Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Mark Rowland — Thu, 15 Oct 2015 23:45:10 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"] Mind you we had a Roe deer that someone brought in which subsequently died. There was no way I was going to pay for that to be disposed of so I put it the back of my car and took it back to the park and dumped it. At least it would then be allowed to follow the natural order of things and provide carrion for other wildlife[/quote]

Ahahaha did you take it out the back and whack its head on the table

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

grumpyoldman — Thu, 15 Oct 2015 22:35:03 GMT

[quote user="Martin Atkinson"]ou know Mr Grumpy but I can't for the life of me think why I hadn't thought of that myself especially for all the bodies of wildlife and strays we have to pay to dispose of that either die here or are scraped up off the road by do-gooders.[/quote]

Yes you cannot win the war but now and again you can have little victories , our stray charities account clocks up about 15k a year in hospitalisations, emergency treatments euthanasias and disposals, knocking it off the top line will probably save us about 6k a year in tax . We are after all being forced to provide an FOC public service as part of our professional obligations and commitment to welfare.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Rob Davis — Wed, 14 Oct 2015 15:49:58 GMT

You mean you let all that lovely venison go to waste...!

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Martin Atkinson — Wed, 14 Oct 2015 08:50:37 GMT

[quote user="grumpyoldman"]We have a separate account where we log these charitable donations . It adds up over the year ,you can offset it against profits by writing it off in the accounts[/quote]You know Mr Grumpy but I can't for the life of me think why I hadn't thought of that myself especially for all the bodies of wildlife and strays we have to pay to dispose of that either die here or are scraped up off the road by do-gooders. Mind you we had a Roe deer that someone brought in which subsequently died. There was no way I was going to pay for that to be disposed of so I put it the back of my car and took it back to the park and dumped it. At least it would then be allowed to follow the natural order of things and provide carrion for other wildlife

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

grumpyoldman — Tue, 13 Oct 2015 21:39:48 GMT

We have strays some injured some not ,on a daily basis . FB is very good at finding the owners , some are chipped but they are almost always pikeys and or PDSA clients, the chip often matches 2 or 3 owners ago . We have a separate account where we log these charitable donations . It adds up over the year ,you can offset it against profits by writing it off in the accounts ,but no one pays anything . You can also reclaim the VAT on the drugs and services your writing off, its a comforting thought when the state looses a bit too.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Martin Atkinson — Tue, 13 Oct 2015 14:33:42 GMT

Had this recent conversation with the RSPCA HQ following a member of the public bringing in a cat RTA. Me: 'Hello (explain circumstances) can I have a log number for this cat please'. Them: 'Sorry we can't do that the person who found the cat needed to call before they brought it in'. Me: 'But they found it 100 yards away it is severely injured, they didn't know they had to call you first and the quickest way to get it attention was to bring it straight here so I'm calling on their behalf'. Them: 'sorry but that's the rules, can't help you'. Me: 'but I have the finder's full details here, what is the difference between them calling you a minute before bringing it here and me calling you a minute after'? Them: 'Sorry that's the rules, call local branch'. Me: 'Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the blind obedience of fools'. Them: '????'!

Next time I'll pretend I'm the finder and get the log number then call back 5 minutes later being me. But that would be fraud, sadly there's no offence for being an intransigent, jobsworth.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Hannah Wynne Richards — Tue, 13 Oct 2015 10:52:03 GMT

Who prosecutes cruelty cases in Northern Ireland?

Are your police any use? Ours aren't!

