History of Greyhound Rescue

It all started when...

Over 35 years of caring for hundreds of these kind, affectionate, graceful and very appreciative breed (the Greyhound)

Appreciative by means of being so thankful for all the help and care you show and give them, quickly building their faith and trust up in people again and showing such readiness to please. No matter whatever fate some of our greyhounds have been through (which some of them have) whether they have been subjected to either physical or mental abuse they seem to have the courage to put this behind them and gain their confidence in people again.

Many of you will know the story of our chairpersons first sighting of two greyhounds, she was aged ten, yet the elegance and beauty of the breed lived with her until the age of 23 when she was able to adopt a greyhound of her own. From there a great passion for these noble gentle dogs was built and so the rescue sanctuary began.

Looking back over the years we have helped greyhounds from many different circumstances. There has been happiness, frustration, sadness and all those other emotions running riot that form part of running an animal sanctuary, but most of all there has been the feeling of great satisfaction when a greyhound has been re-homed into a loving family life, a life that enables them to build their own character, to be an individual and at last find themselves belonging and loved by someone special.

In the last few years awareness of a greyhounds life while racing etc has been brought forward into the public eye, this is a good thing as it can only improve their lives. We tend to see more and more of these beautiful greyhounds walking with their families because people are becoming aware what wonderful easy pets they are. We as a rescue are delighted as any other rescues must be with this result and the outcome of which publicity has played a part into recognising the amount of greyhounds every year needing help its a massive step forward from when we began our work, but not enough. Even though this is all good news there is still a long way to go in helping these dogs, according to the latest figures published by the Associate Parliamentary Group for animal welfare on the welfare issues surrounding racing greyhounds a surplus of 13,478 dogs are produced in one year. Accountable for after rehoming kept as pets euthanasia etc there is a shortfall of up to 4728 whose fate cannot be traced, all these figures do not include the young dogs that never make it to a track. So improvement is needed at every stage of the greyhounds journey through life from breeding to racing and for the lucky ones eventually re-homing. We think, as many do, this problem has to start with the breeders. If less greyhounds were bred it would give the racing industry a bigger chance to be able to financially take responsibility for the care of their ex-racers until they could be successfully be re-homed. Lets hope that now this issue had made it to a higher level of concern the welfare of these dogs will improve in the near future.

On a more personal note involving this rescue, as some of you will know, the whole rescue had to be moved into rented accommodation. It was a difficult move transporting all the dogs also a time of hard work since moving. During our time in the new premises in-between taking dogs in re-homing etc we have had to concentrate on financial matters, as our aim is to purchase a property that will be solely for and owned by greyhound rescue. It will be a permanent base to enable us to continue help and care for our rescues. We always have our greyhound pensioners that live their lives out with us, dogs that cannot be re-homed for some reason or another and some that never get that lucky chance of being re-homed so they need a safe haven and security as will many more that we take in. Efforts are proving to be successful and in the near future it looks promising that a final resting place from where this rescue are able to carry on its work is at last in sight. For this reason a massive thank you has to go out to the general public, without them our work and hopes would be impossible and because without their support, donations, legacies etc these lovely dogs would not get the chance to live their lives out to the full as they so much deserve to be given the best after they have given their best.

With many thanks for your past support and continued support towards our charity which now looks forward to the next 25 years with hopefully more improvement on the welfare issues for these beautiful animals happening in the next few years.