If you’ve ever procrastinated about making a phone call, or had your throat close while giving a presentation or sweated profusely while you stumbled through an interview for your rescue, then I feel your pain.


Hi, my name is Michelle and I’m a introvert.


And everything I’ve both been working for, and desperately dreading has just happened; national recognition of the amazing creature that is the PetRescue website… and a nomination for the Young Woman of the Year Award for me!


Now, in early 2006 I enlisted the help of my incredibly talented friend, Vix to become the spokesperson for PetRescue, which let me return to doing what I love best – hiding behind my keyboard and dealing with people one on one. So to be thrust back into the public eye, although incredibly flattering is at the same time desperately terrifying.


I hope we win. I think the exposure in the media and the award would be excellent for PetRescue and it has the potential to drive a whole bunch of people to consider adoption. So I’ll be there on the night with both my fingers crossed… and my knuckles white.


Wish me luck!

You need to choose…

… to be a customer focussed organisation. Or not.

… to be a organisation whose absolute priority is rehoming animals. Or not.

… to be a group that promotes going the extra mile for your adopters. Or not.


And it’s fine to choose either, but realise the choices you make here will reflect on the way your public perceives and receives you.


So if you put a notice about your procedures on the homepage of your website;

If you are interested in meeting & adopting any of our animals, please consider that the whole adoption process can take up to 40 minutes so please allow enough time to view & meet the animals, keeping in mind that our adoptions must close at the specified times & all relevant paperwork finalised by those times. It can be very stressful for our volunteers & staff when customers come with the intention of adopting our animals nearing our adoption closing times. Thank you.

Be sure you’ve chosen which one you want to be. Because you’re telling your public loud and clear which you are.

Disney’s new movie Beverly Hills Chihuahua is being blamed for everything from helping dog farmers, to filling the shelters with abandoned animals. In a drive to protect the welfare of pets, rescuers criticise the movie makers of promoting unrealistic expectations of dog ownership and predict a wave of abandonment by mislead movie goers.


And it’s not even released until October 3!


But this is far from a new phenomenon. In 2000, at the release of 102 Dalmatians, rescuers protested the movie and called for a percentage of the proceeds be given to rescue;

Activists demonstrated outside Disney’s studios on Monday and tried to deliver a letter to Disney chairman and CEO Michael Eisner demanding a disclaimer (be placed at the beginning of the film).

They also want 1 percent of the proceeds from the film’s ticket and merchandise sales donated to Dalmatian rescue groups and no-kill shelters. ref

When Snow Dogs came out in 2002, rescuers diligently explained the negative aspects of Husky ownership

Carolina Siberian Rescue has a message posted on its Web site stating, “As at any other time, we strongly encourage you to research the breed you are considering bringing into your home. Siberian Huskies have a variety of personality traits that make them less than the ideal dog for a large number of families. Stunning blue eyes and a cute curly tail do not make up for incompatibility issues.” ref

And last year when Underdog was released rescuers pleaded for people to realise the bad about Beagles

“They don’t like being alone,” said Valarie Rahbany, volunteer coordinator for Beagles & Buddies. “When they’re alone, and they don’t want to be, they can get very noisy.”

As well as destructive. A bored beagle will chew, dig or bark. A lot. Beagles can also suffer from separation anxiety, said Rahbany. ref

But there has always been dogs in films; Whether Benji or Lassie, Beethoven or Hooch movies have always included dogs because… people like dogs!

By the end of the 1930s, animal movies were such big business that the top animal trainers became celebrities in their own right. Carl Spitz, the owner of Buck the St. Bernard from The Call of the Wild, was one of these celebrity trainers. In 1940, he embarked on the public appearance circuit, taking with him around $120,000 worth of dogs ($1.6 million in today’s market).

His entourage included Musty, the Mastiff from the Wild Boys of the Road, the Great Dane from Wuthering Heights, Mr Binkie, the Scottie from The Light That Failed and, most famously, Terry, the Cairn Terrier who played Toto in The Wizard of Oz.

Hollywood Dogs, Ann Lloyd

Sure, the dogs in these films capture peoples hearts and drive them to desire particular breeds but does that mean as rescuers, we should all be waving placards at the release of this new movie and lamenting the damage this will cause Chi kind?


