The website gazeta.pl published an article about the Olsztyn animal shelter. – “This year, ‘the holidays’ are starting exceptionally early and with such a bang that we did not expect it,” the employees complained on Facebook. They added that the shelter’s phones had started ringing with calls from people who wanted to leave their dog there.
The owners give various explanations: a sudden illness, pregnancy, an allergy. Particularly cruel, journalists from gazeta.pl emphasize, is abandoning old, sick animals that want to spend their remaining days in a loving home. – Have we, humans, changed so much, or does the life of animals already mean so little to us? – ask the employees of the Olsztyn shelter.
As it turns out, this is happening throughout Poland. Admittedly, at the Shelter for Homeless Animals in Przylasek (Platerówka commune, Lubań County), it is a marginal problem, involving only isolated cases. (Besides, there is a dog hotel nearby where owners can leave their pets.)
But in Dłużyna Górna (Pieńsk commune, Zgorzelec County), we heard that all shelters in the country actually struggle with this problem. Poles abandon their pets more often during the summer.
What can be done about it? Above all, society must be educated. Under Polish law, abandoning an animal is one of the forms of animal cruelty, and it is an offense punishable by up to two years in prison. However, it is often difficult to prove that someone was the owner of an abandoned animal.
What do you think? We invite you to join the discussion.