Mangalore : Animal Care Trust (ACT), an animal welfare association based in Mangalore has launched a stray dog census in city for first time. The census will help to track of the population of street dogs in the city for effective measures to be implemented for animal birth control.

ACT is an organization Formed in 2000 to provide care and shelter for abandoned, injured and sick animals. At present the organization is actively involved in immunizing adopted animals and sterilizing stray ones.

Further the members and volunteers of ACT has come forward and taken up the unique initiative of conducting a stray dog census in various wards of the Mangalore City Corporation limits last month under the census programme.

The members and volunteers under the guidance of ACT trustee Suma Nayak, will continue to count the street dogs in different wards of the city corporation each week until all the wards are covered.

Speaking on the occasion Suma said that, the measure will also serve as an important tool in controlling outbreaks of rabies among stray dogs.She also urged the cooperation of MCC to help the ACT to identify dog-prone areas and reduce instances of children being mauled by street dogs rather than killing it for the solution.

He urged the dog-lovers and citizens to render support to the organization as volunteers in the census programme.