RCMP officer campaigns to stop dog cull on reserve

Alexandra Paul, Winnipeg Free Press · Tuesday, Dec. 28, 2010

WINNIPEG - Maybe it was the body of a frozen puppy, with a live pup standing less than a metre away, oblivious to the carcass.

Or maybe it was the dogs that bobbed their heads for a friendly pat from the stranger in the RCMP uniform.

Whatever it was, RCMP Constable Gennifer Furkalo sent a letter to the editor of her hometown weekly in Neepawa, Man., a few days before Christmas in an effort to save the feral packs of dogs roaming wild in Shamattawa, a fly-in Cree community 750 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg.

"I didn't know it would be as controversial as it was," Const. Furkalo said from the remote northern outpost.

The First Nation manages the population with routine culls every two or three months. It's not a practice the 23-year-old Mountie can support.

"These are dogs that are hungry .... They want to be part of a family and they're all over town. There's no doubt, definitely, there are hundreds," she said.

She estimates she has spent $2,000 of her own money feeding animals and deworming some of them.

She has shipped seven dogs south

for adoption since October at $80 per dog. "There are lots of people willing to help," she said. "I've had responses from all over Manitoba, from across Canada."

The Winnipeg Humane Society has offered to fly in a spay and neuter clinic if she can raise $1,000 to pay for airfare for the vets and $25 per dog to be fixed.

Shamattawa's 1,400 people have an average income of $15,000 a year, and fewer than 200 people have a high school diploma, according to an Indian Affairs website on First Nations in Canada.

Const. Furkalo said she is doing her best to ignore stereotypes that fill feedback comments on websites related to her appeal for help.

"There is a lot of negative light shed on northern communities," she said, adding attitudes toward pets are vastly different on First Nations.

"I can understand the community's point of view. The dogs are seen as a nuisance."

Dogs occasionally attack children, but not often, she said. For the most part, the dogs are not vicious.

Const. Furkalo said she hopes to meet this week with the chief or council to ask what they would like to do with the offers of help she's received.

Chief Jeffrey Napoakesik could not be reached for comment Monday.

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