Puppy Love

My rescue group doesn't have a shelter; our animals stay in foster homes until they are adopted. We do have a storefront in a mini-mall where we have office space, storage space, and a few kennels. We used to have regular hours and do adoptions there, but traffic was too slow so it wasn't worth the volunteer hours. Now the kennels are used to house animals for short periods of time until they can go to their foster homes. Yesterday, I got a call about one of our cats that had been turned in to the Humane Society. The owners didn't mention that it was one of ours, but the staff there scanned for a microchip, and it came back registered to our rescue. I picked her up from the Humane Society and took her to our storefront, and after I set her up in a kennel, I returned to my van, only to be flagged down in the parking lot by a gentleman in a car... with a puppy. It was just chance that I happened to be there when he was, and we don't usually take animals from the public, but once I heard his story (and held the puppy) I couldn't turn him away. He said that two weeks ago, some people in a pick-up truck were giving away 6 week old puppies in his church parking lot. He took one home and named her Amber; he bought her toys and a blanket, took her to the vet and had her vaccinated, and tried to integrate her into his home, but one of his older dogs was not adjusting well. She reacted to little Amber with increasing aggression as the days passed, and he began to fear for her safety. He didn't want to take her to a shelter, where he knew she'd be exposed to disease and at risk of being euthanized. He knew we were a no-kill organization, and thought he'd take a chance. He had brought along her puppy chow, her blankie, her stuffed toys, and her vet records; he even gave us a generous cash donation. I didn't know where I was going to put her, but I figured one small, adorable puppy would find a place without too much trouble.

Amber spent the night in a crate at our storefront. I found her a foster home, but the foster "mom" couldn't pick her up until this afternoon, and I didn't want her staying at the storefront all alone for such a long time, so this morning I picked her up and brought her to my house for a play-date with my dog Darby. Darby was a foster dog that never left. She loves to play with other dogs, and she's very gentle even with the little ones. Amber proved to be a very good house-guest and did all her piddles outside; her worst habit was getting right between our feet whenever we tried to walk around the house. She and Darby enjoyed each other as much as I thought they would. I took the pictures while sitting in the armchair in the living room; Darby (a 45 lb. pit bull mix) was perched on the arm of the chair, and the puppy was next to me on the seat. I call the way they're playing "bitey face" or "face wrestling", for obvious reasons. When they were done playing, the puppy fell asleep on the back of the chair, like a cat; eventually she slid down on to the seat and snuggled up next to me for the rest of her nap. It was a fun 4 hours, but she wore us all out. I was happy to send her home with her foster.

"Lethal White"

Last weekend when I was picking up my mama cat and her babies from the pound, I saw this "lethal white" Australian Shepherd in the kennels.

The term "lethal white" originated in the horse world, where it was used to describe a genetic anomaly that caused some foals to be born pure white, and die shortly after birth. The term is a misnomer when applied to dogs because Aussies with this genetic disorder rarely die of it. Instead, they are usually deaf, and are either totally blind or suffer from a variety of eye defects. There is some anecdotal evidence that they are also more likely to suffer from immune system defects and other health problems, but this observation has not been proven. You can read more about Lethal Whites, and what causes this genetic disorder, in the link provided in the links section on the side bar of this blog.

His release date was already 3 days past, and notes scribbled on the card indicated that he was only to be released to rescue, if at all; the shelter vet was out of town, and hadn't had a chance to evaluate him yet. The notes said she would evaluate him "when she got back", but did not say when that would be. I also noticed that Border Collie rescue's name and phone number had been written on the card. This was Sunday evening. That night, I sent an e-mail with his picture to a rescue group that specializes in "lethal white" Aussies. This group is located in a city about two hours away, but I was fairly certain they had foster homes here. Sure enough, the next day I received a reply from the rescue group thanking me for alerting them to his presence at the pound. She called the kennel manager, who knew nothing about the dog; the call was passed on to the kennel supervisor, who acknowledged that the dog was there, and still needed to be evaluated by the vet. The lethal white rescue rep expressed her interest in the dog, and asked the kennel supervisor to please call her once the dog was released for rescue. She would then send a local foster to pick up the dog.

