{"id":30963,"date":"2011-04-18T09:05:03","date_gmt":"2011-04-18T13:05:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/30963\/bill-mandates-fixing-cats-dogs-sale\/"},"modified":"2011-04-18T09:05:03","modified_gmt":"2011-04-18T13:05:03","slug":"bill-mandates-fixing-cats-dogs-sale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/30963\/bill-mandates-fixing-cats-dogs-sale\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill mandates ‘fixing’ of cats, dogs before sale"},"content":{"rendered":"

Posted By:
\nADVOCATE FOR SAVING DOGS\u2122<\/a>
\n<\/strong>\"Photobucket\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Bill mandates ‘fixing’ of cats, dogs before sale<\/h1>\n

By Rob Shikina<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\" <\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

\n
\n
STAR-ADVERTISER<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

State lawmakers are looking at a bill that would
\nrequire pet retailers in Hawaii to sterilize all cats and dogs before
\nselling them.<\/p>\n

Passing such a law would lessen the suffering of
\nferal cats because of overpopulation and reduce the number of animals
\neuthanized in shelters, said Inga Gibson, state director of the
\nHumane Society of the United States. Many feral cats are the offspring
\nof abandoned house cats that haven’t been sterilized, she added.<\/p>\n

House Bill 243 notes that an unsterilized female
\ncat can give birth to two litters a year, which, extrapolated over
\nseven years, could lead to 400,000 cats.<\/p>\n

Feral cat colonies continue to grow despite
\nvarious efforts to control the cat population, and the pressures of
\noverpopulation lead to starvation of the weakest and the spread of
\ndisease and mange, a form of animal cruelty when uncontrolled, the bill
\nsays.<\/p>\n

“It’s a tremendous issue,” Gibson said. “We have a
\nlarge feral cat issue throughout the state. One of the contributing
\nfactors is the sale of unsterilized cats.”<\/p>\n

Feral cats are also a threat to Hawaii’s endangered birds, according to the state Division of Forestry and Wildlife.<\/p>\n

The bill is just one version of animal cruelty
\nlegislation that is heading to a conference committee to work out
\ndifferences between House and Senate versions.<\/p>\n

State laws mandating the spaying or neutering of
\ndogs or cats appear to be rare. At least one state, Rhode Island,
\nmandates it if the animals are released from a shelter. Some counties on
\nthe mainland, however, completely ban the sale of cats or dogs,
\nwhile a Los Angeles ordinance from 2008 requires pet owners to sterilize
\ntheir dogs or cats by the age of 4 months.<\/p>\n

Despite the large feral cat population, the Humane
\nSociety opposes euthanasia and supports managed cat colonies for
\nunsocialized cats, where a caretaker will get the animals
\nsterilized, microchipped, vaccinated, fed and looked after.<\/p>\n

“It’s not an easy life for a cat that’s not part of a managed colony,” Gibson said.<\/p>\n

Theresa Donnelly, who breeds boxers and is
\nsecretary of the Boxer Club of Hawaii, said the bill wouldn’t affect
\npurebred dogs because hobby breeders usually sell person to
\nperson, which is not regulated by the bill.<\/p>\n

“Any reputable breeder would never sell to a pet
\nstore anyway,” she said. Hobby breeders want to meet potential owners to
\nmake sure their dogs will have a safe home and possibly establish
\na relationship with the new owners to promote ethical breeding,
\nshe said. “People who want to breed animals should be mentored.”<\/p>\n

Tish Rothwell, owner of the Pet Depot in Ewa
\nBeach, said her business has been fixing cats before adopting them out
\never since hundreds of animals were rescued from a Waianae no-kill
\nshelter when the owner died in July 2009.<\/p>\n

After the rescue, shelters were full and couldn’t
\ntake animals from people who were trying to give up their pets. Rather
\nthan see cats euthanized in shelters, Rothwell’s store took the
\nanimals and sterilized them before adopting them out for a fee
\nthat covered medical costs.<\/p>\n

“We want to be responsible and keep that out-of-control cat population down,” Rothwell said.<\/p>\n

However, she has concerns about mandating the
\nfixing of dogs. They recover slower than cats after being spayed or
\nneutered and require more care, raising the cost of the animals.<\/p>\n

Brent Chung, manager of Kalihi Pet Center, said
\nsome customers may not mind if the bill becomes law, but pet stores may
\nrequire breeders to have dogs fixed before selling them to the
\nretailer, reducing the supply of dogs in stores. He said some
\nveterinarians are backlogged and the dogs may be months old by the
\ntime an animal can be sterilized, frustrating customers that want dogs
\nas young as 6 weeks old that are easier to train. He suspected the
\nbill could also boost sales of unsterilized dogs outside of
\nstores. “They’ll beat the system, no matter what,” he said.<\/p>\n

The bill has an effective date of January.<\/p>\n

\n

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Source<\/a><\/p>\n


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Posted By: ADVOCATE FOR SAVING DOGS\u2122 Bill mandates ‘fixing’ of cats, dogs before sale By Rob Shikina STAR-ADVERTISER State lawmakers are looking at a bill that would require pet retailers in Hawaii to sterilize all cats and dogs before selling them. Passing such a law would lessen the suffering of feral cats because of overpopulation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-other"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30963"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30963\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/friendburst.com\/blog-new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}