Wynne

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Pete Wedderburn — Tue, 13 Oct 2015 10:12:33 GMT

I've written the online piece for the Telegraph on this - you can read it here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/pets/animal-pet-hedgehog-pete-wedderburn-vet/

There is a Telegraph poll towards the end of the article - so far 16% say the vet should pay for this themselves. Make sure you vote in it to help sway the balance away from us!

thanks

Pete

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Wren — Tue, 13 Oct 2015 09:45:34 GMT

I have had the 'list' thing too. Right in the middle of our peak pedigree lambing/caesarian season when we were averaging 3 or 4 lambings a night the RSPCA tried to insist I went to a poorly specified rural roadside loaction nearly an hour away to assist a member of the public locate a badger they'd hit with their car and then take it back to my surgery for treatment. I would have had to pass at least two other mixed practices to get there, but apparently we were top of their 'list'. When I told them I didn't have the time, nor the inclination to abandon my loyal clients, for a wild badger chase in the dark they had the cheek to try to remind me of my professional obligations to provide treatment in a way that I found mildly threatening. I still refused and suggested they found someone closer. The RCVS complaint letter never appeared ;-)

So does anyone know any vets who would actually donate to the RSPCA?

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

karen jones — Tue, 13 Oct 2015 08:07:03 GMT

The RSPCA helpline advised someone to bring a rta cat into us passing 3 other vets on the way (2am) apparently were the top of a list. When the kennels were full of two adult and 7 kittens all sent to us by RSPCA with promise that they would be collected we made an official on line complaint and had chief inspector on phone . All cats that we haven't been able to rehome now collected . The inspectors are ok it's the untrained call centre people that are hopeless. The rspca will collect a young fledgling or hedgehog but wont help with cats! As usual it's us vets that pick up the tab for welfare not the welfare organisation.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Julie Innes — Tue, 13 Oct 2015 00:22:46 GMT

We are pretty lucky up here. The Sspca always have a job no. If they bring something in, and seem to have plenty animal rescue officers to go pick up strays and injured wildlife. If the public bring it in we would deal with it free of charge, although very few injured birds seem to recover! In the happy event it did, we would call sspca to collect it, or take it to the nearest centre. We're lucky to have a good relationship with the sspca which works both ways.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Anthony Dennison — Mon, 12 Oct 2015 17:45:46 GMT

A woman rang the surgery on Saturday to tell me she was in the park and she could see an injured bird in front of her. Told her to ring the RSPCA. She said she had, and they said to ring a local vet.

I was in the middle of an overbooked afternoon surgery, so had little patience. Told her if she could get the bird to me I could do something, but wouldn't be able to come out to a park 35 minutes away to pick up an injured bird. Woman seemed rather put out that she would have to do something.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Gareth C. — Mon, 12 Oct 2015 17:43:07 GMT

this is something that also affects us as we are rural. my favourite one was the rspca phoning in the small hours to say that there was a fox stuck in a hedge. No precise location they just wanted to pass the buck. but yes we also end up paying for most of it- stray cats, seagulls etc. even recently a stray chicken. our receptions ask they people phoning in to specifically ask the rspca for a log number. Some members of the public have reported that the rspca were no help at all with respect to stray / wildlife calls and could not help fund treatment. When directed by us to ask specifically for a log number they do sometimes get one. Last week we had one insured cat in the hospital and two strays (including the chicken). There was a whole world of cross subsidy going on there....

Whats annoying is the rspca get to be the good guys and us private vets are viewed as expensive when we are constantly treating (between us all) stray pets and wildlife at our own cost.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Rob Loxley — Sun, 11 Oct 2015 18:59:02 GMT

Well I'll be blowed, on saturday morning a member of the public walks in with a mangey stray cat with her incident number that she's got from the RSPCA, treated for skin/flea allergy and I have a purchase order number to cover the cost and invoice is in the post. If it was always that way...!

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Hannah Wynne Richards — Sat, 10 Oct 2015 11:51:34 GMT

My admiration for RSPCA Inspectors is unbounded.

Wish I could say as much for headquarters

Wynne

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Anthony Dennison — Sat, 10 Oct 2015 11:46:52 GMT

Wildlife FOC, usually because its just a shot of BetLA/loxicom or euthanasia. We do use the IET fairly frequently, but even the inspectors struggle to get it from HQ nowadays - you now have to get a purchase authorisation number to get the IET.

