[ SHOWGSD-L ] Re: [KatrinaAnimalReliefLA] Owners comb kennels for lost pets

  • From: Crossroadsgsd@xxxxxxx
  • To: showgsd-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 22:07:27 EDT

 
 

By SONYA  KIMBRELL
skimbrell@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Advocate staff writer

GONZALES  -- When Phillip and Janice Manuel evacuated their Gentilly home for 
Hurricane  
Katrina, they thought they'd be back in a couple of days.

They went  with their 16-year-old son and Janice Manuel's mother to Atlanta. 
They left  
their two Doberman pinschers in the utility room with enough food and  water 
for about 
four days.

Tears streamed down Janice Manuel's face  as she waited outside Barn One at 
the Lamar-
Dixon Exposition Center on  Sunday where 2,400 animals are being held after 
being 
rescued in New  Orleans.

She stood back as her husband looked through the dog  kennels.

"We're looking for a mother and son," Phillip Manuel  said.

Janice Manuel described her pets. Diva, 4, is elegant and poised.  Valentino 
was born on 
Valentine's Day. He's already as big as his  mother.

"I helped deliver her puppies. There were five. Two lived. We  gave one to 
friends and kept 
Valentino," Janice Manuel  said.

Ascension Parish Sheriff Jeff Wiley on Saturday closed the  shelter at 
Lamar-Dixon to 
receiving new animals.

David Dorfman,  public information officer for the Humane Society of the 
United States,  
said the closure was because Lamar-Dixon is at capacity.

But,  Dorfman said, about 400 animals were shipped out Sunday to other 
locations in  the 
U.S., so they should be able to accept more rescues from New Orleans  today.

Dorfman estimated about 11,000 pets displaced from the hurricane  are being 
housed at 
various locations. He said the only animals being  euthanized are ones with 
extreme 
aggression or that are  diseased.

Several organizations are involved with the rescue effort and  the effort to 
reunite pets with 
owners, including the Humane Society, the  SPCA and other smaller rescue 
organizations 
and shelter groups from all  over the country.

Hundreds of volunteers are working at Lamar-Dixon to  clean cages, walk dogs, 
feed 
animals, handle paperwork and all the tasks  that go along with caring for 
cats, dogs, pigs, 
rabbits, goats and other  pets.

"We've never handled so many," Dorfman said. "After Hurricane  Andrew, I 
think, there were 
400 animals."

The rescue efforts in New  Orleans are continuing and volunteers are trying 
to get as much  
information about the animals as possible to include on microchips being  
embedded in 
the animals.

Information about the rescued animals will  be on the Web at 
http://www.petfinder.com.

The effort is not without  glitches.

Jessica Williams evacuated New Orleans to Houston, leaving  her dog behind 
with her sister.

Williams got an e-mail on Thursday that  her dog, a Shih Tzu named Honey 
Bunny, had 
been rescued with tags intact  and was at Lamar-Dixon.

Williams drove back to Houston Sunday afternoon  without her dog and with new 
frustration.

She found a picture of  her dog that had been taken with two other dogs in a 
kennel at  
Lamar-Dixon, so she knows the dog was there at some point.

"The  other two dogs were there, but mine was not," Williams said.

She looked  several times through the hundreds of kennels with no luck.

A  veterinarian remembered treating a Shih Tzu that was sent to Parker 
Coliseum,  so 
Williams headed there. She said she understands that nobody expected to  deal 
with 
thousands of animals, but the confusion was  frustrating.

Williams said one worker suggested that her dog had been  stolen, and even 
more 
disturbing for Williams, a volunteer offered her  another dog.

"She said, 'Look at this one; it's cute.' I told her I  didn't want that dog; 
I wanted my dog," 
Williams said.

Although the  U.S. Department of Agriculture is overseeing the animal rescue 
effort, at  
Lamar-Dixon there's no clear central command.

Sharon McClellan  works with a Baton Rouge group called Homeward Bound that 
tries to 
match  lost animals with their owners.

She's been volunteering at Lamar-Dixon  since Sept. 2. She said Sunday that 
she was asked 
to stop scanning animals  for microchips that might contain information about 
owners.

"I'm just  worried about the lack of a unified effort.," McClellan said. 
"It's just  heartbreaking. 
Some of these people have lost everything. Their pets are  all they might 
have left."

Dorfman said he wasn't aware of that  situation, and said he would have to 
investigate the  
problems.

Meanwhile, the Manuels had no luck finding their pets in  the first barn and 
were on their 
way to look through more.

"My  husband says he's never leaving the house again," Janice Manuel  said



 

Cathleen Bennett
_www.crossroadsgsd.com_ (http://www.crossroadsgsd.com/) 
We  have puppies 


============================================================================
POST is Copyrighted 2005.  All material remains the property of the original 
author and of GSD Communication, Inc. NO REPRODUCTIONS or FORWARDS of any kind 
are permitted without prior permission of the original author  AND of the 
Showgsd-l Management. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 

ALL PERSONS ARE ON NOTICE THAT THE FORWARDING, REPRODUCTION OR USE IN ANY 
MANNER OF ANY MATERIAL WHICH APPEARS ON SHOWGSD-L WITHOUT THE EXPRESS 
PERMISSION OF ALL PARTIES TO THE POST AND THE LIST MANAGEMENT IS EXPRESSLY 
FORBIDDEN, AND IS A VIOLATION OF LAW. VIOLATORS OF THIS PROHIBITION WILL BE 
PROSECUTED. 

For assistance, please contact the List Management at admin@xxxxxxxxxxxx

VISIT OUR WEBSITE - http://www.showgsd.org
============================================================================

Other related posts:

  • » [ SHOWGSD-L ] Re: [KatrinaAnimalReliefLA] Owners comb kennels for lost pets