NEWS

After exactly 5 years of work in the local area, we are excited to tell you that the way that Baladi Watch works is changing.
When we started with the desire to help the animals in our local area, our main goal was to prevent cruel and inhumane animal treatment by population control through TNR. This unintentionally escalated somewhat and alongside our TNR efforts we voluntarily operated a small shelter for a select number of sick animals or and fostering for animals who were due to travel abroad.
We have been very fortunate to be supported generously by donations from individuals, and facilities and services from local businesses, amazing treatment and kindness from a number of vets in the Marsa Alam and Hurghada areas, who have always helped us when we’ve been in need. The SUST Orphan Animal Hospital Hurghada facility in Hurghada and their ability to treat street animals for free has been key to the number of street animals we have managed to castrate, vaccinate and treat for medical conditions. Other vets have seen us at short notice, taken late night calls, stayed open late for us while we travel from Marsa Alam and offered us coffee, light-hearted chat and a comfy seat to prepare us for the long journey home again.
One of our main beliefs from the beginning was that cooperation within the community is key. We have always tried to work with other people doing the same work as us - work in animal welfare, especially as volunteers, is not easy and by supporting each other we achieve so much more. Different people and organisations have different resources, ideas and experience which can be pooled for the same goal.
Now our dream has come true: a new vets clinic is opening in Marsa Alam, run by an amazing registered charity called FourGive (go give them a like and share!), founded by Lydia and Viktor Ackermann, which will be focussed on the treatment of street animals in Marsa Alam, particularly TNR. This is the first permanent vets clinic to open in the area and is a game changer for the situation of the overpopulation of street animals in Marsa Alam and the surrounding area.
Ellie (one half of Baladi Watch) will be giving up her job in the diving industry to go and work full time in the clinic. Sarah (the other half of Baladi Watch) will be lending a hand as a volunteer whenever she can to help catch street animals for TNVR or helping out at the clinic in whatever capacity is needed. This week we have finally re-homed our last two shelter dogs (Teddy and Caramel), something which we have been aiming towards for several years, and this marks the end of the Baladi Watch shelter, aka ‘The Roof’ where we have fondly spent so many hours over the last few years.
We would like to thank everyone who has supported us financially, emotionally, physically over the last few years in our project, and those who have adopted beautiful souls from us, and assure you that we will both be continuing to work in the field but by supporting an organisation whose values we strongly believe in and which has the resources to achieve something bigger and better than we ever could alone. There are too many names, businesses and vets to mention individually.
If anyone would like to continue to donate towards animal welfare efforts in Marsa Alam we would love you to direct future contributions to Fourgive (feel free to put a note on that you were previously a Baladi Watch supporter!).
Once again, THANK YOU, to everyone who has supported us and to everyone who cares so much for the animals on this planet. Without you we couldn’t have kept going. This is just the beginning! ❤

Hedia and her little kitten Tabaza have been staying at BW HQ (aka The Roof) for a couple of months while Tabaza grows bigger and stronger before their relocation to Marsa Nakari. We took them in after the team at Wadi Gimal diving center were worried about their safety among a big pack of dogs. We wish them a safe and comfortable life in Marsa Nakari as mousers!

Another successful TNR campaign took place in conjunction with Fourgive who will open the first permanent vets clinic in Marsa Alam in just a few months. They invited the team from SUST to carry out castrations and vaccinations for street dogs and cats over two days. In total 17 dogs and 13 cats were treated and we were happy to support with catching, release, transportation and general support in the pop-up clinic, as well as taking some dogs from our own area to be treated. Thank you to everyone who took part in this community effort!

Finally after 2 years it was Felfel's turn to fly to Germany to his forever home. Huge thanks to Anja and Sebastian who accompanied him on the flight and to Rita and Roman and their family who have adopted him. We will miss Felfel so much but we are so happy he has found the perfect home!

Yogi has been limping since the day we met him, the kind team at SUST in Hurghada found a piece of floating bone in his hip and undertook surgery to remove it. He'll be staying on the Roof until he's well enough to go back to Wadi Lahami.

Charlie had been missing for a few days and we finally found him with this terrible deep wound. Thanks to your donations we have been able to send him to the team at SUST in Hurghada to get him all fixed up. We wish him a speedy recovery and send our huge gratitude to the SUST team for taking care of him.

