Taming a lion

Leela sat still while the vet carefully removed the stitches from around her eye. It had been more than a week since the surgery to remove her right eye and the area was healing nicely. After removing the stitches and refilling her antibiotic, I took Leela back home. However, Leela's first home was not a happy one.



In July 2006 I was appointed foster coordinator of the Athens County Humane Society. I was in charge of intake of animals into the foster care program. This included returning all the calls and emails of people who were looking to get rid of cats and kittens. In order for animals to enter the program, I had to see them beforehand to check their health and temperament. In late July, I went with former coordinator Marla Brooks-Verity to check out some kittens. Marla was wrapping things up before leaving her position and agreed to help me.

We drove to the outskirts of Athens and ended up on a gravel road. There were several trailers scattered about, but we couldn't find the address we were looking for. Marla pulled in a driveway so that we could ask for directions. I stepped out of the car and the first thing I noticed was a kitten who quickly scurried into a shed. As I walked closer to the trailer, I saw something that took my breath away. Over 50 cats and kittens of different colors and sizes milled about.

This is how I found Leela. While most of the cats kept a safe distance, little Leela came toddling up. She was the smallest kitten there, probably only 4 weeks old. Her right eye was ruptured and hanging out of her head. No one was home at the trailer, so we made the decision to take Leela and rush her to the vet.

MANAGING A COLONY



After I brought the case of the cat colony to the humane society board we all agreed that it was something we had to take action on. We were able to make contact with the owner of the trailer, an older man named Bob. Bob told us that his situation had started when he began feeding a couple of stray cats. Because he neglected to have the cats fixed, the continued to reproduce. According to the Humane Society of the United States, a fertile female cat can produce an average of 3 litters of kittens a year, with about 4-6 kittens per litter.

This is a common situation in areas like Athens. Tracy Roberg, former spay/neuter coordinator for ACHS, commented on the situation in an email interview. "We would get tons of calls from people who had stray cats dropped off near their farm or house. They just didn't know what to do. I think a lot of people don't know that spay/neuter is a solution to controlling their population from the start. They wait until their female cats become pregnant and then have a total of fifteen cats before they see the problem," Tracy said.

Because there were so many cats, Bob was unable to give each them individual attention. Almost all of the cats and kittens were feral and not used to human contact. We quickly set about rounding up the least feral kittens to put into open foster homes. Altogether, about 10 feral kittens were removed from the property and tamed down in foster homes before being adopted.

Since there is not really any way to adopt out feral cats we had to consider our options. We were able to contact a feral cat rescue group called Save a Kitty, based out of Parkersburg, W.V. Save a Kitty obtained a grant from the national group Alley Cat Allies to help us fund the efforts to control the colony. This grant paid for spay and neuter and other medical expenses for all of the cats at the site. By fixing all of the cats and returning them to the site, we could stop any further overpopulation.

This left us to humanely trap the feral cats so they could be transported to the vet and sterilized and vaccinated. Trapping can take hours. It is hot, sweaty, smelly work. Save a Kitty was able to loan us 20 traps. Humane cat traps have a door that can be propped open. Food is put in the back of the trap. When the cat goes in to eat the food, it will step on a metal tray, causing the door to close.

After trapping over 20 cats, I transported them to the Help for Animals clinic in Barboursville, W.V. A woman from the Save a Kitty rescue met me there. She agreed to take 20 of the ferals to keep in a controlled colony situation.

There were still many more cats outside of Bob's trailer. Over the next few months, we continued trapping the cats to have them fixed at mobile spay/neuter clinics that came to Athens. ACHS also helped control several other colonies, including a colony of feral cats living along the Hocking River near O'Bleness Hospital.

THE OUTCOME

Feral cat colonies are unsanitary and horrible conditions for both cats and humans alike. Disease and illness is common in feral colonies. Many of the cats from Bob's colony had eye and upper respiratory conditions. It is important to control these situations humanely through spay and neuter. Tracy recommends: "Get the cats fixed as soon as possible. It doesn't take an
expert to trap cats. There is some great info online at www.alleycat.org on how to trap and take care of feral cats."

Always remember, feral cats CAN be tamed down if you have the time and patience. In the end, many can live normally in loving homes. Aside from Leela, I also fostered two other cats that came from Bob's colony. Pirate and Ghost were very scared when I first brought them home. I had them both for nearly 6 months until they were adopted. I made sure to handle them as much as possible so they could get used to human contact and I slowly exposed them to normal household occurences.

I also fostered Leela for nearly 6 months. She bounced back quickly after her surgery and never seemed the least bit affected by only having one eye.



*Photos by Amy Lauer

NEXT TIME

I'll be sharing adoption stories from people who have rescued and adopted animals in the Athens area. Have you ever adopted or rescued a pet before? What was your experience?

