Happy Birthday Dior! (and some quick updates)

Howdy folks. Just thought I'd do a little update on the blog to let you all know what we're currently busy with at the moment. One thing's for sure, there's always something happening at the shelter.

Dior turns 3 today!

Today is Dior's birthday! Our happy smiley girl is 3 years old! Dior is actually Debbie's flesh and blood. Debbie is usually not human friendly. She isn't aggressive. She just doesn't go near humans. Whenever we try to approach her, she gets up in a fluster and moves away gingerly. The only reason Debbie followed her rescuer Wee up his van was because she had just given birth to a litter of puppies which included Dior and was especially vulnerable. I guess she knew that her puppies had little chance of survival outside in the wilderness. Her instincts turned out to be right. Even after rescue, only 2 puppies out of the entire litter of eight or nine survived. Dior was one of them, together with her sister Dana. Dana has since been adopted. Dior was adopted as a puppy too but returned.

 Debbie

Upon being returned, it took Dior quite a while to get used to shelter life. Because she was removed from Debbie as a pup, Debbie no longer recognised Dior upon her return. At the old shelter where space was an issue, Dior found it difficult holding her own against Daixi and Daixin. Dior was forced to grow up and fend for herself at the shelter. She didn't have it easy but for now, we can safely say that she has found her place in the shelter. We call her Big Sister or Da Jie in Mandarin because the Dior of today doesn't let anybody bully her no more.

 

Dior with boyfriend, Mario

Another event we are busy with is the next Furry Day to be held this Saturday. We have received feedback that there have been too many volunteers and too little dogs during the past furry days! I guess that's a good sort of problem. That is also why we have learnt to keep close track of the number of volunteers we already have and call for more as and when we require. Every furry day, we learn something and we're slowly but surely learning to fine tune the problems cropping up each time. Currently, we need about 5 more volunteers for furry day. Would you be interested in coming? Do drop us an email as per usual practice!

Diya

This Furry Day is also Detox Day. It's so rare that we manage to get all our dogs out of the shelter at once. So when all the dogs are out traipsing along Pasir Ris Park, a bunch of regulars will be armed with washing equipment and chlorox to disinfect the shelter. Having all the dogs out allow us to do a thorough job. Fancy lending a hand? Please drop us an email! Thank you in advance!

Dexter and Dyana

A batch of our sponsored t-shirts has just arrived a few days ago. We are currently thinking about how we are going to sell them and what is a reasonable price for each t-shirt. .Would you be interested in purchasing a Gentle Paws tee as a souvenir? We'll keep you updated on the t-shirt front.

 Deckie

An adoption drive for this year end is also in the works. A great problem we have is how to publicise it. Past adoption drives have received lukewarm responses because nobody really knew we existed or that our adoption drive was ongoing. The market we are trying to attract is also niche. Almost all our dogs are medium to large sized and we need to target those living in landed property. We are putting much thought into publicity this time. It is going to require lots of time and effort, but we figured... no pain no gain right? Finding a good home is never easy but if hard work means we're able to find at least one good home for one of our dogs, then it's all worth it for us. Do you have any ideas about how we can publicise the drive? Do you have any contacts that you are thinking of sharing with us? Perhaps you can help us stick a flyer in your office? Currently, we're thinking of tagging each regular to one private estate to post flyers in letter boxes. Do you think this will work? We would like to hear from you! Drop us an email if you've got any ideas.

Darwin 

As you can see, there are really a lot of behind the scenes work we have to do to keep the shelter going, apart from the usual feeding and cleaning. We're working on it! Meanwhile, we just want to thank you for all the support you've shown us through our hard times. We know thank you is hardly enough but for now that's what we can offer. Do come down to the shelter some time!