A tail of rescue
A university colleague once suggested that my wife Anne and I might find therapeutic help by starting a 12-step recovery group called Pets Anonymous. That was the time when we had just added a fourth foster dog to our breed brood, along with a cat and another stray dog who took to camping out in our garage. Ray thought maybe we were falling into a pet addiction profile?
Over the past 10 years, we have been a way station for Golden Retrievers, Labs, Goldendoodles, Labradoodles, a Chow, several Greyhounds (very underrated by many as pets), and one strange low-body beagle mongrel we called “Mr. Stubblefield” who loved me, hated everyone else, and often got inexplicably mad at his right rear foot. He was the garage dog who couldn’t decide whether to stay or go.
A lot of dogs are adrift and wating to be rescued by loving individuals. In fact, many of the dogs who are rescued go on to perform outstanding service for others, as is the case in the story below and of this group of lifeguard dogs from Italy who train to help stranded swimmers and boaters, often jumping from helicopters into the water to perform those rescue acts. (AP Photo/Courtesy of the Italian School of Canine Lifeguards)
The Web Connection
The connection between all these animals and the Web 2.0 media is that most of them came our way through online portals. Just about every animal rescue group has taken to the Web to find permanent or foster homes for the available animals. A very brief, partial listing of these sites includes:
- www.theanimalrescuesite.com
- www.adoptapet.com
- www.bestbriends.org
- www.puppysites.com
- www.akcorg/vreeds/rescue
- www.thepetrescue.com
- www.animalrescueinc.org
- www.purebredcatbreedrescue.org
- www.dogrescue.org
- www.animalleague.org
- www.nextdaypets.com
- www.petfinder.com
There is even a site for those wanting to rescue older dogs (www.srdogs.com) and several for those wanting to rescue horses like www.indianahorserescue.com. Then of course there are the many breed-specific sites like the Greyhound site of www.fastfriends.org.
A rescue database
To show you how these rescue sites work, let’s take a look at one of the largest and most well-known: Petfinder.com, or the last one on the above bulleted list. This outfit, which is really a kind of Grand Central Station for individual adoption agencies, is the virtual home of some 350,000 dogs, cats, horses, rabbits, reptiles, pigs, and other barnyard animals.
Petfinder is a Discovery Communications company, the same outfit that brings us the Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, TLC, Planet Green, etc. Sounds like a neat group to work for if you’re into animals, or exploring/saving the planet. Petfinder says of itself the following:
“Petfinder is an online, searchable database of animals who need homes. It is also a directory of more than 13,000 animal shelters and adoption organizations across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. Organizations maintain their own home pages and available-pet databases.”
The folks at Petfinder and the myriad of other individual adoption sites know that pet lovers have become accustomed to using the Web to find pets that best match their needs. Online searches allow them to access an individual shelter’s Web page and find out what kind of pets they have, what the rules of adoption are, whether they are no-kill shelters, how they take care of their animals, etc., etc.
Petfinder is made up of animal-care professionals and everyday animal-lovers who volunteer for local and national animal welfare organizations and groups. Together, these people maintain active and accurate homeless pet lists, and Petfinder acts as a central database for most of these organizations. It is very much like a one-stop shopping mall for pets online.
Gotta read this one
I’ll close out with the tale of one rescued tail, this one attached to a fawn-and-white Whippet named Dapper
Some breeds, like Whippets, are "acquired tastes" but the case of Dapper show the results can be great. (AP Photo/Jane Mingay)
who was jettisoned to the ASPCA because he was ill and his owner didn’t take the time to find out what exactly was wrong. An employee took interest in the dog, however, had him examined and the problem turned out to be minimal. The result? The loving owner writes:
“As the saying toes, one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. What a gem! Dapper was easily assimilated into my furry family of one Italian Greyhound and three cats – ass rescues. He aced his obedience class and went on to a career as a therapy dog, working with mentally challenged adults and nursing home residents. However, his most important work was with young men and women dying from AIDS-related illnesses. His story of being cast out because of an illness struck home with many. By empathizing with a skinny, old Whippet, they could finally express their own pain and anger.” (http://www.petfinder.com/before-pet-adoption/tale-dapper-dog.html)
What else is there to say other than, “Wow!” Or maybe even (grrrr…) “Bow Wow?”
