Now here’s where it gets fuzzy: this wasn’t your typical animal hoarder situation. The woman in this case runs a rescue out of her house, and by all indications was genuinely trying to rehabilitate and adopt out the animals. In fact, the reason animal control found her was due to a tip by a person who had tried to adopt from her.

March 10, 2010 | Photo by K.C. Alfred

The comments following the article are heated; some call her vile and scream for her head. Other people who have interacted with the woman defend her as a person who poured her heart and soul into helping these pets and was doing the best she could. The animals (mostly boxers and chihuahuas) were living in crates and had not been under the care of a veterinarian for their many health problems. They were not being cared for appropriately.

I do not for a minute doubt she truly was trying to help. A person doing all of this by themselves, with no outside help or other volunteers to share the burden, could very easily become overwhelmed- especially these days when relinquishments are at an all-time high. Many rescues can’t bear to turn a pet away, and she seems to have been no exception.

As we all probably know, anyone can designate themselves a “rescue”. They run the gamut from well-funded, organized groups to one-man operations like this one. Somewhere along the way, this woman lost sight of the fact that she was in over her head. She neglected to realize her limitations, and the pets paid the price while awaiting a new home.

Despite all of this, even while listening to the animal control officer detail the conditions of the house, I felt a deep pang of pity at the sight of this woman being led off in handcuffs. I have heard and seen horrific stories of animal hoarders, pets ankle-deep in feces, covered in parasites, with dead animals rotting in the corners of the room. This was not the case here.

The pets had respiratory infections, skin infections, and suffered from lack of attention and care. Bad? Yes. Did they need to be removed? Yes. Did she need to be removed in handcuffs, with cameras rolling? I’m having trouble with that one.

It’s easy to speculate without all the details, so I concede there may be a lot of missing information. Maybe because I see people like this every day-on a smaller scale, but the principle remains. Good people who have gotten in over their head with their pets, who are unintentionally neglecting them while trying to do the right thing, who need a little guidance to get back on track.

I feel terrible for the animals, who have gone through a whole heck of a lot already and are now in the process of being dispersed to local shelters. But I can’t help but feel for her as well, someone overextended who might have done OK had she scaled back a bit more, paraded on the local news like a common criminal.

P.S. Rebecca- I know what you’re going to say- I’m trying!!

She turned on her “soulful” eyes and readily complied.

Brody does not like the competition, if his startled expression is any indication.

He continues to be a bit nonplussed at the new addition, but he’s getting better.

I mean really, who could resist this face?

Why is that?

If you take a peek at the picture above from Merial (they make Frontline, one of the popular choices for flea control), you can see that fleas have 4 life stages, only one of which hang out on people and pets.

The other three stages take place out in the environment- in your carpet, in bedding, cracks in the flooring, on your curtains. If you have a severe flea problem and you expect it to come under control after one application of Advantage or the like, you’re going to be disappointed.

Successful eradication involves treating the pets, even the indoor-only ones; treating the environment; rinse and repeat every few weeks, over a good 90 days or so on average.

There is some concern that fleas may be developing resistance to the medications that have been out the longest. That may be true. What is also true is that many of these treatment failures have as much to do with failure to treat the environment, and/or spotty application of the flea medication, as much as it does failure of the medication to work.

If you’re having a major problem with fleas, I recommend you go see your vet and try and pinpoint exactly which part of your management process is failing and come up with a good multi-modal approach to get rid of these buggers, be it topical medication, oral medication, or environmental control (or all three).

What I do not recommend is doing what one well-meaning but underinformed client told me about trying today:

Three weeks after her pet’s last dose of Advantage, she noticed fleas crawling on her pet and that the pet was extremely itchy on the hind end. Based on some advice from her friend, she covered the pet in mayonnaise.

Hellmann’s, to be exact.

It worked about as well as could be expected, which is to say not well at all. By the time she brought her dog in to see us, she had a ton of fleas, a pretty significant skin infection, and a greasy coat. A furry, stinky, infected hot potato bug salad. Yum!

