A New Year with New Beginnings!

Happy beginnings for a great New Year!  This year will find us doing more and more work on Facebook helping the shelters find home placements for those pets placed on the euthanasia lists. It's not pretty but it's a reality. After all the help we received with Lucy and her babies it's the least we can do to help pay it forward. We will also start blogging about various rescue groups so you can see what they are all about. If you have a group you'd like to see on here please let us know!

Also we look forward to opening our online pet shop..fuzzlebutts on Bonanza.com. fuzzlebutts will not be your ordinary pet store. We are working with some of the best manufacturers to bring you items for the larger dogs that are tough and durable! Cat items that are safe and fun. We offer the Toy Go Round Cat Exercise Wheel! And we will have some of THE coolest pieces of cat furniture you've ever seen. We're not quite ready to open yet but we are diligently plugging along. We will eventually offer items for the smaller dogs too! When we do open we hope you will check it out and let us know if there are items that you would like to see!

And now a short update on Lucy and the babies now known as the B5 (Bengal 5). Lucy has become quite the plump mistress of the house. She still has no desire to go near the doors back outside. Fur has yet to fill in on her nose. She is one happy girl these days :)

And the mascot for fuzzlebutts will be Bailey! One of the B5.

this will be our avatar lol

and in closing we'd like to share this with you..not to upset you but in hopes that you'll spay and neuter your pets, not to take them for granted and to realize above all else how much they depend on us, that they are not disposable!

Kitty Kisses and Doggy Hugs,

fuzzlebutts

Disposable animals..the sad truth

by Pets on Death Row on Thursday, January 20, 2011 at 2:18pm

You can't keep your pet? Really? BY A Shelter Director

I think our society needs a huge "Wake-up" call. As a shelter manager, I am going to share a little insight with you all...a view from the inside if you will.


First off, all of you people who have ever surrendered a pet to a shelter or humane society should be made to work in the "back" of an animal shelter for just one day. Maybe if you saw the life drain from a few sad, lost, confused eyes, you would stop flagging the ads on craigslist and help these animals find homes.
That puppy you just bought will most likely end up in my shelter when it's not a cute little puppy anymore. Just so you know there's a 90% chance that dog will never walk out of the shelter it’s dumped at? Purebred or not! About 25% of all of the dogs that are "owner surrenders" or "strays", that come into a shelter are purebred dogs.


The most common excuses: "We are moving and we can't take our dog (or cat)." Really? Where are you moving too that doesn't allow pets? Or they say "The dog got bigger than we thought it would". How big did you think a German Shepherd would get? "We don't have time for her". Really? I work a 10-12 hour day and still have time for my 6 dogs! "She's tearing up our yard". How about making her a part of your family? They always tell me "We just don't want to have to stress about finding a place for her we know she'll get adopted, she's a good dog".


Odds are your pet won't get adopted & how stressful do you think being in a shelter is? Well, let me tell you, your pet has 72 hours to find a new family from the moment you drop it off. Sometimes a little longer if the shelter isn't full and your dog manages to stay completely healthy. If it sniffles, it dies. Your pet will be confined to a small run/kennel in a room with other barking or crying animals. It will have to relieve itself where it eats and sleeps. It will be depressed and it will cry constantly for the family that abandoned it. If your pet is lucky, I will have enough volunteers in that day to take him/her for a walk. If I don't, your pet won't get any attention besides having a bowl of food slid under the kennel door and the waste sprayed out of its pen with a high-powered hose. If your dog is big, black or any of the "Bully" breeds (pit bull, rottie, mastiff, etc) it was pretty much dead when you walked it through the front door. Those dogs just don't get adopted. It doesn't matter how 'sweet' or 'well behaved' they are.


If your dog doesn't get adopted within its 72 hours and the shelter is full, it will be destroyed. If the shelter isn't full and your dog is good enough, and of a desirable enough breed it may get a stay of execution, but not for long . Most dogs get very kennel protective after about a week and are destroyed for showing aggression. Even the sweetest dogs will turn in this environment. If your pet makes it over all of those hurdles chances are it will get kennel cough or an upper respiratory infection and will be destroyed because the shelter gets paid a fee to euthanize each animal and making money is better than spending money to take this animal to the vet.


