In an article featured in the New York Times (“In Hard-Bitten Baghdad, Tough Tactics on Strays”, March 15, 2009), a journalist brought to light an alarming subject. Apparently as the war wages in Baghdad, the population of street dogs roaming the streets has grown to alarming numbers. Fearing the spread of disease and threats on schoolchildren, local officials have taken to eradicating the dogs. They do this deed by leaving chunks of raw meat laced with a poison.

One of the local veterinarians mentioned that they don’t have many other choices. Running large shelters with adoption programs costs too much money. They also live in a region that generally doesn’t look at dogs as “pets.” Much like the feral cats roaming our own neighborhoods, these dogs are not considered companions, but rather have become more like feared pests. This makes adoption programs difficult to execute.

Unfortunately, Baghdad isn’t alone. Many countries struggle with adoption programs for their increasingly large numbers of stray dogs.

DogsTrust, the largest dog welfare charity in the UK has many programs that operate internationally. One of their more recent campaigns involves feral dogs living in countries like Iraq. Without killing stray dogs, they have found that TNR programs are successful in reducing the numbers of strays.

The TNR program is run much in the same manner as it is here in the US for cats. The dogs are trapped, spayed or neutered, then returned back to their previous territories. Dogs that have been trapped are marked with an “ear tipping” (notch cut into an ear) to prevent re-trapping of already altered dogs. Since these dogs are returned to their territories, it prevents more dogs from taking up residence.

In efforts to prove that these programs work, DogsTrust helped start a TNR program in Oradea, Russia. The program has been dubbed SOS Dogs Oradea and is a joint project of a number of different animal welfare organizations. Along with their TNR program, SOS Dogs Oradea also has an educational program for schools that teach children about dogs and their welfare. Since the introduction of the program, the number of strays and dog bite incidents have lowered and the strays are less and less viewed as pests.

This leads us to ask: Can TNR programs help strays all around the world?