Tuesday I received a call from the foster. She told me that she called the pound that morning and was told the dog had been exposed to parvo, and had already been euthanized. She was very upset that the lethal white rescue rep had not been called first. I told her this was not the first time an animal at this pound had been euthanized despite the fact that a rescue group was ready and willing to take it.

That night I received an e-mail from the rescue rep: the dog was alive after all! The kennel tech who reported the dog was already dead was mistaken. The dog had been put on the E-list and moved to the euthanasia bay, but had not been put to death yet. Another kennel tech had called Border Collie rescue, whose name and number were on the kennel card. Border Collie rescue called the lethal white rescue rep, who called the foster, who ran down to the pound and got there just in time: the dog had just been sedated in preparation for euthanasia. The foster was able to bring the dog home and let him sleep off the sedative in safety and comfort.

Working with the county pound is incredibly frustrating. There are times when the staff show compassion to the animals and are very helpful to rescue, but there are far too many times when the staff is careless with the lives (and deaths) entrusted to them. However, it's too easy to blame the overworked and underpaid kennel staff, and fail to look for the underlying causes to all this needless death: the shelter is understaffed and underfunded because the people of this county do not consider homeless animals a high priority. I wish I had the political savvy to figure out a way to shame the county supervisors into funding more solutions to the problem of homeless animals. Sometimes I feel like animal rescue groups are trying to put bandaids on a gaping wound. We save lives and alleviate suffering one animal at a time, rather than finding ways to prevent the root causes of all of the suffering and death.

Babies Having Babies

Kitten season has begun already. Cats can have kittens at any time of the year, but the birthrate peaks in the spring and early summer. My rescue group has already taken in 3 mama cats with tiny babies that were dumped at the pound, and one pregnant cat that gave birth soon after her rescue. One of the mamas with babies came to my house.

My mama cat, Ivy, is only a baby herself. Judging by her teeth, she is barely six months old. Many people don't realize that a female cat can come into heat as young as 4 months. She is a tiny thing, just skin and bones. She is very tame and sweet, so she must have been raised with humans who handled her gently, but they apparently didn't keep her safe in the house, or spay her, or even feed her adequately to support her pregnancy. I suspect her kittens were a total surprise to whomever raised her, and apparently more trouble than they cared to cope with, so they abandoned her and her two-day-old babies at the pound.

Ivy is showing symptoms of an upper respiratory infection. There is a very high risk of her kittens catching it, and unfortunately, kittens this young frequently don't survive the infection. I'm terrified of losing all five of them. But meanwhile, I'm enjoying their sweet presence in my home, and hoping I will be able to watch them grow and find good homes.

This week I also made a trip to a foster's home in a small rural town about an hour's drive away, to deliver a chain-link kennel run to contain the litter of puppies that were born at her house. After we set up the kennel, I spent some time enjoying the puppies and the beautiful day.

This week I faced one of the worst situations a foster of rescued animals can face: a beloved foster dog ran out of second chances. He had some issues with resource guarding, and despite our efforts to rehabilitate him, he finally bit my partner hard enough to draw blood, over a tissue that had fallen on the ground. Most rescue groups, including the one I volunteer with, will not adopt out a dog that bites. My foster dog had become unadoptable. The only ethical, responsible course of action was to euthanize him. I kissed him goodbye, told him I was sorry, and handed him to the vet tech. It was an awful, awful day.

That evening I spent some time at the pound, where a mama cat and her tiny kittens were waiting for their new foster to pick them up. This mama cat is no more than 7 months old, and her babies were only about 2 days old, with little shriveled remnants of their umbilical cords still clinging to their bellies. They were only the size of my palm. I picked all 5 of them up, one at a time, amazed at their pussy-willow softness. Little Mama laid back and smiled and purred, kneading the air with her front paws (I call it "making air biscuits".)