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Comments
Nice article. These sites provide a great service and that’s how my parents found their current Golden Retriever. It just goes to show how social networks and media can provide so many services and become very specific once a social object is identified to focus on (and enough people are interested to rally around that and engage). BTW, like you, I could easily find myself with a house full of animals needing a home. It’s probably a good thing I don’t have room!
I love to read about animals. Some are fierce, fast, and intimidating while other are cute, fun, and lovable. The truth about them all, is that they are some of the most innocent creatures all around. They can’t speak when they are sick and hurting and sometimes humans out there can be very cruel with them. It’s great to know that there are organizations out there that work towards the benefit of these creatures. Animals such as cats and dogs can be a great company and they just want to be loved.
It is true that technologies like facebook and e-mail exclude the benefit of non-verbals. Society has somewhat compensated for this by creating ‘emoticons’ to display a smiley face or a wink. Still, it can be incredibly difficult to interpret meaning from text alone.
It struck me after reading the “Lost in Translation” section here what Marshall McLuhan might say. After studying his work this week, I don’t know if I am going crazy or actually starting to understand some of what he meant (which I must admit took me a while.)
I have noticed in recent correspondence at work that there is a message beyond the actual body of an e-mail. Could who you send the e-mail to mean more than what is said in the body of the text?
For example: My boss sends an e-mail to five different people in my department asking for each of us to pitch in and help on a project. Do I send the e-mail back to my boss alone, quietly volunteering to be a part of the team? Or do I hit the “reply all” button to let everyone know of my willingness to help?
Sending the e-mail only to my boss could send a message to the rest of our team that they are not important or that I am accountable only to my boss and have no need to include them in my decisions. It could also make them think I was just lazy and didn’t take the time to e-mail anyone back, including my boss.
Hitting “Reply All” and sending the message to everyone could appear as though I am performing a one-man marketing campaign to be employee of the month saying, “Sure, I can help.” Including others on the e-mail seems a lot like boasting to me. However, there are others that seem to use it a lot.
Was McLuhan right? Is the Medium the Message? Could who you choose to send the e-mail to be more important than the text contained in it?
This was a posting close to my heart. It is also a perfect example of how mass media can also improve situations of animals, humans, or even politicians. (The last was meant to be funny. I am sure there have always been thousands of homeless animals. I know from childhood experiences that animals have always been abused. It has only be in the last 20 to 30 years though that you see the ads for animal rescue, the shows about ASPCA animal cops and the mass mailings asking for help. Not to mention all the new ways to find the pet you have always wanted. Personally, I have an adopted chihuahua who was already old with no teeth when I got her. Now, she is 5 years at my home. She had to have heart worm treatment when I got her but she is doing great. I would say the love of my life, besides my daughter. I have a beagle who is slightly dumb but sweet and three cats that altogether don’t make one good pet, but they call my house, home.
Reading your blog post about the somewhat disadvantaged dogs that you and your wife have provided for, I was reminded of President Obama’s dog dilemma. Back in 2008/2009 President Barack Obama had confirmed that he and his family were planning to adopt a shelter pup jokingly, “Obviously, a lot of shelter dogs are mutts, like me,” Obama said. However, many shelters were extremely disappointed when Obama did not hold up to his claims. Instead the President adopted a purebred. Having the President adopting a shelter pup would have increased adoptions from dog shelters and would have been a positive impact. However, it was circulated by certain media groups that because Obama chose to adopt a purebred Portuguese Water dog, an increase in the dubious breeding of these water dogs would become evident, as ill breeders would want to make money off of the breed’s sudden popularity.
I am an animal lover, and it is great to read an article about something I’m so passionate about. My whole life I have had a desire to help and save animals, and have been doing so for quite some time. I adopted and saved several manatees in elementary school by raising money and going door to door. I also convinced my parents to buy several dogs over the years that were in need of a good home. Finally, in 2010, I found the site PetFinder.com. It opened up a whole new world to animals. I was able to narrow my search to find a specific breed or type of animal I was interested in. It was through this website that I ended up coming across an alaskan malamute puppy that I fell in love with. Needless to say, I purchased him with my own money, and named him Mishka. Mishka has been my best friend ever since and I owe it all to PetFinder. Thanks to online sites, a lot more animals are finding homes than ever before. The online world can be a positive step forward in instances such as this.
What great work, Dapper! Way to go!