We found this little puppy by chance, as she was being attacked by wild dogs. She had obviously been dumped or lost her way and they took advantage of her vulnerability. Thankfully, we were able to arrange fast transportation to get her to the team at SUST in Hurghada who cleaned her up, treated her wounds and sent her back to us to look after and continue her treatment. Without your donations this wouldn't have been possible, so we are very grateful for your support.

We joined up with Sophie's Happy Paws to send some cats from our local supermarket with some dogs from her local area for castration and vaccination at the SUST clinic in Hurghada. By combining resources we can save costs and work more efficiently. Thanks to our donors for the financial support which allows us to fund transportation and logistics, as well as the amazing team at SUST in Hurghada for treating all our animals.

One morning a guest at Marsa Shagra heard screaming outside her tent and found this puppy struggling in the shallow water. She took him in and dried him off and he is now in our care. We will do our best to help him. We have named him Felfel and he's a little cutie!

This week we teamed up with Sophie's Happy Paws to combine our resources and run a TNR campaign in Port Ghalib. The team from SUST came down from Hurghada to treat all the animals we brought in to our pop-up clinic. In total we castrated 15 cats and 4 dogs during the two days. A great community effort!

That’s the last female from our local pack castrated and vaccinated against rabies! Thanks to your donations we were able to send Yoda to the team at Bluemoon Animalcenter Hurghada yesterday.

After her brothers Charlie and Cocoa were attacked by unknown dogs and recovered, we found little Caramel curled up against Ellie's chalet last week - covered in dirt and bite wounds. We took her in and she spent a night in the bathroom on antibiotics and pain management, until we were able to send her to Hurghada for treatment.
Dr. Essam and his team from Top vets hurghada animal center took great care of her, shaved her, showered her and cleaned and stitched together the 5 biggest wounds. We cannot thank Dr. Essam's team enough for their fast and uncomplicated help, as well as our donors for funding emergency treatment and transportation to Hurghada.
Caramel is recovering very well and enjoying the extra food and attention!

Unfortunately sometimes the dogs get a bit carried away with their natural instincts and a moment of lost concentration can be a dangerous situation for a local cat. Mishmish was their latest victim but thankfully put up a good fight and after a short stay with the fantastic team at Bluemoon in Hurghada she is now back and fighting fit.

Finally, after more than a year we trap the two remaining dogs from our pack - 50 and booby. That takes our total to 43!

Today we got the confirmation from Bluemoon Animal Centre that Mowglie, Stevie & Panda have passed their Titer Tests and are almost ready to travel.

With sponsors waiting for them in the UK we took Stevie and Mowglie to have their Titer Test blood sample taken. This has to be sent to a certified lab to check their Rabies vaccination has been effective. It is a compulsory test for being able to travel abroad.

Rob and Nina, two of our Gold Baladi Watch sponsors are staying in Shagra and take time to come and visit the farm and all the dogs. The dogs are especially happy to receive all the treats and attention!

It's not long now til the new Fourgive clinic opens in Marsa Alam and we are very happy to be supporting them with their monthly TNR campaigns. The SUST team once again came from Hurghada to perform the surgeries and vaccinations, as well as treat any unwell animals. We supported with helping to catch and release animals, and general support in the clinic for the vets. In total 24 animals (13 dogs and 11 cats) were castrated and vaccinated - a great team effort!

Once again, the SUST team were in Marsa Alam for two days at the new Fourgive clinic which will open soon. Each month they come to castrate and vaccinate street animals that we manage to catch from the city. This month 9 dogs and 12 cats were castrated and vaccinated. Thank you so much to everyone in the community who joined to help catch, release and support, as well as Fourgive and the SUST team!

Baladi Watch were once again very happy to help support Fourgive in their monthly TNR campaign in Marsa Alam. The great team at SUST managed to castrate and vaccinate 8 dogs and 14 cats during the two-day campaign. We look forward to continuing this monthly community effort together!

Thanks to donations from our supporters we were able to fund transportation for a local desert dog and little kitten to Hurghada to the SUST clinic. The dog was vaccinated and castrated while the little kitten had some wounds checked and received deworming treatment and a vaccination.

When the cat population in Wadi Lahami started to get out of control and we were worried for the safety of the cats, we invited the team from SUST to come to undertake a TNR campaign. We were able to successful neuter 15 cats from Wadi Lahami and one dog from Sharm el Luli beach. We would like to thank our supporters for donations which meant we were able to fund transportation, boxes and traps, as well as the team from SUST for coming such a long way to help us. Also thanks to Red Sea Diving Safari for hosting the vets in Wadi Lahami. A great team effort!