Whenever the sadness over my lost foster dog washes over me, the sight and the feel of those tiny, warm, palm-sized kittens and their smiling mother comes back to me just as strongly.

Pupdate

Raven's 9 puppies are doing great. As they get older, it is apparent that they are not purebred labs. We suspect daddy may have had some chow in him, based on the small ears and purple splotches on tongues. Some of the puppies are also quite fluffy. There's an amazing variation in sizes amongst the pups, too; the 3 black females are all quite small, barely reaching 3 pounds at 6 weeks old, while a couple of the yellow and red pups are 6 pounds or more. One of the little black females, Racquel, broke her left front leg at 4 weeks of age. We have no idea how; the foster walked in one morning and found the pup with her elbow bent at an unnatural angle. The leg was kept in a soft cast for 2 weeks, and is healing well.

Helen's litter of 10 has already been altered, and 8 of them have been adopted; Flo's litter of 10 will be altered soon. Reba's litter of 9 is about 5 weeks old and thriving.

Not all of our puppies have fared as well. I'm sorry to relate that the litter of puppies I wrote about in the post "Boxer Mix Bonanza" contracted distemper; all 12 puppies are gone. Those that did not die in their foster mom's arms were euthanized by the vet. Rest in peace and doGspeed to Vanna, Valkyrie, Van Morrison, Val Kilmer, Vaca, Valeria, Valencia, Vance, Valentine, Valiant, Vanya, and Vagabond. Our litter of 11 pit bull puppies has also tested positive for distemper, and 6 of them are gone. The chances of any of the remaining 5 surviving much longer are slim. Please say a little prayer for Santini, Schnapps, Sadie, Silky, Silver, Skippy, Smoochie, Snoopy, Snowy, Speedy, and Sugar Bunch. Their mothers, Vanessa and Sweetie Pie, are doing well.

More puppies

Raven's puppies have opened their eyes. They look like puppies, now, instead of little woodchucks. They are standing up and toddling around on all fours, and attempting to wrestle with each other. The puppies began to cry a lot, and lost a few ounces; it seems Raven couldn't produce enough milk to support them. Foster mom Melanie tried to bottle feed them, but they didn't take the bottle well, so she put the formula down in a shallow pan. They dove in like pigeons on popcorn and lapped it all up. With regular supplementation to mama's milk, they have stopped crying so much and are back to gaining weight.

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It's been a rough couple of weeks for my rescue group. Several fosters "dumped" their foster dogs, which ended up at a boarding kennel since we are so full; a couple of adopters abandoned their dogs at the pound, and they also ended up at the boarding kennel. We had one dog at the kennel, and suddenly we have 10. Dog adoptions have been dismally slow. With no room in foster care, we haven't been able to pull a single dog from the pound. We get calls from the pound saying they have 22 dogs that need to go to rescue by tomorrow, do we have room? Two days later, another call with 8 dogs needing rescue, do we have room? The answer is always no, and it breaks our hearts.

Puppies!

If I'm counting right, we have 6 mama dogs with a total of 58 puppies in foster care right now. The puppies range in age from 2 weeks to 7 weeks. I don't think my rescue group has ever had this many mamas and nursing puppies at once before. Two of the mother dogs came into foster care hugely pregnant, and had their puppies within a week. The other four were all dumped at the pound with their tiny newborn puppies. All of them would have been euthanized if they hadn't gone to rescue.


The beautiful black lab in the last entry is Raven. She was brought to the pound when her puppies were only one day old. I have no idea who brought her or why she was abandoned. She was thin, but not emaciated like some of the nursing mothers we've rescued, and she was wearing a collar. But I believe she was not well socialized in her previous life, and is very fearful. When I tried to lead her out of the cage at the pound, she was so frightened, she tried to run back in. She only made it four or five steps away from the kennel before she dropped to her belly in terror and refused to move. I had to pick her up and carry her, and she defecated all the way through the receiving area and out to the van. She continued to do so in the van on her way to her foster home; the cage was covered with feces by the time we arrived, and so was she. Thankfully, her 9 tiny puppies were contained in a small pet carrier, and only the bottom of the carrier was soiled.


