pet connection

From the Los Angeles Times:

The Los Angeles City Council voted 10 to 1 Friday to approve mandatory sterilization of most dogs and cats at the age of 4 months or older, and city officials pledged low-key enforcement driven by complaints. The ordinance must get a second reading in a week, but it is expected to pass.

The measure, initiated by Councilman Richard Alarcon, offers exemptions for animals of licensed breeders, show animals and service animals.

Veterinarians who believe that sterilizing certain dogs and cats is too risky, or that four months is too young an age, can provide a letter to get the animals exempted.

The council decision Friday was greeted by cheers and a standing ovation from about 100 supporters, most wearing bright yellow stick-on badges proclaiming their position.

Proponents as well as dozens of critics filled the Van Nuys City Hall room where the council met Friday. Those in favor of mandatory sterilization and those against the measure spoke passionately and staked their positions on their concerns for healthy dogs and cats.

“The bottom line . . . is that all of you are here to save animals’ lives,” said Councilwoman Wendy Greuel.

Yes, because those of us who support no-kill solutions  (Maddie’s Fund and NoKillAdvocacyCenter) and the responsible, ethical breeding of healthy, well-socialized dogs and cats by breeders who remain responsible for those animals for life are all about killing animals.

Pretty interesting that L.A. goes this direction, considering that the L.A. Times is the news organization that has done the most to expose the selling of sick, underaged puppies from Mexican puppy-mills.

The winners in this bill? Meth-heads who abuse their pit bulls litter after litter and sell the puppies for cash aren’t going to be affected. Puppy mills who sell through the Internet or retail puppy boutiques — hello, Paris! — aren’t going to be affected. Feral cats … will keep producing more feral cats.

We’ve written about this legislation before. Click to read it all.

People who don’t pay attention to the laws now won’t in the future. And instead of a community-wide no-kill effort to truly reach the people who are causing the problems, we get feel-good crap legislation that punishes people who aren’t the problem.

Simple solutions rarely are either simple or solutions, and California is where the laws of unintended consequences are always the strongest.

***

This week I’ve got the third of three different but nonetheless extraordinary DogCars — the Honda Element SC, the new Volvo XC70 wagon and the new Mazda Tribute. I’m writing up my reviews of them all for the DogCars.com Web site today. The Tribute would be a wonderful DogCar by any measure, but the model I’ve been driving is even more spectacular — it’s a hybrid! (Alas, the hybrid model is in very limited production for 2008.)

My mother once adopted the feral kitten of a Golden Gate Park feral cat. Her name was Misty and she lived to be 22 years old, and loved my mom and pretty much no one but my mom until the day she died — held at the very end in my mother’s arms.

Probably at least in part because of Misty, I’ve admired the work done by Alley Cat Allies for a long time. If you’re not familiar with them, they are a national group seeking non-lethal means of reducing feral cat population numbers. You can read more about them and the good work they do here.

In the last year the group has raised their profile quite a bit, and have been coming out with some very hard-hitting informational pieces.

One of the projects they’ve recently come up with is a video that says it so much better than I ever could:

Pet Connection BFF Dr. Patty Khuly has been on a roll with some especially nifty postings, and the comments on those posts are just as good.

I’ve never met Dr. K, but I adore her compassion and honesty, both of which come through with every word she writes. Her post on how veterinarians dread the flood of sick pet-store puppies around the holidays is something else. Love how the parents blame the veterinarian for “ruining my kid’s Christmas” when the parents were the morons who didn’t do any research before they pulled out a credit card at the mall (or clicked on an Internet “puppy-mill direct” Web site).

Anyway, here’s the post. The comments took off in a different direction when a pet-rescue volunteer piously informed all that her group won’t allow adoptions around Christmas. That sort of idiocy makes me crazy, so I happily jumped into the fray. See, every potential adopter isn’t incompetent, and for many — especially older singles — the holidays are a slow time that’s absolutely perfect for getting a new pet off to a good start. Heck, I know some businesses that even close the week between Christmas and New Year’s, whether the employees want it off or not.

Adoption guidelines are one thing; unbreakable rules are another.

As I’ve written before, some of my best adoptions when I was running a breed rescue were people who didn’t “pencil out” — a single woman who lived in an apartment, an older couple who wanted a very young dog and a middle-aged man living with his teenaged son in a very dicey neighborhood. All three homes had the dogs for life, and stayed in touch with me for years. They turned out to be a lot better home than the “perfect” family with the perfect fence, stay-at-home mom and expensive home in a nice neighborhood who dumped the dog I placed with them years later because the kids wanted a puppy instead.

Yes, I took my adoption placements seriously, but I also looked at the bigger picture and took chances on people who my gut told me would try their best. And they did!

For me, that’s the essential story of Nathan Winograd’s “Redemption”: We rescuers too often see people as guilty until proven innocent and often look for reasons not to place a pet. We gotta drop our egos and turn that around, so people and pets have a chance to be together. Who can blame people for getting puppy mill dogs, the way some shelters and rescue groups treat them?

Dr. K’s posts on small pets for kids and the feral cat-bird debate (along with the comments) are also good, thoughtful reads.

And speaking of good, thoughtful reading, Miss Christie should bring her elegant self back in here today, since she should have met her deadline crunch by now. I’m looking forward to her posts again.

Update: The animal-rights group PETA is out with a new ad for Christmas. If they understand what really going on in shelters it’s not evident. And geez, they somehow fail to note that they themselves are for the end to all domestic animals (no more exploitation of pets!), and have a 90 percent kill rate for all the pets they take in, in addition to advocating for the extermination of all pit bulls.

But I guess that’s your fault, not PETA’s. You made them do it, you evil people.

***

On the adoption front, personal: About a month has passed since Pip joined my family from German Shepherd rescue, and what a difference!  He’s still a gangly adolescent goofus, but he’s filling out beautifully and his coat has taken on a lustrous sheen. His manners have improved and his mild separation anxiety has diminished remarkably. I adore this silly boy, and he’s going to be a great dog with more training and maturity.

The command he hears most often? “Eaaaassyyyyyyy!” That’s because he plays rough, too rough for both my 11-year-old retriever (Heather) and the 9-week-old retriever (Otter). “Leave it!” is popular, too, with regard to the cat (Miss Clara) and the rabbit (Velocity).  Pip learns quickly and wants to please, so we’re doing pretty well overall.

I’m surprised, though, that for all his sheer adolescent enthusiasm he is of all the dogs in my home the absolute best with Otter the puppy. They play gentle “bitey face” games and he plays tug-of-war — and lets her win!

The prize for “most adaptable” would have to go to Clara. My lovely young cat is thoroughly unphased by the addition of a large dog and a little puppy, and seems to have come to like them both.

From the Associated Press:

The trial of a prominent birdwatcher accused of animal cruelty for shooting a cat ended in a mistrial Friday after jurors couldn’t reach a verdict.

Jim Stevenson, the founder of the Galveston Ornithological Society, has admitted he shot the cat last fall because he saw it hunting a threatened species of bird near the San Luis Bridge Pass. If convicted, he would have faced up to two years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

The trial sparked an Internet debate between cat lovers who decry Stevenson’s actions and birders upset by the toll feral cats take on bird species. It’s also raised questions about what makes an animal a pet, especially if it lives outside.

Jurors deliberated for more than eight hours before the judge declared the mistrial.

“The jury was hopelessly deadlocked, so the government has to decide if they are going to waste more of taxpayers’ money trying this again,” said Stevenson’s attorney, Tad Nelson. “But they can try this a thousand times and they will never get a guilty because he didn’t commit a felony.”

Nelson said his client thought the cat was a stray. A state law bars the killing of domesticated animals without the owner’s permission.

But prosecutors argued that a toll bridge worker took care of the cat and named it “Mama Cat,” effectively becoming the pet’s owner. And they say Stevenson could have easily realized that if he’d looked around the bridge before firing.

The New York Times had a good piece on this case yesterday:

Mr. Stevenson, 54, does not deny using a .22-caliber rifle fitted with a scope to kill the cat, which lived under the San Luis Pass toll bridge, linking Galveston to the mainland. He also admits killing many other cats on his own property, where he operates a bed and breakfast for some of the estimated 500,000 birders who come to the island every year.

In her opening statement, Paige L. Santell, a Galveston County assistant district attorney, told the jury of eight women and four men that Mr. Stevenson “shot that animal in cold blood” and that the cat died a slow and painful death “gurgling on its own blood.”

She said that the cat had a name, Mama Cat, and that though the cat lived under a toll bridge, she was fed and cared for by a toll collector, John Newland. He is expected to testify.

Whether the cat was feral is the crucial point in this case. Mr. Stevenson was indicted under a state law that prohibited killing a cat “belonging to another.” Prompted by this case, the law was changed on Sept. 1 to include all cats, regardless of ownership.

This weekend the National Feral Cat Summit is being held in Orlando. Considering that Alley Cat Allies held a National Cat Advocacy Seminar last month in Washington, D.C., the case can be made that the tide is turning when it comes to feral cats and trap, neuter, release programs.

In publicizing its involvement in this weekend’s Florida feral fandango, the HSUS cites the results of its unhelpfully small but nonetheless interesting study, if one imagines the results would hold up with a proper sample:

The HSUS conducted surveys at several 2007 veterinary conferences and found that 40 percent of those who responded are veterinarians in private practice who provide services for feral cats at reduced costs. Almost half of the respondents were inspired to help at the urging of a client or feral cat advocacy group.

[...]

Of the 81 veterinarians in private practice:

73 respondents (90 percent) help feral cats in their community.
44 percent became involved at the request of a client*
33 percent became involved at the request of a feral cat group*
* Others became involved as veterinary students, through another
veterinarian or working at an animal shelter.

Eight respondents do not help feral cats in their community.
50 percent indicated that they never had the opportunity
25 percent indicated that they did not support TNR
25 percent did not give a reason for not helping

The study was sent by e-mail and I couldn’t find it online. I’ve asked them to put in up and send me the URL, so I’ll link to the entire release when I get it.