Mass poisoning kills 22 dogs near Alice

Mass poisoning kills 22 dogs near Alice

At least 29 dogs were poisoned, and 22 died in Hillcrest, in Alice, on Tuesday.
The animals were collected by the King William’s Town SPCA after community members called on the organisation for help.
Annette Rademeyer, King William’s Town SPCA committee member and volunteer senior inspector, said: “The KWT SPCA received a call for help from a community in Alice yesterday after their dogs started dying en masse.
“We sent vehicles to Alice and came across dogs that were frothing at the mouth and some were weak and lethargic.
“The dogs were brought back to the SPCA where our vet examined them and said it was suspected poisoning.”
Rademeyer said it took two trips to fetch all the dogs.
She said six of the dogs had died from the poison, and 16 had to be put down.
“Dr Lia van der Westhuizen conducted postmortems on three of the dogs and found black grains, which appeared to be organophosphate.
“This is often found in fertiliser.
“On the second trip to Alice, trainee inspector Dennis Block questioned some community members and they say the community know who the culprit is.
“We are unsure as to what the motive for the killings is.
“Some community members have threatened to kill the suspect,” she added.
Rademeyer said the postmortems were consistent with information given to them by the community.
Pieces of meat found in the dogs’ stomachs showed traces of poison, she said.
“The SPCA condemns, in the strongest possible terms, the wholesale poisoning of animals.
“With poison one often gets secondary poisoning so many more animals are affected.
“We do not know how many animals had already died when we got there but we were told that many had died and the owners had buried them.
“We are busy compiling a docket and charges will be laid in terms of the Animal Protection Act.
“Our hospital is full of animals in various stages of recovery. We will try and get them to eat something today,” she said.
Rademeyer said the KWT SPCA has seen many poisoning cases but up until now the worst had been five dogs at one time.
Councillor Singilizwe Alfred Nivi said his ward committee members from the Hillcrest area confirmed to him that more than 29 dogs had been poisoned and that a man had been seen pouring what was believed to be poison on the carcass of a cow, which the dogs may have eaten...

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