My step-sister Melanie and her husband Jim, her foster parents, took this turn of events in stride. Their calm, sympathetic reaction to a stressful and smelly situation was a true blessing. We cleaned up the van and washed poor Raven off with the hose out in the driveway. Again, she was too frightened to walk on the leash, and Jim had to pick her up and carry her into the house; she pooped while he carried her, too. It says a lot about this dog's temperament that she never once growled, snapped, or even looked like she might snap throughout this whole ordeal.


I am very fortunate to live in close proximity to Melanie and Jim, and I have been making frequent visits and taking lots of pictures! Raven greets me with enthusiastic tail wags, but if I reach out to pet her too quickly, she cowers and drops to the ground. Despite her fears, she has let numerous friends, relatives, and small children handle her puppies without a grumble. She immediately learned to use the dog door, and only elimiates outside. Not surprisingly, Melanie and Jim are falling in love, and are considering adopting her.

Just some cute pictures today

Shock

Apparently I spend a lot of time at the pound. Tonight two of the techs asked if I wanted to throw a sleeping bag on the floor and move in.

It was an unusually hard night. As soon as I walked in the door, I was told that every cat in the adoption room would have to be out by 3:00 on Sunday. They had decided that all of the cats had been exposed to upper respiratory infection, and they want to disinfect the room. This seems strange to me because URI is constantly present in the adoption room; it has always been present in the adoption room. It will be completely contaminated again within a week or two, once more cats are put there that were exposed to URI before they arrived. In any case, there are about 30 cats that need to be rescued.

As I was walking through the kennels, I spotted a chihuaha having a seizure on the wet concrete floor. I ran to find a staff member. I'm worried it might have been distemper, a highly contagious disease that attacks the nervous system, and the chihuaha's two kennel mates will be euthanized just because they were exposed.

The kennel cards for animals being released for rescue are kept in the treatment room. Sick and injured animals are kept in cages in one half of the room; animals are euthanized in the other half. The basket for the rescue cards is on the euthanasia half of the room. If you're there after hours, and you need to see a rescue card, you can either find a kennel tech and ask him to fetch it for you, or you can go in yourself and risk witnessing a scene like the one I saw tonight. A dog I had been petting just 15 minutes ago, an old Mexican Hairless dog with terrible skin lesions, was dead on top of a pile of carcasses heaped in a wheelbarrow. A black cat was lying lifeless on the counter with a syringe still in its heart. The floor in front of the rescue card basket was stained with shit and blood where a dozen animals had recently died.

To top off the evening, a little chihuahua that had been hit by a car was huddled in a small cage on the floor of the intake area. It was curled in a tight ball, its eyes wide open but not focused on anything. There were no apparent signs of injury, but it seemed to be in shock, or at least deeply traumatized. Its eyes blinked when I crouched down in front of the cage and spoke to it softly, but it didn't respond otherwise. I opened the cage and straightened one of its ears that was bent backwards; I stroked its head and shoulders and back. No response. I checked its gums; they were pink, which is good. But there were small drops of pinkish liquid coming from its nose. When the kennel teched picked it up, it urinated in terror.

I feel like I've been punched in the emotional gut. I feel like I need to disinfect my brain. I feel totally exhausted.

No Dogs Allowed

Yesterday I took my 5 orange foster kittens to a PetSmart Luv-A-Pet adoption center, where they'll stay until they are adopted. I have to wonder if mama cat is lonely in her room by herself, or if she is content to be alone, her kittens successfully raised and heading out into the world. (These pictures were taken several weeks ago, when the kittens were only about 6 weeks old.

