Cruelty-to-animal cases just keep coming, week after week

TUESDAY MORNING EDITORIAL — Cases of cruelty to animals are all too common, but they continue to shock us. Thus, when the B.C. SPCA reported yesterday (Monday) that 16 dogs and two horses had been seized from a rural property near Clearwater, the suffering of animals was back in the headlines.

The dogs, said the SPCA, were badly neglected, filthy and matted, while the horses were also in poor condition. The bodies of two dead dogs and a dead calf were also found on the property.

Seven thousand complaints of animal cruelty are made to the B.C. SPCA each year. A look at the SPCA’s news releases over just the past month shows how badly we treat our pets.

An 11-week-old abandoned kitten needed surgery for a serious eye injury but was on the mend in Chilliwack. A five-month-old German shepherd-border collie cross was found abandoned and badly injured at a rest stop north of Williams Lake. She had surgery and is recovering.

A shepherd-cross was found emaciated and near death near Port hardy. In Metchosin, a couple was charged with animal cruelty for neglect. A Victoria-area woman was charged in what the SPCA called “a disturbing case” of animal cruelty in which she allegedly killed five cats. Eleven house cats, six feral cats and a dog were removed from the property.

And on goes the list. Only a few weeks ago, the SPCA and Kamloops veterinarians were nursing 11 horses that have been severely neglected. Not all of them made it.

Sadly, there will be many more of these cases. Sometimes the cruelty is intentional, often it’s just stupidity or a simple lack of human caring. What will stop it? More arrests and more convictions would help, but the SPCA has only 26 constables in B.C. and cruelty cases aren’t always easy to prosecute.

So, we just wait for the next one.