Greyhound Racing – Who is the real winner?

For the greyhounds at least, it isn´t as simple as “first past the post”. No matter how hard they try, how fast they run, ultimately they will be the losers.
So who are the winners in this sport?


The Winners!

• the greyhound industry as a whole, which generates enormous annual profits.
• The owners of the best registered dogs, who profit from prizes
• The registered dog owners who can sell the best dogs on to the independent sector, once they have no further use for them.

The Losers!

• the puppies killed because they won´t make the grade as a racer.
• The thousands and thousands of greyhounds racing in the independent sector whose welfare is not regulated.
• The dogs kept in appalling, dirty, cramped conditions.
• The injured greyhounds, many of whom go untreated.
• The dogs abandoned or killed when they can´t run fast enough to win a race.

How can you make a difference to the dogs, and help the greyhounds become the winners?

Sign our petition on http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/stop-the-greyhound-slaughter. We are aiming for 20,000 signatures to present our protest to Governments around the globe in March 2008.

Members of Facebook can join the following cause: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/view_cause/18204. This has been set up to give people a voice. You can post media links and chat with other greyhound lovers at the same time!

Better still, make one special dog a winner! Adopt a greyhound and you will gain a loyal and rewarding pet. Your dog will then be the ultimate winner with the best prize of all – a long and happy life!

First past the post, or past it?

Have you ever “bet on the dogs” or gone to a race track for an evening´s entertainment with your friends? If you have, I´m sure that you enjoyed a civilised and pleasant evening. But look carefully behind the “fun” image of this sport, and you´ll begin to uncover a sub-culture of abuse, cruelty and slaughter.

There are over 30 race courses registered with the National Greyhound Racing (NGRC) in the UK, and the NGRC co-ordinates the registration of dogs, and acts as the judiciary and disciplinary body. Any dog racing on these registered tracks must be identifiable by a totoo, and kept with a registered trainer/ owner/ manager.

However, there are currently also over 50 independent tracks, and dogs racing on these tracks have no protection, meaning that a huge slice of the lucrative racing sector is completely unregulated.

Tha fastest dogs race on the regulated tracks, therefore when the fateful day comes and the dog is no longer “ first past the post”, it is either destroyrd or sold on to the independent sector. Here it may race for another year or two before, finally, worn out and deemed useless, the dog will be abandoned or killed.

Consider the facts:
-Unregulated, independent tracks are not required to have a vet present during racing events.
-Injured dogs may wait for hours in pain before they are treated.
-At the age of 4 or 5 , whee their racing career is over, many greyhounds are slaughtered.
-In the UK alone 40,000 greyhounds are needlessly slaughterd each year.
-Young dogs who do not make the grade will not even live to see their first birthday. They will be destroyed.
-A slow or injured dog is not a profitable dog. Favourite disposal methods include drowning, beating the dog to death, poison, shooting, starvation and abandonment.
-Many abandoned dogs die in traffic accidents, as they wander, hungry and bewildered, after being dumped. Many will simply starve to death.

Don´t these gorgeous, elegant creatures deserve more after running for our “entertainment”? Here´s how you can help.

Sign our petition on http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/stop-the-greyhound-slaughter . We are aiming for 20,000 signatures to present our protest to Governments around the globe in March 2008.

The greyhounds thank you from the bottom of their hearts!