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The NAME game for our broken Min Pin puppy!

October 16, 2010
Author:

Wanna come up with a name for our little broken Min Pin? We’re entertaining any suggestions! He’s approximately 12 weeks old, super energetic, and cute, cute, cute! Yes, he’s a bit needy and somewhat obsessive about where you are at every minute of every day (and don’t try sneaking off while he’s dozed off for just a second, cuz he ain’t buyin’ it), but he makes up for his neurosis with super endearing, affectionate qualities.

Click here to see Min Pin’s youTube video

So again, both the radius and ulna are broken in one front leg. min-pin-xray2Judging by the location and the way they are broken, our guess is that someone stepped on him, which isn’t really hard to imagine since he is so needy that he runs directly under your feet while you are walking (thus causing me to quickly re-train myself to shuffle my feet around the house). Whomever stepped on him probably did the math and figured the vet bill would be much more than the cost of a new puppy, so off to the shelter he went (rotten SOB’s!) Poor little guy! He remains a trooper and has an incredible agility considering the weight of his casted front limb, which is half again the size of his entire body! He hops around on all three, and happily makes friends with all of the dogs (and cats) who come around to visit.

OUCH!

min-pin-1Again, name ideas anyone?

min-pin-2

Elijah Blu, the saga continues.


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To-date, we’re still waiting to hear back from Dr Skinner, the veterinary neurologist, with the results from EB’s spinal fluid. The myelogram showed him that whatever is going on with Elijah Blu is not a surgical issue, meaning he does not have a compressed or ruptured disc injury. What he does have going on is still unclear. The spinal fluid will show them whether there is some kind of inflammatory process going on, which is likely, since the best he has ever acted or responded was to a corticosteroid called Dexamethasone which acts to reduce inflammation. Unfortunately, it is not something they can safely prescribe long term for Elijah Blu.

In the meantime, here is a pic of Elijah Blu following his recent hair cut. He’s still cute as a button!

elijah-haircut1

Second chances…or third, etc.


Author:

I’m sorry it’s taken me this long to catch up on what’s going on. Things got a bit crazy following the story in the Oregonian. Sadly, despite the fact that it was clearly stated that we only take county shelter dogs, we got a lot of calls and emails from people wanting to give up their pets. Susan actually took a call from someone who wanted us to re-home their ten year old Yellow Lab because “We have kids now and she chews up their toys and we have to keep her in the laundry room, and we’re just tired of her.” They also said they had already “Gotten rid of” their other dog.

Sigh…even after twenty-some years dealing with the rescue world, it continues to floor me how many people somehow end up with pets they can’t figure out how to commit to for the 12-18 yrs of their lives. Seriously, I shudder to imagine what this world would be like if it weren’t considered immoral to give away ones children if they are causing a cramp in your lifestyle. With regard to the people who give away their pets, I really wish they just wouldn’t bother getting one to begin with. It would save us a lot of trouble, and the pets a lot of fear and readjustment, and that’s assuming they are lucky enough to find a new home.

I actually intended to update everyone on the kitties we had adopted out ten years ago and recently learned that they were going to be euthanized because they weren’t getting along well and some of them were not using the litter box consistenly. This past Thursday was the scheduled D-Day (including a short reprieve we had been granted), and we learned on Wednesday that the woman had found someone to adopt two of the cats and convinced the husband to try it with just the other two. Fingers crossed! One of our long time volunteer fosters had also piped up and said she might be able to take a couple of the cats, but the former option is much more practical. Interestingly enough, when we explained that there was no magic island we could just take the cats to, they figured out a solution.

Here are some pics of me with the two puppies. The little six week old “Mini-Aussie/Queensland Terrier mix” has since gone to a new foster home, and I’m taking care of the little broken Min Pin puppy. As you can see, they’re helping me do email…okay, not really helping, per se. One-handed typing takes much, much longer to do.

puppies-and-me1puppy-kisses-10_10sophia-sounds-funnypuppy-pant-leg

The little bugger likes pants…and shoe laces!

Tomorrow is the big day!

October 11, 2010
Author:

Yes, tomorrow OCU at Indigo Ranch will be featured on the front page of the Oregonian’s Living Section! Hopefully lots of people who don’t otherwise have much reason to venture out of the Portland metro area, will learn about our ranch and hit the highway so they can check it out!. I was up today with Trish so she could take some new pics for the website while the salmon are running. It’s amazing! It happens every October for about a week, and luckily, they’re spawning right now! We climbed down the bank of the Nehalem behind our barn and stood about five feet away from the salmon while they pushed and flopped trying to make their way up stream. There were five of them in one spot today and Trish got some great pics and video that she’ll post later tonight. Awesome!

