www.Straydog.org Update - POSTED EVERY DAY BY NOON
Bill Arnold's Daily Straydog Log
SUNDAY JANUARY 25 2004
DUMPED ON!
Two Black Labs were abandoned at the entrance to our driveway last night
At about 5:45 this morning as Tina, our first early morning feeder, was arriving, she radioed me and Randy to tell us there was one dog tied to our gate post down at the entrance to our driveway and another dog on the loose hanging around the tied up dog. The loose dog had a broken rope around its neck. The tied up dog had a plastic bag with a an envelope in it fastened securely to the dog's collar. (See the letter below.)
No kennel space available!
I told Tina to go ahead and bring the two dogs up to our fenced in shelter compound, and we scrambled to find a place to put them, as we have absolutely NO SPACE LEFT. The only thing we could do was to bring Macy, who's been staying in the small six-foot by 12-foot emergency kennel by the hospital trailer, inside and leave her in the one remaining hospital kennel, which we put Katie in at night and use for Alice whenever there's gunfire in the area during the day.
Neighbors shoot strays
Almost every day there is occasional small arms fire nearby, often within a few hundred yards of Straydog. Many days it literally sounds like we're in a combat zone. And this leads me to the warning I've posted here on this website several times before:
NEVER ABANDON A DOG ANYWHERE, AND ESPECIALLY NOT NEAR OUR SHELTER. We have several neighbors who will (and do) shoot stray dogs as readily as I would swat a fly or smack a mosquito on my arm.
When someone abandons a dog near Straydog, the poor animal has about a 10% chance of making it into our shelter and about a 90% chance of dying by the bullets of our various neighbors' fully automatic weapons. (I've reported the firing of these fully automatic weapons to our local law enforcement agencies on more than one occasion, but nothing is ever done about it. The last time I spoke with the sheriff's dispatcher, she said that as long as the gunmen are on their own property, they can shoot whatever they want, with whatever they want.)
Abandoning a dog (or cat) is a crime!
I've put my son, Joe, to work on mounting security camera's along the entire property line so we can catch these criminals, arrest them and have them put in jail where they belong. After you read the following letter, you may have some sympathy for the dog dumper's situation, but dumpers MUST be made aware that abandoning a dog (or cat) is against the law just as abandoning a human child is against the law, which happened just last week in Gun Barrel City--a newborn baby was found dead after having been abandoned by its mother in a wooded area. We are literally living among some very, very primitive people.
The criminal dumper's letter:
To the managers of this facility:
Due to hard times, I have become unable to provide adequate care for my dogs. They have gotten some kind of skin mite that I have been unable to care for. I know that you can provide for these animals more than I can.
The male's name is Jordan. He is about two and a half to three years old. The female, I never could decide on a name, so she is just Baby Girl. She is about 15 months old or so and has had one litter of pups.
Thank you so much,
Anonymous
Erin's report on Adoption Day ...
Susan's foster dog, Gidget, gets adopted!
Gidget went to a loving couple with a little beagle who needed a friend. This little beagle was so excited to have a friend to play with that at first she scared Gidget a little bit. Finally Gidget warmed up and began talking (singing and barking) and playing with this beagle named Holly. If this doesn't work out for any reason, there is another couple who earlier had fallen in love with Gidget, but they decided too late that they did want her after all.
Henry is at his potential new home!
Henry has a home that we hope will work out permanently! All seemed to be fine, but we want to talk again in a couple of days to make another assessment.
A fellow came in the store and absolutely fell for Henry. He used to have a brindle dog like Henry. The family has three children, two very precious elementary-school-age children with autism, and a sweet pre-teen who seems very responsible and adult-like for her age. We were concerned that the younger children wouldn't know how to treat Henry, but the Dad assured us that the children and dog would be monitored at all times. The older boy (about seven or eight) tugged on my shirtsleeve and said (pleading with me) that they had cleaned up their house "and now we're waiting to take the dog home."
The dad has had dogs before and seemed really in tune with knowing what must happen for the adoption to work permanently. He wanted a chance to work with Henry and the kids at his home, and he also promised to get training classes started with Henry and the family soon.
So after spending a lot of time at PetsMart, where the family walked with and sat with Henry for quite a while, and then after a lengthy home visit, we decided to let Henry stay with the family on a trial basis, and we plan to keep in touch to see if everyone is completely happy and comfortable with the situation. They promised to keep Henry on a leash at all times, even though there is a dog park nearby. The dad knew that he should do this even before we suggested it. (Henry gets along fine with some dogs, but not so fine with others.)
We're hoping Henry Higgins is sleeping on one of the beds in their home and being the really good dog that we know he can be. He has a fenced back yard for potty breaks and running, but our understanding is that he will be an inside dog.
I'm hoping and am pretty sure that we'll receive positive reports back from Henry's new family.
Three more potential adoptions in the works
Colby, Sasha and Kerry all have families interested in them who will be visiting PetsMart again next week. (In fact the people interested in Sasha called Sunday to say they DO indeed want to adopt Sasha.