Sunday, March 26, 2006

Animal Aid event report

Every now and again we get the chance to mingle with the public, meet other animal lovers, promote rabbit welfare and generally push our unconventional philosophy on anyone we can corner. One such occasion was "A Dog’s Breakfast", an event held on the 22nd of February by Animal Aid to draw attention to the problem of abandoned and mistreated pets.

The idea of the Dog’s Breakfast was for people to come along to the Lilydale Showgrounds (with their own dog if they chose to), have some breakfast and look at displays of dog training, dog competitions, stalls promoting dog grooming, dog health, dog adoption, doggy diet issues…and us.

We should have known that something called A Dog’s Breakfast would have a predominantly canine focus, and so it was. Oh, there were also some cat-lovers there, but they looked a bit nervous surrounded by so many dogs. Needless to say, we were the only bunny-huggers in attendance.

We did our best to talk up the wonders of bunny friendship to anyone who would listen. It is pretty hard to convince someone to adopt an abandoned rabbit when they are standing in front of you holding a leash, at the other end of which is an Irish Wolfhound the size of Phar Lap!
The highlight of the morning for us was meeting a woman who had won first prize in a competition for the person most resembling their dog. A quietly playful creature with neatly trimmed light brown hair, soulful brown eyes, delicate paws and a frisky wag in her tail – and the dog wasn’t bad either!

For more information about Animal Aid, please visit their website - http://www.vaat.org.au/