I’m not saying every pet owner needs to use topicals plus oral meds plus flea bombs every two weeks year round. If you are fortunate enough to live in an area where fleas aren’t a major problem and you can control it with a little Skin so Soft here and there, hats off to you. But I have yet to find a household with a truly significant flea issue that managed to wrestle it into submission without some heavier artillery.

If you have a severe flea problem and your current regimen isn’t working, time to make a change. Preferably, to something that is not a condiment.

Anyway, I left out that last part because I was happy to have an excuse to hand over litter duties, and I just never took them back. So here we are, that baby is now five, and my husband still does most of the litter changing. He has in this time become a bit of a litter connoisseur, dictating with precision which qualities makes a good or a poor choice with the snobbiness of a Beluga caviar taster.

Smell, dust, scatter, all of these things factor into his poorly described algorithm, and I simply just buy a new container of litter every week and hope I picked the right one. “What eeez theeees?” said with a sneer meets a bad choice, one a little too dusty. “I hate zee marbles!” he declares when I tried a container of crystals. I’m still a little unclear on which one he actually liked, but that’s OK.

I tried some of the more environmentally-friendly litters a while back, paper ones and pine ones, and found them soggy and a bit smelly, so I’ve been sticking to clumping litter ever since. Then the people over at  World’s Best Cat Litter sent me a sample bag to try out. Our resident litter expert (aside from Apollo) was dubious, but agreed to give it a shot.

I asked my co-worker/ cat expert what she thought of it, and she told me that it is all she uses in her house of 13 cats. That alone was encouraging. I guess I haven’t been keeping up with litter technology evolution, but this litter wasn’t at all what I was expecting.

• It’s a corn-based litter- so it avoids the problem of silica inhalation for both pets and people (which is a very legitimate concern, especially with the abundance of feline asthmatics.)
• It’s the same approximate size and shape of clumping litter, so my cat accepted it with zero problem.
• It clumps very well. Their claim that urine clumps are smaller than traditional litter did hold in our house.
• I also agree with the claim that it doesn’t sink to the bottom and create glued-to-the-box clumps.
• It smells like, well, corn. It has a bit of an organic smell to it which is not at all disagreeable and not chemical-ly like a lot of scented litters. After one week of daily scooping, it still smelled fine.
• It’s biodegradable, and can be flushed in some locations (not in California!)

So help me god, I when I first opened the bag I sat there just smelling it trying to decide what type of hay it reminded me of before realizing that I was sitting in the garage sniffing cat litter. That’s the kind of thing you usually find neighbors talking about on the evening news. Then each day this week I actually stuck my face waaaaay too close to the box trying to be offended by the smell. It didn’t happen. Look, I’m not saying I want a perfume version of the stuff or anything, but so far as odor goes- I’m hard to please, and this worked very, very well.

The official statement from my husband, on the other hand, is “It doesn’t scatter dust all over my garage,” which is apparently his number one concern. High praise from Mr. Particular.

I’m more impressed than I thought I would be. It really is a great product- and widely available at pet stores. I’m convinced- we’re making the change!

It was more like Cirque du Soleil than the old school three-ring circus, with aerialists, trapeze artists, and unique acts from different corners of the world. Plus popcorn. I didn’t miss the animals (obviously) and from listening around, no one else in the audience did either.

I am so heartened that a traveling show can change with the times and continue to succeed, and so glad I could share the fun and excitement of the big top with my family in a way we all felt good about. I wish Circus Vargas- and others who have done the same- many years of success! We’ll see you next time around!

He dreams of being a shar-pei.

In my post about the Sea World tragedy last week, I mentioned how my friends have pretty much stopped inviting me on any Sea World trips. At least when I decline, I’m nice about it.

However, I neglected to mention the e-mail response I sent to the well meaning woman in my mom’s group who suggested we all take a group trip to the Ringling Brothers circus last year. I can’t say I was too diplomatic at all about that response, in which I helpfully included some links to all the abuses suffered by the exotic animals in their care. I went all “Water for Elephants” on her, truth be told.