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I handle returns for my adoption group, and yesterday we had an interesting one. I thought I had heard every story and excuse imaginable over the years, but this was a new one for me.

About six months ago, I received a call from a woman, M, who said she had just adopted one of our puppies from her son and daughter in law. Daughter in law had adopted the puppy from us, as a "surprise" for her husband, who was overseas at the time. I was irritated to hear this; if she had told the adoption counselor that her husband did not know about the puppy, we would have denied the adoption. Everyone in the household must know about and agree to the addition of a pet. In this case, shortly after the puppy was adopted, hubby announced that they would soon be moving overseas, and they could not take the puppy. Apparently, no dogs are allowed "overseas", wherever that is.

The adopters were in violation of their contract, having given the dog away without contacting us first; we would have been within our rights to ask for the dog back. Instead, we simply changed our records to reflect the new owner of the puppy.

A little over a week ago, M called us again to ask us if she was allowed to keep the dog outside. She had recently moved to a new house, and she could not get the dog to stop eliminating inside the house. She felt she had to keep him outside during the day. A friend of hers had criticized her for it. She was considering giving the dog to this friend. She had read our adoption contract, and thought it stated that our dogs should "never" be outside. I asked her where the dog sleeps at night; she said, in the garage. I asked her if she spent any time with the dog during the day; she said she worked from home, and was frequently outside with the dog. I told her that was OK, as long as the dog was protected from weather and had human companionship. Our contract stipulates no outside only dogs, and although the garage is not my personal ideal, it's an adequate place for a dog to sleep.

A week later, M called again. She wanted to know if it was possible to return the dog. She had thought her friend would take it, and give her $95 for it, but she couldn't get hold of her friend. She wanted to know if we took the dog back and adopted the dog out again, could she have the money we got for his adoption fee? She needed to re-pay her son for the dog. Apparently, when M offered to solve her son's "overseas" problem and take the dog for him, he demanded that she pay for the privelege. He wanted not only the adoption fee his wife had paid for the puppy, but also reimbursement for the supplies he had purchased. The total came to nearly $300, and M could not afford to pay it.

I told her no, we would not give her the dog's adoption fee. I told her I thought it was outrageous that her son was trying to make her pay for doing him a favor. His wife made a commitment when she adopted the dog, and should accept responsibility for her mistake in making that commitment. M had also made a commitment to the dog, and now she should take responsibility for her mistake. I told her it was time her family stopped trying to make money off of this dog. She pointed out that she wasn't trying to MAKE money, just pay her son back, and that he wouldn't make any money either, he just wanted to break even.

:: banging my head against the desk ::

And here comes the good part: I asked her why she could no longer keep the dog, and she said she was moving out of state. I asked her if the state she was moving to didn't allow dogs; she said she was moving out of state to enter a monastery, and they didn't allow dogs.

Okey dokey!

I found a foster for the dog, and had M bring it to one of our adoption centers for the foster to pick up. Strangely enough, within 5 minutes of the dog's arrival, a new family fell in love with her and adopted her. If you pray, please say a prayer that this is the dog's true forever home.

Boxer mix bonanza

I was up at 6:30 this morning and out the door by 7:15 with two carriers full of five fluffy orange foster kittens. They are 10 weeks old now and today was their appointment at the vet clinic for their spay/neuter surgery, shots, tests for FIV and FeLV, and microchips. Fifteen minutes into the drive, my cell phone rang. Jennifer had just gotten a call from a tech at the pound: a boxer mix mama dog and her 12 tiny puppies had been scheduled for euthanasia this morning. They had already Aced the mama dog (gave her Acepromezine, a sedative) in preparation for the Euthanol (a drug that stops the heart)when they looked at one another, and said, "We can't euthanize this dog without at least calling rescue". I really thought we were full, but Jennifer and I put our heads together and came up with a plan: we'd beg a cat foster to stash the mom and pups as best she could for a week, and by then all of Joan's current foster puppies would get adopted, and we could move the mom and puppies to Joan's.

