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| Helping hands: Volunteer Marion Jan carefully moves a castrated tomcat into a recovery cage after its sterilization. The animal welfare student journeyed from her native Holland to Indonesia to lend a hand in the Spay-a-Stray Cat Sterilization Drive, which started on Oct. 9 in Pulau Seribu (Thousand Islands). |
Twenty-two days. That’s how long it will take animal welfare volunteers and a veterinary team to sterilize over 1,000 homeless felines in the Spay-a-Stray Cat Sterilization Drive, which started on Sunday in Jakarta.
“An average of 40 cats a day have been sterilized so far,” said coordinator Budhi Virgianti Ramadhini from the Jakarta Animal Aid Network (JAAN).
“We originally planned to sterilize 25 a day, but in the first four days alone we had already operated on 181 cats in the Thousand Islands,” Budhi said, calling the stray population problem there “overwhelming”, especially on Pulau Panggang. In light of the high number of strays, organizers extended the temporary week-long clinic on the islands for a second week in a row to treat a total of 399 cats.
The set target is double that of last year’s total, making it the most ambitious drive to date for the organization. Budhi said their fingers were crossed that they might surpass sterilizing 1,000 felines when the event wraps up in November.
“We are very dedicated and driven to continue to do what we are doing until the situation really starts to change for the better,” Budhi said.
The free sterilizations are provided for unaltered stray cats, which are caught, spayed or neutered, and then released back in the same location where they were collected.
Two dogs in Jakarta had also been spayed, Budhi said.
Several experienced vets volunteered to carry out the procedures alongside a supporting team of volunteers, comprising Dutch and Indonesian veterinary paramedics and assistants, administrators, cat catchers and logistics helpers.
“JAAN had asked for permission to carry out the drive from the Indonesian Veterinary Medical Association [Perhimpunan Dokter Hewan Indonesia PDHI] and the association was very supportive of it, and have asked for a report and presentation of the work done after the drive is over,” JAAN co-founder Karin Franken said.
Financial support and manpower are the deciding factors for timing a mass sterilization drive, Budhi said.
“We sent round an email six months ago of our intentions, and when we raised a decent enough amount, we realized we could do it [hold the drive] in October,” Franken said, adding that they had also collected medicine from the Netherlands for it.
Locations are decided on according to where the need to sterilize strays is highest and a clean room is available to act as the makeshift operating area for before and after the surgeries.
“We should keep them [stray cats] for at least a day until they are fully recovered before we release them, so we need a large enough place to store all the cages,” Budhi said, adding that a clean water supply, good light and a secure roof and ceiling were helpful to prevent the recovering cats’ exposure to flies, dust and heat.
For day one of the sterilization drive in West Jakarta, Wulan Purwono, a regular JAAN volunteer who helps in domestic adoptions, said cats were caught the day before by two volunteers using a net to help secure them into cages and then kept overnight in the makeshift operation area.
Pointing to a detailed map of Kemanggisan where four areas were selected for the sterilizations over the next week, Wulan explained that they concentrated their search for strays in the first area for the first three or four days, then they would move onto the second and third areas for the following days until the drive ended on Nov. 1. The fourth area would be used only as a backup in case cats were in short supply, she said. “Other people have asked us to expand the search, but we’re concentrating on these areas on the map so we can observe the results next year,” Wulan said.
Budhi reported that the drive was running smoothly in the areas the operation had been set up in, and all the residents had been supportive.
“Announcement letters are sent out ahead of time to the local authorities of the proposed areas for the sterilizations, and leaflets are distributed during the search for strays in the neighborhood. Actually, [after learning about our activities] some residents helped us in catching the strays and carrying the kennels, so we are grateful for this good response,” she said.
Public response for helping the mass sterilization drive had also been good, she noted, and volunteers had come from everywhere to lend a hand.
“Volunteers couldn’t help out everyday or for a long time, but we were so appreciative of how ever much time they could give us,” she said.
Fonnia, a high school student and animal lover, who like many Indonesians, goes by one name, volunteered her time to help assist the program by running errands for the medical team and assisting in carrying the cages between locations. “I feel awful if I see someone hurting an animal on the street, but as a student I don’t feel empowered to say something about it, so this action helps me feel better,” she said.
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| Prep time: Two members of the Cat Sterilization volunteer team prepare a sedated female cat for surgery. The veterinary paramedics also clipped the sterilized cats’ ears in a V-mark so volunteers could visibly tell them apart from unaltered cats during the next sterilization drive. |
Budhi said, “People are always very generous when we have a positive program like this event, but of course, it’s always a struggle because we need so many donations to cover all the expenses for such a big drive, which is why we started getting the word out six months ago.”
Budhi said the sterilization program was ongoing and an estimated 1,600 stray cats and 700 stray dogs have been sterilized since JAAN started in 2008.
As the founder of the animal advocacy group iCARE, which also conducted sterilizations of strays over the years, Budhi realized that they could reach more cats and be more effective if the animal welfare groups joined forces.
“Controlling the population of strays is really what we need to do at this time, and pairing it with an adoption and education program would make this a remarkable solution for both humans and animals,” said Budhi, who has owned pets all her life.
Source : http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/10/26/sterilization-drive-stray-cats.html
For more information on the Cat Sterilization Drive please visit www.jakartaanimalaid.com
