Fondation Helga Heidrich SOS Animaux
A life dedicated to save animals: Helga Heidrich, activist for animal rescue
Helga Heidrich was born in Germany and opened her first animal shelter back in 1973. She was 28 years old and worked as a acupuncture therapist. She was impressed by Morocco and loved the charm of Marrakech. Therefore she decided to move to Morocco in 1995 and fight for abandoned and misstreated anmials as well as offer them a new and safe home. Her commitment and dedication to care for animals in need increased over the years.
It all started with her very first rescue mission of an injured Mule in the Medina. After this first experience, she rented some square meters of property in order to build an animal sancutary. However shortly after, the property was too small and crowded. Therefore Helga bought a huge piece of land and founded her own rescue organization: Fondation Helga Heidrich SOS Animaux.
sustainable animal protection
The international organization Fondation Helga Heidrich SOS Animaux is a registered NGO for animal protection and officially located in Burgwedel, Germany. Animal welfare starts within your own community and must not stop at any country border. Therefore we are supporting animal welfare projects in Morocco. We want to change the situation sustainably. For this reason, we rescue and convey dogs and cats for adoption as well as support castrations and education in Morocco. Only by changing and improving the living conditions of street animals in Morocco, we can reduce the suffering in the long run.
Castrations as part of animal protection
In order to reduce the suffering of street animals in a sustainable way, castrations are essential. Most animals are not neutered, which results in a fast and not controlable increase. The results is a growing population, less food and more contagious diseases. To avoid such a development, we conduct hundreds of castrations in Morocco yearly by using a three Level approach:
- Castration of Street Animals: We capture street animals, castrate and release them again. Of course, only on the condition that they are safe from animal trappers at the respective location and do not need any medical treatment.
- Castration Campaigns: We educate the population. The animals are neutered in our Patner animal clinic in Marrakech or by our cooperating veterinarians from Germany at our sanctuary.
- Castrations in our own sancutary: All dogs at our sanctuary aged at least six months are neutered in our Moroccan veterinary clinic or directly at our sanctuary. Like this, we ensure that our animals do not reproduce even after their arrival in Germany and at the sanctuary.
