Kerry's update: May 19, 2009

Sanctuary animal updates:
Since our last update on April 9th the following dogs were adopted: Terry (that is him in the picture with his new brother), Ellie (came back and was adopted again), Sarah, Chet, Apricot, Liberty, Jinx, Fiona, Slash, Magnolia, Banker, Sampson, Lil Ann, Greta, Bundy, Willie, Randall, Tanner, Sissy, Kelly, Winner, Alex, Swampy, Chester, Nyssa, Llaylia, Aggie (came back), Keena, Lab Lady, Shep Lady, Elvis, Deja, Jack, Bella, Moet, Vu, Bubba (went BACK home), Johnny Cash, Bertha, Max, Deja, Boxcar Willie, Chester, Hola, Amigo, Major, Lima Bean, Fresco, Limo, Sadie, Joe, Blondie, Memphis Belle, Sable, and Brittany. Cashew – A CAT – went home too! YES WE ADOPTED OUT A CAT! Almost 60 animals found homes this month. Nice going team. The staff at Pets Alive, and our volunteers – are AMAZING.
Some standouts as far as adoptions goes this month are Elvis, Swampy, Liberty and Moet. Liberty and Moet were not here that long but Moet was an elderly pitbull – 12 years old. Liberty was a pit bull mama that was the sweetest dog but she did have some saggy teets from birthing so often. Her new family looked past that and loved her instantly. Swampy was adopted by Russ and his family. I have mentioned them before and how much they do for us here. They took Swampy home to work with him on some issues and this crazy, badly behaved, dog aggressive, mouthy, husky is now perfectly obedient and living with all their other adopted dogs. Check this link for some updates and pictures. Russ is really amazing and he and his family are all wonderful to us. We’re really happy for Swampy.
Elvis was probably here the longest of any adoptable dog. I think he spent almost two years here and he was going stir crazy, circling in his run and just always agitated. He needed more exercise, he needed a family, he needed OUT of here, but though many people came to meet him, none took him home – until this month. Here is an update and photos of Elvis in his new happy home! There has been tremendous joy here at Pets Alive now that he has finally found his home.
Gift Cards
Looking for the perfect gift? Give Pets Alive for all your occasions. Make a donation to Pets Alive in someone’s name and we’ll send them a card that you can personalize. We currently have six cards (dogs, cats, mouse, horse, etc) to choose from, and six different occasions (Birthday, Celebration, Sympathy, etc). Click here to see all our cards and send one today! You can also add a personal message to your card.
Animal Cares and Concerns
Houma is recovering pretty well. He is keeping down food and has started to gain weight. Still not completely out of the woods, but doing pretty well so far. We lost two animals this month. Ruby, a hound mix died after complications from a previous surgery before she came to Pets Alive. She appeared to have a punctured intestine. We did surgery, but once opened up, there was nothing that could be done for her and so we had to let her go. It was a very difficult loss. She was a very sweet dog with a horrible life before she got here. We mourn her passing very much. We also lost a puppy that came up in another transport. He died a few days after arriving here. Transports can be very difficult on puppies.
Greta had her surgery and it all went well. Thanks to Nicole, the veterinarian who donated her time and skills to do the surgery for us, Greta is doing well and was actually adopted by one of the nurses at the hospital.
Sterling managed to slice up his paw pad pretty bad, on what we still don’t know, and had to get stitched up. He didn’t seem to notice.
Poor Lonesome was also attacked – through the fence! He let his tail wander into the pen next to him and the dog there thought it would be a fun tug toy. Not so fun for Lonesome. Off to the vet to get fixed up. He is doing fine now and we took the opportunity (while he was under) to bathe and groom him!
Biggie, a HUGE dog we took in, has a serious weight problem. Compound that with an upper respiratory infection and this makes for a very sick dog. We are doing the best we can for him and we’re hoping he will pull through this. Biggie is about 60 pounds overweight. Please take a look at your dog. How anyone could let a dog get to this size is beyond us all. You are not doing any favors by giving your dog “excess” food or treats. Fat dogs have joint issues, arthritis issues, can develop diabetes, heart problems, and a whole host of other problems. It is easier to KEEP weight off than to try to get them to lose it. If we are successful in getting Biggie down to size it will take us over a year to do so. Exercising your dog not only keeps his weight problem down but virtually eliminates issues such as destruction, aggressive tendencies and a string of other behavior issues. A dog with plenty of exercise is a dog that is not bored and won’t resort to other means to keep himself stimulated. WALKING is NOT exercise for most dogs. It is better than nothing – but running, chasing a ball, playing fetch or chasing a fox-on-a-stick is much better for your dog. Getting a second dog can also help. Our dogs here play with each other all day long.
Intakes:
This month we took in 17 dogs from Tennessee from a rescuer that had to shut down, 34 from South Carolina during the Great Escape weekend, one from L.A. (Bernie – thank you Kathy for getting him to us from the airport!), two from local shelters where their time was up (Biggie and Rusty), one from a breeder who was going to euthanize the dog (puppy was born blind), three returns from dogs we adopted out (Aggie, Willie and Bunker), and eight other owner-related surrenders: Max, Llayiah, Jasper, Alex, Rex, Muki, Sterling and Jasper. Cupid was born blind, no eyes really and his breeder was going to put him down. Kerri (our adoption coordinator) and her husband Patrick drove 11 hours to go and save that pup. They are now fostering Cupid (so named because he was born on February 14th). We also took in three cats (one of which was already adopted).