Here's a little euthanasia 101 for those of you that have never witnessed a perfectly healthy, scared animal being "put-down". First, your pet will be taken from its kennel on a leash. They always look like they think they are going for a walk happy, wagging their tails. Until they get to "The Room", every one of them freaks out and puts on the brakes when we get to the door. It must smell like death or they can feel the sad souls that are left in there, it's strange, but it happens with every one of them. Your dog or cat will be restrained, held down by 1 or 2 shelter workers depending on the size and how freaked out they are. Then a shelter worker who we call a euthanasia tech (not a vet) find a vein in the front leg and inject a lethal dose of the "pink stuff". Hopefully your pet doesn't panic from being restrained and jerk. I've seen the needles tear out of a leg and been covered with the resulting blood and been deafened by the yelps and screams. They all don't just "go to sleep", sometimes they spasm for a while, gasp for air and defecate on themselves. You see shelters are trying to make money to pay employee pay checks and don’t forget the board of directors needs to be paid too, so we don’t spend our funds to tranquilize the animal before injecting them with the lethal drug, we just put the burning lethal drug in the vein and let them suffer until dead. If it were not a “making money issue” and we had to have a licensed vet do this procedure, the animal would be sedated or tranquilized and then euthanized, but to do this procedure correctly would cost more money so we do not follow what is right for the animal, we just follow what is the fastest way we can make a dollar. Shelters do not have to have a vet perform their euthanasia’s so even if it takes our employee 50 pokes with a needle and 3 hours to get the vein that is what we do. Making money is the issue here not loosing money.


Then it all ends, your pets corpse will be stacked like firewood in a large freezer in the back with all of the other animals that were killed waiting to be picked up like garbage. What happens next? Cremated? Taken to the dump? Rendered into pet food? Or used for the schools to dissect and experiment on? You'll never know and it probably won't even cross your mind. It was just an animal and you can always buy another one, right!


I hope that those of you who still have a beating heart and have read this are bawling your eyes out and can't get the pictures out of your head, I deal with this everyday. I hate my job, I hate that it exists & I hate that it will always be there unless you people make some changes and start educating the public. Do research, do your homework, and know exactly what you are getting into before getting a pet. These shelters and humane societies exist because people just do not care about animals anymore. Animals were not intended to be disposable but somehow that is what they are these days. Animal shelters are an easy way out when you get tired of your dog (or cat), and breeders are the ones blamed for this. Animal shelters and rescue organizations are making a hefty profit by keeping this misconception going.


Between 9 and 11 MILLION animals die every year in shelters and only you can stop it. I just hope I maybe changed one persons mind about taking their dog to a shelter, a humane society, or buying a dog. For those of you that care--- please repost this to at least one other craiglist in another city/state. Let's see if we can get this all around the US and have an impact.


Now you see why fuzzlebutts wants to get involved.....this could have been any of our 11 kids :(

We almost lost our Lucy.......

Being as I'm not feeling so good I'm having my human mom write for me

On Wednesday, Aug 25th, Lucy and the kittens were all scheduled for their sterilization. The babies are just about 10 weeks old and weigh between 2.5 and 4 pounds. As expected we were a nervous wreck for our new little family as we dropped them off at 8am and couldn't pick them up till the following morning at 7:30am. Bright and early Thursday morning we were first in line to pick up our crew. Couldn't understand why they kept avoiding us and left us till last.

They came out with all the carriers except Lucy's. Babies were all being sent home but there had been a problem with Lucy. Briefly told that she had ripped out her sutures overnight and that they were stabilizing her for a return to surgery to see what happened. Spent most of the day making call after call to see what was going on. If it were not for all of you dear friends we would have been even more more upset than what we were.

Finally got thru and was told we could pick Lucy up at 3pm. When spaying they cut or separate the uterine horns and the uterine body

Once the cuts are made they are closed by what they call ligatures.