As soon as I dropped my foster kittens at the spay/neuter clinic on the east side of town, I headed back over to the pound on the west side. Mama dog and her pups were in the treatment room, and poor mama was still very doped up on Ace. We weren't sure she would be able to walk. But when I opened the cage to put on her collar and leash, she lurched up to greet me; and when she spotted the kitty in the kennel across the aisle, she staggered out of her cage and made a drunken charge at the cat, brought up short by the leash. I loaded her fat, two week old babies into a carrier and walked them out to the van. Her spine and hip bones were protruding, yet her teats were literally dripping with milk. It always amazes me how the bodies of half-starved nursing mothers seem to channel nearly every morsel of nutrition they ingest to their milk; twelve sleek, fat puppies can practically suck the life out of a dog who isn't getting enough calories.

I loaded up two more dogs, coincidentally both female boxer mixes, which I had already planned to pick up and bring to our mid-town office where I would meet their foster a few hours later. When the foster saw the mama dog and puppies, she melted, and to my surprise she offered to take them, along with the two she had already agreed to take. The cat foster was off the hook, and we wouldn't have to move them in a week after all. We loaded them all in her truck, along with two huge bags of food; she assured me that no dog stays skinny for long at her house. I knew it was true. The first dog she had ever fostered for us, a beautiful Catahoula hound, had come out of the pound with a wicked case of kennel cough, and was just a bag of skin and bones. A few months later, she was healthy, shiny and sleek.

After mopping up several gallons of pee and a little bit of puppy poop, I picked up my groggy foster kittens and headed home. The poor babies did not get a warm welcome: their mother didn't recognize their smell, and won't let them come near her; if they try, she hisses and smacks them. She had been letting them nurse up until now, even though they are far past weaning age. They are having to grow up fast today!

The Hard Part

Tonight at the pound, I had to advocate for a dog's death.

I was going down adoption row, looking for cards with a red "R", which means the dog is no longer available for public adoption and must be rescued. I came across a large sheltie mix or small collie mix that was obviously very old, and one of her eyes was partially obscured by a red inner eyelid. I checked the card, and it told me she had been relinquished by her owner last night. Distressed, I stopped and said out loud, "Why? Who would do this to you?" A kennel tech was right next to me, and said, "I know, can you believe it?" I pointed out the injured or infected eye, then asked, "Where the hell are her ears?" I couldn't tell if they were just tiny, like a Shar-Pei, or if they had been cropped. I asked the tech to unlock the kennel for me, which she did. Both ear flaps were shrivelled, lumpy and hard; I lifted one, and found the inside was full of black gunk, the flesh underneath bright red. Just then I looked at the floor and saw fluid tinged with blood.

I said to the tech, "This dog has an eye infection, an ear infection, she's pissing blood, and she's about a hundred years old. Why the hell did she get put on the adoption line?"

Five minutes later, the kennel tech responsible for the dog's intake was being read the riot act by the kennel manager. The kennel supervisor asked if my rescue could take the dog; I told her, "Even if we could get that poor dog healthy, she would never get adopted. I wish we had a sanctuary for dogs like her, but we don't. She should have been euthanized last night." She agreed, and said they'd just have to put the poor thing down tomorrow.

I could just throttle the owners who relinquished this sweet, ancient, badly neglected dog. I would also like to slap the tech who didn't bother to LOOK at the dog before he put her up for adoption. If anyone had wanted her, the vet would have taken one look at her and cancelled the adoption. She was doomed, and putting her on the adoption line only prolonged her suffering.

My dream is to someday open a sanctuary just for dogs like this: old, sick, neglected, unadoptable, but still full of love and hope and life. I had to walk past her kennel twice more before my evening was over, and both times she rushed to the front, wagging at me eagerly, as though she'd made a new friend. I felt like I had failed her, betrayed her, even though I had done the best I could. I told her I loved her, and I was sorry.