Foundation for street dogs

Fighting for the rights and wellbeing of straydogs will never end! We started 2015 in the South West Balkan as no other NGO was working there at that time. Together with reliable partners and professional veterinarians for pets we started in Kosovo in January 2015 and in Albania in 2016, then in Montenegro in 2019. Since then we supported the sterilisation of hundreds of stray dogs to stop the reproduction of puppies that have no chance to survive or live an adequate life. We teach kids in schools and organise postgraduate training for veterinarians that want to learn spaying/neutering of dogs. We do not hesitate to raise our voice for the animals. Our work is appreciated by the citizens who suffer under an enormous amount of strays!

Please NOTE: We do not support sheltering of dogs - except Open Shelters and ambulatory treatment of Community Dogs in our activity regions. The programs in Albania and in Montenegro are stopped.

Donate today to stop the daily increase of hopeless and maltreated stray dogs!


Overview


Effect

Our CNVR work shows immediate effect in the municipalities where our supported teams are allowed to work. But as long as citizens treat their dogs like waste, there will be never an end to stray dogs. So our focus is now the registration of dog owners and breeders in Kosovo and stray dog treatments in Niksic/MNE. An awareness campaign and teaching show furthermore more empathy in some citizens for the suffering dogs. 

 

Start of our CNVR work in 2015 was first in Peja, then in Gjakova, Vushtrri, Mitrovica, Drenas (ongoing) and now from 2022 in Skenderaj. Those Municipalities support our work financially and with informations of their citizens. We stayed 2022 in all contracted Municipalities except Mitrovica.  

 

With JETA TierundMensch our Partners in Albania we sterilised hundreds of street dogs in Durrës and Fieri. But the abandoning is without end and in Albania we quit because there was no cooperation of the local Mayors. Instead we started 2019 to help the Municipality of Niksic in Montenegro until January 2023. Then after violation of our contract we stopped to work there as well.

Topics

We concentrate primary on CNVR :catch/neuter/vaccinate/ release - if you want to know more about it click here - a worldwide recommended program to reduce stray dog population. Our work is a model how the stray dog problem in Kosovo and Montenegro could be managed for the next few years, until there is a clear reduction of stray dogs. To accomplish this goal breeders and dog owners should register and chip their dogs (click here). 

 

Furthermore our partners visit regularly children in their schools and train veterinarians for large animals in small cut surgery on pets. We make awareness campaigns throughout the country Kosovo.

 

We have animals for adoptions and for sponsorship, specially sick dogs need your support (Sanctuary click here). 

Dangerous diseases on the South Balkan are transmitted by animals - specially not vaccinated and not dewormed roaming dogs! More

 

 



our current work


January 2023 Registrationsprogram

In January 2023 the state of Kosovo has started with the microchipping of owned dogs in the rural regions as well. Most Municipalities inform the citizens that for one year they can get free registrations from veterinarians that are part of the state tender. So is also our partner DVM Zenel Zhabari from Vushtrri.

Example: Information by the Municipality Vushtrri HERE


New pet clinic and sanctuary drenas

In 2022 we started to build a 3rd pet clinic and sanctuary in Drenas on the road to Skenderaj. Drenas offered us for CNVR a contract to share the costs, so it is for us a welcoming region. The City Pet Klinika veterinare with a small sanctuary will be located in this new building, our partner there is DVM Shaban M. Mehmeti. Opening from 31st march 2023 on.


regions 2021- 2023 Kosovo

We work intensely and in cooperation with the Mayors offices in Gjakova, Vushtrri-Nevolan, Drenas and new Skenderaj. The work in Mitrovica was stopped due to the fact, that the former and the actual Mayor do not support our work at all. We need always support by the locals, because else the behaviour of citizens will never change. 


Every day big sadness

Still someone has to watch out and to confront herself with the suffering of stray dogs, else we could not help. Finding in two days four dogs that needed emergency help, is sometimes too much. But three dogs can stay with us - because they cannot manage to find food on the street, were dehydrated and Piki is blind :-( 


NO SHELTERS IN KOSOVO!

