As the economy continues to slump, more and more pets are finding themselves on the street, the Council of Agriculture (COA) said yesterday, calling on pet owners to act responsibly when dealing with animals’ lives.
Those who intentionally dump their animals are subject to fines up to NT$75,000, the council said.
“Recently we have heard of more pet abandonment than usual, where owners dump their pets in front of pet shops, animal hospitals or outdoors. We urge people to respect lives as this will not only contribute to strays or pose problems with public safety and environmental hygiene, but also violate the law,” Department of Animal Industry Director Hsu Tien-lai (許天來) said.
PHOTO: CHIEN JUNG-FONG, TAIPEI TIMES
Once pets become strays, they are often collected by local environmental bureaus and placed in animal shelters. However, volunteer Paul Liu (劉柏良) at the Taipei Animal shelter in Neihu said their prospects were not optimal, as adoption rates were dropping.
“People are having a hard time taking care of themselves, so they are less likely to contemplate adopting pets,” Liu said.
“Before, dogs in better condition, even the mixes, would get adopted quite easily, but in the last year adoption rates have dropped noticeably. Now it seems the shelter is half occupied by pure breeds [because of a trend to buy a certain breed of dogs as a result of movie or celebrity influence],” said Liu, who had been volunteering at the shelter for three-and-a-half years.
“More dogs are being put down,” he said, adding that even the ones kept alive had a poor quality of life because “the number of dogs is simply too high … they overwhelm the volunteers and the staff.”
Asked how to solve the problem, Liu said it had to be stopped at the source.
“People should not act on impulse and buy or adopt a pet because they’re cute, while the government should educate people on animal protection,” Liu said, adding that people should not be fixated on getting pure breeds or adopt a dog at the shelter as a way of saving money.
China appears to have built mockups of a port in northeastern Taiwan and a military vessel docked there, with the aim of using them as targets to test its ballistic missiles, a retired naval officer said yesterday. Lu Li-shih (呂禮詩), a former lieutenant commander in Taiwan’s navy, wrote on Facebook that satellite images appeared to show simulated targets in a desert in China’s Xinjiang region that resemble the Suao naval base in Yilan County and a Kidd-class destroyer that usually docks there. Lu said he compared the mockup port to US naval bases in Yokosuka and Sasebo, Japan, and in Subic Bay
Police are investigating the death of a Formosan black bear discovered on Tuesday buried near an industrial road in Nantou County, with initial evidence indicating that it was shot accidentally by a hunter. The bear had been caught in wildlife traps at least five times before, three times since 2020. Codenamed No. 711, the bear received extensive media coverage last year after it was discovered trapped twice in less than two months in the Taichung mountains. After its most recent ensnarement last month, the bear was released in the Dandashan (丹大山) area in Nantou County’s Sinyi Township (信義). However, officials became concerned after the
The majority of parents surveyed in northern Taiwan favor the suspension of all on-site classes at schools from the junior-high level and below amid a surge in domestic COVID-19 infections, parent groups said yesterday. About 84.4 percent of respondents in a survey of 2,912 parents in northern Taiwan, where the outbreak is the most serious, said they supported suspending classes, the Action Alliance on Basic Education, the Taiwan Parents Protect Women and Children Association, and the Taiwan Love Children Association said. The groups distributed questionnaires to parents in New Taipei City, Taipei, Keelung, Taoyuan and Hsinchu city and county from Saturday morning
DETERRENCE: US National Security Council Indo-Pacific Coordinator Kurt Campbell said cross-strait affairs are on the agenda at the US-ASEAN Special Leaders’ Summit The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday thanked the Czech Senate for passing a resolution supporting Taiwan’s inclusion in the WHO and other international organizations for the second consecutive year. The resolution was passed on Wednesday with 51 votes in favor, one opposed and 11 abstentions. In addition to the WHO, it also called for Taiwan’s participation in the “meetings, mechanisms and activities” of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the International Civil Aviation Organization and Interpol. In its opening, the resolution states that the Czech Republic “considers Taiwan as one of its key partners in the Indo-Pacific region,” while noting its