Today I had find out one terrible thing in Latvian legislation – any dog or cat in rural area could be shoot down if it is over 200 metres from the living house!
According to the special paragraph in our Hunting Bill, any dog or cat that is away from living house over 200 metes and has no registration tag could be shoot down.
The trick is that no one rural municipality here register dogs and cats and as a result - there is no way to get registration tag if you live in the rural area, so basically any dog or cat can be killed knowing that no registration tag will be on it.
(Barns and other outbuildings are not mentioned, so you can imagine that any dog and cat in farm is in danger). Just now we had case here in Jelgava district – the dog had shoot when playing with his owner’s children in the field and no law can punish the shooters! Dog was playing with children and they could be injured or even killed accidentally too!
Here is a small legal gap as bill says – in hunting areas – which means that shooting could be done by professional hunters if the dog is on the land registered as a hunting land but in practice it means that any prat with gun can shoot the neighbours dog and leave without any legal trouble. It is awful!
In cities and towns legislation is much more complicated and nobody can kill the dog without serious investigation, but in rural areas – please, door is open!
For me this story started this morning as our neighbour found both her dogs dead in the field on their own land. I called the police, and get info that it is legal. Called to lawyers office and they proved the situation.
And now I need your help. If you know any animal right organization, or even better – you are member of it, please pass this info around as I need help. Not financial but experience – how to organize campaigns, how to make it work better and if some organisations would like to participate sending letters to our ministry of Agriculture, asking for amendments in legisation, it would be even better.
Within a month I will have agriculture internet portal to start the campaign (I am its chief editor already and I hope it will be launched within a month), few magazines and at least one big daily to start the battle, I also have support from quite famous law office that are offering me help and also two NGOs, so a bad start just in one day, but I would be really happy for any help!
All advices, ideas, previous experiences are very welcome!
Anna Zigure – Crew
According to the special paragraph in our Hunting Bill, any dog or cat that is away from living house over 200 metes and has no registration tag could be shoot down.
The trick is that no one rural municipality here register dogs and cats and as a result - there is no way to get registration tag if you live in the rural area, so basically any dog or cat can be killed knowing that no registration tag will be on it.
(Barns and other outbuildings are not mentioned, so you can imagine that any dog and cat in farm is in danger). Just now we had case here in Jelgava district – the dog had shoot when playing with his owner’s children in the field and no law can punish the shooters! Dog was playing with children and they could be injured or even killed accidentally too!
Here is a small legal gap as bill says – in hunting areas – which means that shooting could be done by professional hunters if the dog is on the land registered as a hunting land but in practice it means that any prat with gun can shoot the neighbours dog and leave without any legal trouble. It is awful!
In cities and towns legislation is much more complicated and nobody can kill the dog without serious investigation, but in rural areas – please, door is open!
For me this story started this morning as our neighbour found both her dogs dead in the field on their own land. I called the police, and get info that it is legal. Called to lawyers office and they proved the situation.
And now I need your help. If you know any animal right organization, or even better – you are member of it, please pass this info around as I need help. Not financial but experience – how to organize campaigns, how to make it work better and if some organisations would like to participate sending letters to our ministry of Agriculture, asking for amendments in legisation, it would be even better.
Within a month I will have agriculture internet portal to start the campaign (I am its chief editor already and I hope it will be launched within a month), few magazines and at least one big daily to start the battle, I also have support from quite famous law office that are offering me help and also two NGOs, so a bad start just in one day, but I would be really happy for any help!
All advices, ideas, previous experiences are very welcome!
Anna Zigure – Crew