Puppies

On Friday, February 9th I set off for the Athens County Dog Shelter. My mission: to interview Lana Planesik, acting dog warden and humane officer. I had met Lana several times before during my work for the humane society, so I figured the interview would be a breeze.



The dog shelter is supposed to be open Monday through Friday from 1:00 p.m. till 5:00 p.m. When I arrived there around 1:30, the shelter was dark. A sign on the door indicated that due to the high number of calls, the shelter would not open until 2:00 p.m.

There were several people in the shelter when I came back with my roommate after 2:00. Since Lana was busy talking to people, I walked through the kennel area. Most of 30 some cages were occupied. Many of the dogs were mutts, but several were purebred. I walked past a female yellow Lab, a male German shepherd and two male Rottweilers. In fact, the Humane Society of the United States estimates that 25 percent of dogs in shelters are purebred.

When I came back to the front desk, I was able to talk to Lana. I asked her if I could talk to her about the shelter and ask some questions. She looked a little flustered and said that she was leaving in the next half hour to go on more calls.

"If you really want to help, you can take the puppies in there," Lana said gesturing to a small room.

I walked inside and found three tiny black and white puppies sitting in a box. They were so small that they fit in the palm of my hand. Lana told me that they had just been dropped off by a man who found them by a dumpster in Chauncey.

The puppies were shivering. They couldn't have been more than five weeks old, much too young to be away from their mother. I knew they wouldn't survive for long in the shelter - they were just too young.

I conferred with my roommate, a fellow animal lover. We agreed to take the puppies and find good homes for them. Before leaving the shelter, Lana vaccinated each puppy against the deadly parvo and distemper viruses. She also gave us a case of wet dog food. Lana assured us that we could bring the puppies back anytime, but I knew that I could never take them back to the shelter.

ONE WEEK LATER

I returned to the dog shelter, determined to talk to Lana and to come away without any dogs or puppies. The three puppies that I took the week before were thriving. My roommate and I named them Marty, Biff and George - a tribute to the movie Back to the Future.



This time, the shelter was quiet and Lana took me to her office to talk. She told me about her positions as humane officer and dog warden. The humane officer serves the entire county of Athens, while the dog warden is an Athens city position. Lana has been serving as humane officer for the past 23 years.

Shortly after I talked to Lana, the county comissioners announced that assistant dog warden Jamie Perry would take over as head dog warden - a change that has been planned for several years. Hopefully, lessening Lana's workload and distributing the work will make the shelter run more efficiently.

According to Lana, approximately 1,400 to 1,500 dogs came into the shelter in 2006. Over 1,100 of those dogs were euthanized. "It's hard to find a home for one dog, much less the 40 we have in here each week," Lana said.

Many of the dogs brought in are surrendered by their owners or found as strays. However, as the humane officer, Lana sometimes rescues animals from bad situations and brings them to the shelter. "We give people the benefit of the doubt. They receive a warning, and I check back later to see if they've fixed the problem," Lana said.

Lana contends that adequate food and shelter are the biggest animal welfare problems in the county. "People just tie their dogs outside and don't feed them," she said.

Another problem that hits home at the shelter is illness and disease. It is likely that most of the dogs that enter the shelter have never been vaccinated. With the close living conditions, illnesses such as parvo and distemper are common, particularly in puppies. "We haven't had any parvo in here since May, but we're constantly checking for it," Lana said.

LIFE WITH THE PUPPIES

Nearly four weeks later, I am down to two puppies. George found a home with friends and is now named Moof. Moof is a cross of "moo" and "woof" because his coloring looks like a cow.

Marty and Biff are doing great. They're nearly three times the size they were when I first brought them home. They're nearly housebroken and they love to prance around outside and chase leaves.

Marty and Biff will be neutered this weekend and I hope to find them homes after that.



*Photos by Amy Lauer

New experiences

Leaving the suburbs of Cleveland for the hills of Athens was a bit of a culture shock. However, I was determined to get involved with community organizations that interested me. Throughout high school I volunteered at the Stay-A-While Cat Shelter, a no-kill shelter in North Royalton, Ohio where cats roamed free in large rooms. Every Saturday I went in to the shelter to clean and play with the cats. The work was easy and fulfilling. Every once in awhile I would see cats and kittens leaving to go to their new homes.

I figured that my experience at the Athens County Humane Society cat shelter would be similar. I started going to the shelter once a week. At first my duties mainly consisted of cleaning and feeding the cats. Shortly thereafter I started helping the manager, Marla Brooks-Verity, with medical procedures. I learned how to flea treat, deworm and give shots to cats and kittens. I also learned how to hold the cats by the scruff of their neck to keep them still for drawing blood for tests or giving shots.