After her surgery all seemed well with Lucy. Staff is there very late at nite and return early in the am with a few hours of no staffing there. When they returned in the morning they found Lucy in a pile of blood and in critical condition. Took them 8 boxes of gauze pads to just soak up the blood pooled around her, put her on oxygen, IV fluids and a heating pad with a tech holding a pressure bandage on her incision.

Apparently the ligatures on the 2 ascending cuts were fine. However on the descending cut, the ligatures knots untied and she began bleeding in to her belly. When the pressure in her belly became too much, Lucy ripped out her sutures, inside and out, to let the blood drain out and she continued to bleed until they found her. Once stabilized, which took most of the day, they took her back into surgery. Again another incision to find out the problem, re-tie the ligatures, double check the other ones, and close her back up. I think they knew we would not let her stay there another night alone and unsupervised.

Back home on Thursday evening, our poor Lucy was an absolute mess. The anesthesia and pain meds for 2 days in a row really took it's toll. She was so dazed and almost confused, any slight noise just startled the daylights out of her. In between we were also monitoring the babies and trying to console our other pets who had no idea what was going and why they weren't allowed in certain rooms.

That night, Lucy was frantic and the only way to calm her was to hold her. She wanted nothing to do with a cage or an elizabethan collar. So I stayed up and held her for 4 hours straight just gently talking to her. She let her self relax. Managed to try the cage one more time for about 20 minutes, but went back to holding. So the entire night I just held her to my chest with her head tucked under my chin and let her sleep.

By Friday morning she was still groggy but very anxious about her kittens, we periodically took her in to see that they were ok and sleeping. By this time all the kittens had rallied around. Only one of the little females was a bit shocky at first, but holding her most of Wednesday night calmed her down. She was the only one that seemed to experience any pain but that seemed to subside by Thursday nite.

This post has taken me days to get completed..it's now Sunday morning and things are beginning to look up. Last night Lucy was just kind of blank and staring into space. We wrapped her tummy in a towel and sat her on the couch beside me and let the kittens out. 4 of the 5 just kind of zipped by as they were more intent on just running themselves ragged. The 5th kitten, was the little female who was initially kind of shocky. Her and Lucy just seemed to melt in to each other. Nuzzling and bathing her baby till she was soaked, Lucy seemed almost back to normal. Normal will take time as she is still run down from blood loss and tires very easily but at this time the things are finally looking up.

I'm tired but oh so much better

This is Lucy's belly today, 4 days after the double surgery. She is still quite swollen and bruised. She may not appear swollen but she had lost so much weight that it almost makes her look normal. Unfortunately it's all swelling on her tummy and inner legs

    

Here's the babies resting up

except for this guy who's feeding his fat little face again. He's the biggest at 4 pounds

Our sincerest thanks and gratitude to all our extended family on Bonanzle and the Pet Finders Forum for their many prayers and good wishes for Lucy's recovery. If it had not been for you all, we would have never survived ourselves much less Lucy. Such a great and loving bunch of people that it is our pleasure to call them part of our family. So many, many thanks and undying gratitude for those that sent donations to help with the mounting bills, mainly food bills now. Just this family is consuming 18 cans of Fancy Feast per day!....may God bless you all for helping raise this family of felines..these are your babies too! We love them all to death and have only wanted the best for them

On Lucy's behalf...many heartfelt kitty kisses and hugs to you all,

Mary & Russ

Lucy & her Babies

Sofy & Joey

Sammy, Jessy & Billy

I am in love and with the wrong person?

This has been a rough week! I have been out mixing with all my new brothers and sisters and WHAM, something went askew. Mom says I'm in heat. I was all cranky then suddenly became all lovey with everything in site. I loved all the furniture, I rolled all over the place, even down the basement stairs. Do cats get PMS? I kinda think so. I tried loving the boy cats, but Jessy and Billy just look at me all dumb and bewildered and sit like lumps. I have been screaming my little lungs out for over 24 hours non-stop. My little bum just stays stuck up in the air and no one is interested except for one. My new bestest friend.

I have found my new soul mate, Joey. I have been trying to seduce him too but it just isn't working! Darn it! Joey just follows me around nuzzling and licking my head. However, no one informed me he has this drooling problem, so he is quite messy. And he has this annoying problem with wanting to shake paws with me all the time...his paws are as big as my head.

