Animal-Kind International Blog

Thank you to Nune Mehrabyan, SAA shelter founder/director, for this report about how SAA spent AKI funds and thank you to Gayane Barsegyan for sending us great pictures from her visit to the SAA shelter during November! In the last half of 2018, Nune spent AKI funds to pay for dog food for shelter animals, surgeries and other vet care, and for salaries of shelter workers. Nune feeds shelter dogs a mix of dry food, rice, oatmeal, and meat. She purchased the food in the pictur

The dogs in the pictures above were lucky to be rescued and cared for-for their remaining years-at the Save the Animals-Armenia shelter. They are no longer with us. Save the Animals-Armenia cares for about 150-170 dogs at their shelter. Many of them are older dogs because it's so difficult to find adoptive homes, especially for large, mixed breed dogs, which is what most of SAA's dogs are. So once a dog enters the SAA shelter, it's unlikely the dog will be adopted. Animal-Kin

Save the Animals-Armenia has been an AKI Partner Organization since 2010. For AKI support to SAA after 2016, please read AKI Blog posts on AKI's SAA page here; before 2016, keep reading...... It's never easy to raise money in Armenia for Save the Animals-Armenia. But 2015 was especially difficult for Nune and the SAA shelter. So Nune was very grateful to receive AKI's 2nd disbursement of 2015. She bought dry dog food, rice (see 2 pictures), and meat, paid shelter workers' sa

It's not easy running a dog shelter in Yerevan, Armenia. There are so few people and businesses who are willing to donate to help dogs. There are so few people willing to adopt mixed breed dogs. Very few people are willing to work at a dog shelter-they find it demeaning-and it's hard work. The winters are harsh. The number of dogs who need to be sheltered far outweigh the capacity of Yerevan's main dog shelter, Save the Animals-Armenia. Yet Nune Mehrabyan persists, every day

Every winter we work especially hard to make sure that Save the Animals-Armenia has enough nutritious food for the shelter dogs, can pay the electric bill (for the heated shelter building where many of the dogs sleep during the winter), and can take the shelter dogs to the vet, when needed and pay for their meds. Since the majority of SAA shelter dogs are middle aged or older and haven't had the easiest lives, many of them need special care and daily meds. In the winter, they

The AKI Board votes on our 1st disbursements to our partner organizations during the 1st few days of May, and then we send the money off as soon as possible after that. We postponed a bit for disbursement 1 of 2017 to SA-Armenia because we had an ongoing fundraiser for 2 SA-Armenia dogs who needed major surgeries on their legs. We raised more than enough to cover the 2 surgeries (We hoped for US$500 and we raised US$1010), so on 3 June, we sent disbursement 1 to SA-Armenia to

At the end of 2016, we raised US$3770 on the LoveAnimals crowdfunding site for Save the Animals-Armenia. The fundraiser was in response to an appeal by AKI partner organization, SAA, for dog food to get them through the coldest winter months, when the dogs need extra food and good nutrition, and for help with the shelter's gas (heating) bill. The January and February 2017 gas bills are below, US$685 and US$762 respectively! Thank you AKI donors--Nune paid off the heating bill

Our AKI partner organization, Save the Animals-Armenia, was in desperate need of extra dog food during these cold, snowy months in Yerevan. The 180 shelter dogs are getting older (picture of an SAA shelter dog below) and need good, nutritious food, especially during the winter. The meds that many of these older shelter dogs need are so expensive. And then it got so cold and wet, SAA Founder & Director Nune had to bring many of the dogs inside the large shelter building and th

Save the Animals-Armenia relies on AKI donors to provide food for the shelter dogs, spay/neuter, shelter renovations, and even to pay the gas bill. Nune bought this rice with the last AKI disbursement to Save the Animals. Nune mixes the rice with meat and something called, Herkules, a highly nutritious additive. The older dogs really need this extra nutrition. And all the dogs need it during the cold winters in Armenia. Then the food gets divvied up for the dogs. This feeds

Save the Animals-Armenia has been an AKI partner organization since 2009. Nune Mehrabyan runs the shelter, located in Yerevan, which houses 200-220 dogs. In March this year, Nune told me about a dog at the SAA shelter that couldn't walk. For 45 days, she had been at the shelter. Nune had taken her to the vet, who showed Nune exercises to do with the dog (pictured below). And then one day, Jade walked! Nune sent me a video and said, "yeeeeeeeeeeeees,,,It's a WANDER...REALLY W