Click here to watch salmon running youTube video.
Click here to view photos of salmon & Indigo Ranch (same as slideshow below)


Meantime, I picked up the little broken 12 week old Min Pin from the shelter today. Turns out it wasn’t both legs that were broken, it was both bones in his left leg. So his radius and ulna are both broken. The x-ray photo shows the damage. Ouch! If you know much about the energy level of this breed, or for that matter, any 12 week old puppy, you know how hard it is for this little guy to have a broken leg! He’s so adorable and does his very best to hop along and has already figured out how to use only his rear legs and jump up on my sofa the minute I sit down (cringe). I’m trying to keep him from jumping at all, but it’s not as easy as it might seem. He shrieks bloody murder in his crate, but won’t stop bouncing around until he’s in my lap. Super cute! Poor little trooper. Once he’s in my lap, he seems perfectly content to watch the other little six week old puppy, who has just discovered toys, and will pick one up and shake it to death! Ohhh, be still my heart, these two are soooooo adorable. BTW, the little min pin is laying in my lap with his splinted leg resting on my keyboard. Lots of fun typing while trying not to disturb him.

min-pin-broken-leg-10_10min-pin-10_10min-pin-xray

We were given a reprieve on the euthanasia date of the cats we adopted out ten years ago as kittens. D-Day is now Thursday. Not that it matters, since it’s not like people are banging down the door to help three ten year old cats. We’re going to consider ourselves lucky if we’re even able to divide them up into three homes, and to-date we still need three homes (hint, hint). I know we’ve been down this path before with our volunteer Sandi’s senior cats after she passed away unexpectedly, but we have to try again. If anyone thinks they can open up a space in their heart and their life to take a cat, these cats are all three described as VERY sweet…

And not to forget the dogs who aren’t adorable little puppies but still desperately need our help, we’re trying to find a foster home for a sweet Rotti mix female that one of our volunteers rescued as a stray. Raven, as Kim named her, isn’t in super shape. This poor girl is a perfect example of a dog who has been ignored or discarded in a yard. She has some skin issues and is very thin. Still, she has a nice temperament, and virtually no hope of finding a home at the shelter. Her skin problem is an easy one to correct, it’s just going to take giving her a change to a quality diet. Raven has tiny little ears so she may be part Shar Pei, it’s hard to tell at this point. She isn’t as big as a Rottweiler, but has the coloring and sweet, soulful eyes.

ravenraven-skin

We’re still collecting donated items for our “tag sale” and this weekend we got a taste of what kind of stuff we’re going to have at the sale. Holy smokes! It’s amazing what you all donated to us. Thank you so much! I can’t wait for the sale. It’s going to be very exciting!

Oy Vey! What a day, and it’s not even 5pm!

October 8, 2010
Author:

So here we are at just before 3pm and I’m already needing to vent some of the crisis of the day. I didn’t blog at all yesterday, in-part because I was having a technical problem connecting to my server, but also, because I was taking advantage of the decent weather and winterized my house, along with rounding up bits and pieces for our upcoming tag sale…

This morning started with a call from our vet, telling us that one of our adopters from ten years ago who had adopted three kittens from us, had finally reached the breaking point with inappropriate toilet habits and needed us to take the cats back today. Evidently her husband has threatened to take all three of our cats, plus another they adopted a few years ago, to be euthanized if the cats don’t go today. Our vet told me he has been working with them over the past couple of years on ideas to stop the problem, but it sounds like bad chemistry between one or more of the cats has upset the apple cart, and because nothing has worked, hubby dearest is at the end of his rope. Hubby prefers to euthanize the cats because he doesn’t feel it is humane to bring the cats to a no-kill shelter because they may languish there. To be fair, the wife is devastated, but they are facing divorce at this point. Back to our reality. We don’t have a magic island! Where in the heck are we supposed to put three/four senior cats with one day’s notice? I am (almost) speechless. I can’t imagine what would make someone believe they could – with one day’s notice, call a rescue group made up entirely of foster homes and have them say, “Sure, we’ll drive right over and pick them up and take them to a beautiful cat island, where all the cats live peacefully together, and successfully use litter boxes.” So we’ll just try to figure out someone to take the cats, one at a time.

We also had a Mini Aussie show up at our ranch late yesterday. If you know the area, it’s a small possibility he wandered away from one of a dozen homes within a few mile radius, but more likely that he was dumped near our property because out in the country they believe our property is a rescue. I met “Timber” as Shannon named him, today, and he is very cute, and well behaved (aside from marking everything in sight), about 1.5 yrs old, and intact (and what a surprise, he’s marking everywhere!). His toe nails and pads don’t look like a dog who has been on the road very long. He was not wearing a collar and did not scan with a microchip.  We posted him as a found dog at Columbia County Animal Shelter and we’ll just hope someone is looking for him…

timber

A couple of hours ago I got a call from someone who “found” a six week old Mini Aussie/Queensland Terrier puppy. When I asked where she found him, it turned out her 19 year old brother bought him from someone at the coast and five days later, he realized he doesn’t have time…the funniest part (as if there’s anything really funny about this nightmare)  is that the puppy doesn’t look like either a Mini Aussie, or a Queensland Terrier! As you know, normally we don’t take dogs from this type of dumb move, but I worry about a six week old puppy at the county shelter because of the potential for upper respiratory virus, etc., and when they’re this young they don’t have much immune system. So, we’re looking for a home for a really cute, smart little guy. Here are his pics. I don’t think we need to say much more about that!

puppy-10_8_10puppy-2puppy-3

Just a few minutes ago, the shelter called about a 3-4 month old Min Pin who came in with both front legs broken. They don’t have any history and don’t know what happened to him. I don’t have pics yet, but he needs to be rehabilitated and will be wearing splints for at least a few weeks. I will have pics tomorrow morning and will include those and blog about him as soon as I know more.

As an update, we’ve raised enough money for Elijah Blu to have his myelogram on Tuesday, October 12th. We haven’t raised enough money to do any surgery for him, but at least we will hopefully find out what’s wrong. Here’s a pic of Elijah from today. He just got a haircut!

elijah-haircut

Some of you may remember Jada, the young Boxer/Lab we intervened and took in to prevent her euthanasia by her former owner for having some obnoxious, defiant behaviors. Jada is actually a very sweet girl, with a very independent personality, and a very active brain. We placed Jada with a young, athletic couple about a month ago and it seemed like such a great match…that is until the woman of the couple found out her mom has cancer and was going to be staying with them during her cancer treatment. The couple was worried her activity level would be too much for their mom during her treatment and they vacillated for several weeks whether giving her up was the right thing to do because they really love Jada. Their mom didn’t want to be the reason they gave her up, but today they finally decided they do need to give Jada back. I’m sad for them and I’m sad for Jada, because it was an otherwise perfect match. So, back into the adoptable dog pool she goes…

jada1jada-2

A foster for the little Lhasa…

October 5, 2010
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Tried to find a foster for the little female Lhasa mix (details on my post from a few days ago), but no one responded so I’m going to suck it up and take her in myself. I have a feeling she’ll endear herself on someone pretty quickly and hopefully find either a new foster or a new home! Hoping, hoping, hoping.

lhasa-dahlia1-300x234

We’re gearing up to take donations this Saturday, October 9th in Hillsboro, for our upcoming “Indigo Rescue Tag Sale” (we’ve decided to call it a tag sale so people don’t assume it’s just junk. After all, our donors donate some really nice stuff!!). If you have stuff to donate, we’ll be there collecting items from 11am to 4pm. The address for drop off is: 1942 SE Pine Hillsboro, OR 97123. This is a perfect time to clean up and clear out for the winter! The actual sale will be at the same address. This is a perfect time to clean up and clear out for the winter!

And if you’re a big fan of our Annual Fall Jewelry sale at the Cedar Hills Rec Center, that’s coming up, too! Our 11th Annual Fall Jewelry Sale will be this November 20th from 9am to 4pm and if you’ve never been to one of our jewelry sales, you’ve really got to try to come! It’s truly a spectacle, with jewelry of every type for every style, and TONS of it! We have jewelry sent to us year round from people from all over the country. We’ll have a flyer and announcement posted on the Home Page of our Indigo Rescue site very soon. Hope you can make it!

Last, as a reminder, next Tuesday, October 12th, OCU at Indigo Ranch will be featured in the Oregonian, as the last article submitted by Jacques VonLunen, the writer for the Pet Page. Jacques has taken a reporting position in the tri-cities and we wish him well. We’re also hoping he goes out with a triumphant story in us!

