BARKING MAD DOG RESCUE SHELTERS
OUR MAIN SHELTER and THE VILLAGE HOUSE SHELTER, NISIPARI, CONSTANTA, ROMANIA
The village of Nisipari in Romania is home to our own shelters. Nisipari is just over 30 kms from the city of Constanta itself, which is on the Black Sea coast. Here at our main shelter, we rent the ground from a local man, although we have just started to building a more permanent rescue center - on land very generously bought for us by a German gentleman who is a very good friend to our dogs. This is also on the periphery of the village.
Here we care around 350 dogs. Our shelter is not the most luxurious compared to western European standards but our dogs are happy and healthy living in social groups, with room to play and interact. Our new shelter will be purpose built and we are looking to
Since 2018 we also rented a small, slightly dilapidated house in the village where the more vulnerable dogs are housed. Pups, oldies and little dogs live here. In 2022, thanks to a generous legacy, we were able to buy this. Ion and Aura live here with so many dogs. one day we hope to be able to fix the leaky roof and give them modern facilities. Currently there is one cold outside tap and an earth privvy...
We pay all costs - food, vets, wages, maintenance, electricity and rent for our current shelter land. More than 350 dogs and 20+ puppies live here across these two shelters.
THE MAIN SHELTER
THE VILLAGE HOUSE MINI SHELTER
TEAM ROMANIA
The dogs at our main and biggest shelter are cared for by a remarkable family, Gea Caineanu, her father Ion and mother Aura. These three selfless individuals have given up nearly every aspect of 'normal' life to look after every aspect of our work in Constanta.
The pandemic has been particularly hard on this dedicated family. There have been no volunteer visits for two years. it has been even harder to retain workers in Romania where no one wants to work with dogs. Brexit too has has had a significant impact, where the regular aid runs have been halted from the UK. Thank goodness we have the Aura, Gea and Ion
Coca's dogs.
Coca is an older woman whose whole life has been dedicated to saving dogs. In her working years, she had fewer dogs and a job to support them all. With her redundancy and the killing law coming into force, Coca has taken in more and more dogs. We heard of her plight in early 2015 and promised to help her in any way we could. Since then, we have kept that promise.
We rarely get to visit Coca. Her shelter is some hours from our one. Coca doesn't have the luxury of a team. She cares for her 140 dogs single-handedly, with occasional help from a casual worker. Coca is in her late 60s, needs a hip replacement and has a bad heart. What can she do? Pass by boxes of pups left at her gate? Ignore dogs dumped on the road on the way to the shelter?
For over ten years, we have paid the dog food bills for these dogs, month in and month out. Vet bills too! Occasionally, with our German friends too, we are able to get some dogs adopted. It is very hard to help from afar except financially. We also send a bit of money to Coca to help pay fuel back and forth, seven days a week, to the shelter.
The food bills alone for these dogs is around £2500 monthly...
If you can help us feed Coca's dogs, please click here. Thank you!
