( the subject of how much Cape Breton Fudge might still be included is a very interesting topic to pursue on another day )
Nor is it any trouble to get stats from any of the groups who do rescue. Generally they are pretty proud of the lives that they've saved and don't hesitate to "dish up the goods"
Yet there will be no meaningful numbers without accurate data from Animal Control .. and that's where it gets a little sticky. Although AC in our province is a municipal responsibility, if there is one constant in the equation it is that there is no constant.
The operations are as varied as one can possibly imagine. In some places there is an animal control officer.. in others that job is contracted out. Some have their own pounds .... others contract out for sheltering services.
Outside of Antigonish and Guysborough Counties, who both still have restricted dog breeds on the books, generally the dog by laws are pretty consistent throughout the province. There is a 72 hour holding time for impounded animals... after which the designated animal control person can destroy or sell the unclaimed animals.
Destroy how? It was only five years ago in Annapolis county that the dogs were still being shot by Animal control. Sheltered how? When the SPCA shut down Celtic Pets, the Town of Port Hawkesbury had to scramble to make other arrangements to shelter and dispose of their impounded animals.
If there is one standard, it is that there is no standard, only secrecy. Animal control information should be freely available on all municipal websites. In some instances, its only possible to find anything when one of the participants runs afoul of the law... such as the recent difficulties that one contractor has landed in with Revenue Canada.
Irregardless of the contractual arrangements, monthly and annual animal control statistics should be publicly available on each municipal or county web site, just as the society is doing. Unfortunately, secrecy always inspires suspicion.
Now this is where it really starts to get dirty. To the best of my knowledge, it isn't happening in Nova Scotia, but the fact that its happening anywhere in Canada is nothing to be proud of for sure. Its called Pound Seizure and in a nutshell it is the practice of selling homeless pets from pounds and shelters to laboratories for experimentation.
In fact the land of BSL likes the idea so much that they actually wrote it in legislative stone ....hard enough to be a pit bull up there but clearly there are fates worse than death in Ontario for the pitties. Nor is the practice limited to Ontario... Alberta, Manitoba and Quebec are also engaged. Indeed animal welfare advocates estimate that Quebec has become the largest unregulated supplier of pound source animals for research in Canada.
And before the keyboards catch on fire, yes.. I am very opposed to the use of animals in research. There is a common conception that this is acceptable because it allows researchers to move forward with the cure for diseases like Cancer. The reality is that according to statistics released by the Canadian Council on Animal Care, nearly two-thirds of all animal research carried out in Canada has little or nothing to do with curing disease or advancing human medicine.
In addition to which, as a DES daughter, I have had personal experience with the fact that the drugs that were tested on animals didn't always turn out to be safe for people after all. Given existing data on species specific reactions, most animal deaths at the hands of animal research are inspired by curiosity or that old 'publish or perish' bit.
The last little dirty bit flew through my radar by accident, in the form of a story about a farmer up near Truro whose neighbours have taken legal action to stop his practice of fertilizing his fields with liquid sludge from rendering plants. My curiosity got the better of me and when I started digging I was almost sick. Dead animals, even diseased animals, from all manner of sources are disposed of in rendering plants which produce a product that eventually becomes the 'animal fat' ingredient in some commercial pet foods. The list of potential problems with that one runs right around the block... starting with the concern for spreading BSL and winding though the issues of using animals which have died from cancer or communicable diseases.
How many times has assumption left the animals out in the cold... or worse it would seem? In light of that, there are three pieces of protective and/ or preventative legislation that should be tabled in this province, to ban :

• the disposal of companion animals from any source at rendering plants.
• pound seizure, and
• the use of the gas chamber or any other inhumane method for killing

As always ... in so much dark no light is little. I tripped over an amazing group of volunteers who run Project Jessie ( http://www.projectjessie.ca/ ) Among other things, these folks are working hard to save every animal they can from pounds where they are vulnerable to seizure, while at the same time advocating to have the law changed.
If you have men that will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men. St Francis of Assisi