Great news from Ireland: drops in number of dogs abandoned and dogs put to sleep

Huge congratulations are due to everyone working in dog welfare in Ireland.

Latest Government figures show that there has been another huge drop in the number of abandoned dogs in Ireland as well as a big fall in the numbers of dogs put to sleep in Irish pounds.

Hats off, in particular, to everyone at Dogs Trust in Ireland. Since being established in Ireland 2005, Dogs Trust has neutered over 50,000 dogs and conducted around 2,000 classroom presentations. A Dublin Rehoming Centre was established in 2009 and is already rehoming over 100 dogs every month.

As a result of everybody’s hard work, the numbers of dogs destroyed in Irish pounds has dropped from 16,546 to 6,536 since 2005. That’s over 10,000 fewer dogs destroyed.

Obviously, there’s still a lot of work to do but we’re convinced that the numbers will continue to fall in the years ahead. Good work Ireland!

Dogs Trust Dublin Launch: the celebrity guests

I gave our Communications team about 25 seconds to catch their breath on returning from Dublin before I hounded them for a behind-the-scenes guest post on the goings on at the launch party. Duly the lovely Sinead, who is deputy head of the department, obliged with these snippets on making sure the celebrity guests had a great time. More photos on our Flickr feed!

The photographers, Marc and Tony, at the Dogs Trust official opening seriously had their work cut out for them. Tony was taking pictures of staff and guests while Marc was looking after our VIP guests. Bear in mind that we had FIVE celebrity guests all arriving at the same time. Interesting. Craig Doyle was super lovely and got up close and personal with a fabulous Samoyed called Kiko, who later had to be put back in his kennel (Kiko not Craig) as he was a little bit over excited. Ben, the other dog pictured with the lovely Mr. Doyle got a little bit amorous and let’s just say the pictures will have to be photoshopped…

Meanwhile in the puppy palace I was with the gorgeous Amy Huberman and Holly White doing an extremely glam photoshoot involving three stunning little puppies. The camera was clicking and the girls were working their magic until a certain little wheaten doggy decided to throw up all over Holly’s coat. Emergency wash down of jacket and back to work like a true professional!

A few hundred yards away Steve Collins the ex boxer was meeting his “doggy double”, Marley the Boxer, and It was honestly love at first lick. I mean there were practically fireworks between them and Steve decided there and then that he wanted to rehome Marley.

After a long but wonderful day I can safely say that all of us were exhausted and ready for at least two days sleep which of course never happened as it was straight back to work. I am looking forward to a long lie in this weekend!

Dogs Trust Dublin Official Launch: news and video coming soon!

The doors opened quietly to dog lovers last month, but today sees the official bells-and-whistles launch for Dogs Trust Dublin!

The brand new centre aims to rehome 1,000 dogs every year, and builds on neutering and microchipping campaigns and education work Dogs Trust has been doing in Ireland since 2005.

The big event is taking place as I write, as 11am marks the big moment. We have people on site bearing cameras and ready to capture the best bits for all to see online, so please come back and watch this space tomorrow for a chance to see all the news and get a good peek at the centre itself.

I'm told there are some celebrity guests, too!

In the meantime, if you'd like to visit Dogs Trust Dublin or find out more about it, visit www.dogstrust.ie.

Dogs Trust Dublin takes shape ready for autumn launch

Excitement around our brand new Dublin centre is mounting as the centre buildings are finally recognisable! The interiors are taking shape, too, as with the kennel block photo above. We have glass doors these days because they are less stressful to the dog and they're at an angle so that visitors can see better and the dogs don't get stressed staring at each other!

You can see more photos on the website. For general information and updates about Dublin, visit www.dogstrust.ie.

Dogs Trust goes International as Liza Fitzpatrick helps "fashion" a home for Man's Best Friend in Ireland

Dogs Trust is soon to have its 18th Rehoming Centre, and the first International site, with the creation of a state of the art complex in Dublin.

TV style guru Lisa Fitzpatrick is today helping us mark the start of work on the new site, which is the next stage of our work in the Republic of Ireland, which began in 2005. The aim is to bring an end to the destruction of stray and abandoned dogs through a national neutering campaign, an education programme and, of course, the new Centre.

Over 12,500 stray and abandoned dogs were destroyed in Ireland in 2007 for want of a good home. That’s the equivalent of 34 dogs every day. The new Dogs Trust Dublin which will care for over 1,000 stray and abandoned dogs from all over Ireland every year.

Located north of the city, (near junction 5 of the M50), the centre will provide everything an abandoned dog needs to get him back on his paws again including the love of our specially trained staff. The Rehoming Centre will be conveniently located off the Ashbourne Road so it will be easy to get to from both North and South of Dublin.

The Rehoming Centre will include the following:

• 24 rehoming kennels (all angled and glass fronted)
• 6 puppy kennels (all glass fronted)
• Indoor puppy play area
• 30 holding kennels (all angled and glass fronted)
• Sponsor Dog Suite with three glass-fronted 'homes' for sponsor dogs
• Underfloor heating for all kennels
• Surgical suite - see below for how you can help with this!*
• Behaviour assessment and training suite
• Training barn
• 6 free-running exercise and play areas
• Accommodation for 3 members of staff to live on-site

Dogs Trust Chief Executive, Clarissa Baldwin, said:

“We are so thrilled to be starting building work on our very first Rehoming Centre in the Republic of Ireland. We look forward to working together with our local partners in Dublin towards helping as many stray and abandoned dogs as we can. This new Rehoming Centre will enable us to care for over 100 rescue dogs at any one time and help us to find new homes for all these dogs with so much love to give.”

Lisa told us:

“It is a pleasure to be a part of this event which marks the beginning of a brighter future for dogs in Ireland. I look forward to seeing the finished results of this stylish and cutting edge Rehoming Centre in September 2009. I’m sure it will be amazing if plans are anything to go by!”

Dogs Trust will provide regular updates over the year on progress. Meanwhile, check out the picture above of the plans to get an idea of what to expect.

*Surgical suite: Building a fully equipped vet suite will cost £180,000. Can you help us raise the funds? If you want to contribute towards the building of the new suite, you can do so by simply making a donation on the Dogs Trust website, choosing "Dublin appeal" from the dropdown to ensure your money goes directly where you want it to. There is also a link to this appeal on our Facebook Page. The dogs in our care thank you for your generous support.