Coral was unfortunately left behind a few months ago when her siblings travelled because she failed her titer test. Now with a successful titer test and the waiting period over she is finally travelling to the UK via Stuttgart to join her family and friends. We have been fostering Coral for the last 6 months while preparing her for travel to the UK. We wish her a safe journey and beautiful life in her new home.

Snow and Wadi are off to Cairo to fly to England via France! We have been fostering them for the last few months while the requirements for their travel paperwork have been met. Unfortunately their sister Coral will have to follow later as her titer levels were not high enough but they will be waiting for her when she gets there! We wish them a safe trip and lovely life with their new family in England.

After Felfel suddenly couldn't put any weight on his back leg, x-rays showed a dislocated hip which couldn’t be manipulated back into place, and resulting nerve damage. Dr Girgis and his team at The Ark Veterinary Clinic in Hurghada have had him in for surgery, putting the hip back into place and replacing the ligament with a pin. Get Well Soon Felfel! Thank you to everyone who contributed to his surgery and treatment costs.

Gizmo wandered straight into the trap last night and Ganzabil (who had been missing for several days) turned up just in time to catch the car. Both will be castrated and vaccinated against rabies by the great team at SUST in Hurghada. Thank you to our supporters for helping to fund transportation and logistics to get them there!

We are so happy to announce that Stevie has been adopted and travelled to Germany to his new family. We started the 9hr drive to Cairo from Marsa Alam with him at 9pm Saturday night, arriving at the airport early Sunday morning. He then took an Egyptair flight from Cairo to Berlin where his new family took him home. We hit quite a few obstacles in the weeks leading up to his departure, so we would like to thank everyone who helped out and supported him and us in some way. He has such a loving new family who have patiently waited to get him home and who have totally changed his life for the better.
We can't wait to see him settle in and enjoy his new life!

Finally after some intense preparations we set off on the 9hr drive from Marsa Alam to Cairo airport at 3am this morning with Sage for the first part of her journey to her new home. It was an emotional moment as we said goodbye having looked after her for more than one year, but we really couldn’t ask for a better home for her in the U.K. We are now on the road back to Marsa Alam, another 9hrs, and will be tracking her flight via Istanbul. We can’t wait to see her settle into her new home with her amazing new owners. Lucky owners, lucky doggy.

Our 5 youngest puppies were nowhere to be seen in the week leading up to the Bluemoon monthly Marsa Alam visit so we weren't able to take them for surgery and vaccinations. But sure enough the day after we got sight of Dune and Bonnie. We managed to trap them and keep them in, and Bambi also showed up the next day so we got her too.
Thanks to your recent donations we were able to send these three puppies to Hurghada today by truck where the Bluemoon Team castrated and vaccinated them all before sending them home again.

Our beautiful girl Daisy, Baladi Watch ambassador, has passed away after being hit on the road. We raised Daisy since finding her as a 2-week old puppy in August 2019. She leaves a big hole in our hearts and we will never forget her. Thank you to everyone who gave her attention, smuggled her food, gave her love and helped us fight for her rights.

We knew one of our adult females was pregnant but they are always a bit secretive about where their babies are. Today we found 7 healthy puppies hidden, as usual, in a hole in the mountain. We will continue to keep an eye on them and handle them enough to be able to catch them for surgery and vaccination in a few months. Our next mission is to catch that mum and stop this happening again!

Sunny, our beautiful but very experienced (!) adult female has had yet another litter of puppies. We found 4 healthy and well, and will keep an eye on them to be able to get them vaccinated and castrated when they are old enough.

With the help of Mohamed from Bluemoon and his blowgun we managed to capture 3 important adult members of our pack for castration and vaccination. We took them along for their surgery along with our three remaining kittens.

Thanks to our sponsors and donors it's food delivery day on the farm and we are now well stocked for the coming weeks! Thank you so much to everyone who supports us.

We are delighted to announce that our two longest 'Roof residents', Teddy and Caramel, have finally been offered a home at the North Coast of Egypt. We accompanied them on the 14 hour road journey to their new home.