To the airport for another Taiwan dog


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Our super great animal rescue liason, Mindy, from Taiwan, flew in late last night, and brought with her the sweetest young dog named Derek. As you may know, Taiwan has experienced several devastating Typhoons over the past couple of years and they already have a severe pet overpopulation problem, but with the Typhoons, many people lose their homes and as a result, there are even fewer homes for the dogs. In Derek’s case, he was apparently tossed off a motorcycle, by a woman! Mindy saw the incident and tried to speak to the woman but she quickly took off, leaving Mindy to grab Derek and get him off the street before he was hit by a car.

As always, we are faced with the moral dilemma in taking a dog from an0ther country when we have plenty of dogs who need homes right in our own backyard. In Derek’s case, a family who had already adopted one of our dogs from Taiwan last year, had recently inquired about rescuing another dog from Taiwan as a companion for the one they currently have. It was shortly after they inquired, that Mindy asked me about whether we might have an option for Derek. So, we all met at the airport last night and Jim took Derek as a ‘foster to adopt’; which we liken to a ‘rent to perm’ kind of deal, only with dogs. Seriously, barring any bad chemistry problems between the dogs, I’m quite sure Derek has a permanent home already, because:

a) He’s flippin’ adorable! He has really soft, cream colored fur with apricot tips, and a super long plume of a tail.

b) He’s less than a year old, playful and really sweet with other dogs

Derek took an immediate liking to Jim’s hat at the airport and we had a heck of a time getting it away from him (see pics). In the car, he turned his attention on tearing up a napkin, and tossing a “toy”, just so he could pounce on it. This was after more than 24 hours of time in a kennel in the belly of an airplane, traveling through three airports and layovers.

Here are some pics of Derek’s arrival for your enjoyment.

A day at the ranch…


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We had the second of two Animal Reiki classes at the ranch on Sunday. Liza Beer graciously offered a special training to Indigo Rescue volunteers and seven of us participated. It was so peaceful, and we are all trying hard to learn how to promote healing energy and calming to our companion animals.

A funny thing had happened when I arrived at the ranch and was unloading my car. I had Wesley and tiny Mighty (4lb Chihuahua) with me, and I noticed that two of our Alpacas, Webber and Wyatt, were staring at the dogs. I mean really staring! They were craning their necks as if saying “What in the heck is that?” They were clearly facinated. So we walked over to their turn out with the dogs, and all five Alpacas started following the two dogs. Every where they went, the Alpacas would follow them along the fence line, trying to sniff at them. Initially, the dogs were very curious, too, and although I hadn’t had time to get my camera out, they bumped noses through the fence. Shoot! A great photo opp missed! Well, I did get one of Malynda holding Mighty up for Wallace to get a good sniff. That Alpaca stuck his nose between the bars and out as far as he could get it, and he and Mighty touched noses. It was sooooo sweet! A really nice experience between species…

Wallace-and-Mighty meet

Outreach day at Petsmart

October 2, 2010
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Today was our outreach day at Petsmart in Beaverton on Walker Rd and Cedar Hills Blvd. We’ve done it every other Saturday for the past ten years.  There are busy days and there are slow days. Today was a sunny, beautiful day so we sat outside for most of the day. The dogs had fun and got lots of fresh air and exercise. The bad news is that it was verrrryyy slow today. I imagine every one was taking advantage of the last great weather, and I can’t blame them. Kenai, the Dancing Malamute had the most interest and three people came in to see her. She’s so beautiful, but has a bit of a neurological issue that causes her head to tilt a little. She’s also got the typical Malamute head strong behaviors, but for the right family, it’s worth a little stubborn tendency for how sweet she and affectionate she is, and those amazing rhythmic dance moves…. ;o ) I’m trying to get a video for your viewing pleasure before she goes to her new home. It really is amazing and unique! So, we discouraged the people who liked her for her look, and we are taking an application from someone who has experience with stubborn breed dogs (they had a Chow mix before).

No other dogs got applications. Can you believe it?! We had 18 adorable dogs there….oh well, there’s always another adoption day. Crap! We need more foster space so we can take some of the other dogs we know need foster homes!

