11/20/10 Adopting is Cool!
Animal Friends invites you to adopt an animal from the shelter
Under the motto "Adopting is Cool!" the City Office for Agriculture and Forestry of the City of Zagreb and the Shelter for Abandoned Animals in Dumovec, in collaboration with Animal Friends, will organize a public event with the aim of promoting animal adoption and educating the citizens on the proper ways to care for a companion animal.
The event "Adopting is Cool!" will take place on Saturday, November 20, 2010 from 9:00 A.M. until 2:00 P.M. on Trg bana Jelacica. There will be information stalls distributing useful information about companion animals and adoption, and dog and cat food will be sold at a promotional price. The main goal is to educate the people, especially children, on the importance of protecting animals.
At 11:00 A.M. children from the Zecici group at Bajka Kindergarden will join the event and show what they have learned through the education program and the regular visits of the dog Curo, who was brought there by the members of Animal Friends. The shelter's manager Tatjana Zajec, whom children have also met during such a visit, will bring some of the abandoned dogs and explain what the children will be able to see and learn during their oncoming visit to the shelter. Children will learn how to treat their companion animals with responsibility, what it means to have a dog or a cat, how to approach the animals safely, caress them, and play with them, but also how to recognize a stray animal and what to do in such cases.
Adopting abandoned animals is not only a necessity but it is "cool" as well, because all dogs from the Shelter for Abandoned Animals are examined by veterinarians, vaccinated, micro-chipped and spayed/neutered. Besides, when adopting an adult animal, the potential new guardians will know the dog's character in advance. What is most important, though, is that adopting an animal is a good deed – it means saving the life of an innocent creature and giving a loving home to those who were left without it because of irresponsible people.
Educational programs on animal protection, particularly those aimed at children, are foreseen by the Animal Protection Act. They are also an efficient way of preventing the abandoning of animals and animal abuse. It is important that children should develop a healthy attitude towards animals from their earliest age, and to build up awareness about the need to care for animals and to respect their rights to the benefit of the entire community.
Since adoption programs are a chronic scarcity in all of Croatia, we hope that such actions will motivate other communities to launch similar projects and to engage themselves in animal protection in accordance with statutory provisions.