Reality bites, while TV crews keep recording
By David S. Greene
July 8, 2010
When a county shelter in a major community like Dade County, Fla. is profiled on television, don’t you think they’d plead with viewers to please, please adopt animals so they don’t have to kill them? According to Yes Biscuit!, that’s what happened, except business went on as normal anyway.
With a television crew on site, a 4-month-old puppy was killed. YesBiscuit puts it best in the following:
Yeah I guess no one will adopt him NOW but golly, doncha think having a frelling TV news crew at the shelter would have been a super opportunity to put a spit-shine on this li’l monkey and a bandanna around his neck and mention that he’s looking for a new best friend? He probably would have been adopted by the end of the day and perhaps even some other dogs could have benefited from the overflow. But instead of doing something to help him get adopted while the news crew was there, the shelter chose to kill him.
And in case you didn’t get the point, the shelter operations manager drives it into the dirt:
[Xiomara] Mordcovich said, “People need to realize what happens here, and they need to understand that this is the consequence of what happens in the community out there. This is what we all do to our best friend.”
WE ALL? – No ma’am. This is not what we all do to our best friend. Killing pets and blaming the public is what you do. WE ALL are a humane society and we don’t want pets killed because they’re homeless. We want them sheltered until new homes can be secured. That’s why it’s called an animal shelter. Look it up.
Yep, what better way to teach people kindness than to kill pets to teach them .. uh … um … what? And the shelter industry wonders why the no-kill movement is gaining ground …
What do they know, and how do they know it? The bond between people and pets that Dr. Becker talks about so eloquently is based largely on mutual trust. Studies out of Duke University’s Canine Cognition Center are revealing new insights. From the Charlotte Observer:
Brian Hare, the Duke evolutionary anthropology researcher who runs the center, opened his lab last fall as part of a small research field nationwide looking at canine cognition.
[...]
To test how quickly and accurately dogs process hand gestures, Hare and his group test them with a modified shell game. Hare shows the dog a piece of food, hides it under a cup, and steps back to see if the dog can find it. Then the test gets harder. He adds a cup, shields both while he hides the food, steps back and points to the cup hiding the treat. At first, most dogs hesitate to trust anyone other than their owner to lead them to food. Over time, however, many realize strangers can also be truthful about where to find snacks. The question is how and why they make that deduction.
A separate piece on Discovery.com compares and contrasts the cognition of dogs with that of horses.
According to the study, published in the latest issue of Animal Behaviour, horses are able to decipher certain types of human-given visual and auditory cues. Dogs, however, appear to be far more adept than any other species at figuring out what we are trying to communicate, especially when we’re attempting to direct an animal’s attention to an external object. The reverse “Dr. Doolittle” phenomenon — how well animals understand us — seems to be tied to two factors: domestication and an animal’s predisposition to how we communicate.
Studies show dogs excel in the testing, but Animal Behaviour researchers also believe that with more training, horses would improve greatly. The difference is that dogs don’t need so much training. They just get us. Cats, well, they’d prefer to have us to do what they want. There’s something to be said for that, too, don’t you think?
Submarining hot dog: I’d be the first to tell you that dachshunds are an odd breed. This Los Angeles Times story shows how adventurous some doxies can be. A Russian guy named Sergei Gorbunov is a professional scuba diver in Vladivostock, and his dachshund Boniface doesn’t want to be left behind. I know that Cami and Harry love to swim, but neither of them enjoys going underwater. Boniface is different. Decidedly different.
[Gorbunov] had a diving suit complete with helmet made for the dog and is teaching him the tricks of the trade. In a recent demonstration, Boniface barked eagerly as Gorbunov readied the equipment and uncomplainingly endured being hung upside-down as Gorbunov fitted the suit on him.
No thanks, Sergei. If it’s all the same to you, we’ll stick to wading placidly in local ponds and rivers.
Poll shows the word hasn’t gotten out yet: Our friend Valerie Hayes conducted an informal reader Examiner poll to get a sense of people’s impressions of PETA, well-documented record of killing the animals in its care.
Seems most of the respondents, animal-lovers all, presumably, had no idea of PETA’s record, which is on file with the Commonwealth of Virginia. My take on it? I’m not surprised. That said, as long as the word hasn’t gotten out, it’s best not to stay silent. Education is always beneficial. So here at Pet Connection, we’ll keep working at it.
The best article of the week: Here’s this week’s example of an article I want you to read because it’s just flat out interesting. The story of Eadweard Muybridge. You may know him from his 19th century filmed motion studies, especially his images proving horses did lift all four feet off the ground when they galloped, but there’s so much more. From Randy Malamud in The Chronicle of Higher Education. It’s just a great piece.