Her response was a horrified, “I had no idea!” which was hopefully sincere and not just an attempt to tame the crazy lady. I think she meant it. Either way, the topic never came up again.

I declared a long time ago that I would never again set foot in a circus that used elephants, big cats, or any other exotics as part of their act. The history of animal abuse in the circus circuit is long and well-established, unfortunately. I’ve been hitting up the Cirque du Soleil shows every time they come to town instead, and haven’t looked back.

It was with a great degree of trepidation that I saw a big tent being erected in the parking lot of our local mall. Circus Vargas, it proclaimed. They’ve been around California for decades. They’ve been pestered (and deservedly so) for many years by PeTA for their treatment of the animals and elephants in particular- and I’m the first to admit, as extreme and reactionary as a lot of their actions are, they aren’t always wrong.

I went to their website today. I’m not sure why. Needing to stoke the fires of indignation? Imagine my surprise to find no mention whatsoever of their elephants, tigers, or bears. Trust me, I looked and looked.

They don’t have them anymore.

I’m sure this wasn’t a decision of conscience- wouldn’t they try to talk it up if it were? I imagine it was financial more than anything, the cost of maintaining these animals coupled with the fines they were slammed with over and over and over. I don’t care what the reason is. All I know is that the show is now, as it should be, just clowns, trapezes, and tightrope walkers.

So here is the question. I think the kids would enjoy seeing the show, and as it is described now I think I would too. I honestly didn’t think I would see the day when a traditional circus toured without that element that made it so objectionable. 10 years ago, attending would never have been an option. But times have changed, and I’m trying to decide how I feel about supporting a business that was guilty of some terrible actions in the past, but has been forced to evolve into something that is now OK.

I’m torn, because I remember this very circus and what they used to do. On the other hand, we know in the past circuses used to exploit not only animals but people with physical conditions. Change can happen, and part of me thinks that regardless of whether that change came from conscience or outside motivators, I can express my approval with agreeing to give it a chance. Besides, if they shut down, who’s left for everyone to go to? These guys.

Would you go?

ETA: I received an e-mail from Joan Hart, the Marketing Director from Circus Vargas, and she confirmed that the circus does not have animals in their shows (and apparently hasn’t for some time.) Yay Circus Vargas! Thank you!

I thank you all for your thoughts. This is good. I am going to call and get tickets now.

It never happened to me again. I have to believe our paths were meant to cross (especially since my not-so-sentimental colleague at the time might very well have obliged her request.)

As one might expect, the staff of a veterinary hospital is pretty pet-oriented. We all have pets- most of us, multiple pets- with the exception of our one anomalous staff member with no animals, much to everyone’s bafflement. He has a young family, he’s understandably busy, and he just hasn’t gotten around to it.

When our no-nonsense receptionist took a break this afternoon, she asked this staff member to watch the front desk for her. 10 minutes later, he walked into the back with a really cute little puppy.

“Who’s that?” I asked.

He shrugged. “This lady came in, handed me the dog, said she couldn’t keep him and left.” He paused. “At least he had a parvo vaccine.”

The receptionist, who had just entered the room, looked at him like he was out of his mind. “What do you mean she gave it to you? Why did you let her do that? We don’t take relinquishments!” She started to look panicked. “What are we going to do with him? We can’t keep a puppy here! What am I going to tell the boss??”

As I started to run through the list of options in my head, it occurred to me that the staff member was still holding the puppy with absolutely no effort to hand him off to anyone else. It was, dare I say, a bit possessive.

“Did you call your wife?” I asked suspiciously.

“She’s fine with it,” he admitted.

This marks the fourth fifth pet this year turned over at our clinic who would up adopted by a staff member.  Not that I condone veterinary hospitals as a dumping ground for unwanted pets, but the times I’ve seen it happen, the staff has always wound up working very hard to get the pet adopted out. Not once has a pet been turned over to a shelter. We’re suckers.

I can’t say I approve of someone doing what she did, but you have to admit it could have turned out much worse for the pup.

