St. Eustatius Animal Welfare Foundation

Helping Statia Care for its Critters

It is our intention that ALL children of St. Eustatius receive education in the humane treatment of animals. We believe this will help our children to be compassionate toward other people as well.

Dog Grooming Course

This year we started a dog grooming course for children on the island. They learn to bath the dogs, clean their ears, clip toe-nails and deal with fleas and ticks. We start and end the class with a simple questionnaire to measure what the children learned. We also discuss the benefits of spaying and neutering pets with the children and with their parents. With so few activities for children on the island, the class has been a big success. Some of the children have volunteered to help with future classes.

Humane Education Lesson Plans

This year we began developing humane education lesson plans in cooperation with the local schools. Our education program will be for children ages 3 through 18 years of age. We are working with the schools to provide education during school hours and separate education at the St. Eustatius Animal Welfare Foundation petting zoo, animal shelter and educational porch.

Last year, a child psychologist, Marijn Sweijs was interviewed on Statia Radio Station 91.5 about our Humane Education program on Statia. Download the file to your computer to hear Marijn's interview. (The file is 2.7 MegaBytes in size in MP3 format. Right-click the link and "save target as" to your computer. )

Pets in the Class

We are also working with the schools to begin a "pets in the class" project where children can see and touch animals and learn how to interact with them.

Petting Zoo

As part of our Educational Program, we plan to start a Petting Zoo next year for the children of St. Eustatius. Many of the children are afraid of animals, even their own pets. In the petting zoo they can learn how to touch animals and give them proper care. Hopefully this will help them to love animals and act towards animals in a responsible way. The petting zoo will have goats, sheep, pigs, chickens, a baby donkey and a calf. The petting zoo will be located on the grounds of our Concordia property.

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An ongoing spay and neuter campaign is essential to keep unwanted pets to a minimum. For this activity we make use of the visiting vet Dr. Swanston from Sint Maarten and volunteer vets from abroad. We post the schedule for these events on our home page and will announce them on the radio and on local billboard messages.

Pet owners are asked to give a donation that can be tailored to their financial situation.

Corrie J. Van Duren - Imhoff is coordinating this program and also the transportation of the animals to and from the vets.

Scheduled Clinics

Feb 5 through Feb 20 - Spay/Neuter Clinic

Feral Cat Neutering Project

As part of our spay/neuter campaign, we are currently trying to obtain cat traps to catch the island's feral cats and neuter them. These cats cause problems with some of our endemic animals such as the iguanas.

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In October 2003, we signed a lease with the Government of St. Eustatius for 4200 square meters (nearly one acre) of land at Concordia, beyond the Fire Department. Thanks to the generosity of SBA (Stichting Buitenlandse Asielen = Foundation for Foreign Animal Shelters), who provided grants for the entire first floor construction, we are almost complete with the first floor of the building.

The first floor includes the animal adoption center, an entry terrace, an operating room, storage, and an office. The adoption center will be small (for only 10 animals, including boarding kennel) and also serve as an educational tool for the children. In the future, our adoption center web page will include information about the pets that are available for adoption. At present, we are also looking for funds to build temporary housing for our trained volunteers from abroad.

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(Imported) free roaming cattle badly damage the natural vegetation and contributes to erosion which in turn will damage the currently pristine coral reefs around St. Eustatius. There are about 300 donkeys, about 500 cows and several thousands of goats and sheep, all free roaming. The Foundation has been cooperating with the Government of St. Eustatius in a castration campaign for the donkeys on the island. This campaign should diminish their numbers to an acceptable amount in a couple of years.

Cows are not suited to our dry climate and often die in great numbers during dry periods because the owners cannot buy food for them. Our Foundation hopes to do an experiment with two calves which will be raised in a fenced area and fed with imported food to see if this method of farming can be economically attractive. If so, we will offer the farmers assistance with the change to fenced farming. The same experiment will be tried with goats and sheep.

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It is our intention to have several fundraising activities a year. Activities will include food sales, demonstrations by children on the property (giving guided tours), donkey rides, a dog competition (best cared, most friendly, obedience) and others. We are also planning to open an AWF Shop. Our main source of income at this time is through grants from other organizations which are described below.

AWF Shop

To gain additional funds it is our intention to start selling small gift items, partially made by children on St. Eustatius. Items included will be painted kalabash fruits, T-shirts, painted mobiles with local animals from St. Eustatius, place mats, framed pictures, presse papiers made from local (dead shells) and many more. If you have any ideas: let us know!

Cooperation with other organizations

We have arrangements with the following other organizations who provide grants and other forms of help:

• Stichting Buitenlandse Asielen (SBA)
• International Veterinary Assistance (IVA)
• AMFO/SENGO
• St. Eustatius Save the Children Foundation
• SESNA

Stichting Buitenlandse Asielen has generously donated money to the SEAWF for construction of our new building and has made some other smaller donations for spay and neuter activities, funds for a small truck to transport animals to and from the vets and materials (among others instruments). They will give a yearly donation of about $500 to help cover running costs.

IVA (USA)

The President of IVA, Mehrdad Nazari visited St. Eustatius in November 2003. IVA helps our foundation with volunteer vets and donations of money, medications, and materials.

AMFO/SENGO

Through SENGO, AMFO has provided funds to begin our course in dog grooming next year.

Save the Children Foundation (St. Eustatius)

Cooperation will focuses on education, the petting zoo and getting grants.

SESNA, an organization active to help and stimulate small businesses on the Dutch Antilles supported a study of our Foundation to see if fenced farming with cows is economically attractive. The result of the study is that if no local food can be used at all it will be difficult to make a profit. The AWF will receive money to do a follow up study to raise two calves in a fenced area with imported food till the moment they can be slaughtered. This will prove if fenced farming with cows is really economically feasible.

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