Pictures done in the last week of May 2017 at Prishtina dog shelter in Graçanica below! Some dogs on chain, some dogs sick but not isolated, all seem to have flees, the food is old, spicy and not meant for dogs!

DO YOU REALLY THINK YOU RESCUED A DOG OR PUPPY, IF YOU BRING IT THERE? Look out for families, fosters and pay them for taking care of a dog - and never believe anyone who says he has a shelter. There are no shelters in Kosovo that deserve that name! And if you ever follow a street dogs life - for example in Gjakova, they live for years after sterilisation in the city center or park and survive, are happy, and free to walk where they want. Maybe a short life due to traffic, but this is freedom to move!


Cooperation Four Paws

In October 2023 Four Paws International Vienna did for the very first time a CNVR program in the Municipalities of Decan and Junik together with our veterinary team and in our clinic Pro Vet Gjakova. Four Paws sent their veterinary team from Sofia and all worked efficiently so that 229 dogs and 24 cats were treated within not even 2 weeks. We are very grateful for the interest Four Paws take in the straydog situation in Kosovo and hope they will join us again.


Niksic Montenegro

In spring 2022 we met the new and actual Mayor of the Municipality Niksic in Montenegro. Already before we had a contract with the former Mayor concerning the municipal shelter in Brestice, where we invested in a free running zone. The Mayor and his staff showed clear interest to find solutions to reduce the straydog population. So together with our partner vet clinic, Family Vet, we invested in a Sanctuary. But our partners and the Municipality violated our contracts, so we quit. In Niksic/MNE we stopped the CNVR after 3 years of cooperation with the Municipality. Instead we are on a prevention program with the association KORINA.


Montenegro Report


Montenegros horrible shelters!

Montenegro owns some of the worst shelters on the European continent. Recently we engage in Berane together with the KORINA TEAM. Regularly street dogs are brought to those shelters and killed after 30 days. Other - so called No-Kill shelters - let the dogs sitting in their feces, sick and not sterilised - until they die on a chain, without sufficient protection against rain and sun, or locked up in a cage! 


Cooperation in Vushtrria

In a very friendly meeting end of October 2019 the Mayor of Vushtrri, Dr. Xhafer Tahiri, declared to cooperate with our foundation next year to help reducing humanely the street dog population supporting any CNVR activities with our partner veterinarians. The contract was renewed 2022 with the Mayor Ferit Idrizi!


Where do we work since 2023?

Google Map


Opposing traditional shelters

This photo from Niksic state shelter in Brestice shows the life of captured dogs - a sad life in a prison! Lifelong sentence or killing after a few days or weeks if no one adopts. We oppose any construction of such shelters on the Balkan and promote instead the concept of Community dogs and Open shelters, which are the future! See:

Territorio de Zaguates

Open shelter Animal Trust

Open shelter Bulgaria Terry Kyle


Protest against killing healthy dogs

The second half of 2022 our main work was to mobilise befriended NGOs abroad to protest against a planned regulation by the Food & Veterinary Agency, drafted by a delegation from three Balkan EU states and the local Animal Rights Foundation - which did not step out neither protest in public. In Art. 23 the regulation states the euthanasia of healthy formerly owned dogs, if the owner does not take the abandoned dog back! See the protest mails to the Agriculture Ministry

Animal Rights Foundation Switzerland

Susy Utzinger Foundation Switzerland

Stichting Dierennood Netherlands

Cane Corso Club Germany

StrayCoCo Foundation Switzerland

Kosovo Small Animal Veterinary Association

 


Failure contract with Mitrovica

Signed in April 2021 was an agreement with the Municipality for one year treatment of 500 dogs, while they were obliged to publish our CNVR program and inform that we offer free castration of dogs if an owner cannot afford to pay. The veterinarian under contract is DVM Labinot Osmani. The former Mayor Agim Bahtiri did not keep his promises. So we leave 2022 Mitrovica and our veterinary partner helps Skenderaj to treat straydogs as the Mayor offered us a contract, sharing the costs.


Earthquake in Durrës End November

More and more dogs left alone, their owners vanished or died in this Municipality. JETA Tier und Mensch, supported by us, is on place helping to collect the dogs, bring them in safe places and feed them. People are vanished, half of the town has left...no one there to help.