Honey the pup and the not-so-noble house

WHEN Honey, a beagle pup, was rescued from a Wan Chai pet shop, she was undernourished, with open bleeding sores, raw and swollen paws, patches of baldness, mange, scabies, worms and severe dermatitis.

Honey is now in the safe hands of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), but hundreds of other puppies across the territory will not be so lucky.

Honey is one of the steady stream of sick and dying animals vets claim they see every day at clinics across Hong Kong. Now a group of them are mounting a campaign to force the Government to introduce legislation and harsher penalties, enforce legislationand step up public education.

They want rules on home breeding introduced, and the minimum age of puppies imported into the territory to be raised from eight to 13 weeks so they will have had all their vaccinations before leaving their country of origin.

RSPCA vet Dr Katriona Bradley is handing out forms to all interested vets on which they can record the state of their patients.

''We will present them to the Government, so they cannot ignore the evidence. This has always been a problem in the past. They have demanded proof. Now we will be able to give it to them.'' Categories will include the animal's breed, age, where it came from, proof of importation if any, and its illnesses.