Animals left inside Pets Corner shop recover at home

Published: 19th May, 2011
by TOM FOOT

POOR Pipkin is just a few weeks old and all alone.

The baby rabbit was found nuzzling up to his dead sister in a tiny cage in a pet shop in Queen’s Crescent last week. He was discovered cowering as loose snakes and other ravenous exotic animals hunted for food in the dingy basement. 

The New Journal visited Pipkin at an animal home on Tuesday following our front page story on the rescue at the closed Pets Corner in Malden Road last week.

The shop was found shut down, its owners evicted with a bailiffs’ notice stuck to the door.

Pipkin’s fur was infested with reptile lice, his ears were plagued by mites and his eyes red from infection.

At least one rabbit and a turtle died after being left without food and water in the shop, rescuers said.

Welfare officers at the Mayhew Animal Home said they had inspected the shop a number of times but had not been told that animals were for sale, or about the condition of the basement area.

Camden Council, who gave the shop a clean bill of health in February and a licence to sell animals, last week insisted they made several inspections and also found “no grounds to take action”.

They are now considering prosecuting the shop’s owners, who cannot be contacted, despite attempts by the New Journal.

Mayhew officer Zoe Hubbard, who helped with the animal rescue, said: “It was a dark and dingy place. There were flies everywhere and rat poo all over the floor. There was no lighting. The walls were rotten. It was a complete health hazard.”

She added: “We had been before but we were never told about the basement. These were not the sort of animals you would expect to see in a pet shop.”

The Mayhew team said the sweltering heat combined with no ventilation had created a muggy, tropical-like atmosphere that had energised some of the exotic snakes and reptiles – including a giant black and white Monitor lizard and a “bearded lizard”. A chinchilla was jumping six feet in the air.

Welfare officer Lucy Edwards said: “There were three snakes that the snake man had no idea if they were venomous or not. It was quite scary – they were diving about and the snakes were jumping at them. People think our job is all fluffy – but it isn’t.”

The exotic animals have been taken into quarantine by the City of London at Heathrow Airport where they are waiting to be deported.

There are gerbils, hamsters and 16 rabbits, one of which is heavily pregnant rabbit – the sexes had been mixed up in the cages possibly to encourage breeding – all recovering in the Mayhew, separated into families in bays together.

But orphan Pipkin has to be kept in his own enclosure. He has been named after a fictional character from the classic novel Watership Down. 

“I don't know if rabbits feel sadness –  but they certainly understand death,” said Ms Hubbard. “Rabbits are social animals. They need to be with their siblings.”

Mayhew chief executive Caroline Yates said: “At Pets Corner the basic standards were, in our eyes, minimal. Sometimes you feel like you are banging your head against a wall. We cannot begin the process of rehoming for two weeks, but I imagine we will be looking for people to adopt at that time. Animal welfare issues cannot be disassociated from social issues. 

“Usually, when it comes to these issues, there is a human involved.”

An RSPCA spokeswoman said: “We helped remove some of the animals. It’s nothing to do with us now. Camden Council and the City are leading the prosecution.”

The New Journal has been inundated with phone calls from residents who said they had complained about the conditions at Pets Corner and animal welfare to the Town Hall.

According to Camden Council, the shop was granted a licence in February and an inspection in March had found no problems at the pet shop. They are now pursuing the owners.

A Town Hall spokeswoman said: “Camden Council takes animal welfare very seriously and is considering a prosecution in this instance.”