FOOD
Dnipro Shelter Attacked
The Russian invasion can be felt every day at the Dnipro Shelter when soldiers bring in animals rescued from the front lines but this week the war came right to the shelter’s front door when a missile landed just 30 feet away from the property. Thankfully no one was seriously injured. There was damage to the roof and windows, the fence was bent up and the ceiling collapsed on the cat barn.
The Dnipro Community came together to help clean up and Sochi Dogs was able to help get supplies for the repairs. They are projected to take some time. It's been difficult to find anyone who can do the work because so many people have had to enlist and others are helping fix the damage in other places across the city.
This attack also damaged the water pipes leading to the shelter. Since the invasion began, running water has generally been unreliable and after this latest attack, it would take months for the city to repair the pipes. Running a shelter without water is extremely difficult and very expensive. It would be impossible for the Dnipro Shelter to survive the summer without having easy access to water, so with the help of our dog-loving community, Sochi Dogs supplied the Dnipro shelter with the materials needed to install a pump and get running water from an underground well! Everyone at the shelter (including the dogs) is incredibly grateful and excited!
Curbing the Population of Homeless Animals
At Sochi Dogs our goal is to stop the suffering of homeless animals and we couldn’t do that without the help of our community. To get ahead of the spring puppy/kitten season in Ukraine we partnered with 5 vet clinics in the Dnipro region to spay nearly 1,500 cats and dogs! Animals came in from all over the region: street dogs and cats from animal rescuers to abandoned pets cared for by neighbors of fleeing families.
If every one of those animals had a litter, thousands more animals would suffer on the streets. We are incredibly grateful to the volunteers who helped organize these clinics, the vets who worked long hours, the caring folks who traveled long distances to bring animals to be spayed, and everyone who donated to make this a reality.
Our spay and neuter work does not stop there. The effort required a tremendous amount of work on the part of the vets and volunteers. We are regrouping and hope to be able to make this into a sustainable long-term program.
619!!!
As of this weekend, we've spayed/neutered 619 animals since the start of the campaign on 3/1! On Sunday, people waited in line for 3 hours at one off our partner clinics, and a record of 100 animals were spayed that day!
At each of these events, we see just how much this work is needed. One woman helped her senior neighbor bring in cats that she had been caring for after their family fled Dnipro at the start of the war. Another brought in a street dog that she had been feeding. We can't keep this project going without your support, if you can please consider donating and together we can prevent animals from suffering on the street.
