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Police dog helps rescue man submerged in river
January 26, 2009
FROM STNG WIRE REPORTS
Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart on Monday introduced the latest hero of his department, a 1 1/2-year-old bloodhound who located and rescued a suicidal man submerged in a south suburban river last Sunday.
The river rescue was carried out by Melanie, a bloodhound, and her partner, Sheriff’s police Officer Jim Pacetti, on Jan. 18, Dart said at a press conference Monday.
Sheriff’s police got a call about 5 p.m. regarding a despondent man who had told his parents he was going to kill himself. Police traced his cell phone to a forest preserve near 87th Street and LaGrange Road in unincorporated Lyons Township, but were unable to locate the 36-year-old man.
Melanie was called in around 8 p.m., according to a release from Dart’s office. The dog sniffed a pillowcase, then led officers into the woods.
She followed a trail for a quarter-mile before venturing west for 300 yards, north 250 yards and 50 more yards to the east, where, about 9:30 p.m., she found the man semi-conscious and half-submerged in water. Temperatures were around 5 degrees and Read more
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Go see ‘Hotel for Dogs’ and Pedigree will donate to shelter dogs for each ticket sold
by Helena Sung, Pet News Examiner
From now until July 16, 2009, for every ticket purchased to see "Hotel for Dogs," the Pedigree Foundation will make a donation to help shelter dogs–up to a maximum of $250,000.
For the past four years, Pedigree dog food has been running "Adoption Drive," a mutli-million dollar fundraising and awareness campaign meant to help the millions of homeless dogs in shelters and at breed rescues across the country.
Its past efforts have already raised $3.5 million dollars for 3,500 shelters and breed rescues across the country.
I think it’ll be a cinch to help Pedigree max out their donation from ticket sales to "Hotel for Dogs."
To inspire more people to adopt dogs; to raise money and awareness for dogs living in shelters; to live up to our brand promise that ‘Everything we do is for the love of dogs…"
–Pedigree’s mission
"Dogs rule" is a promise and a celebration. It’s a promise that to us, dogs come first. That everything we do is because we love them.
–What the "Dogs rule" slogan means to Pedigree
*For more information go to www.dogsrule.com
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Downturn sees increase in dumped doggies
By Rebecca Hyman
Tue Jan 13, 2009, 06:24 PM EST
Lakeville – An 8-year-old yellow Lab mix was rescued from the side of the road in Carver on Nov. 27. He doesn’t have a name, at least not one he is able to tell his new caregivers at the Lakeville Animal Shelter.
The abandoned pooch has sweet, sad brown eyes and a friendly disposition, but he might have trouble getting adopted because of his age, Animal Control Officer David Frates said.
Frates said he’s noticed a big spike in dogs like the abandoned Labrador retriever being “dumped,” set loose away from home and left to fend for themselves, many of them in Freetown-Fall River State Forest, since the economic downturn.
“They can’t afford to go to the vets. They’re losing their houses. That’s a big thing. Landlords don’t want dogs,” Frates said.
“I think sometimes people are just backed into a corner, where they can’t get into an apartment, and they need it for their children, and they can’t find a home for the dog.”
The Lakeville Animal Shelter on Montgomery Street boards dogs for Carver, Rochester, Berkley and Freetown, in addition to the town’s own lost and abandoned animals.
Frates said he has picked up 27 dogs dumped in the state forest and the surrounding area in the last four to six weeks.
The same thing happened last year, but not so much in previous years, he said.
“It’s only happened since the economy started to get bad,” Frates said.
He said the dogs are generally found around nearby houses rather than in the forest itself. They don’t stay in the forest because there’s nothing to eat.
Frates said some people may dump their dogs instead of surrendering them to avoid the $50 fee.
He suspects the dogs that are dumped in the forest are from out of town, probably Fall River and New Bedford. Most of the dogs he finds in Freetown are lost and eventually reunited with their owners, Frates said.
He said the dumping isn’t confined to the forest, but extends to the entire surrounding area.
A couple of weeks ago a couple of German shepherds were dumped on Howland Road in Lakeville, he said.