After only working there for a month, I took my first foster kitten home to my dorm room. I quickly learned that kittens at the shelter had little chance of surviving their time there. Because of their weaker immune systems, kittens would become ill in the shelter environment after days of arriving. Feline upper respiratory infections ran rampant.

I continued working at the shelter for the rest of the year. It quickly became an important part of my life. I was usually there at least four days a week, sometimes more. Over the course of my time at the shelter I had many experiences that made the animal welfare problems in Athens really hit home. Some of the experiences that I'll share are not pleasant and may be hard for some people to handle.

FACING REALITY

"Where's Joe?" I asked when I came into the shelter one day. I was refering to the the tabby and white cat with the loud meow. "Did he get adopted?" No one would answer my question. After this situation was repeated several times, I finally learned to shut up. It was my first important lesson - don't ask questions when cats and even whole litters of kittens disappear overnight.

Shelter manager Marla Brooks-Verity would go to the shelter after hours to euthanize the cats. "I probably euthanized about 35 cats a month, and at least three times that number during kitten season," Marla said.

During spring, summer and fall (kitten season) every available cage was taken. The small shelter was busting at the seams, stuffed full of the unwanted and forgotten cats of Athens County. At one point we even housed kittens in the storage closet because of the lack of space. Every day, more cats would be dumped outside when no one was there. There were no cages outside, so people would just let cats loose, which contributed to a growing feral colony in the area around the shelter. I even remember arriving at the shelter and finding over 10 cats and kittens that had been dumped outside. Often, newborn kittens would be left in boxes by the front door with no mother in sight.

With the shelter so full, sickness was common. There were several times when I found kittens dead in their cages - a result of illness or disease. Dead cats were carefully wrapped in plastic and placed in a large freezer until they could be picked up for disposal.

Marla served as the shelter manager for seven years. "Before we got the large freezer, we wouldn't have anywhere to put the bodies. Sometimes people took them outside and threw them in the dumpster. The whole place smelled like rotting cats," she said.

Shelter volunteers did everything they could to help out, but them number of animals was overwhelming to all. Adoptions were the one bright spot, though they were few and far between. Most people wanted small kittens, so adult cats were often overlooked. I found myself trying to not become attached to the adults because I never knew if they would be there the next day.

CLOSING THE DOORS

In November 2005, the Athens County Humane Society cat shelter closed its doors. On paper, the shelter closed because the organization was forced off the property for legal reasons. However, several humane society board members had been lobbying to close the shelter for quite some time.

The shelter had become a place where no one wanted to be.

"I wanted the shelter to close," said Marla. "And it's good that it closed because it made us focus on prevention and spay and neuter."

With the building gone, the humane society began a foster care system for homeless animals and started efforts to provide more low-cost spay and neuter services to residents. They began scheduling a low-cost moblie clinic called RASCAL to come each month to perform spay and neuter surgeries.



After the shelter closed I could breathe easier. I didn't have to face the same devastation every day. But this doesn't mean that there aren't still problems. In fact, many Athens residents are upset that there is no shelter in the county.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Was closing the shelter a better option than killing most of the cats that went into it?

What would you do if you found a stray animal in Athens?

*Above photos by Amy Lauer

First impressions

In February 2005 I set off to find the Athens County Cat Shelter. After several wrong turns I maneuvered my car down a steep embankment, across a rickety bridge and along a winding gravel road until I reached my destination. What I found was a small wood-shingled house — the home of the Athens County Humane Society.

During my sophomore year at Ohio University, my love for animals inspired me to begin volunteering at a local animal shelter. I had done extensive volunteer work at animal shelters in my hometown, but I quickly discovered that my experience in Athens would be far different.

Athens is located in the heart of the Appalachian region, nestled in the hills of southeastern Ohio. The area is marked by beautiful terrain and an overwhelming culture of poverty. In fact, Athens County is one of four counties in Ohio designated as "distressed" by the Appalachian Regional Commission.

The poverty level directly affects animals and animal welfare in the region. Many residents lack the money or means to properly care for their pets. According to Athens County Humane Officer and Dog Warden Lana Planesik, adequate food and shelter are the biggest animal welfare concerns. Pet overpopulation is another major issue affecting the Appalachian region. Because medical procedures such as spay and neuter surgery are expensive, pet owners often neglect to sterilize their pets.

I am creating this blog for an assignment in my Online Journalism class. When I first learned that I had to create a journalistic blog on a topic of my choice, I was extremely excited. Finally, I could inform others about matters pertaining to animals in the Appalachian region.

This blog will delve into the animal welfare issues that are prevalent in the Athens area and throughout other parts of Appalachia. It will follow the efforts of people and organizations who, like myself, strive to make a difference for the animals.

I look forward to this experience and I hope that I can shed light on a topic that many may be unaware of. Your questions and comments are welcomed and encouraged, as they will help me continually improve the content of this blog.