Philanthropy is based on voluntary action for the common good. To assure that philanthropy merits the respect and trust of the general public and that donors and prospective donors can have full confidence in the not-for-profit organizations and causes they are asked to support.

We declare that all donors have these rights:
1. To be informed of the organization’s mission, the way the organization intends to use donated resources, and of its capacity to use donations effectively for their intended purposes.
2. To be informed of the identity of those serving on the organization’s governing board, and to exercise prudent judgment in its stewardship responsibilities.
3. To have access to the organization’s most recent financial statements.
4. To be assured their gifts will be used for the purposes for which they were given.
5. To receive appropriate acknowledgment and recognition.
6. To be assured that information about their donations is handled with respect and confidentiality to the extent provided by law.
7. To expect that all relationships with individuals representing organizations of interest to the donors will be professional in nature.
8. To be informed whether those seeking donations are volunteers or employees of the organization.
9. To have the opportunity for their names to be deleted from the mailing list.
10. Feel free to ask questions when making a donation and to receive prompt, truthful and forthright answers.

Get access to ROLDA’s Latest Financial reports page.

Do you feel like you are ready to be part of our big international family?

You decide how much you would like to contribute to the rescue of animals in need with us!

Considering that millions of dogs die in shelters every year while millions of others are the victims of abuses across the World, it takes a massive collective effort coming from communities of compassionate animal lovers to confront these cruelties and change these dogs present and future.

These are some ideas for ways you can help the dogs. Please share this page with your friends and family members interested to advocate for the animal’s cause!

Active help

1. Volunteer at ROLDA shelters!
2. Donate Air Miles for our volunteer travel to help us save our funds for life-saving missions!
3. Connect with us! Visit our online networks and help us grow!
4. Add a ROLDA banner, or video to your website, blog, or social network page! Copy & Paste the following code:

5. Online shop to help the Romanian dogs! Buy Romanian handmade products from ROLDA online shop and help our dogs!
6. Spread the word! If you are a journalist or veterinary student, visit our shelters to get inspired for your final exam!
7. Write letters to your favorite newspaper or animal magazine’ editor and tell our story!
9. Post flyers and brochures in your town: public places, stores, and events (We have English, French and German versions available)
10. Advertise our dogs for adoption! Create printable materials (small posters, flyers) to promote ROLDA dogs for adoption (we re-home dogs all across Europe).
11. Advertise our dogs on free ads websites or specific dogs ‘related websites, popular in your own community.
12. Become a sponsor! Sponsor a billboard with a ROLDA message in your community.
13. Arrange a friendly coffee or lunch to present ROLDA programs to people that care about the animals.
14. Get your local university inspired to promote the Romanian animal’s cause!
15. Sponsor our leaflets or brochures printing at your location to save time and postage costs!

Plan the future for your dogs

Include ROLDA as the beneficiary of your will read more!

1. Make a one-time donation by card to ROLDA.
2. Become a monthly donor.
3. Host a house party for Romanian dogs
4. Create a fundraising event.
5. Sell items on eBay or Amazon websites to benefit the Romanian League in Defense of Animals (ROLDA USA)
6. ROLDA USA is featured cause on GoodSearch and GoodShop websites. It’s thanks to people like you that we’re able to save hundreds of dogs each year. Now, we have an easy way for you to support ROLDA. When you use Goodshop.com to shop online, you get thousands of deals on items ranging from sports equiptment from Kmart and ink and toner from Walmart to coffee makers from Bed Bath and Beyond and we receive donations from Goodshop. This program is free, easy and a great way to save dogs from death. It only takes a moment to sign up and select the Romanian League in Defense of Animals – ROLDA as your cause. Then, shop online at your convenience and Goodshop will take care of the donations!
7. See our wishlist on Amazon!

What you can do for a global change?

1. Promote the local pet shops that do not sell puppies.
2. Check out what people are selling to benefit us when you shop on eBay.
3. Buy eco-leather, free fur products, and cosmetics not tested on animals.
4. I.D. your dogs and encourage others to do the same.
5. Turn your own garden into a “small sanctuary”: respect the wildlife!
6. Place a bowl with fresh water for thirsty wild animals during the hot summertime.

A Memorial Gift is a beautiful testimony to the life of a beloved person or pet who has passed on—and the gift of life for animals in need. It can be just the right touch for expressing compassion to someone who has had a loss.

