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A private surrender to ACS turns rescue mission

A simple surrender sometimes ends up very complex. Late July 2007 a family rang ACS wanting to surrender their guinea pigs as they were moving interstate. They wanted their guinea pigs gone asap. Naturally all who choose to surrender generally bring their guinea pigs to our shelters although this time round the family were not willing to do so and would only part with their guinea pigs if ACS were to pick them up from their home along with their cages. The guinea pigs were located over an hour from the shelter and ACS did not think it was reasonable to ask us to pick up the animals although in consideration of the guinea pigs involved we decided to arrange a pick-up after we were then told that one of the guinea pigs had passed away only a day before the phone call to ACS. The family offered to pay ACS for fuel costs involved in the pick-up so we decided to go along with the pick-up.

With a very busy schedule one of our volunteers who lives approx 3hrs from the location, offered to dedicate their time to this mission and Deb and her family set off to pick the guinea pigs up but were surprised with what they found on arrival at the home. The guinea pigs were found living in old rotting wooden lawn hutches and it was obvious the cages had been freshly cleaned for our arrival as fresh newspaper had been laid in the cages. A fifth cage was viewed where the other guinea pig had recently passed and it was described as ' feral ' by Deb. A young daughter of the home began speaking to Deb and mentioned that ' their guinea pigs always seemed to die from hot or cold and one even died because they put it in a rodent ball and couldn't get it back out again '. Deb and family packed and left with the guinea pigs and were not given ANY payment for their time as promised.

Once back at the shelter, shelter manager Jessica had a chance to check the guinea pigs over with Deb and family and upon closer inspection of the guinea pigs we found very overgrown toenails, a fungal infection n one of the guinea pigs, and one guinea pig in particular is currently in a very serious condition he was very skinny, had an upset stomach, had wounds on his body and had possible back teeth overgrowth which will needed vet attention asap. Upon closer inspection of the enclosures we found under all the ' freshly laid newspaper ' that the cages were infact filthy and in turn the possibility of fungal spores and other bacteria contained within the timber of the cages was high. With this the cages were taken to the dump to seize any possibility of bacteria spreading.

Since this surrender/rescue all the guinea pigs gained condition. Smokey had to undergo surgery for his back teeth overgrowth and luckily made a full recovery post op. The other guinea pigs were named Fudge, Snickers and Titch.

ACS receive many private surrenders to the shelter most of which are healthy and much loved guinea pigs but sadly every now and then some of our private surrenders do come as a shock and very unwell and sick guinea pigs are surrendered or the surrender turns into a rescue case or mission.

Below are photos of the guinea pigs and their enclosures

Two of the enclosures were very small and measured only around 70cm x 30cm in size

Photo below in the top row second from the right you will see a dark line inside the cage. That line is a staining and depicts a time when the bedding in the cage got to that height which would mean at some time it would've reached around 15cm.