So mom and dad are trying like crazy to raise some money to get me "fixed". Guess if Joey could do it so can I. And the babies all have to be done at the same time if we want the discount deal. Mom says I absolutely cannot even think about looking outside, although I go back to the window well where I came in from and yell for help! I'm telling you, us cats get PMS too...I'm acting so wild and crazy. I'm grabbing my babies and just dragging them around for no reason. Then I have to meow as loud as I can..dad says I can out scream any Marshall mini stack..what ever that means. Wonder if they make Midol for cats?????

So here I am with my new Bonanzle ranch hat on..think I would do this if i was in my right mind?

And oh my, here's my new bestest guy pal that I'm in love with. OK I know you think he looks a bit goofy with his cowboy hat but oh he can turn my head with his good looks and charm. He's a younger man too! He's only 8 months old..does that make me a cougar now?

And the babies..what can I say

Mom says edumacation is very impotant, I'm halfway thru this seesaurus

Got my ranch hat and ready to do my chores. Got the mouse! Who would ever name a mouse Dell? That is just so lame.

You sure you don't need more help? Honest..I really want to help. I can unplug the keyboard again for you..would that help? Did you know how pages you can open at one time plus install wizards at the same time. What's a wizard by the way?

Mom says that you have to to take a bath every single day....personally I think it's overkill. Besides my tongue gets tired.

Can we puhleeezzz go shopping now? Look at all this cool stuff on Bonanzle  I'm sitting on all the right buttons so lets go find cat tree, and some more foods, some treats and some toys and, and, and ....

How could someone not wuz me? or my mom? I don't understand......

Dad says I've been on the computer long enough. Says he has to try and make some money to take care of all 11 of us! So gotta go for now, I have this incredible urge to keep screaming and meowing as loud as I can.

Kitty Kisses,

Lucy and the Babies

Hello Friends!

It's been hard to keep up with my blog! The babies are now 6 1/2 weeks old and growing like crazy. They weigh between 1 pound 6 ounces and 1 pound 13 ounces. I wasn't feeling so good for a couple of weeks. I had bad diarrhea and was losing weight, not like I had any extra to spare. We went to the vet for our first parasite testing about 2 weeks ago and we were all negative. Still got a dose of icky tasting deworming medicine and have to get another dose on August 10th. Vet said she had no clue as to why my tummy was so upset. But hey, I got to have lots of fresh chicken and rice, yogurt and cheese...think I'll be sick more often.

Me and the kids have been keeping mom and dad really busy. The babies have learned to play really well and jump up on everything. Mom's office desk is pretty cool to play hockey on..everything gets thrown off on the floor lol. And then there's the shelves of china to get lost in..so many places to check out.

This past week I've been going out to meet my new brothers and sisters. Samantha is a 20 year old kitty that tolerates me pretty well but is not exactly enthused about the kitties pouncing on her. Billy is 11 years old and Jessy is 8 years old. I pounded them good a couple of times and they are afraid of me...showed them who's boss! Then Sofy is an 7 year old Black Lab/Chow who loves me and the babies. Joey is the 8 month old Great Pyrenees/St. Bernard..boy is he a handful! Joey loves all of us but we have to watch him with the kittens because he gets so excited. The babies just love to crawl all over him and nest in his fur, especially that big ol tail.

Mom has to update our ChipIn page because she says we need some help to get the next round of parasite medicine and then to get us us all spayed/neutered. Before they could take us anywhere we had to get a pet carrier for me and a much bigger one for all the kids. Plus we are running out of food again. Guess we eat an awful lot lol

I am so happy in my new house! I just feel so comfortable here. I can lay down where ever I want, there's always food, water, toys and lots of attention. Thanks to all of you who helped me get here...it's the bestest ever. Here's some pictures of us! Enjoy!

Hope you all have a fabulous week! We got a new kind of litter box and we have to go try it out! Mom says it's great. It's called the Breeze Litter System by Tidy Cat   No more litter all over the place and no more perfume. We'll see you later!

Kitty Kisses,

Lucy and the Babies

p.s.  feel free to tweet us or facebook us, it would be really appreciated!