El Refugio are very good at getting media coverage for large scale rescues and exposing how Spanish hunting dogs are kept. Here is film of the latest rescue of 52 dogs, mostly podencos, kept in appalling conditions. Bev Farmer of Podenco Friends has translated.

Please watch this video of a recent rescue, it will give you some insight on what we have to deal with the situation over here in Spain and what happens to the hunting dogs and why we need help.

I have quickly translated the report

52 hunting dogs seized by the Guardia Civil in Villa del Prado
26/08/2014

An individual was reported yesterday morning by the Civil Guard Villa del Prado in Madrid, and is accused of an alleged crime of cruelty to animals. The defendant is the responsible of 52 hunting dogs, half without microchip, which many of them are crammed into an area of barely 30 square meters, in groups of up to seven dogs in kennels 2 x 1 meters.

The absolute rot has been the permanent environment in the life of these animals. Nearly twenty of them had to be taken urgently to proceed to hospital due to their
critical condition. A number of them had their ears cut off with a knife, and were also found on the premises several dead dogs, one in an advanced state of putrefaction.

The rest of the animals were rescued by several associations safety who had received the notice. These include El Refugio, to be presented as an indictment of the judicial procedure was forthcoming. Its president, Nacho Paunero, managed to locate and briefly interview the accused, who questions “whether the animals were his and if engaged in hunting,” the owner denied everything with absolute coldness.

“We have been for 18 years insisting that the hunting environment is the main focus of the problem of abuse and neglect of dogs in Spain: seasonal massacres of greyhounds at the end of the hunting season, thousands of abandoned dogs that do not serve them to hunt pregnant and end up to ten pups born to be abandoned, but also the Spanish countryside is littered with places like this has been reported in Villa del Prado, which are not subject to any control.

While the government does not take action on the matter, there will still be hundreds of thousands of dogs abused, abandoned and dying, which many will committed to ensuring that the only thing you can do with them is sacrifice. They demand urgent change in management policies, the uncontrolled rein there about using dogs to hunt. “Nacho said Paunero (President El Refugio).