APS volunteer brings light to dogs in need of new homes

The national economic slowdown has had reverberations across wide number of domains, and pets are no exceptions. The horror stories in the press of late have ranged from tales of horses abandoned in the wake of rising feed prices, to food pantries striving to add pet foods to the mix for owners who can't afford it.

Durham's own Animal Protection Society of Durham, does a yeoman's job of trying to find homes for as many animals that make their way to its front door as possible. (Unlike Orange County's APS -- which maintains a bucolic facility in Mebane stocked with pets hand-picked from shelters in Orange and neighboring counties -- APS of Durham is co-located with the County's animal shelter on E. Club Blvd.) A job that's not easy in the best of times, and which gets even harder in the worst of times.

The hard-working volunteer staff at Durham's APS does their best to find homes for the companions in their facility. Now, one volunteer, Eunice Chang, is taking the effort to the blogosphere with her new web site, Bull City Dogs.

Chang's providing some great photos of dogs in need of new homes and will also cover general pooch-related topics from time to time.

Keep in mind that if you're looking for a cat or dog, you can see all the pets available through APS and many through Independent Animal Rescue as well at the APS web site.

Comments

[Dan S.]

Both of our dogs came through APS (one directly, two-years-ago-yesterday; the other via Independent Animal Rescue last July). It broke our hearts to walk through the kennels at APS, to see all the dogs that no one wanted, and to know that we couldn't adopt more than two.

In fact, as I was buckling our first dog into the car for the ride home from the APS, a woman pulled up with a carboard box containing 12 purebred German Shorthair puppies that she'd bred and couldn't find buyers for, so she was dumping them at the APS. Half of me wanted to cry, the other half to smack her.

[Steve]

Another volunteer has also just started heading up an effort to video tape all of the dogs and cats and post these videos to YouTube. Initial findings are that they are experiencing a 100% adoption rate for these animals. I expect that with the efforts of the many people that have stepped forward to volunteer with this effort that we will soon see videos for all of the animals online. I'm hopeful that this effort will help to publicize all of the wonderful animals available at APS and that these animals will be adopted instead of purchasing a dog/cat from a puppy mill or back yard breeder.

[barry]

Dan - all of me would have wanted to smack her.

Steve - would be nice if Durham County had a plan to discourage "back yard breeders" instead of offering them discounts on their registration fees, wouldn't it?

i'm so tired of the "if only we had more money, we could do something about it" approach to animal welfare (among other things) in Durham County. Just how many of the programs that need to be happening do our elected officials expect volunteers to keep stepping up to the plate for?

[Steve]

Barry - by "discount" I'm assuming you mean that the country does not enforce the collection of registration fees ($10 for altered dogs, $75 for intact). I recently heard (can't remember where now) that only 60% of the county dogs are registered. I personally think that number is too high. I'll bet that it's lower.

Sometimes I wonder why I bother paying fees for registering our dogs (all three neutered), paying for dog park tags, etc. when so many others can't be bothered to do so, and the rules aren't enforced.

At the most basic level, people don't register their dogs for the same reasons that they speed through our neighborhood streets - because they can, and there is nothing being done to prevent them from doing so and punishing those who do.

Once the city and county start enforcing the various laws already on the books, it will go a long way towards making Durham a much better place for us and our animal companions.

[Barry]

Steve - Maybe it's changed recently, but you used to get a discount on your unneutered animals if you had more than one of them, ie - breeder's discount. The number i've heard is that 60% of the county's animals are *unlicensed*. Although anyone who read my blog today knows that number has gone down by one.

http://dependableerection.blogspot.com/2008/06/animal-control-followup.html