It has just entered my head that all the trainers putting dogs in to kennels should have the decency to castrate or spay and vaccinate their dogs before handing them over to GRF (and other dogs rescues).
Greyhound rescues might save lots of money this way and designate it to develop and spread awareness that would help find new homes to their dogs. That should be a conscience matter after forcing the dogs to become money-making machines.
What do you think about it and how to help achieve that? I am curious about your opinions.

I think we need to be aware of the two different views people have of greyhounds. Most (if not all) of us reading this forum see them as beautiful, loving animals who make wonderful pets, but we must be aware that to some owners/trainers of racing dogs they are seen as a commodity - a means to make money. If it becomes compulsory to neuter a dog when it retires I fear the commercial decision for some owners/trainers would be to put the retired dog to sleep as it is cheaper to do that than to have the dog neutered. I'm sure we've all read or seen horrific stories of how some unfortunate dogs are disposed of when their racing career comes to an end, and my fear would be that these stories would become more widespread if additional financial burdens were placed on owners/trainers. Obviously I don't want to paint a completely black picture here as there are, of course, many responsible owners/trainers who take good care of their dogs throughout their racing lives and make appropriate provision for their dogs to be successfully rehomed either directly or through rescues such as GRF.

"Unfortunately" I have to totally agree with you Steve. There is no law regulating these issues. Even The Greyhound Board of Great Britain states in the rules of racing:
Rule 18 Responsibility of Owner
i The Greyhound Regulatory Board shall hold the last registered Owner to be responsible for the welfare of a Greyhound and also for making acceptable arrangements for his/her retired Greyhound as follows :- a The Greyhound be retained as a pet, or b the Greyhound be boarded at a Licensed Kennel, or c the Greyhound be boarded at a Kennel licensed by the local authority, or d the Greyhound be found a home through the Retired Greyhound Trust, or e the Greyhound be sold or found a home, responsibly, or
f if it is necessary for the Greyhound to be euthanased either on humane grounds or because none of the above options are available, the Owner ensuring, subject to Rule 58, that such euthanasia is carried out by a registered Veterinary Surgeon.
That gives irresponsible owners and trainers much space for mistreatment. On top of that nothing is mentioned about the costs of neutering, vaccination etc. That is quite sad and unfair that the whole burden is passed on to the public.

Hi Guys,
We totally agree with the points that you make but have to point out that the Greyhound Board of Great Britain sponsor the Retired Greyhound Trust. The RGT use the GBGB money to castrate or spay all greyhounds that come into their possession. At the moment we believe that they have around 800 rescued dogs in their possession and rehome around 4000 dogs a year. When they take a dog from a trainer the trainer must also pay a sum which helps towards these costs.
Though we agree with your points we must be fair and balance the books a little bit.
Celia and Jimmy.

I think it was five years ago when i reported all the stray greyhounds to the NGRC, as it was then. I was trying to work with the industry. I think there were 67 strays that year and the NGRC only prosecuted three people, and one of them didn't turn up.
I have copied the above text from one of the licensed kennels (a charity as well) that wanted to fight against hugely mistreated dogs. As far as I know the situation has not improved up till now.
Unfortunately not all dogs can be accommodated by the RGT. I think all the trainers/owners making any kind of mistreatment should be prosecuted and that prosecution should be more effective to expel all the wrongdoers from this industry.

Hi Stan,
We couldn't agree more with you. Anyone knowingly mistreating a greyhound should certainly be punished. Catching them doing it is the big problem.
Hopefully things will gradually improve with pressure from many sources.
Celia and Jimmy.

What happens to greyhounds at the end of their racing career and those that fail to make the grade is obviously of primary importance.
The other thing that interests me is the training methods used to intensify a potential young racing greyhound's natural chase instinct. I haven't been able to find out much about this. It may be that some just have a higher natural prey drive but I have a successful ex-racer who is a wonderfully sociable dog and two hounds with very limited racing history who are wonderful dogs but would chase anything that moves (or even sounds as if it might move if chased!).
Does anyone know anything about training methods?

Hi Marion,

I've found this article on training a racing greyhound, and this one. In simple terms the training appears to be more about race technique than it is about developing a chase instinct. The chase instinct is naturally there in the dogs - thousands of years of breeding has seen to that. My parents had two greyhound pups that were from a litter abandoned by a canal. They never had any race training at all but their chase instinct was every bit as strong as any other grey I've met. Some greys have a very low prey drive/chase instinct and typically these dogs will never race as the lure does nothing for them. Some dogs are more interested in trying to play with the other racing dogs resulting in an extremely short racing career!

Thanks Steve, I just sometimes wonder about the nature of the 'lure' that is used to train them in some cases.

according to the Greyhound Board of Great Britain, the lure is normally either a stuffed toy or a small plastic windsock in a variety of colours. There are some less scrupulous trainers that use a live lure, although I believe the use of live lures is banned by the industry both here and abroad.

I've noticed Bambi reacts strongly to carrier bags blowing in the wind...altho she also reacts fairly strongly when they are just sitting on the floor so this may not be relevant at all!! But she always makes a bee line for them, could this have been used in training or is that the wind sock type thing already mentioned above?x

Thanks again Steve, and it's good that use of live lures is illegal. I'd heard that sometimes in Ireland they used to trial them for both racing and coursing, using muzzled dogs and live lures. That could explain certain behaviour traits. I just wish we could get inside their heads to understand them better.
If any trainers follow the forum, I'd be very interested to have your comments.

guys as someone who races dogs i can assure you that those mistreating these amazing dogs are thankfully now in the minority. Most of the people i know within the racing fraternity are sickened by any acts of cruelty against dogs.

I don't know how others deal with neutering but i offered to have this done prior to placing dogs with celia and as she can get it done more cheaply than i could she preferred that i donated the neutering fee that i would have paid so she could utilise the extra money to provide other things the dogs in the kennel need.

The annual welfare spend of gbgb/bgrf is around £3million i believe around half of this goes to RGT to assist with finding dogs forever homes. Many tracks also put on RGT charity nights

Re the training of pups all of them are different but most including mine tend to be trained to 'hunt' a soft toy, when they get fully grown they are taught to chase a lure in a straight line (usually a soft toy tied to a rope/string and dragged up a field) afterwards they are taken to a track and allowed to watch the mechanical hare for a bit before being taken on to the track and started just before a bend (so they don't run into it too fast and hurt themselves) the next time they go to the track they start a little farther back from the bend and this is repeated until they get used to running in to it at pace. Then they are acclimatised to the starting trap and will probably have two or three solo trials before they are put in against another dog to see if they will pass or if they require to go back a stage.

mine all love to chase and enjoy their racing but we did have one who didn't seem to enjoy racing so we took the decision that as she wasn't so keen we would rehome her she was rehomed by celia and jimmy last year, she was fast but that was never a consideration

Thank you so much for all this useful information, Liz. Most of us 're-homers' don't know very much about the processes involved and we take on adult dogs with little idea of their early history.
My four constantly surprise me with new little character traits - of course a lot of it is down to individual personalities but sometimes you wonder if there was some trigger in their past that explains particular patterns of behaviour.
That they enjoy human company so much says that most racing greyhounds offered for rehoming have been treated with kindness, and we just have to do more of the same (with sofas!)

no problem marion, i'm constantly surprised by my 4 at home too you think you know them then they turn round and surprise you all over again,

some are naturally nervous and flighty but most are just big cuddle magnets mine love when i lay on the floor and they all cuddle into me it must look a right sight usually i end up with my little lurcher samson digging his extremely sharp elbows into my ribs but i love it really