Emmett had a deeeeeeep bark. It wasn’t a “ruff“, it was a WOOF. Sometimes, when a persistent salesperson was at the door and his lack of better training was apparent as he was trying to rush out between my legs, they would look dubiously at me and ask if he bit. If it was a Girl Scout, I’d smile and introduce them. If it was one of those annoying people selling magazines, I’d shrug non-committally and eye him ominously.

Now if you ever met Emmett, you’d know the biggest risk to your health was getting knocked over while he leaned on you for rubs, but they didn’t know that, right? And I had no desire to disavow them, or any unwanted interloper, of that belief.

At the end of the day, should someone actually break in, I’m pretty sure Emmett would have been useless other than as a warning system or deterrent. But that is a powerful thing in and of itself, and it helped me sleep easier.

Brody’s had the bark of an old dude since he was 12 weeks old. It scares the living daylights out of the uninitiated. I don’t mind, though I make it a point to emphasize to the UPS guy it’s all show just in case Brody somehow gets out since I heard those guys might be packing tasers at some point.

Koa….Koa barks like a 10 pound Lhasa. All I can hope for in her case is catching someone with the element of surprise when that tiny voice ends up emanating from an 80 pound shadow.

Who am I kidding- these guys are totally useless from a defense standpoint. What I really need to do is build a nice moat around the house, with a few arrow holes for good measure. I wonder if the HOA would be OK with that.

In the warm Southern California climate, flea season is year round. And over the next few months, Taffy became Scrappy. Her long lustrous fur fell out, to be replaced with that hyperlichenified elephant skin indicative of massive irritation. Her skin was one raw welt.

The only way to keep her comfortable was to shave her short like a rat, dose her up on steroids like a Mr. Olympia wannabe, and routinely smoke out the house with nasty-smelling flea bombs probably just as bad for us as they were for the fleas.

Then Advantage came out.

Oh, Advantage came out, and the clouds parted and the sun shone down on us and everyone else battling with massive flea problems like a fairy flea-mother of mercy. For pets with severe flea allergies, it really was a lifesaver. The last few years of Taffy’s life were spent in blessed relief, with a full body of fur and normal-looking skin.

As a parasiticide, Advantage and the slew of competitors that came after it were regulated by the EPA, not the FDA. It is not, and never has been, a prescription item. Bayer, the manufacturer of Advantage, made an agreement with veterinarians that the only people they would sell it to were veterinarians. It was a nice business arrangement- Advantage quickly became the leader in the market, vets got to be the sole distributors, and pets got to live flea-free. Everybody wins.

Over time, Advantage began to pop up in places it wasn’t supposed to be- retail outlets, online stores, pet shops. Sometimes it was counterfeit product. Much of the time it was “grey market”- authentic product obtained in a manner not entirely within the original agreement. It was not illegal for those places to sell it, though they weren’t technically supposed to have it. The writing was on the wall for vets, as each year it became easier and easier to obtain. Other, newer products were more easily accessible to owners who didn’t want to make a trip to the doc just for flea products.

Bayer, along with Merial (makers of Frontline) finally capitulated to the undeniable allure of big-market distribution and ended their agreement to distribute their products solely through veterinarians. As of this month, Advantage will be available in our local PetSmart, Costco, Target, and whoever else wants to sell it. I just saw some on OVERSTOCK, for goodness sake.

Many vets were incensed. Flea products were very profitable, very useful, and a great way to start a dialogue with owners about flea allergies and skin disease. They’ve spent the last 12 + years building up these brands, only to have the manufacturers take away their ability to be the sole distributor once that partnership bore fruit.

I don’t own the practice I work in, and our clinic’s Advantage sales do not affect me directly so I admittedly have less of a stake in this issue than many. I’m sure it’s harder to be philosophical when it’s your small business taking a hit, but to me, I’m just happy a good product is becoming even more accessible.

Several times a month, I see a pet with the classic signs of pyrethrin toxicity associated with inappropriate use of over-the-counter spot on treatments. In addition to just not working very well, these product reactions can be severe and life threatening. If these sorts of events can be prevented by having a superior product right there on the store shelf at a competitive price, I’m all for it.

Besides which, we just started carrying Comfortis. It’s all good.