Mihaela from the USA just made a donation “In memoriam of Rhett, a rescue dog who rescued me”!

The “Memorial Gift” can be of any amount. Make sure to select the “Memorial Gift” option and provide your honoree’s information. The amount of your gift will not be mentioned. The list of people that donated to honor someone or something will be displayed on this page for 3 years starting the day the donation was made.

Examples of specific “Memorial Gift” levels

For 200 EUR sponsor a dog for an entire year and receive a nice certificate (online, by email, or printed) from your sponsored dog as a memorial gift!

Choose between these amounts 10, 15 or 50 EUR to make a gift to a particular dog in the loving memory of a person or pet.

With 20 EUR you can name a tree in memory of a beloved person or pet. We will plant the tree for you.

For 25 EUR you can “Sponsor Them All”: hundreds of dogs in our care, donkey Ben and even Mr. Cat!

With a 10,000 EUR name, one of our 5 garden sections of your choice, or for 50,000 EUR gives a forever name to the entire ROLDA garden. Alternatively, you can name one section of our new shelter. Have a look here at the sections of the area that still need a name/sponsor.

For 5,000 EUR you can name forever a garden’s path. We have 10 paths available. For 1,500 EUR you can name a bench and for 2,000 EUR you can name a kennel.

Cookie spent years in the ROLDA shelter and nobody wanted to adopt him. He got used to sheltering routine and survived, exactly like he did on the streets before we rescue him. Cookie is a senior dog and with a shelter full of cute pups, not many people give a chance to a senior. But Avril did.

She got the precious Cookie delivered in September and when she contacted us with feedback, she brought tears to our team’s eyes. It is said that love is blind. In Avril s eyes, Cookie is looking exactly like Baloo from Jungle Book.

Yes, Cookie should meet Avril much sooner because, in a shelter, we only protect these dogs against being hit by cars, and injured, but we can’t offer them the best. With Avril, Cookie enjoys living, even if it’s just for the last years of his life. We thank you Avril and family for this happy end story and this amazing opportunity to discover the treasure inside a senior ROLDAdog!

In photos, you can see Cookie enjoying walks at the beach and long walks near someone that love him. Cookie gets lots of hugs and surprises because Avril wants to catch up on all the years they missed. And in one of the photos, you will see Cookie near his first-ever Christmas tree. He might not understand what that tree is about, but we know that Christmas miracles exist when are made possible by amazing people.

But our mission does not end here! In the ROLDA shelters, we have around 300 senior dogs that deserve a chance at life and good care in old age. We need your help, they need our care!

Ioana – and the reason why we sometimes think that animals have more soul than many people

If this dog could speak, she would say: “It’s been over 6 months since I couldn’t properly eat because I can’t close my mouth.” I can speak but I would prefer not to, especially when I have to tell you her story. However, if this dog survived for 6 months like that, I must find the energy to speak up for her. Even if it’s so painful!

When meeting the ROLDA rescue team, a tail started to wag. The tail belongs to a medium size dog that looks like a German shepherd. Her head and entire body are full of healed wounds. Yes, wounds look healed and emotionally, she is even better than she looks because she wags her tail to strangers.

Strangers who beat her, almost killing her, some months ago. Since that moment, she couldn’t close her mouth, but her head full of wounds got better, and her body stopped being in pain … months after, her mouth still couldn’t close ..and therefore she vomits everything she is trying to eat.

This dog lives in a very poor village, she is fed by the mercy of a lady that sees her every day when going to look after a 98 years old woman. The dog follows this woman back and forth to her house because this is what she knows doing – taking care of the people she loves. She ignores the danger of being hit by cars, which barely avoids her. She is following the person who gives her the rest of the meals, even if she can’t even properly eat the meals.

She is desperate for human attention even if people were beating her to death. But this doggy has good instincts because this woman turned out to be her guardian angel because a few days ago, she called to ask for help.

A woman named Ioana called me around 6 pm. She apologizes for calling so late. (It wasn’t late because some call me at 22:00 or later. Dog’s emergencies don’t run based on a “working with public” program.) The lady was calm, coherent, and spoke from her heart. She told me that she is taking care of a senior woman, located 45 km away from Galati, in a little village called Baleni.