He said the dogs are generally larger breeds such as shepherds, labs, Dobermans and boxers.
They are in fair condition for the most part and don’t show signs of abuse.
“They don’t stay out in the cold very long,” Frates said.
Sometimes, he sees indications the owner still cared about the animal.
In one case, somebody left two German shepherds in the forest with a bag of dog food, he said.
Frates said dogs come to him for a variety of reasons: they are abandoned, surrendered, lost or seized from their owners for one reason or another.
The peak time for lost dogs is around holidays such as Christmas and Thanksgiving when relatives are coming and going and dogs can bolt out the door and the Fourth of July, Frates said.
The Lakeville Animal Shelter took in 316 dogs in 2008. It also takes in cats, but just from Lakeville.
It is not a no-kill shelter but euthanizes very few dogs. Frates said 16 were put down in 2008. The shelter only euthanizes vicious dogs deemed unadoptable, he said.
Friendly dogs that simply fail to get adopted are given to rescue organizations, he said.
In 2008, 115 dogs were adopted, Frates said, while many others were reunited with their owners.
Frates used to work in the highway department. He pitched in temporarily when the former dog officer retired in the mid-1990s and decided it suited him. He loves animals but is able to resist adopting every hard luck case that comes through the door, he said.
For Frates, the job brought him full circle.
In the 1960s, his father was the town’s dog officer.
Those were the days before the town had a shelter, when the animal control officer boarded dogs in doghouses at his own house. It was Frates’ job as a child to help care for the canine houseguests.
He admits he hadn’t yet developed such steely reserve.
“We used to keep half of them in those days,” he said.
Frates said the shelter has had excellent luck finding adoptive families for abandoned dogs. Five have already been adopted out since the new year, he said.
He said one reason is the shelter has night and week-end hours. It is open Mondays from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. and Saturdays from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.
“A guy can’t tell his boss he’s going to leave work to go get a dog,” Frates said.
The shelter currently has nine dogs being boarded, five of which were either surrendered or abandoned and are available for adoption. Anyone interested in possibly adopting them may call Frates at (508) 947-3891.
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No room at the shelter?
Across the country, animal shelters are filling up, looking for ways to find homes for more dogs and, in some cases, closing their doors amid an influx of abandoned pets caused primarily by the flagging economy.
Both public and private shelters are feeling the strain of too many dogs and cats and not enough homes that want them.
The Madison ARK animal shelter is just one of many that is telling people they just can’t take anymore.
Mandy Nabors, executive director of Madison ARK said that it’s currently housing about 70 animals and there is no more room, according to one MSNBC report.
People are still dropping them off, though.
“They began dropping them at our doorstep,” Nabors said. “We found a cat in the back in a carrier, a dog someone left for us in our outdoor fences, several litters of puppies left just in the yard — and we’re not going to turn them away. We took them in and we just have no more space. All of the rooms of the building are taken up and all the rooms have animals. Our supplies are running out very, very quickly.”
The tanking economy has led to many shelters reporting more owner surrenders (pets brought in by owners) and more reports of pets being abandoned in buildings or let loose on the streets, USA Today reported last week.
All this in addition to the traditional spike in surrenders caused by Christmas pets that haven’t worked out.
In Pennyslvania, yet another factor is at play — a new state dog law that, while calling for improved kennel conditions, limits the number of dogs breeding kennels can keep.
In the past 30 days, more than 100 dogs have been brought to the Humane League of Lancaster County.
Most, according to an MSNBC report, are dogs from area kennels, struggling to comply with the state’s new dog law.
The Humane League is asking kennel owners and others to wait until next month to “surrender” their animals. And it’s cut the price of adopting a dog in half — a strategy many shelters have turned to in recent months.
For more information on dogs available in Lancaster, visit the Humane League online.
Posted by jwoestendiek January 12th, 2009 under Muttsblog.
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‘Adopting’ 27 Dogs Leads Woman to New Calling
By Amy Lieberman
January 4, 2009
Colleen Spalioni, above, reportedly adopted 27 dogs from a shelter two weeks ago, yet she says that’s not so. She went to replace her deceased dog Barney, above, but decided to help other dogs find homes. (Photos Courtesy of Colleen Spalione)
SPARKS, Nev. — Woman adopts 27 dogs.