While undeniably many people were inspired by the gorgeous antics and decided to get Dalmatian, not all automatically went on to be terrible owners. Most of the Dallies will have stayed with their families and lived long, happy lives. But it was this sudden surge of popularity that was the cause of the large number ending up in rescue… the sheer influx of this breed that saw them abandoned and not just another breed of dog.


Soon, the market settles, the overproduction of the breed stops and numbers return to normal levels, both in sales and abandonment. And the issues of dog farming and pet store puppies continue movie or no movie.

So what should we be doing at the opening of these types of films?

We should be pleased that people connect with dogs in films and use this opportunity to educate people of the plight of rescue dogs, the fantastic benefits of pet adoption and the folly of pet store puppies. Chi rescue groups should be making themselves known to their local media and use the interest generated by the movie to adopt more pets;

A local Beagle rescue group recognized a good marketing opportunity with the opening Saturday of the Disney movie ‘Underdog.’

Tampa Bay Beagle Rescue brought more than a dozen beagles and beagle mixes ready for adoption to greet guests at the Muvico Theater. No on-site adoptions were planned, but the group hoped the exposure might boost awareness of the plight of homeless animals, elicit applications from potential adoptive families and recruit volunteers. ref

Despite our intentions, running down dog breeds in the media doesn’t deter new owners from buying; it just cements in their minds that rescue dogs are ‘broken’ and they don’t buy from us. If we assume that everyone who falls in love with a breed from a film is automatically an irresponsible owner, then we lose the chance to interact with them and help them become a great one. If BYB and puppy farmers see huge benefits from movies such as this and we don’t, it is simply shows that our choice to boycott films rather than use them to promote our rescues has meant our message isn’t heard.


Simply, love them or hate them these movies influence the public immeasurably. We should consider them an opportunity to do the same.

When we started PetRescue there was a huge resistance to the project by people who firmly believed it would never work. Rescue would never pull together, no one in rescue had the time and who the hell were we to be telling them how to rehome animals!


And you know what? It could have just as easily failed as succeed and JB and I could have returned to our regular jobs and the story would have ended there. No harm no foul.


But PetRescue does work for precisely the same reasons the naysayers thought it wouldn’t – it was really, really different.


In the year since Nathan Winograd’s Redemption was published an awful lot has happened to the rescue industry. Almost overnight all the people who had visions of a better way, but who’s opinions had always been quashed by ‘it will never work’ found a voice which says we are allowed to believe we can do it better and that we are allowed to try new things.


So why still so much resistance within the rescue industry to trying anything new? As the ones encumbered with the killing, shouldn’t we most want to see animals saved and the most keen to do anything in our power to do so?

Why? Because we value our competence

Competent people have a predictable, reliable process for solving a particular set of problems. They solve a problem the same way, every time. That’s what makes them reliable. That’s what makes them competent.

Competent people are quite proud of the status and success that they get out of being competent. They like being competent. They guard their competence, and they work hard to maintain it.

Seth Godin – Change Agent

So with this call from the No Kill movement to start trying new ideas, suddenly there is a chance of failure. People who are competent resent the stress this puts on them; Adopting outside our area? Too risky. Starting a foster program? Too hard. With competence stifling any chance to be innovative they’re stuck; unable to move forward and clinging to the way it is now. It’ll never work! they chime We know what we’re doing, how dare you question that we’re not doing enough! and then the deflection which give them permission to keep on being competent; why don’t you blame those truly responsible, the public for the death of these poor animals.


But No Kill with it’s newly found voice and creative ideas challenges us to identify new opportunities to save lives. No Kill advocates  believe ‘good’ pet owners far outnumber the ‘bad’ and that all of the people who walk into a shelter are potential adopters, foster homes or volunteers. We believe that engaging our community in life saving programs can make our shelters a hub for all pet-lovers.  And that by getting people help when they need it, not judging them, allows more pets to stay in their homes.


But most of all No Kill demands more than competence from rescue organisations. Instead it requires us to raise the bar and embrace proactive thinking and innovative action. And that can only be a good thing for the pets presently dying through competence.

