Another day, another surprise left at the front gate

Today I decided to clean the cattery again to better get aquatinted with our feline friends at the shelter. I always tend to focus on the dogs and really never keep up with new arrivals and adoptions when it comes to cats, well this week I'm changing that.

The nice thing about cleaning cats, in addition to spending time with them, is that your socks don't get wet. Now this is just the added perk since so many of our cats are sociable animals. While I was cleaning Molly in our visitation room, and yes, she gets her own room, she actually jumped on my back while I was scooping her litter box and she started to clean my hair. I have to say I was a little freaked out but she really is such a nice cat. Once I got all of the healthy cats taken care of and fed I headed over to the isolation unit where there are still six cats.

Our medical staff has certainly stayed on top of those sickies and I can now say that they are certainly getting better. I remember when they could barely open their eyes because they were caked with so many eye boogers from their URIs. Now they are up and about and very talkative. It was sad to see a young bonded pair, Laverne and Shirley, separated and just crying out for each other. When I would let one out of their kennel they would immediately go to the other's and just paw at them, it really was sad. Hopefully soon they will be able to go back to the healthy side and to bigger kennels.

Of course once I took care of the cats I headed over to the rabbitat where I made quick work of changing out hay boxes, blankets, and water. Surprisingly enough though for some odd reason my allergies acted up on me and once I was in the small little building that houses our rabbits I couldn't stop sneezing. All I have to say is that I hope it was allergies!

You know it wouldn't be a Monday without taking care of poop buckets. Thank goodness we are running a little short on 150 pound dogs this week! Since we have all little guys it was pretty easy to take care of all of the runs with just two people, but we still had to disinfect the four fake grass yards since we were to be getting some new arrivals later on in the afternoon.

Once we got everything set up for the new arrivals I headed into our break area where I heard the unmistakable cry of a hungry kitten. Sure enough, there was one in a postal box literally covered in fleas. Once again someone had just dropped of this animal in front of our gate hoping that he would be found. Now this is better than the alternative of leaving the animal in a canyon or out in the wild but couldn't you take better care of it in the first place and at least leave it with some water and food. In any case his new name is now Huku, which is apparently Hawaiian for flea or lice, not as cute when you hear the meaning.

With all of the commotion I learned later that there had been a showing with my good buddy Skeeter and Taxi. It turns out the reason I didn't hear about it because it was such a long showing and I had no idea it was going on. Unbelievably it turns out that our staff members were actually introducing them to each other and they ended up getting along great. Because of this the potential adopter is actually going to be adopting both. Not a bad Monday afternoon I have to say. In addition to this great news, another adoption counselor was showing a little poodle named Monty and the family absolutely fell in love and ended up adoption too. Now this adoption is a win/win as well because in all honesty this little guy has a scream that will cut right down to your bones!

Closing the day out the new arrivals came in. After their four hour van ride they were a little shaken up but seemed to be adjusting just fine. Of course there are a few more puppies and several other dogs that for some reason look exactly like ones that we have gotten in the past. In fact one staff member said we should contact the AKC to get these little guys recognized because literally every time we bring dogs from this shelter there is always one that looks like this basset hound, dachshund, chihuahua mix.

Well, hopefully I can give you a better update on the new guys tomorrow and also have some more great adoption stories.