Horror in the wheelie bin: Confronting find that still brings tears years later

It’s been many years since she saw what was inside those wheelie bins, but the image still haunts outgoing Animal Welfare League of Queensland CEO Denise Bradley.

He arrived on their doorstep at eight weeks old. A black and white puppy with floppy ears, an uncertain origin, and a far from certain future.

Misshapen, with malformed elbow joints which required orthopaedic surgery, staff at the Ipswich Animal Rehoming Centre worried that Clifford would never find a family to love him. And for almost a year, he didn’t.

But after a record 325 days at the Centre, a family who had heard of Clifford’s plight drove 20 hours to take him home.

These days, Clifford leads the best sort of dog’s life, playing with his best mate Snoopy in the backyard, going on long walks and beach swims, all posted on his own social media account (@leapinglarriikans).

Animal Welfare League Queensland rescue dog Clifford. Source: Supplied.

Rescue dogs Clifford and Snoopy. Source: Instagram

Clifford is the joyous, furry embodiment of the Animal Welfare League of Queensland’s (AWLQ) Promise to never euthanize a treatable animal in their care. It’s a promise that has saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of animals over the many years the AWLQ has been in operation, and it’s a promise that Denise Bradley, the outgoing Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the League, is particularly proud of.

Bradley has been at the helm of the AWLQ since 1996, starting its first branch in Jimboomba, becoming Board President in 1996, and its CEO in 2010.

Bradley recently announced her retirement from the organisation that has its roots in her own family, with her father, Neil Andersen, the Founding President of the AWLQ.

“I grew up in Southport with my mum and dad who were both involved in the very beginning of the Animal Welfare League in 1959. It was a very small group back then at a time when unwanted animals were really only euthanised,” Bradley recalls.

“They’d get taken to the local tip and shot.”

The outgoing Animal Welfare League Queensland CEO Denise Bradley. Photo: Supplied.

In the 1980s, the family and other fledgling AWLQ members started an animal shelter in the Gold Coast’s Coombabah, where a young Bradley would spend her afternoons after school caring for a menagerie of unwanted animals.

“Back then if animals weren’t rehoused in three to five days (a long way from Clifford’s 325 days stint) they’d euthanise them. So every Friday I’d go to the vet to collect what animals I could before they were euthanised to take to our shelter, and I would get very emotional about the ones I had to leave behind.

“Then one Friday after we had been running the shelter for about three years, there were no wheelie bins out the front of the vets with the animals we couldn’t save inside them, and I remember I just cried and cried with relief.”

Bradley is crying now at the memory, such is the deep love she still holds for all creatures great and small after a life spent caring for them.

During her tenure, Bradley, 69, married for 49 years to Terry, with three children and - currently - three dogs, Winnie a deaf blue Cattle dog, Gus, a cattle cross, and Annie a kelpie, challenged many of the existing models for animal care.

Denise Bradley in 2017 with her dad Neil Andersen who first started the AWL in 1959. Picture: Adam Armstrong.

Bradley’s initiatives include the Getting to Zero campaign and The Promise which means that every one of the 11,000 stray and homeless animals that come through the AWLQ’s doors is, she says, “treated with the best care available”.

“Our Promise is that we will never euthanise any healthy, sociable or treatable animals.

“If they need surgery, we have vet clinics. If they are really old, we will care for them, and we will rehome them.”

The organisation does this with the help of its 200 employees (when Bradley started there were 15) and 800 volunteers on its books. And Bradley still remembers the first time she saw The Promise in action.

“We had just opened the Community Vet Clinic attached to our Gold Coast Rehoming Shelter, where our model is very much like a public hospital in that no animals sick or suffering are turned away.

Denise Bradley has a long history with helping animals. Photo: Supplied.

I was out the front when this elderly couple came in with their little dog in their arms, a little foxy cross, and they were bringing it in to be euthanized, and they were both very upset.

“They had brought the little foxy to their vet, who had found a lump, but they didn’t have the money to have it removed, and so they were bringing it to us to say goodbye, and we said, ‘No, it’s alright, we can fix it, we can remove the lump’, and they were just overwhelmed. “Seeing them take that little foxy home is something I won’t forget.”

Bradley’s life is full of moments like these, beautiful hellos - and goodbyes - between humans and the animals who choose to love them.

Bradley’s own goodbye to the organisation she has devoted her life to will not be a permanent one - she says she’s sure she will continue to help where she can. And her services and those of the AWLQ are needed more than ever, with Australia’s current cost of living crisis also impacting the animal welfare sector.

Outgoing AWLQ CEO Denise Bradley. Photo: Supplied.

“We’ve had a bit of a perfect storm”, Bradley says.

“During the Pandemic we had a noticeable rise in numbers of people wanting animals, there were just no dogs or cats to be found. We didn’t have enough to cope with the demand.

“But now, we are seeing that same noticeable rise in surrenders because people simply can’t afford a pet any longer, or they can’t find a rental if they have an animal. So we are back to pre-COVID numbers - and we’d love people to come and give one of our animals a loving home.”

And if people do, Bradley says, the rewards will be endless, adding that her long career in animal welfare has given her a profound appreciation of our furry and feathered friends. “Animals are all about love, receiving it and giving it. They are so loyal, so forgiving, so loving and trusting … we humans could learn much from them, I certainly have.”