To be fair to the RSPCA - the problem is HQ, at a national level. Most of the local shelters are ok, and the inspectors are excellent at their job (mostly); they get even more frustrated than us about how tight their hands are tied.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Bob Russell — Sat, 10 Oct 2015 10:15:47 GMT

Last stray we had was sealed in a box for the bin men to collect. RSPCA were phoned by the finder (in reception!) and they suggested returning it to where it was found!!!!

The finder did ask whether she should seal it back in the box!

We sorted it and found a home and the RSPCA lost a number of regular donations by direct debit because clients heard the conversation!

Pretty much given up with them. We sort wildlife FOC and seems strays are our responsibility as well. One reason we all have homes full of pets!

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Hannah Wynne Richards — Sat, 10 Oct 2015 08:16:03 GMT

I've got a good relationship with several charities - I do their work at cost price, so they will take wildlife/strays off my hands. Stray dogs have to go to the dog warden - that's the law - but if they're unclaimed, a charity usually rehomes them

Wynne

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Virginia Campbell — Fri, 09 Oct 2015 22:33:50 GMT

We're in the city (Belfast) so tend to get birds and hedgehogs and not much else. The practice bears the financial burden but it's pretty straightforward: a lot of them have euthanasable injuries (we're not very heroic); the larger (eg pigeons) apparently fairly healthy birds get a rest, fed and fluids and a test flight. There is a lovely bird lady who will rehab most things including pigeons and crows. The nice hedgehog people have retired from hedgehog keeping, so various vets and nurses in the practice have garden hedgehogs now. Dead things go in a miscellaneous bag for cremation; I don't know if we get charged for this or not (cremation people are great and one of them used to work for the practice as a receptionist so I think they might do it FOC as a goodwill thing) but there's not much weight in it so even if we get charged it won't be much.

The cost is in staff time really - but everything gets admitted by a nurse and just worked into the ops list so doesn't take up consult room space/time.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Ashley Rubens — Fri, 09 Oct 2015 21:48:47 GMT

As above, the RSPCA have put so many obstacles in the way of paying out the IET that we don't bother contacting them, not for help or rehabilitation as they have never been prepared to provide either. We pay, and we are lucky to have bird man who rehabilitates raptors and other wild birds and a crazy hedgehog lady for one of our nurses!

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Gillian Mostyn — Fri, 09 Oct 2015 21:44:31 GMT

Same again...the practice (well, me) pays for the vast majority of stray/wildlife care.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Joyce Whitehead — Fri, 09 Oct 2015 21:23:19 GMT

And another one. I can't remember the last time we claimed for a wildlife casualty, certainly not for years and years. We had a wild deer this week, brought in by the member of public who collided with it. It sadly had a fractured spine so pts and cremation only but I didn't actually consider asking for any contribution.

In addition each year we probably end up rearing and rehoming about 10 plus cats and kittens, many feral found abandoned. Obviously these are also at our cost, but the PR is pretty good, and we now insist all rehomed animals are at least vaccinated and neutered by us so we make some money...

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Kate Richardson — Fri, 09 Oct 2015 21:08:19 GMT

Ditto to the above posts

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Rob Loxley — Fri, 09 Oct 2015 20:05:02 GMT

Stephanie sums up the obstacles the RSPCA put in the way of contributing (and I'm sure most of the time it rarely comes close to covering) to IET. They've pushed the fee level down also.
I think you need to make it clear to the general public, who I'm sure would be outraged - particularly if they donate to the RSPCA to help stray and wild animals.

So we try as best to meet their requirements but many of our recent cases remain unpaid. We cover these and costs above IET from a charity box on reception.

RE: Treating strays and wildlife - who pays?

Martin Atkinson — Fri, 09 Oct 2015 19:18:16 GMT

Simple answer to the original question: we do, RSPCA are a waste of space.