By Wendy Huntbatch
Co-Founder of F.L.O.P.R.S. (For the Love Of Parrots Refuge Society)

February 24, 2007
Presented to the SPCA Annual General Meeting, Nanaimo BC

Looking in the “Pets For Sale” column in the newspaper, you will find a huge number of dogs and cats on offer, many of them “free to a good home”. In all the years that humane societies have preached the importance of “spay and neuter” you might think that this column would be just a memory by now. There are two reasons for this lack of success. The first is that there are always people willing to make a dollar on the back of a “cute” or “exotic” living being. The second is that there are always devoted individuals or community groups willing to take responsibility for the same living being who has outlived the welcome at a home that, at the moment of purchase, could not imagine life without their new family addition.

These same groups of devoted animal lovers end up being responsible for ending the lives of animals for whom they cannot find a home. All this is done quietly and with dignity behind closed doors, so that the irresponsible feel no guilt. Even with “No Kill” policies at many shelters, more than 400,000 dogs and cats are killed in humane shelters in Canada every year. There are simply no homes available for these “excess” animals – and yet people keep on breeding them for money. What would happen if these shelters went out of business because people could no longer bear the heartbreak of having to kill another innocent animal?

Do you think this stops with dogs and cats? Think again!

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2 January 2007

As always, at this time of year we reflect upon the 12 months we have left behind. Naturally there are some days that I would rather not have endured. The day that Revenue Canada seized the bank accounts of the Refuge and the Gift Shoppe was, I think, the most emotionally disastrous day of my life. Although Horst and I had personally donated thousands of dollars to pay for food and heat for the birds as well as five months' wages for our valuable employees, we just did not have any money left to pay Revenue Canada.

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Please click on the thumbnails below to learn how you can help some special birds have a home for life through our "Virtual Adoption" program! More stories coming soon!

Birds who are now partly sponsored, thank you!

Birds who are now fully sponsored, thank you!

"This is, in a word, a great place and these miraculous creatures deserve no less, but few places can deliver it this well. It is, indeed, 'world class'."

– Stewart Metz (author and Director of the Indonesian Parrot Project), after his visit at the Grand Opening of the Refuge on August 13, 2005.

"The World Parrot Refuge is a true sanctuary where parrots live out their lives in a loving, spacious and happy environment under the guidance of extraordinarily caring people. The many visitors destined to pass through the refuge will come to understand that parrots are not toys or trophies, but beings with needs and emotions as real as our own."

– Rosemary Low (author of more than 30 books on parrots)