When we talk about pets being killed in pounds around Australia, we tend to gloss over the detail by saying it’s a ‘humane death’ or that ‘we’re putting them to sleep’, which of course is to make everyone feel better about the situation. But while we use euphemisms to describe the act of euthanasia everyone is familiar with (anesthetic overdose via injection) often this purported ‘kind death’ could not be more violent.


Nearly every Australian pound outside the metro area has the same problem; a lack of a resident vet. And since rangers aren’t medically trained and often work alone (killing by injection requires two people – one to hold and one to inject), they have to come up with solutions that see the pets killed in ways we wouldn’t dream of for our own pets.


When my mum inquired with her local council on available resources to euthanase her oversized, terminally ill dog, the ranger informed her that they could send someone out to ’shoot him’ as that is how they kill the dogs in their facility. Now this isn’t some remote country location, this is York, one hour out of Perth.


Last month the shire of Horsham in Victoria (3hrs out of Melbourne) was pressured into changing their practices by their community;

The council has been criticised for shooting strays not claimed from the pound within eight days, but a report tabled at last night’s meeting said using a vet would cost council about $50,000 a year. ref

The council voted last night to adopt the use of lethal injections. The decision came after months of pressure from a group of Horsham residents advocating a change of policy. ref

And today, Wyong pound (located 1hr out of Sydney), was found to have been killing their animals by stabbing them in the heart.

It has been revealed Wyong Council has been using a method known as heart plunging to euthanise homeless dogs at its Charmhaven facility.

The ABC understands local staff have euthanised more than 1,000 dogs by this method over the past two years. ref

These aren’t in any way isolated cases – these are common practices around Australia. In fact, some councils work to move backwards when it comes to euthanasia techniques. In 2003, the Collie Shire Council (3hrs from Perth) tried to change the method they used to destroy dogs from lethal injection to firearm.

“We are reviewing it to see if there is a more cost effective way’”

Collie Shire chief executive officer Ian Miffling

In this case the RSPCA stepped in and recommended that the council not put cost above animal welfare.

RSPCA WA shelter manager Rona Raftinger said if the designated firearm conductor did not shoot with pinpoint accuracy there was the chance the animal could be injured instead of killed and consequently experience an excessive amount of pain.

“They draw a line between the eyes from the right ear to the left eye and put a cross in the middle,” she said.

“If the dog moves just a tiny fraction it could enter the head and just wound the animal.”

Now, I’m not picking on rangers; they have a job to do of which animal control is just one small part. But why is the community not being told of the terrible methods they’re being forced to use? Once the public is told their money is being used to shoot and stab pets to death, they’ll demand more from their local councils. And both rangers and pets will be set to benefit from better welfare practices.

Direct evidence of the impact of feral cat predation is difficult to collect, as feral cats tend to be shy and elusive. It is also difficult to separate out the effect of feral cats from other factors that may lead to the decline of a native species, such as competition from other introduced animals and clearing of habitat.

In some areas of Australia, such as the tropics, Kangaroo Island and Tasmania, feral cats have been around for more than a century and don’t appear to have contributed to extinctions of any native animals.

The NSW Department of Environment and Climate Change Pest Animals website

It seems no creature has ever been more maligned than the cat, but interestingly it’s quite an ‘Australian’ thing to hate them. Accused of wiping out native species, it seems almost patriotic to be anti-cat, but other countries such as the UK don’t persecute cats in the same way and actually have quite a strong preference to cats as great companions for people who work.

Australian men really don’t like cats (sorry to any cat loving Australian men) it is extremely unusual to  meet a single Australian male who owns a cat, but not so in the UK. Cats are easily rehomed and just as popular with blokes as women or couples.

PetRescue’s Vix commenting on her recent trip to the UK

So if they make such great pets and are only one small part of the ecological destruction that’s taking place in Australia, who are these anti-cat sentiments being drummed up by?


Well, obviously there are the conservationists who see cats as a threat to wildlife. And the associated debate tends to focus on two images; the big nasty cat vs the small furry marsupial. Of course our heart strings are going to be plucked for the native mouse – but is it a realistic argument to say cats are to blame for their extinction?

Approximately 2.5 million native animals are killed by motor vehicles in NSW alone each year, that’s 7,000 a day.

