Straydog UPDATE posted TUESDAY 10/14/03 at ~9:00 p.m. CT

Bill Arnold's Daily Straydog Log

TUESDAY OCTOBER 14 2003

More calls today from people who are trying to place dogs they've rescued

     We committed to take one, a 40-pound, one-year-old male, whose rescuer already has five former stray dogs and simply cannot keep six.

     We'll try this new guy first with Tipper, who's let us know she doesn't want a kennel mate on several occasions by becoming very aggressive toward the other dog during their introduction. If Tipper won't accept this new fella, we'll try him with Dixie, who's been separated from her brother, Buster, because she was beginning to play way too rough with Buster, leaving several puncture wounds on his neck on more than one occasion before we finally separated them, putting Buster in with Foxy Yatzee and leaving Dixie alone. If these two solo females won't accept the new dog, we'll have to free up another kennel or build another small temporary kennel, which is not cheap.

     Of the two dogs, Daisy and Freddy, who were adopted Saturday only Freddy freed up a kennel, and that's where the two new pups, Sadie and Madison, are staying. Daisy had been in with Scotti, and Scotti will accept no males and only certain females. Scotti's a very picky guy.

Why we don't take 40 or 50 dogs to adoption days

     Every once in a while someone asks us why we don't sponsor huge adoption days and try to adopt out 40 or 50 dogs at a time. First of all, every day's a huge adoption day right here at Straydog with all the dogs on display. As we've said many times before, anyone can call and make an appointment to come out and pick out a dog or two any time during daylight hours. That's exactly what Heather's new mom and dad did. They made the appointment primarily to see Krissy, but after touring the whole shelter and visiting with several additional dogs in the park, they picked out and adopted Heather, who is now Libby. All the dogs are listed and pictured on two different "Dogs for Adoption Links" on our website, or if the particular dog is a current rescue, you'll find its photos in recent updates (via the links below). A great percentage of our adopted dogs have been adopted to people seeking dogs via the Internet. Secondly it's not the easiest task in the world (as Susan Devers, who's been our Adoption Day Volunteer Coordinator for three years, would attest to) to find four or five volunteers every Saturday to handle the four or five dogs we take to PetsMart in Plano, Texas (just north of Dallas). To find 40 or 50 volunteers would be a tremendous task. Thirdly, if we were lucky enough to adopt out 40 or 50 dogs in one day, and we filled their "seats" in our "lifeboat" immediately (or as quickly as possible) with 40 or 50 new rescues, which is what we promise our contributors we will do, we would go broke in one fell swoop trying to pay the vet bill for the new arrivals' checkups at the clinic, each of which medical bill can run anywhere from a couple of hundred dollars to several hundred dollars, depending on how much rehabilitation each new dog might need.

     So we continue to move along at the same pace Pat moved us along at. It's a pace that to us is so fast that we can just barely maintain it, working all day every day. Providing a good, secure, happy home for and taking extremely good care of all the dogs who are living here is our number one priority. Adopting dogs out and taking in new rescues at a rate we can financially sustain is essential to our survival.