ISTANBUL
A lack of spaying and neutering procedures is the number one problem for stray animals, particularly in Türkiye, according to a local animal foster.
“The biggest problem is the lack of neutering,” Neslihan Yilmaz, 35, who has devoted herself to fostering stray animals in Istanbul for the last three years, told Anadolu as this Tuesday marks World Stray Animals Day, an occasion to raise awareness of the plight of homeless animals.
According to Haytap, the animal rights federation in Türkiye, there are nearly 163,000 stray cats and 128,900 dogs in Istanbul alone, according to 2018 figures.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that there were approximately 200 million or more stray dogs worldwide between 2009 and 2010.
Yilmaz, who works for a pharmaceutical company, is among many others in Istanbul who try to help the city's stray animals. So far, Yilmaz has managed to find homes for around 20 dogs via her Twitter account with over 25,000 followers.
“I usually share about my dog #donotshopadopt,” reads her Twitter bio.
She generally tweets about her 5-year-old Caki, a grumpy beagle.
Yilmaz’s house was Caki’s third home when she was around 6-7 months old, she recalled.
And thanks to Caki, Yilmaz one day noticed a stray dog called Boti in her neighborhood who was looked after by a cafe owner at the time.
Taking in more dogs
When the coronavirus hit Istanbul like the rest of the world, that cafe had to close its doors and Boti was left homeless.
He ended up at Yilmaz’s house. At that time, it took Yilmaz around three months to find a home for Boti as she said at the time she only had around 300 followers on Twitter.
Now it takes Yilmaz only a few days to find a new house for a dog with her humorous short texts and clips describing the animal. “There are so many dogs that it’s not easy to find a home for them with just a couple of photos,” she explained. “You need to know the character of that dog and make people imagine how they would feel living together with that animal.”
Although Boti, a mixed-breed dog, recently died due to an illness, Yilmaz says he was her “first love” and the one who gave her the vision to foster 20 others.
According to Yilmaz, municipalities are not liable to neuter stray animals, so they avoid it altogether, resulting in overpopulation.
“Each municipality should be given a sterilization target according to its capacity, and municipalities that do not perform sterilization should be penalized,” she said.
As currently there is no such law, Turkish municipalities do not allocate budgets for sterilization and instead try to solve the problem by rounding up dogs and releasing them on the outskirts of settled areas.
"The only way out is neutering. There are so many animal lovers in Türkiye and as long as the state does proper sterilization, we can feed and take care of the rest very well.”
Yilmaz believes that not only stray animals but also pets should be spayed.
According to estimates, one dog and her offspring can produce 508 puppies in seven years, and one cat and her offspring can produce nearly 4,950 kittens in the same time.
Yilmaz thinks that those who are sensitive about stray animals but cannot adopt one for various reasons can also support these animals by donating for spaying procedures.
“A sterilization means that six to seven puppies do not come into the world and do not fall into the shelter,” she said.