I always like to hear from readers, especially if you have tips, and links for interesting stories. Give me a shout in the comments, or better yet, send me an e-mail.
Photo credits: Miami puppy, YesBiscuit. Boniface, AP.
A couple months ago a FB friend who has pitbulls sent me a message about 7 English shepherds who had been dumped in a rural Indiana pound by a puppymiller who found them not lucrative.
She’d gotten the info from HER FB friend who volunteers at the shelter, and had found this influx of 7 to be unusual enough to mention.
So two degrees of separation to an ES rescue person, and all the ES were quickly on their way to ES-savvy homes — two adopted directly from the pound, and five, including a very pregnant bitch, to NESR foster homes. Freeing up space at the shelter and getting them off the public dole.
Today I found out that this volunteer and a few others have been responsible for the pound killing NO healthy animals (she says they put down two badly-injured dogs) in the last 18 months. Just with Petfinder and social networking, posting pictures and generally working their asses off.
http://www.petfinder.com/pet-s.....erid=IN432
The pound is not officially no-kill. It just hasn’t had to kill for space for 18 months.
Their previous kill rate was 70%.
Miami-Dade FAIL.
I see their “pit bull” ban is working well for them. They have pages and pages of “American bulldogs” and boxers on their petfinder listing. And German shepherds, chows, and “pit bull terriers.”
FYI, the poverty rate in Dade County is 16.5%. In Jay County, 14.3%. National was 13.2% (All 2008 figures.) (Compare to Detroit, 26.1% or Pittsburgh 20.4%.)
Comment by H. Houlahan — July 8, 2010 @ 8:22 am
I’m afraid that until no-kill legislation reaches every animal shelter, things will be bad. The interesting thing is, that in my travels I have found people to assume that because it’s a “humane society” that it is automatically no kill. They’re shocked when I tell them otherwise.
That scuba dog reminded me of Hawkeye and Mutley, the scuba diving cat and dog combo. I had been meaning to post their video, along with the Russian scuba cat on my site. So thanks for that reminder!
Comment by Kurt Schmitt — July 8, 2010 @ 8:30 am
I can;t even look at that clip. Uh- feel sick every time I see this.
Comment by ericka — July 8, 2010 @ 10:40 am
Oh my God. I just read this about the puppy. I am shocked and sick at heart. That’s just … God, I don’t even know what. Too awful.
Comment by Glenye Oakford — July 11, 2010 @ 6:01 pm
“WE ALL? – No ma’am. This is not what we all do to our best friend. Killing pets and blaming the public is what you do. WE ALL are a humane society and we don’t want pets killed because they’re homeless. We want them sheltered until new homes can be secured. That’s why it’s called an animal shelter. Look it up.”
But we aren’t a humane society—if we were, 3-4 million pets wouldn’t be killed in shelters every year!
I agree that it’s incredible that they chose to kill this dog instead of highlighting him on air, but it doesn’t change the fact that this happens every minute of every day in this country.
We are all to blame here: we are responsible for not caring, for not making shelters accountable, for not doing enough.
“Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.”
Albert Schweitzer
Comment by Patricia C — July 21, 2010 @ 7:23 am
Patricia … a tiny, tiny shift in the percentages of people who adopt from shelters/rescues rather than other sources would cover every single adoptable animal, and include animals that could be made adoptable with medical care and/or training. A 90 percent live release rate for a no-kill country, every shelter in the land.
Shelters could be actually be what they claim to be — a place that protects and cares for an animal in a time of need — not places that see their job as killing pets and blaming/hating people.
There are communities now across the country — urban, rural, suburban — where this is happening. And there are more all the time.
The problem is a lack of vision and a surplus of blame. But that’s changing.
No, “we” are not all responsible for these deaths, because most of us ARE responsible pet owners. The blame game needs to end.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — July 21, 2010 @ 7:40 am
Gina:
I stand by what I said. I am not playing the blame game: I am saying that we all need to be responsible, and we do.
When I say “we” I include that group that you mention in the first sentence in your post. They are part of the “we”. Shelters are part of the “we”, communities that care about their pets are part of the “we”.
This is everyone’s problem, and I think that we all need to be accountable. Shelters generally aren’t self-governing: they answer to a board of directors, a city council or to some other authority. If the shelter refuses to change then we, the public, need to effect the change in whatever avenues are available to us.
I was part of a group that brought Nathan Winograd into my community to teach us about no kill. Is my community finally no kill? No, it is not. You just can’t fix apathy.
Thanks for the forum and for the opportunity for discourse. This has become one of my favorite blogs.
Comment by Patricia C — July 21, 2010 @ 7:43 pm