210 Dogs Sterilized in March Campaigns

BDS Board Member Linda DiMeglio interviewed for documentary about women making a difference in Mexican society.

March was a big month for us, we received a lot of requests for sterilizations, and we ended up sterilizing a total of 210 dogs this month! In our main campaign day in the colonia of El Calandrio, we sterilized 74 dogs. Then, we held another 2 mini campaigns at local residences, where another 54 dogs sterilized. To top it all off, another 82 vouchers for in-office sterilizations were redeemed. Wow! Thanks to all of you who are donating to help us keep sterilizing dogs!

See pictures from our campaign here:

Our main campaign was scheduled in El Calandrio at a school that we have used 4 other times before. This colonia is an excellent location for us to hold our sterilization events, as it is close to multiple low-income neighborhoods. However, we ran into a big of a snag on campaign day! When we went on the Friday before the Sunday campaign to pick up the keys, the school was closed and we were told we needed to cancel the campaign! The electricity was shut off and the school was not going to reopen for at least a few weeks. We had 75 appointments and over 40 on our waitlist. After a bit of a panic, one of our volunteers who works with the school district reached out to ask if she could contact the director at the school adjacent to the one we were scheduled at. Our volunteer immediately got in her car and went in person to meet with the director, who agreed to open the school for us! It was incredible, and we were back on for our campaign.

Despite all the stress and craziness, we had an incredible campaign day and everything went smoothly. Not only did we complete 74 sterilizations that day, but we also distributed 45 vouchers to people who showed up without appointments and we had over 50 on a waitlist, so we are going to do our campaign again in the same location in April.

YTD, we have completed 534 sterilizations and our running total is 7,028.

But that's not all...In March, we began a social media educational program on the importance of sterilizing male dogs. Statistically, only 37% of the dogs brought to our campaigns for sterilization are male, and one of our goals is to increase that number. So, one of our volunteers created 4 different facebook banners outlining the importance of male sterilization.

AND, so incredibly humbling... a woman by the name of Sylve Soulie contacted Linda DiMeglio, our board member who organizes and runs all of our campaigns, and the driving force behind Baja Dogs Sterilizations, to ask if she would be willing to be interviewed for a documentary that Soulie is producing about the place of Mexican women in modern Mexican society. There are different episodes planned, including the one she reached out to Linda about, which will be about women who dedicate their spare time to saving dogs. Long story short, on April 1st, the documentary was filmed at a coffee shop in El Centro. Stay tuned for more information once it is ready to air!