Beautiful Maggie was a dog we found in the desert during a TNR campaign. She had suffered a car accident apparently and broken her leg and had since lost the bone, probably through infection. The vets team advised that amputation was the best option so today Dr Girgis and Dr Youstina operated to remove her leg. It has been a long day and she has a long recovery ahead but she is already doing amazingly well considering all she has been through and we will take good care of her. We would like to thank everyone who has contributed to the costs of her surgery and treatment, as well as to the amazing team at The Ark who always take such good care of our animals (and us!).

Another journey to Cairo for the BW team, this time to take Duke to Cairo airport for his flight to Germany to be reunited with his new owner, Ilke. Thank you so much to Dalia for accompanying him on the way and we wish Ilke and Duke a happy and long future together!

After our dear colleague, Tracy, passed away Vodka was left behind but her amazing family decided to adopt her to the UK and take her into their family. That meant another journey to Cairo for us to deliver her to Egyptair safely! Thanks to our agent Mr Safwat for ensuring her safe departure and we wish Vodka all the best with Tracy's family in the UK.

It seems like Blue has eaten something bad and is in a very bad condition, bleeding from his mouth. Thanks to your donations we have been able to send him to Dr Essam at Top Vets in Hurghada for treatment. We wish him a speedy recovery and are very grateful to the Top Vets team for taking care of him.

Yesterday it was Elsa and Pixie's turn to get neutered and vaccinated against rabies. Thanks to your donations we were able to fund transport to take them to the SUST team in Hurghada for treatment. We would like to thank the SUST clinic and Susy Utzinger foundation for the continued support for treatment of our street animals in Egypt, and to our supporters for donating money and items to make trips like this possible.

One of the conditions of adopting through us is that all animals are neutered before travel - there are enough dogs and cats needing homes. This time it was Coral and Snow's turn, so we took them to Dr Girgis at The Ark Veterinary Clinic in Hurghada where they were so well looked after. Now they just need to get used to their cones!

Concerned about Cocoa's front legs, we took him in to Dr Mostafa at The Ark Veterinary Clinic in Hurghada to get him looked at. He tested positive for blood parasites which has caused arthritis in his front legs. We've now got a long list of medicines to get at the pharmacy to treat the parasites and arthritis and hopefully he will recover very soon! Charlie and Felfel also joined for vaccinations and microchips!

The day has finally come! You may remember Mowgli who flew to the UK back in April. Unfortunately his microchip didn't scan on arrival meaning he had to wait in quarantine to go through the whole travel procedures again. Now he can finally enjoy being with his new family and we wish him all the best for the future!

MumMum was one of the first Baladi Dogs we met back in 2019, she was the sweetest natured dog and went missing but came back very skinny after 5 months. Concerned about her eating habits we took her to the vets in Hurghada, but she passed away as we waited in the reception. During the post mortem they found her intestines completely blocked by a huge tumour, around 20 cm in diameter. We are so sad, but knowing that we did our best for her and that we got to spend her last days and hours with her brings us comfort.

This month's visit from Bluemoon Animalcenter Hurghada to Marsa Alam was all about the cats. Mishmish's fur was falling out and Jamaica got attacked by a bigger cat. After some treatment for parasites for Mishmish and some antibiotics and betadine cream for Jamaica they were ready to go back. Thanks to Dr Rana and the whole team for treating these kitties!

This month we were able to get 3 puppies (Charlie, Cocoa & Caramel) castrated and vaccinated against Rabies and other viruses, along with Taameya and Jamaica the cats! Thanks also to Dr Rana for checking a lump on one of our previously castrated cats which turned out to be just a fatty lump. Thanks again to the Bluemoon team for carrying out this work, and also to our supporters for enabling us to get extra vaccinations, tick collars and treats!

We've waited for this moment for a long time! Panda is brushed and ready to start his long journey to a new home in the UK! We are so happy for him and his new owner and we can't wait to see him settle in and experience a whole new life. What a lucky doggy!

Mum mum has been missing for almost a month, but today we found her, almost home. She has obviously been held somewhere as she had escaped with a rope around her neck. She is back on the farm where she belongs.

After months of trying we managed to trick Sally & Curly into the rubbish room. With the generous support of our donors we were able to send these two dogs directly to Hurghada without needing to wait for the monthly Marsa Alam clinic.

This month we took Panda for his Titer Test, Mowglie & Stevie for their rabies vaccinations and microchipping, and two street cats for neutering. We were very grateful for two of our supporters, Nina and Rob for joining us and helping out with the clinic visit!