Our Animal Welfare Assistant, Del Jones is on call for all emergencies.  These emergency responses range from run over dogs, to cruelty complaints to disaster response.

Emergencies happen any time of the day and night and, if ascertained to be an emergency, they will be responded to immediately.

AWA – Del Jones: 072 693 4646 

Other emergency numbers:

Duty Officer: Vrolijkheid Nature Reserve: 082 496 2448
Christie Roode: (humane snake catch & release) : 083 416 3512 / 073 905 8542

Our main focus at our fortnightly Primary Healthcare Clinics is to provide affordable vaccination programmes combined with endoparasitic control (parasites living inside the body) and ectoparasitic control (parasites living outside the body), for pet owners that cannot afford private veterinary fees.

Uncomplicated treatments are carried out on sick animals, as well as providing subsidised dog and cat food.

We utilise this time with the owners to educate on responsible pet ownership, feeding regimes, pest control and health issues. There are many old wives tails that are believed, some of which can be detrimental to the animal’s health.    

Pet-loving, highly skilled vets

Did you know that every six weeks, the vets and their team from Cornerstone Veterinary Practice, Robertson, working under their charity wing, The John Moore Foundation, give their time free, to sterilise needy animals in McGregor?

Friends of CARE fundraise for all drugs and equipment needed and the veterinary team give their time pro bono, for which we are eternally grateful. Thank you Cornerstone vets and your team!

Here’s why sterilisation is so important:

Animals from the surrounding farms and local areas are collected by our volunteers, sterilised at our facility and once recovered are then returned to the owner. The owners are asked to cover the cost of the drugs involved, which is around R250. Unfortunately most cannot afford this, in which case we ask them to donate what they can.

The control of breeding animals is paramount, especially considering how many offspring can be produced by just one breeding pair.

We endeavour to visit all homes within the lower income communities on an annual basis to check that basic welfare standards are being met. Del will give advice on how best to achieve this. Shelter and water are our main concerns. Advice is also given on installing running wires rather than chaining dogs up, as this gives them freedom of movement and hopefully the ability to move from sun to shade.

On farm visits we visit the farm worker’s homes to ensure good animal welfare standards are being met. It is important to show owners how to achieve animal welfare standards by utilising materials that are abundant on farms, for example, poles and wire. Generally workers have free access to such materials. Owners are taught to think out of the box to improve their animals living conditions, by using time, not money.

We offer educational programmes in local schools, in low cost housing areas and on farms to educate animal owners on responsible pet ownership, humane treatment and adequate shelter. We also touch on planting the seed of looking after the environment.

During lockdown we took the opportunity to design and print our own animal welfare education books to be used in educational opportunities. We have a book with illustrations and colouring-in pages for the younger children and a more advanced book for the older children. Both include a quiz at the end to test understanding.