We are getting estimates for the fencing and have some companies interested in working with us at almost cost to buy it. The cost is still over $15,000. We need to lay down wire, then pea gravel, then fence it all. This cost does not include the wire or pea gravel. It DOES include a better habitat for our dogs and a safer environment for both people and canines. We group dogs together as it makes for physically and emotionally happier dogs if they can run around and play with other dogs and have space to romp. PLEASE help us. If you have never donated to Pets Alive…please consider doing so this time. We are desperately in need of your assistance to get this project underway. Thanks to a new volunteer – Davey, we have a backhoe at our disposal and we have two volunteers that know how to install fencing, willing to lead a group volunteer day to get it done. All we need to do is raise the money to buy it (AT JUST ABOUT COST). If you can donate even $5 please do so. If you read these newsletters and updates and approve of what we do, won’t you please consider a donation now to help us out? This is critically important to do NOW before it gets too hot or too late in the season to be able to use it. We need your help with this or we simply won’t be able to do it. No more sliding gates, we will have regular gates that will open and close. All fencing will be six foot high. You can come to Pets Alive and view the mock-up we did (it is posted on the volunteer board). Thanks for your consideration and PLEASE don’t skip this. PLEASE click the button above and chip in to make this happen. WE CAN NOT MAKE THIS HAPPEN WITHOUT YOU. Remember we get NO funding from ANY source (like the town or government) other than private donations like yours. Thank you to Rose, Toni and John for kicking it off with some large donations.
General Updates:

We welcome two new staff members this month. Renee is our new horse caretaker, and Alex is our new cat caretaker. They replace Brittany and Frank who have moved on. Please stop and say hello if you get the chance. The first weeks at Pets Alive can be a little hectic – it’s truly a LOT of work to be an animal caretaker. Much more than you would expect. So far both are working out wonderfully and we love having them join us.
Ginny has also been found and returned home. Ginny was a cat we adopted out last month that had gotten out of the house and lost. We set traps and many volunteers and staff went looking for her, but one day the owner came home, saw Ginny and Ginny followed her right up the walk and into the house. Thank goodness. It is a dangerous world for an outside cat!
We also finally have a new Volunteer Coordinator. Joy has accepted the job and is absolutely AMAZING. We love her and she has come into this job full force. You can contact her at volunteer@petsalive.com. Speaking of which are you on our volunteer mailing list? It is separate from THIS list. Sometimes we send out an urgent mailing if we need help. Please sign up to get these alerts! You can do so here. Thank you Joy, we are so very lucky to have you.
We are also starting a new Event and Fundraising committee. This committee would oversee all events or fundraising done in our name, provide guidance, outlines and keep track of what needs to be done. We have had events run for us that have not gone too well and we want to make sure that when something is done that we have some trained people that can make sure everything goes smoothly. In some cases you would be running and managing the entire event, in other cases you would be providing guidance and assistance to the people who want to put the event on for us. If you are interested, please email us at info@petsalive.com for consideration. We thank you for your willingness to participate but please do not offer unless you feel you can commit the time to doing this. It is truly a labor of love! Thank you Roxie (and Evelyn) for stepping up to start this and we hope new members will join you soon. Thank you also Joy for everything you are making Pets Alive able to be. We really needed you and greatly appreciate your work on Pets Alive behalf.
Thank You:

Thank you to Marisol and Rob Thomas, who when given an opportunity to have a booth at the CBS Citifield Expo, chose Pets Alive to be the benefactors.
(Pictured from left: Pam, Kerri, Janet, Matt, Kerry, Becky & Tom).
They could have had anything there, and they chose to spotlight us. It was an amazing opportunity for us and we were able to reach out to thousands of people that day. We also raised over $1600 in t-shirt sales and donations. Thank you to everyone who came, for Mike from DoubleM Productions, who rushed hundreds of t-shirts to us all in a couple of days (he is a BIG dog lover!) and to Angela and all the other people who donated to help us raise money to print up brochures and have the shirts made up (thank you all our little twitter friends!). Thank you also to John H who drove all the way into PA to pick up the shirts so we would have them in time. You are all so wonderful and this was a great day for Pets Alive. Thanks – as always – Rob. You are truly a man of your word and we so appreciate your support. Not many people realize that if it was not for Rob and Marisol…that Pets Alive would have shut our doors last year. We continue to appreciate your support. Thanks for loving the animals and for supporting our efforts to help them.

Thank you to Manon, the director at the Sullivan County SPCA for being so gracious and wonderful. They had a large supply of canned cat food there, and she brought over a bunch of it for us as it was more than they needed. Manon is such a wonderful example of shelters working together to help each other. We greatly appreciate her help, support and kindness.
Special thanks to Anthony and the fabulous mural he painted for us at the brick house. We really love it and the whole place is brighter as a result. You can read the full story here.
Thanks to the SUNY Ulster vet tech program who came to Pets Alive to work on our horses. Their teacher, Sandy, uses PetsAlive to teach them various veterinary techniques, such as how to do a physical exam, take temperatures, worm, do an xray, etc. Many of them continue to come to Pets Alive after that as volunteers.
Thank you so much to Vic from Mountain Top Landscaping. He and his wife, Eileen, stopped by Pets Alive a few weeks ago and left with all our non working mower equipment. He fixed all of it and even pressure washed and cleaned all the equipment. He picked it all up and delivered it all back to us as well. He was fabulous. Thanks so much Vic. (Vic also plowed all our driveways for free this entire winter. He and his wife are big animal lovers – thank goodness).
Thank you to Cathy P, who painted a ‘tree of life’ for us on the wall of the kennel. It came out beautifully and our eventual goal is to sell “leaves” on the tree with people’s names that donate to Pets Alive. We have the tree now, and that was the first step.
A HUGE thank you to Purina Pet Food. They emailed us this month that they had 12,500 pounds of food and litter that they wanted to donate, were we interested? WERE WE INTERESTED????? I couldn’t REPLY fast enough!! We had to get it of course, so we rented a truck, sent out a MAD SCREAM for help from our volunteers and people came out to help – as they always do. About 1 dozen volunteers showed up – THANK YOU ALL! – to help us unload all the food and cat litter. It was a FABULOUS success and we’re so excited about it. We called up some local shelters to come and help themselves to some of it as well and they sent over some people to take some of it back. Purina says they may have a load of stuff we can have EVERY quarter. YOWSA. We’re doing Snoopy Dances over here. PLEASE HELP us to thank them. Send me an email: info@petsalive.com that I can pass on to Purina. They asked that we not give out their personal contact info but would LOVE to see some of the emails from our supporters in regards to this. PLEASE send me just a few sentences thanking them for the support and help they offered us. We want to stay on their good side and be able to keep getting these donations!
Thanks to the more than 15 volunteers from the Wellness Group that came down this month to help us. They cleaned windows, cleaned up the yards, raked leaves, painted, made signage and a host of other things. They were fabulous and we hope they will come back again.
We had two 50/50’s this past month – one at the Comedy Club and one at a table event we were chairing. In both cases the winners donated the proceeds BACK to Pets Alive. Class act these two. Really impressed and touched by that action. Thank you Kim and Peter!
Thanks to Anne and Maria, who came from far away, stayed in town for 2 nights and volunteered at PA for 3 days. They were working so hard they lost track of time and had to be kicked out of here at night. When they were done for the evening, they went shopping at Walmart and bought $200 worth of stuff off of our wishlist. While here they cleaned out two large dog runs, walked EVERYONE, and had a great time. When they first came, they talked about maybe coming back annually, but when they left they said they intend to come more frequently. I guess they liked it here. When they got home, they also sent us a large check to put toward our new fencing. We loved them, they were a total blast and we hope they come back soon.
Events and Fund Raising: