Question about keeping lost dogs and micro chipping

abutler101

Hi, we have found two dogs that we think were probably abandoned. One is a very friendly young male dog, the other is a very timid and scared older female that looks to be over bred. We have asked all the neighbors around and nobody has seen them before. One neighbor has said that she would like to keep the male one though. We want to check if they are microchipped first though. We will probably surrender the female dog to the pound but if we brought the male dog to get him checked for a chip would he have to be surrendered too? If they don't have chips is it legal for my neighbor to keep the male dog?
thanks

lorebringer

A vet will check both dogs for a chip for you - this should be free. You need to inform the pound of the male that has been found, as well as the local Gardai, give contact info of where the dog will be so if the owner does show up there is somewhere for them to contact. You should also contact local rescues/charities to see if the owner has been looking for the dog. If the dog is micro chipped and registered, you need to contact the owner (most of the time, the vet will do this for you). A rescue or pound will be able to tell you the legalities regarding keeping stray animals (I'm not 100% clear tbh). If there is no chip and the owner cannot be located, your neighbour will need to get him licensed and chipped (and register the chip).

With regards to the older female - a dog like that (older etc.) is very unlikely to get out of a pound, please contact rescues instead. If you leave a dog into a pound in Ireland, they legally only have to keep them for 5 days and after this they can be euthanized. Many pounds across the country have serious overpopulation problems and quite a number of dogs get euthanized (not all are the same). A rescue would be a better option for her.

DBB

You have a legal obligation to let the dog warden or Gardai know that you have found both of these dogs.
Your neighbour is perfectly entitled to hold on to the dog and does not have to bring him to the pound, but, he/she needs to be aware that unless the dog is physically brought to the pound and spends 5 days there to give the owners the statutory time to come forward, the dog won't actually become the neighbour's legal property for 366 days.
That means that the rightful owners have a full year to come forward and take their dog back, and there's not much your neighbour could do to stop them. It has happened, and is of course extremely upsetting for the kind person who took the dog in.
I'd echo the advice to try to get help for the female via a rescue group, she probably doesn't stand much of a chance in the pound unless it's one of the pounds that has a really good rescue working with them that takes the homeable dogs out before they're put to sleep.

abutler101

Thanks, If I rang the local SPCA and brought them there would they notify the dog warden/gardai for me?

DBB

abutler101 wrote: »

Thanks, If I rang the local SPCA and brought them there would they notify the dog warden/gardai for me?

Perhaps they will if you ask, I'm not sure if they do so as a matter of course. Strictly speaking, it's meant to be the finder who reports found dogs, but that's probably splitting hairs.
I run a rescue and I would not contact the guards or warden if a found dog was handed in to me, but I do ask the finders to do so. Whether that's what other rescues do or not, I don't know!:)

muddypaws

The thing is OP, dogs are stolen and then may be abandoned months later, sometimes at the other end of the country, so even though these two may look like nobody cares for them, there may be somebody somewhere in the country that has been missing them and looking everywhere for them. Thats why you need to notify the correct authorities, so that people know where to look for their missing animals.

tk123

Was this in Dublin by any chance? Somebody I know encountered 3 loose dogs in traffic during the week. They only managed to catch one of the dogs, brought it to the pound and it was reclaimed the following morning.

abutler101

Thanks everyone. We will ring the SPCA in the morning and talk to them, then ring the dog warden if necessary.

@tk123, No, nowhere near dublin. We are in south tipp

abutler101

I rang the TSPCA this morning and unfortunately they are full so they can't take her. We will have to bring her to the pound tomorrow morning and hope she gets
claimed.

VonVix

abutler101 wrote: »

I rang the TSPCA this morning and unfortunately they are full so they can't take her. We will have to bring her to the pound tomorrow morning and hope she gets
claimed.

I sent you a PM.

abutler101

The story has ended well. We brought the girl to the pound this morning (after ringing two local shelters that had no room). We were told that the other dog had to go down there too but could be claimed after five days to be brought home. We went up to our neighbors house straight away to tell her she needed to bring the dog to the pound and got a call from the dog warden saying that the girl had been claimed. We were amazed because we had only been gone 10 minutes, so we brought down the other dog for our neighbor and he was claimed too by the same person. It turned out the person was an elderly man who had left his gate open by accident and they had escaped.

muddypaws

abutler101 wrote: »

The story has ended well. We brought the girl to the pound this morning (after ringing two local shelters that had no room). We were told that the other dog had to go down there too but could be claimed after five days to be brought home. We went up to our neighbors house straight away to tell her she needed to bring the dog to the pound and got a call from the dog warden saying that the girl had been claimed. We were amazed because we had only been gone 10 minutes, so we brought down the other dog for our neighbor and he was claimed too by the same person. It turned out the person was an elderly man who had left his gate open by accident and they had escaped.

Which is exactly why people should stick to the law, as it is the pound that dog owners will go to if they lose their dog.