WIRES

Cats do impact on wildlife, but there has been a great deal of misinformation and propaganda about the true harm they cause. This debate has become so heated at times, fuelled by a minority of vocal cat haters who often have the ear of government, that people have lost sight of the fact that it is humans themselves who are the real culprits. Massive, ongoing and largely irreversible damage to the environment by human activity is the main reason for the loss of wildlife, the impact of cats being infinitesimal in comparison.

The truth about cats and wildlife puts some perspective on the issue

Further sources of anti-cat sentiment are media ‘personalities’ who still think it’s funny to hurt cats;

I tried the traditional methods — water, screaming, Caligula — but the thing about cats is that they always have an exit strategy, so it’s hard to nail them in a way that convinces them to never return.

The Age’s Jim Schembri on Adventures in cat proofing

(I wonder if it would had been so ‘hilarious’ if it had been a golden retriever rather than a cat that he had been trying so hard to ‘nail’?)

And finally, the very people you would think would actually be on the cats’ side – cat protection groups – seem to feel unless a cat is an indoor, owned cat it’s better off dead and happily push the ‘cats kill wildlife’ agenda, which seems completely at odds with their pledge to save cats.

The Minister for Agriculture, Joe Helper, today joined the Cat Protection Society to urge people to restrain from feeding Victoria’s half a million stray or feral cats, and arrange for any strays to be collected by the local council.

“People think they are being kind by feeding stray or feral cats without realising they are contributing to a massive problem that condemns the animals to a life of disease, neglect, public nuisance and threats to native wildlife,” Mr Helper said.

Eleven animal welfare and industry organisations are taking part in this public education campaign, which will run throughout the state for a minimum of 12 months. Organisations supporting the campaign are the Animal Welfare Science Centre, Australian Veterinary Association, Cat Protection Society, Department of Primary Industries, Lort Smith Animal Hospital, Monash University, Municipal Association of Australia, Pet Industry Association of Australia, RSPCA, The Lost Dogs’ Home and Victorian Animal Aid.

‘Who’s for cats?’ campaign launch media release With friends like these…

While it seems easy to just make cat laws the same as dog laws (desex + confine) by demanding this we’re giving charte blanche to councils to ‘dispose’ of any cats living outside these parameters. With no one defending a cats right to live and not always be as reliant on humans as the dog, we’re saying to our community ‘it’s ok to hate cats, owners should keep them out of your way, otherwise consider them fair game for abuse”.


But what about the ownerless? And the semi-owned? As animal welfare ambassadors it should be our role to defend the right of all cats to be respected as living, feeling individuals, just as important as any other and with a right to life and protection.

Earlier this year Petfinder and Maddie’s Fund announced the winners of a competition they members to find effective marketing strategies for adopting hard to place dogs and cats.


The results have now been made into a library of great ideas to help those pets often seen as unadoptable. Check them out here:


Top Prize Winners
Behavior Problems
Big, brown, nondescript dogs
Black cats and dogs
FIV, FeLV cats
Length of stay issues
Medical problems
Pit bulls
Senior Pets
A combination of problems (age, medical, behavior)
Adoptions in general

Some rescue groups consider themselves the ‘garbage collectors’ cleaning up after a careless community and judging the people who drop their pets off as irresponsible and unwilling to work on a solution.


Nearly always I’d suggest, it’s because the relinquishing owners that come to them are unreachable – they’ve already made up their minds and resent someone righteously telling them they’ve made the wrong decision. As they say, the horse has bolted…


Other rescue groups (the ones more interested in saving the lives of pets, than keeping the public as an enemy to be punished at every opportunity) see there is a chance to reach people way, way, way before they walk in the door looking to surrender.

Those who believe in a non-punitive approach tend to develop and maintain programs and policies that are more proactive, working to head problems off at the pass more than just react to them. They also say they have something more to offer people caught in the housing crisis — real, practical assistance and compassion.
…

I spoke with Brown about how her shelter has responded to the foreclosure crisis and economic downturn in the Reno area. She said NHS works with local press and real-estate agents to make sure pet owners facing foreclosure are aware of the resources available to them. They offer a free animal help desk, a pet food bank, and have a list of more than 500 foster homes, as well as a creative adoption program to find new permanent homes for pets who need them.

Foreclosure Pets (you MUST read this!)

