Help Us Scratch those Fleas!

Hallo again, another 3 months have flown by, and we have reached the end of another busy year. In many ways it has been the same as previous years: full of puppies, sick and injured animals, some finding wonderful forever homes. But this year has been notable because of earthquakes and extreme heat, with costs continually increasing but on a positive note we have developed some new partnerships including Mission Dogo, Anella Living and AIESEC

As I said at the start we have taken in many puppies and injured animals this year, and this last 3 months in particular. We have around 30 puppies running around the farm, full of fun and mischief. Sadly, some of the puppies that we rescued did not survive. Each time this happens a little piece of our heart breaks, but for each puppy or dog that survives, gets healthy and especially finds a new home, the heartbreak mends and we carry on with some positivity.

We hope that in 2024 we will manage to improve our infrastructure so that we can enhance the life chances of all the animals that we rescue. This will include new work at both the Farm Refuge and Shems Refuge. We are going to expand the Shems Refuge so that we can move all the animals from the Clebs Refuge. Housing most of our dogs in one location means that we will be able to make savings in staff, transport and property costs as well as providing better facilities for both the dogs and the staff working there. We also have better access to water at Shems Refuge which is so important in the summer months, to keep the dogs hydrated and healthy and keep ticks at bay.

Towards the end of November, we found that our website content and a lot of our social media content (along with that of other organisations) was being used by a group masquerading as an animal charity based in Libya.   After a lot of in-depth research, we reported the scammers to all relevant authorities and have managed to get them shut down. While we were doing this, we had some very negative comments on our social media, and no surprise found that they had been posted by people involved in the scam.

It is very likely that this will happen again, so we need our supporters to be careful. Donating via GlobalGiving means you can be sure that your donation will go where it is needed and where you intended.

If you see someone using our content to raise donations, please contact us at info@saramorocco.com and we can either let you know if it is OK to donate or take action to stop any illegal activity.

You may have seen from Social Media that there has been a lot of culling of street dogs again in Morocco. In our area it was mostly dogs in Taghazout and Aourir but also some dogs and cats in Agadir were callously killed. We all know that not only is this inhumane, painful for the animals and risky for the human population, it is totally ineffective. We will continue to try and ensure that our message gets through to the public and officials alike. We think that it will help if our supporters from abroad contact the Ministry of Tourism and let them know how this action makes them feel about Morocco. Please note we are not asking people to stop visiting Morocco. Too many people in our communities, many of whom support our work, depend on tourists for their livelihoods. An embargo on holidays in Morocco would hit the working people very quickly. To help our supporters make their voices heard we have compiled some notes for Tourists with some useful contact addresses. You can find them here www.saramorocco.com/addresses

Lots of puppies came to us in this quarter. Sadly, a lot of them died from parvovirus while still very young. It is heartbreaking how quickly they go despite intensive and dedicated care. We hope that they at least had happy little lives, though they were very short.

Some older dogs came to us with serious injuries, some we had to let go but others are on the mend, and we hope will make full recoveries.

We managed to get 18 animals adopted to new homes abroad. This is the best result for the animals, for their adopters and for us. It is what makes it all worthwhile.

In addition, we managed to neuter 149 street cats and 34 street dogs, which brings our totals for the year up to 626 cats and 203 dogs.

As we start on a new year, I am trying to be hopeful for good things to happen. I know that it will not all be easy, and there will be heartbreak on the way, but I need to start this year with some optimism. For now I have 2 dreams. The first is that we can increase our income so that our costs are covered, and we don’t have to spend every day worrying about how we are going to feed and care for the animals in the refuges. My second dream is that the people in power in Morocco will get their act together and start making sure that TNVR is adopted throughout the country and the horrific and useless slaughter of animals is stopped.

I also hope that all our supporters have a peaceful, happy and safe year. See you all soon

Hazel and the team at SARA.

This summer has been hot and dry and more than a little scary!

Agadir was in the record books as the hottest place, then we were hit by an earthquake. Fortunately, we were not hit too hard by the earthquake, although there was heartbreaking loss of life and destruction of homes and livelihoods in villages in the High Atlas. It reminds us all that our way of life and life itself are fragile. Everything can change in minutes and at the same time everything continues. And we have to keep going. We still have 1,200 animals whose lives, health and happiness depend on us.

We are incredibly grateful to all of our supporters for continuing to help us keep going.

After July temperatures broke all records and became the hottest July ever on the planet, Agadir was officially the hottest place on Earth in early August with a temperature of 50.4 degrees Celsius (or 122.7 F). I'm pretty sure it would have been hotter inland. These high temperatures have a huge impact as our refuges are all inland and apart from the farm refuge there is no easy access to water or electricity. The dogs are suffering from these extreme weather conditions and unfortunately several of our older former street dogs have died from heat exhaustion.

The weather forced us to put our long-held plans to leave the Clebs Refuge into action. Clebs was the first place we found when we rescued the 750 dogs from the animal shelter in Agadir in 2018. It was always a struggle to keep it going. We were hoping that we would find a plot of land near Agadir where we could buy and develop our dream refuge, and although we have come close, that will not happen this year. So we decided to invest in the New Refuge's infrastructure and build more enclosures to reduce the number of dogs in the poorer conditions in Clebs.

The cost of transforming the shelter was 74,242 dirhams, to which was added at the beginning of August, the annual rent of 36,000 dirhams.

As a result of this investment, we have decided to give the “new” refuge a proper name and it will be called Shem's Refuge. Shems is Darija (Moroccan Arabic) for the sun.

We're still hoping to leave Clebs entirely, but we don't have a timetable for that just now and in the meantime, we have to keep paying the rent.

Then the earthquake came. A magnitude 6.8 earthquake struck Morocco late on Friday evening, September 8th. The epicenter was in the High Atlas Mountains, about 70 km north of Agadir. Thousands of mountain villages were destroyed and over three thousand people and their livestock were killed. It will take a long time to recover from this devastating event. The people in the villages live a relatively simple life and rely on livestock for both their food and their income. We hope their way of life hasn't been destroyed too, but it will take a long time for them to recover and winter is just around the corner. The government is working intensively with various aid organizations to help them prepare for the severe weather conditions expected in the high mountain regions.

Closer to Agadir and in the Souss Valley, where our shelters are located, we were very lucky and suffered no damage, although many people from Agadir were very scared as the memories of the catastrophic 1960 earthquake are still vivid.

Michele was busy, she was invited to another area of Morocco where all the different government and professional associations are working together to implement a TNVR program. They were very interested in hearing their advice and we look forward to seeing the results of their engagement.

Additionally, we welcomed many visitors to the refuge this summer including Jack and Nyall who helped us with some IT issues. We also welcomed Fernando from Spain who runs 3 shelters near Madrid and the Association “la caravane Sans Frontières from Switzerland, both of these visitors brought us many useful gifts. This summer board members from Morrocan Animal Welfare Support Souss, the scottish charity who help us with international fundraising also came to the Refuge.

Five dogs left us to travel to their new forever homes in Europe and we neutered and vaccinated 147 street cats and 58 street dogs.

As always, the months have flown by, and the end of another year is not long in coming. We hope to bring you some exciting news in the coming months, as there are few irons in the fire. In the meantime, thank you for reading this far and we hope you enjoyed the newsletter.

Thank you for your support.