Tomorrow I’m going to tell you about my little Pit bull foster, Tawnee, and her sister, and the typical crappy life they lived before coming to us…

Kenai

Kenai

Pixie relaxing at the adoption event

Pixie relaxing at the adoption event

A pretty typical day…

October 1, 2010
Author:

My first day of blogging in order to share what life is like in an animal rescue went something like this:

The shelter contacted me about finding a foster home for a cute little two year old Lhasa mix female who failed the standardized temperament test because she showed some food aggression. They also said that otherwise, she’s a really nice dog.  Sadly, the shelter doesn’t have the time  or space to wait and see if her food aggression might be related to how long the dog was on her own (and how hungry she might be), or whether the dog is so terrified in the shelter environment that she is acting differently than she would in an otherwise quiet home. luckily, most times we find the dogs are very different outside of the shelter.  Finding new foster homes is always a challenge, and our current fosters are all full, so you know the drill, call me if you might be interested in fostering this little girl for us. Be prepared for the fact that we will need to match the foster dog to the foster family just like we would with a potential adopter.

Lhasa mix female

I was also contacted by a breed rescue organization who isn’t able to take in a dog who was adopted out to a family by another rescue, but the dog was in such poor health when the family adopted it, that they don’t want to send him back to that original rescue. The family wants to re-home the dog because it’s a JRT mix, and doesn’t do well with their young children…go figure.  JRT’s are pretty high up on the national bite statistics list (umm, try number four). This doesn’t mean they can’t be great dogs in the right home, but it isn’t rocket science to figure out that a home with small children isn’t a good idea for a breed that bounces off the walls with so much hyper energy it nearly buzzes. No, scratch that, it’s freaking ridiculous! Personally, I blame the rescue organization who adopted out the dog to this family in the first place, rather than the family, who didn’t know better and should have been guided by an organization who wanted the family and the dog to be successful, not just to adopt out a dog!

Ordinarily we save our precious foster space so we can take dogs who are failing or in need of medical care from the county shelters. We  don’t take any owner relinquished dogs because we are trying to help people figure out how to overcome hurdles and keep their commitments to their pets, rather than giving them up during any inconvenience or life change. But, my heart feels badly for this situation, which should never have happened in the first place. Should we have to be responsible for another rescue making a poor decision? Not really, but it isn’t the first time we’ve been put in this situation, so here we go again. Looking for a foster for a JRT mix. Sigh…

JRT mix male

There was also an email from someone who adopted a sweet young female Pit bull from a shelter in NY. The dog tested “no concerns”, but they live on a farm and the dog has killed a chicken and apparently went after a pigmy goat. She’s great with the family and their other dog, but once again…hello, what do you know? A dog with a high prey drive was adopted to a home in the country and is going after small farm animals? Hmmm.

So that about wraps up my bitchfest for today. Oh, and that was from just a few of the emails I received. I also got one about a missing 12 year old cat, etc. Hopefully it isn’t too depressing for you, but if it was, ha! Welcome to my world. Honestly, some days can be pretty entertaining, and luckily, we do get some phenomenal happy endings. I promise I’ll share all of those, too.

So that we can end on a good note, we’ve helped turned lemons into lemonade. Back in May, one of our volunteers alerted me to a “rescue” group called Tiny Paws Puppy Rescue, who was advertising their rescued puppies on Craigslist. Our volunteer had exchanged with them and asked if the puppies were spayed or neutered before they “adopted” them out for $350-$400. They got kinda defensive and started making claims that involved the county shelter, so our volunteer forwarded the exchange to me to see if what they were telling her was true. I was positive the claims were untrue, so I forwarded the exchange to the county so they would be aware of this group out there talking smack about them. A couple of weeks later, the same Tiny Paws Puppy Rescue contacted me looking for a new vet for their organization. Turns out the vet they were using at the time didn’t appreciate what was happening with their pups and dumped them.

Meanwhile, Debbie Wood and a lot of other people at the county, along with KATU reporter Dan Tilkin, were doing a lot of reseach about TPPR. Turns out, not only were they not a rescue, or a registered non-profit, but they were using references from veterinarians who don’t exist, and selling puppies without vaccines (who later came down with parvo). They estimated from the number of adoptions the group had posted on their website since May, 2010, that these people sold $70k of puppies (189). They claimed on their (now defunct) site that most of the puppies were from raids in various counties, but it was confirmed that none of the puppies came from any of those counties. Holy puppy crap!! They were probably getting free or inexpensive puppies posted on Craigslist, then selling them without spay/neuter or vaccines under the facade of being a rescue.  F*%^#r’s!  Rotten, greedy, and exploitive! Their existence made other rescues who are working so hard to have an impact, look badly.

The good news is that thanks to a handful of perservering people, Tiny Paws Puppy Rescue no longer exists. Our hope is that they won’t move somewhere else and start their whole money making scheme again. You can view the KATU story here:

http://www.katu.com/news/local/104136279.html?tab=video

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