So how do you become proactive, when you’re operating as a reactive organisation? It’s easy – stop blaming your community and start behaving like a shelter.

When you look closely at these issues it becomes clear that the balance between a conciliatory and a confrontational approach has been weighted so far towards compromise that little has been gained for Australian animals.

RSPCA Australia Chief Scientist, Dr Bidda Jones @ AAWS

Just as groups attempt to get laws passed that reflect the best practice for animal welfare, industry and government can use the promise of change just to keep the peace.

Won’t you just shut up and go away?

Take the Clover Moore bill. I like Clover’s law, I think we’re ready for it. Any civilised society looks back on the history of the way it treated its animals with deep sadness; and I think shipping baby animals like fruit, then selling them from glass boxes to whomever has a whim, will be one of the things that will make future generations ashamed of us.


So news today that, although they’re not ready to ban pet shop sales

Dodgy pet shop owners will face tough new penalties for maltreatment of animals under new state government regulations to be introduced next week. ref

Well, that’s a relief… except didn’t dodgy pet shop owners always face tough penalties for maltreatment of animals? And wasn’t the system failing regardless?


So what are these ‘tough new regulations’?

Minors will also be banned from buying pets under the overhaul, and a mandatory three-day cooling-off period will be introduced to stop impulse buys.

Well, selling to minors is a no-brainer – you would have to truly be satan if you were selling pets to unaccompanied children. But a three day cooling off period neither stops impulse buys (pets are still small and cute after 3 days – they don’t turn into delightfully destructive adolescents until a bit later) or represents anything new, as the code of practice of 12 years ago specifies that a cooling off period should be offered.

So what is this all about?

Simply, this is the pet shop industry’s way of releasing information to make it look like something has happened to change them… all while things stay exactly the same.

Dr Jones cont…
We have reached a stage where animal welfare is firmly on the agenda of governments and industries but while this is a good start, there is still a strong resistance to any meaningful change.

Despite the high profile and public standing of organisations like the RSPCA, when it comes to policy-making, governments listen much more attentively to economic reasons than to ethical ones.

We get what we pay for

Society always moves much faster than any government or industry so if we want the situation to change then it’s up to us.

The big pet store chains are already moving away from live pet sales due to consumer demand. Pet shops won’t need to be dragged kicking and screaming by any new legislation, they’ll simply fail to thrive unless they meet the needs of their customers.

“There should be a law against that” – rescuer


The speakers at the Australian Animal Welfare Strategy Conference were from an incredibly broad spectrum of animal related backgrounds; from groups working to improve the welfare of animals in zoos and laboratories, in beef and milk production, chicken farming and rodeos, right through to groups who work on the frontline of animal rights. Two major conference sponsors were the RSPCA and the AWL, another was Meat & Livestock Australia. But although every one of these groups had their own positions, some directly opposing – the level of ‘crazy’ was incredibly low.


Why? Because those most connected to the law process don’t have the luxury of relentlessly pursuing a particular view point – they realise they have to work together with the industry to bring about change.


That’s not to say these individuals aren’t driven by a dream of their own idea of animal welfare utopia, it’s just that the law can only move as fast as society. There’s very rarely a law enacted that is unpopular with the majority of the population; that’s simply not good politics.


Say, I think all dogs should be brown. I have a whole bunch of reasons why being brown is better for the welfare of dogs. But if most in the community don’t care about dog colour and those in the dog industry don’t support my ideal, rest assured there will never be brown dog enforcement.


Cue the effective industry participant. They work with multicoloured dog breeders to find out their motivations and work to show the benefits of breeding brown dogs. They educate the community to their point of view with research and clever messages. They accept that there will never be a law that can make the change overnight – and that any law is simply a way to gather up any laggers once the commuity has already changed.


If your plan for success hinges on getting a new law, then you’re likely to die waiting. Like living a life hoping to win the lottery, if you find yourself thinking ‘if only we could get the government to bring in a law’ – take it as a sign that you’re in a impotent frame of mind and are probably not doing enough to bring about actual change.


You can’t beat them – you must join them. Walk into the den of the enemy, sit quietly and listen to their point of view. Engage the community with your message. It’s only once you stop calling for the heads of the people who have a different point of view to you and instead work to engage them, that you’ll have the chance to bring about change.