Chipping drive to keep pets safe
Animal Angels Gauteng and Fora Krugersdorp recently teamed up to microchip close to a hundred pets to make sure they find their way back home if they ever get lost.
Who doesn’t absolutely love their pets? Pet owners often treat their furry friends like their own children, and losing one can be devastatingly heartbreaking.
With this in mind, Erika Reich from the Animal Angels Gauteng group encourages everyone to take their pets to get ‘chipped’ as soon as possible.
Micro-chipping involves inserting a computer chip about the size of a grain of rice between the pet’s shoulder blades, below the skin. If a stray animal is found, staff at any shelter or veterinarian can scan the area and attain information about the owner, such as a contact number or address.
Early in the year, Animal Angels received a large donation from Virbac for their BackHome microchips, which they used in two separate chipping drives. After the first successful drive at the SPCA Centurion, they headed out to Friends of Rescued Animals (Fora) Krugersdorp on Saturday, 27 March.
“The Fora staff managed to chip a whopping 98 animals, with quite a few more to be done during the following week as people could not get to Fora due to the huge power outage,” Erika said.
All of the animals chipped were brought in by pet owners from outside. On the day, chipping was done at only R50 per pet, which is fairly less than the usual price of between R150 and R300. The funds raised went directly to Fora for their daily operations. Vibrac also donated a flea and tick treatment for each animal they chipped.
Micro-chipping is permanent, and Erika gave the assurance that the animal experiences no discomfort during insertion or thereafter, and most animals don’t even realise they’ve been chipped.
“A microchip, unfortunately, is only as good as the information on the database. Owners are reminded to update their information should they move or change telephone numbers. These microchips are recognised internationally,” she explained.