Close to the lady, she is taking care of, it’s a very old house, more ruined and there, she found a dog hidden. She tried to remove the dog from the house and had a stick in her hand. Seeing the stick, the dog went on the belly, lying down, leaving head down, ready to be kicked. She said: How I can hit that dog, I was so impressed by how the dog left to head down… knowing that it will be hurt. I would never hurt a dog.

In the house it was dark but when the dog finally exits to light, Ioana could see the dog’s proper skin was full of wounds, and the head was also wounded; the dog was severely beaten before.

The dog is a female. She suffered a lot, Ioana said. Every day she goes to the ruin to feed the dog. The dog is always there. Probably she belongs to people who used to stay there. Even if the signs of past injuries are gone, months after, the dog continues to feel sick. Every time she eats, she vomits. I guess she has something stuck in the way to her stomach. Obviously, the dog needs urgent medical aid because she is vomiting for months!!! After every meal.

In the village, the vet only gave this poor animal some pills, which have no effect because the dog won’t take the pills and even when she does take them, she instantly vomits them.

The dog is only bones and Ioana feels sad. That’s why she called me. From Ioana’s voice, I felt this dog’s pain. Without knowing, Ioana is this dog angel on Earth – it’s the woman kind enough to never use a stick against a dog, to carry food for this dog, to protect her when she is following Ioana on the road (Ioana is afraid the dog not to injured by cars). There are many ways in which this story is special. I simply can’t decide what part moved me so deeply.

Shortly after we rescued Angel, she was diagnosed with Dirofilaria immitis—heartworm disease. Sadly, Angel passed away. Heartworm is both complicated and expensive to treat, which is why most infected dogs don’t survive.

Preventing heartworm disease is much less expensive and much more effective, but the harsh reality for stray dogs is that they are extremely vulnerable to being infected with this fatal disease because they do not receive heartworm prevention medicine.

Dirofilaria immitis, or heartworm disease, is a serious and potentially fatal disease in domestic pets, wild animals, and humans. It’s caused by foot-long parasitic roundworms that live in the heart, lungs and associated blood vessels which cause severe lung disease, heart failure and damage to other organs.

The disease is so widespread because it’s easily transmitted by mosquitoes. One bite is all it takes.

Our ROLDA sanctuaries are surrounded by forest, agricultural land, and the Danube and Siret rivers, making it a favorable habitat for mosquitoes to thrive. The area is also home to hundreds of wild animals and stray dogs—all potential carriers of Dirofilaria.

Our dogs receive Heartgard for 6 months (spring to fall) to protect them against Dirofilaria, but that still leaves thousands of stray dogs around our sanctuary unprotected and at high risk of contracting the disease.

A donation of €41 can protect 1 dog for 6 months against this deadly disease.

Since 2016, our efforts to provide Heartgard to all 650 dogs in our sanctuary have been compromised due to the abrupt financial cuts caused by our former partner ArcelorMittal Galati. Their actions have put in danger the lives of these poor dogs and have left us struggling to maintain our shelters operational—not to mention the risk of shorting food and medical supplies, including heartworm medicine and treatment.

ROLDA continues to pursue legal action against Mittal to seek justice for our dogs. The legal battle is still ongoing in court. Until the issue is resolved, we kindly ask you to help us keep our dogs safe and free from fatal diseases such as heartworm.

Remember, €41 can protect 1 dog for 6 months.

Every time we rescue a new dog, we try to figure out where he/she comes from so we can try to understand him/her better. When Delu brought Ellie to the shelter, these are the facts as we knew them: A local animal lover called Delu went to pick up Ellie. Ellie and a mixed chow named Bunga were sharing a transport crate when they arrived. The person who called Delu said she found both Ellie and Bunga wandering the streets. She mentioned briefly that Ellie was limping.

It’s clear to us that Ellie belonged to someone. She was abandoned but we don’t know why. Some time ago, Ellie must have been hit by or with something, because she had an old, untreated femur fracture for which she got no treatment. It is heartbreaking, but this is the reality: many homeless animals live in pain, with a fracture or break, and the bone sets naturally – sometimes, in the wrong position, which generates the limping. Plus, probably, pain and more damage/health problems accumulated as time passed.

Ellie is a small, adorable girl who has learned, unfortunately, what it means to be a homeless dog.

After seeing how she limps, we decided it was something serious and rushed Ellie to the vet. There, after a medical exam and XRAY, the vet decided it was the old femur fracture that needs surgery to be corrected and set into the right position.

