"Please take care of my dogs while I'm gone!"

The Late

Pat Arnold's
w w w . S t r a y d o g . o r g

Straydog Inc., Pat & Bill Arnold's Happy Home for Strays, a No-Kill Dog Shelter
P.O. Box 1465, Gun Barrel City, Texas 75147 * (903) 479-3497 * EMAIL: straydog@straydog.org

Straydog Inc. is a 501(c)(3) Tax-Exempt Non-Profit Corporation - DONATIONS ARE TAX DEDUCTIBLE
(As always, complete financial records are available on request.)

Since Pat's death Bill Arnold continues to work (without pay) all day every day for Straydog Inc., managing the shelter exactly as Pat would have wanted. Pat and Bill's four children (all in their 30s and 40s with full-time jobs) are also helping out a lot at Straydog, trying to carry on their mother's mission of providing decent lives for dogs who have no one.

 

Our Dream: ALL Stray Dogs to Lucky Dogs!

Our Mission: Since Pat's death I (Bill Arnold) am committed to continue to do whatever I must to help in the effort to achieve complete and total control over the size of the population of companion animals--dogs and cats--by way of spay and neuter rather than euthanasia. I (as did both Pat and I before her death) believe that all who are conceived deserve to live a full and decent life. Thus we must put all emphasis on stopping conception! (Approximately 15,000 homeless dogs and cats are euthanized every day in the United States.)

Our Example: To inspire others to join us in the fight to gain control of the population of dogs and cats by way of spay and neuter rather than euthanasia, I (Bill Arnold) will personally sacrifice whatever I must to keep our NO-KILL shelter running, and before her death Pat continued to report on what happened at our shelter each and every day in her Daily Dog Log, which is still updated by Bill each and every day on our website www.straydog.org.

Our Shelter Goal: To find these wonderful dogs good, secure, loving homes.

Our Vow to all dogs we rescue is that they shall never suffer again!

Our Happy Home for Strays - How We Got Started

Pat's Story:

The creation of our shelter for homeless, unwanted, abandoned dogs (and cats) began (unintentionally) in September of 1992.

In order to spend more time at home I had almost three years earlier left my typesetting job at the same printing company in Dallas where my husband, Bill, continued to work for another 10 years, and I was working part time as an assistant to a real estate appraiser, accompanying the appraiser on house and property appraisals all over our rural area, when suddenly it seemed that my eyes opened up to the widespread problem of strays. Almost everywhere I went, I began seeing stray dogs.

Our Happy Home for Strays was officially founded without our really planning it when we rescued our first sick, abandoned puppy, a female we named Happy, on a cold, rainy morning in the fall of 1992. I had pulled into a country store/gas station that drizzly, gray day to buy gasoline, and as I stood in the rain filling my gas tank, a frightened, golden-haired, eight-month-old pup came crawling over to me on her tummy. She was cold, wet and shivering and looked to be sick.

The owners of the convenience store said the puppy had been hanging around for a week. I cuddled the sick little puppy in my coat to warm her and drove to the local humane society and left her there hopefully to be adopted during "her three-day stay." Half way home I realized that the puppy would not receive any medical attention, and because she was sick, she would probably be euthanized right away.

I turned around and went back, got the little dog and drove right to our local veterinary clinic where "Happy" was given treatment. And this is what started it all.

Next came Misty, then Toby, then Pup, then Angel, then Blackie, and then Blackie Cat and then Orange Cat, and by the fall of 1994 we were up to eight former stray dogs and two former stray cats. With the number of stray dogs gradually increasing and being unable to find them good homes we moved (at the "suggestion" of our next-door neighbor) WAY out in the country to a small one-room cabin on a 20-acre plot, where we built four large kennels to house the eight dogs we were then caring for. (We, ourselves, financed all this and we alone continued to finance all of our shelter operations until we started receiving donations after an article on us appeared in The Dallas Morning News in March 1997.)

Several years have now passed since we moved to the country, and the total number of kennels has increased to 32. We have found great homes for many of our strays, and we continue to look for good homes, but we also continue to take in one desperate dog every time we adopt one out. (Your financial and moral support sustain us.)

New Arrivals - Healthcare - Every rescued dog or puppy who finds us is immediately taken to our vet for vaccinations, spaying or neutering and to receive whatever other medical attention might be required for any health problem the animal might have. We are a no-kill shelter.

Our vets have treated many of the dogs for heartworm, mange, parvo virus, gunshot wounds, broken bones, birth defects (such as Helen's eyes and ears and Stevie's eyes), hip dysplasia and malnutrition among other maladies. When the new dog is pronounced "ok" by the vets, we bring the dog to our Happy Home for Strays where he (or she) stays in a nice quarantine kennel for two weeks so we can keep a close watch on him (or her) for any health problem that might arise.

After the quarantine period is over, the dog is placed in a large kennel with a friendly companion dog so that each dog has a playmate.

All the dogs are given the monthly heartworm preventive Sentinel. All the dogs are kept up-to-date on yearly vaccinations and are kept healthy and happy--the same as we've always treated our family dogs.

Housing/Living Accommodations for the Doggies - Each of our 32 kennels is approximately 30' x 30' square enclosed by a six-foot-high chain-link fence. Each kennel contains a large sturdy shelter with a porch roof added to give extra shade in the summer, and two dog houses are placed inside each shelter to ensure better protection from bad weather. In the winter the dog houses are filled with fresh hay to keep the dogs warm, and in the summer the hay is removed from the dog houses, and doggie "swimming pools" are put in the kennels for splashing-around, summertime fun for the fellas--AND the play pools give the dogs a way to cool off! They love their pools!

Fun-Filled Happy Days

  • The dogs are all treated as well-loved family pets.
  • Yummy, nutritious meals are served two times a day. (Weekly Dog Food Expense: $470+)
  • Daily dog walks for all the dogs (now 75 dogs plus six puppies) to the big fenced play yard begin at 7:00 a.m. and last until noon. The dogs are walked two at a time (except the puppies, who all go together) to the big play yard so they can spend some fun "free time" running, sniffing and playing outside of their kennels.
  • Individual, quality playtime with our other wonderful doggie caregivers ends the day for the dogs. From 1:00 p.m. until nearly 6:00 p.m. we again "make the rounds" visiting each pair of dogs inside their kennel to give the dogs individual attention, which includes daily brushing (for those dogs who will let us), playing ball and lots of hugs and petting.

    • Employees  - Straydog Inc. has eight wonderful full-time employees. (Employee Weekly Payroll: $2,800+)

    Managers - Formerly Pat and Bill Arnold and now just Bill Arnold, also founders, officers and directors of Straydog Inc. - Before her death Pat was on duty 24 hours a day seven days a week at our shelter, and Bill, who officially retired from his regular job of more than 25 years on November 15, 2002 receives enough from his pension and social security to continue to pay all personal living expenses. Bill is now managing the shelter alone in addition to helping get caught up on the tons of office work always needing to be done, picking up supplies, updating our website every day and handling the printing of our periodic newsletter, which printing will continue to be donated to Straydog Inc. by Bill's former employer.

    Neither Pat nor Bill ever received any salary or wages for our work at Straydog. (Manager, Officer and Director Pay: $0 (ZERO))

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