The headlines have become viral on the Internet over the past two weeks, hitting as far as India and New Zealand.
But there is one minor aspect of the bizarre story that went untold, Colleen Spalione revealed to Pet Pulse.
"I never went to that shelter with the intention of adopting 27 dogs," Spalione, 43, said. "They keep on saying that I adopted them, but it wasn’t true. I only transported these dogs with the intention of adopting one for my family to replace Barney."
Barney was Spalione’s 2-year-old pointer that was hit by a car in November. The loss was devastating for Spalione, who cradled the dog when he died in her arms shortly after the accident.
"I was very upset," she said, tearing up in a phone interview. "I slept with him [Barney's body] overnight and would have kept him for another day, but there was an odor. I had him cremated and the hardest thing for me to do was to take him to the cremation center and walk away. I didn’t want to let him go."
Spaliones grief left her incapable of eating — after four days, she visited the doctor, concerned about her diabetes.
The doctor’s advice was simple: Get another dog, he told Spalione.
So the mother of five children, ranging in age from 13 to 23, set out to find the dog who could help replace Barney. The task proved more difficult than Spalione had anticipated.
She first located two different Barney look-alikes in Read more
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Autism service dogs
December 31, 5:58 PM
by Megan Drake, Philadelphia Dog Advocate Examiner
Dogs have assisted humans as companions throughout history. The blind were the first to benefit from the special training of canines. In the November 5, 1927 issue of The Saturday Evening Post Dorothy Harrison Eustis authored an article, ‘The Seeing Eye’. She wrote it after visiting a formal dog guide program for the blind in Potsdam, Germany. Eustis was impressed with the concept of guide dogs and because of her efforts formal guide dog training began in America.
Now the deaf population benefits from four footed furry creatures as well as people with physical disabilities like spinal cord injuries/pathologies and neurological disabilities. This now includes autism and individuals who suffer from all aspects of the autism spectrum.
First identified by Dr. Leo Kanner in 1943, autism is a neurological brain disorder that begins in early childhood, typically within the first three years of life, and persists throughout adulthood. Autism exhibits deficiencies in verbal and non-verbal communications and social interactions because the parts of the brain
affected are language, social interaction, and creative and abstract thinking. Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) is an umbrella term and includes Autistic Disorder, Asperser’s Disorder, Retts Disorder and Childhood Disintegrative Disorder.
As with all human beings, autistic individuals have their own distinct personalities but children with autism can learn and function productively with appropriate education and treatment. People with autism process and respond to information in unique ways. For instance, they might monologue on a favorite subject in spite of efforts by others to interject comments.
Service dogs for autism assist children in different ways. Often the presence of a trained autism service dog has a calming effect allowing for better social skills and communication to develop. They provide a sense of security so abstract and concrete thinking can improve. Emotional outbursts occur less often and attention span increases. The main role of an autism service dog is increasing independence and autonomy for the individual.
Renee Premaza (a.k.a. The Jersey Dog Trainer) is a Certified Canine Behavioral Theorist. She has volunteered her time as the trainer for the Animal Adoption Center in Lindenwold, NJ and has spoken to the volunteers at the Camden County Animal Shelter and the Cumberland County SPCA animal shelter about how to clicker train their dogs in order to successfully adopt them out to their forever homes. She also provides dog training classes. To find out more information on the classes take a look at her web site.
In 2004, Premaza was invited by Patty Dobbs Gross to train puppies in the New Jersey area for the NorthStar Foundation. NorthStar breeds Golden Retrievers as service dogs primarily for children who are autistic. Premaza wrote chapter 16, "Puppies 101" in a book titled "The Golden Bridge."
There are numerous organizations which provide training for service dogs. The Autism Service Dogs of America (ASDA) located in Oregon is a non-profit, community based organization that provides uniquely trained service dogs to children living with autism and their families.
NorthStar is based in Connecticut and has been training dogs to work with autistic individuals for the past ten years. Many shelter dogs are rescued to become autism service dogs.
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Stop Puppy Mills Now!
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