China Pets Face Bleak Start to Year of the Dog

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January 27, 2006

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Dogs in China face a bleak start to the Year of the Dog as

families trawl pet stores for gifts ahead of the Spring Festival, animal rights

activists say.

Just weeks after bringing cats and dogs home, many residents realize they are

too much like hard work and abandon them on the street. The phenomenon is

expected to be at its worst after the Lunar New Year holiday which begins on

January 29, heralding the Year of the Dog, which makes canines an auspicious

seasonal gift. ``New year is twice as bad. Pick a year and then pick the

animal,'' said Carol Wolfson, founder and director of Second Chance Animal Aid,

a nine-month-old Shanghai organization that runs an adoption and shelter program

for abandoned pets. ``Pet stores pump them full of antibiotics to make them look

cute and then they die a few weeks later. Or else owners just put them out on

the street when they've had enough,'' Wolfson told Reuters. Abandoned animals

are the dark side of the explosion of pet ownership across China in recent

years. The national pet population hit nearly 300 million in 2004, up 20 percent

from 1999, according to state media. Raising dogs was banned under the rule of

late Chinese leader Mao Zedong as a bourgeois pastime and was only made legal a

few years ago once living standards rose with the economy. While more people

have the means to raise pets, many do not have the will to provide long-term

care. Some dogs and cats end up being killed for their fur in barbaric

conditions, crammed into cages which are then thrown on to the ground,

shattering their bones, according to animal rights group People for the Ethical

Treatment of Animals (PETA). ``With the Summer Olympics in Beijing fast

approaching, we hope the Chinese government will take action to restore the

damage that the fur industry has done to the country's international

reputation,'' PETA Asia Pacific director Jason Baker said in a statement.

Abandoned dogs and cats fill cages on the second floor of the Shanghai Pet

Association, piles of excrement lying on the tiles beneath them. ``People just

drop their pets off outside the door. Often the cats are sick with skin disease

or have infections,'' said Xia Jun, 24, who runs the center. Since it was

founded in December, his organization has built a network of more than 60

``foster parents'' who take of the animals after they are picked up and vets

give them check-ups. Xia said the association aimed to rehouse 500 cats and dogs

in 2006, but was braced for the worst in coming weeks. ``We expect the dumping

phenomenon to perhaps double over the new year period,'' Xia said. Some

so-called animal protection organizations are not so altruistic -- many have

been found to be selling the cats and dogs they gather to restaurants, with

dogmeat widely believed to keep out the cold in winter.