Being an old problem, there were no guarantees that her leg will recover. But after surgery and a very long recovery period, Ellie‘s pain will stop. In the worst-case scenario, she will lose the leg – but we are hopeful that the vet will do his utmost to save her leg, stop her pain and help her walk normally.

It is sad to think that in a moment, the life of a dog can change so dramatically: from the time when she had a home, until the moment she ended up on the streets, being hit, injured – staying in pain and ending up limping, since who knows when! Thanks to ROLDA friends and supporters, Ellie‘s nightmare will slowly be over.

Making a small gift – Help Ellie’s leg to heal by contributing to medical costs.

More supporters mean more help and during critical times, when your finances are limited, our needs (emergency veterinary costs, food costs, etc) are easier to cover when there are more contributors.

Nothing comes easy in life. Not for Ellie and not for us. Our mission is to work hard, to face difficulties but to make miracles happen for these dogs. And you, dear ROLDA supporter, are part of every step we take to transform each dog’s future.

There is a saying, when someone needs a friend, God sends them a dog. Regardless of your religious beliefs, we can all agree dogs are man’s best friend. ROLDA dogs need a friend, a friend like you, and no dog needs a friend more than Piciu.

After everything I have seen since ROLDA began, I sometimes fall into the trap of thinking I have seen everything, then a story like Piciu’s comes along and reminds me just how wrong I am. You receive weekly – if not daily – heart-breaking stories about our dogs and I wish more than anything Piciu had no such story to tell; I do not know where to begin.

Piciu was the adored pet of a man living with his wife in the village of Smardan. One tragic evening, Piciu became trapped in sharp, metal fencing whilst exploring. In the desperate attempt to free himself, Piciu suffered deep wounds to all four legs and lost a dangerous amount of blood and no, there are no blood banks for dogs here. Piciu was not discovered until the morning, barely clinging to life.

Many would have discarded him like trash, though Piciu had loving owners who wasted no time in rushing him to a vet. It is a uniquely heart-breaking sight – a grown man, weeping and sobbing like a child, inconsolable with grief – cradling his beloved, dying pet in his arms, begging for help whatever the cost.

Piciu is a beautiful, affectionate dog. He needs every prayer to see him through his intensive care and rehabilitation. All four of his legs were grievously wounded, three of which were maimed including one of his front legs that were so irreparably damaged, it required amputating. Furthermore, Piciu is not vaccinated and it would be too risky to vaccinate him in his current state of extremely poor health and weakened immune system.

We have to take extra special care of Piciu, who is exceptionally vulnerable to diseases like distemper, though with our love and expert care, Piciuwill recover and his remaining legs will gradually improve. The most important thing now is to do everything possible to help Piciu fight back to health and reunite him with his family.

Can we, with your help, get Piciu back on his feet?

“My pain is easier to bear when I see you.” that’s what Oscar seems to say when he is around people. Unfortunately, there is no end to the pain that animals feel. It was a regular Saturday. I took a break from writing a report, and logged in to Facebook when the image of a tiny fur ball filled the screen… he was trying to reach a person in a parking lot.

He was too young to understand how dangerously close he was to the busy road. He was focused on reaching the person that stopped the car in the parking lot before she went away, like all the other people who abandoned him behind… hungry and scared… alone in the bitter cold.

He wished to go faster or run as normal puppies did, but he couldn’t… he could only use three legs to move. With one paw suspended in the air, the pain was easier to manage. And so he hopped on, in the night, waiting for someone that would notice him before it was too late.

There is no end to the pain that animals feel, so there is no end to the ROLDA Rescue Team’s mission. Even if it was his day off, Vasile rushed to his van and drove 90 kilometers to Tulcea to meet a lovely girl called Ema.

It was she who spotted Oscar in the parking lot and rang the alarm. Vasile took the small, injured pup back to Galati to the same clinic that once saved Maia’s legs. For this particular case, ROLDA Rescue Team had to cross the Danube River twice and drove for a total of 3 hours and now, veterinary bills are ahead.

We hope that together, we can transform Oscar’s life. Please make a gift to help Oscar heal!

I don’t know if everyone can get an Oscar … but on Saturday, thanks to Ema from Tulcea and thanks to Vasile, ROLDA got one.

Please make a gift to help Oscar and also, help ROLDA reach more dogs like Oscar, dogs that have no one else to turn to – dogs that without you, would die all alone, hungry, injured and scared.