A Guide to Taking Your Pets with You to Bulgaria

If you are planning a move abroad to live in Bulgaria and would like to take your pets with you there are some conditions that must be met first. Unfortunately taking your pets with you to Bulgaria is not as simple a task as packing them up in their pet carrier and traveling to Bulgaria. There are regulations surrounding the bringing of pets into the country that you should check into before making any plans involving your pets coming to Bulgaria. You will need to make sure that you get the necessary paperwork for bringing your pets overseas to Bulgaria. You will also need to make sure that you have the proper paperwork for any other countries that you may be traveling through on your way to Bulgaria. You will also need to take into consideration any possible quarantine regulations in the event that you want to bring your pet back to your home country. Currently there are no quarantine regulations in regards to bringing pets into the country other than needing to have a health certificate with proof of rabies vaccination.

Something important to consider when thinking of taking your pets abroad to Bulgaria is whether or not you will want to bring them back to your home country. There is a pretty good chance that there are quarantine regulations with your home country. For instance, if you will be bringing a pet from Bulgaria to the United Kingdom your pet will need to be microchipped, have the rabies vaccination and be blood tested at least one month after the vaccination to ensure protection against rabies. Your pet will need to stay in Bulgaria for a minimum of 30 days after the blood test to make sure that it has not gotten rabies.

If you are taking a pet from Bulgaria to a European Union country you will need to make sure that you have gotten a pet passport for your pet.

To take your pets into Bulgaria all you will need to have is an export certificate from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) and a health certificate for the pet from an approved veterinarian date no more than 15 days before departure. It will need to show that the pets are free of rabies and have been given the rabies vaccination.

Rabies is an epidemic of sorts in Bulgaria, specifically in the more rural areas. If you have a dog you should note that resident dogs of Bulgaria are required to get an annual rabies booster. If you have cats it is required that they are vaccinated against feline gastroenteritis and flu.

Bulgaria, specifically the city of Sofia, has a stray dog problem. In fact, it is estimated that there are four stray dogs for every person in Sofia, where its packs of wild dogs have made it infamous. In an attempt to curb this problem the city council requests that animal are sterilized or castrated to prevent the problem from getting worse.