Animal cruelty is but one aspect of the larger problems related to animals and includes many kinds of mistreatment, from temporarily failing to provide essential care to the malicious killing or repeated torturing of an animal.
The intense public reaction to animal cruelty cases covered by the media suggests the public is concerned about the treatment of animals and believes animal cruelty to be a social problem worthy of the police or welfare organisations’ attention.
What is considered animal cruelty?
Neglect is when an owner fails to provide the animal with adequate food, water, shelter, or veterinary care. Severely restricting an animal’s movement full-time by tethering it to a stationary object or keeping it in a cage is the most common and most visible type of neglect. Neglect is the most common type of animal cruelty.
Hoarding is a severe form of neglect in which the owner accumulates an excessive number of pets, is unable to provide even minimal standards of nutrition, sanitation, shelter, or veterinary care, and houses the animals in overcrowded conditions. Such neglect results in illness and starvation and can lead to the death of the animals.
Physical abuse is intentional acts that cause the animal pain, suffering, or death. Abusive behaviours include beating, burning, choking or suffocating, dragging, drowning, hanging, kicking or stomping, mutilating, poisoning, shooting, stabbing, and throwing, among others.
Abuse also includes sexual contact with animals, particularly contact that causes injury or severe distress. This abuse is considered a criminal act. Dogs and cats are the most frequent victims of neglect and physical cruelty.
What signs show an animal is abused or cruelly treated?
These signs could include:
Animals in poor physical condition (skinny or emaciated, open sores, dirty, foul odour, excessive head shaking or scratching, excessively matted coat).
Excessively aggressive animals (lunging, snarling, snapping, growling).
Excessively submissive animals (no eye contact, cowering, shaking, backing away).
Poor general sanitation (urine or faeces in the home, no access to clean water or food).
Exposure to extreme weather without proper shelter.
Insufficient space, lighting, or ventilation for the number of animals present.
Cruel confinement (short tether, small cage, hot car).
Lack of necessary medical care (animal is diseased, injured, or dying).
Cruel or inappropriate training methods (suspended with front legs off the floor to punish, weighted down and thrown into the water, forced to run alongside the car).
Tight collars or harnesses embedded in the animals’ flesh.
Dead animals on the property.
The most obvious harm caused by animal cruelty is the pain and suffering endured by the animal. In contrast to what is often presented by the media, happy endings in cases of physical cruelty are rare: the abuse is often ghastly, and victim animals are rarely returned to good health or adopted by a loving family.
Particularly in hoarding cases, severe crowding and a lack of socialisation create health and behaviour problems that might leave animals unadoptable and at risk of euthanasia.
Report animal cruelty directly to your local SPCA.
To ensure they reach the animal sooner, use the local SPCA emergency numbers, not email, in emergencies. The society’s mandate is to prevent cruelty, and in a country spanning over a million km², the inspectors must first focus on cases contravening the Animals Protection Act.
The main animal welfare legislations in SA are the Animal Protection Act No 71 of 1962, which prohibits animal cruelty on all domestic and wild animals in captivity or under the control of humans, and the Performing Animals Act of 1935, amended in 2016, which requires establishments training animals for exhibitions or performance, or training guard dogs, to be licensed.
Furthermore, the South African Bureau of Standards, in co-operation with the National Council of SPCAs (NSPCA), has enacted a series of animal welfare standards, which provide further details concerning certain species of animals.
Information supplied by Judy Adams, Nigel SPCA.
