TIPS AND TRICKS: Information, Please!

I love that so many people are so passionate about posting urgent animals on Facebook, and sharing them with others that might help. Some of these cats and dogs would not have a chance in the world to be seen if it wasn't for the hard work of volunteers and crossposters.

Sometimes, however, the passion overtakes logic, and pictures get posted with a lack of information. Think of posting and crossposting as a form of marketing - would you put a great picture of your product up on the internet, and then not tell people how they can get it or where it's located?  I have seen many caring people post pictures of pets on Facebook, with a big HELP! and no vital information. People need to know, in a concise manner, the W's of the situation.

WHO? 
Who can potential adopters talk to for more information? Who can help a rescue or adopter arrange to get the dog or cat to safety? Who will know what options are available for transport? Who is allowed to pull from this shelter? Answering these questions ahead of time can prevent the dreaded "I want to help, but I don't know who to talk to!" problem.

WHAT?
What breed of dog is it? How old?  What do you know about his or her temperament? Good with dogs/kids/adults/cats/none of the above? Does the dog or cat have any special needs? HW status, health status, shots, spay/neuter status are all very important too, if you have them. These are all questions that help rescues and adopters make the decision on whether or not a pet is right for their situation. If the information is not readily available, they may move on to another animal.

WHERE?
Where does this pet currently reside? Shelter name, address, city and state are very important. This way, a potential rescue or adopter can figure out what will need to be done to save the animal, or if they even can do so.

WHEN? 
When is this pet going to be killed? When is the shelter open so that someone can save the pet? 

WHY?
If the dog or cat has a story, it's VERY important to tell it! This can differentiate your urgent animal from another. If you don't have a story, try to take the information you do have, and make the plea more personal. 

HOW?
How much is the pull fee, and what does that include? How can an out of state adopter or rescue save the available animals? How can one pay the pull fee - over the phone, or does it have to be in person? What payments does the shelter accept? How is the dog handled after that - does it go to the vet for a spay, or is it available immediately?

It helps to post all of the information on each picture...that way, crossposters do not have to hunt down details to add to the picture in order to generate interest in the animals.

Posting as much information as possible is the first step in saving these animals lives. 

Some great examples of posts that have the info needed:

Kristin Kucsma, North and South Carolina kill shelters
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.544707235369.2055330.19802242

Petra Kleber Keim, Heard County GA
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1717898661715.2085897.1065694329

Greenville SC Urgent List
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.201057003262674.41760.153272091374499

Urgent Part 2 NYC Area
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.206358356043718.56767.152876678058553

ISSUES IN RESCUE: The Cost of Out-Of-State Rescue

I really feel like I want to tackle this topic, because it seems to come up a lot. On my rescue album on Facebook for the Highlands County Florida Urgent Dogs , I list out what it will cost to save a dog from the shelter, both for local and out of state adopters. I have been asked many times lately, "Why do they charge so much for out of state rescues? I want to save a dog, you want it safe. Can't you do it for less/free?"

The answer is, no. And the reasons are all practical, not greed-related (at least for the good rescues out there).

Let's say you want to rescue a dog and you are local. That's awesome - that's what I want! I want that dog to go to a good home. You can come to the shelter, pay the $75-85 pull fee...this comes with rabies vaccine and spay/neuter surgery. You can also opt to ask for a heartworm test once the dog is at the vet, which will cost another $40. In the grand scheme of things, $115 for a neutered, vaccinated, heartworm tested dog is a pretty good deal...it would cost you a lot more at your vet.

Now, let's say you are an out of town adopter, and you contact me, asking me to get a male dog to you. This is where it gets trickier. This means that you are not able to come to the shelter yourself to do the financial transaction, and you are not able to pick your dog up from the vet. Here is a breakdown of what it costs to save your dog:
- Gas to get to the shelter: $varies (and I have never asked anyone for gas money, even though I am 2 hours away.)
- Pull Fee: $75.
- Post-surgery Pain Meds: $10
- Heartworm Test: $40 (and if your dog comes up heartworm positive, I have then taken on the risk that you no longer want the dog, which is now my responsibility...but let's say he's heartworm negative.)
Then, the dog needs an Interstate Health Certificate. This requires:
- Wellness Exam: $28
- Parvo/Distemper Test: $17
- Fecal Flotation Test: $14
- Deworming Medicine: $45
- Interstate Health Certificate Issuance: $12

So far, this is $241, and every step of the way I shoulder the risk that you may change your mind on saving the dog (it happens way more often than you would think).

Then, we have to figure out transport. Let's say you live far away, and it is best to transport the dog via flight. Let's assume that flight costs $300 (I have never had to pay for a flight for a dog, so I am guessing here). Let's say that the next flight that your dog can catch is 3 days after his neuter procedure, and you do not have a local foster in place. This means $15/day for boarding...which comes to $45 total.

Then, someone has to pick up your dog from the vet and transport them to the airport, which is usually Orlando airport in the case of the dogs at Highlands. This is a 3 hour drive round trip, and costs gas money as well. There will also have to be a travel kennel purchased...let's say that's $100.

So in total, assuming that the dog is healthy, assuming that you keep your end of the bargain and don't decide at some point that you have changed your mind...the grand total cost for an out of state rescue (under the given circumstances) can be around $686. If you have asked me to pull this dog and change your mind at any time, disappear from contact, etc...then I have a large financial bill to cover (remember, it's $241 before he even gets on a plane) AND a dog who is depending on me to find him a place to live that is NOT back at Animal Control.

I hate to say it, but I don't know any rescue that can consistently afford to take on $700 per dog bills on behalf of people who only have to say "never mind" when the going gets tough. I know I can't. As I have said many times, animal rescue is not an endeavor that makes any legitimate rescuer money. There are no stockpiles of unused donations sitting around, and whenever I let people know how much it would cost to save a dog - I am NOT embellishing. I am NOT demanding gas money or mileage or repayment for my time, and most of us don't. I am ONLY asking for the hard costs of getting that dog to safety, and I can't afford to cover them, even temporarily, for someone who's only commitment is saying "I want that dog!" on Facebook.

All that being said, though, for those who are truly committed...for those who are willing to contribute to the safety of their future furry children (or start a chip-in themselves to raise money to help defray the rather large cost involved)...for those who plan their transport without demanding that someone else take care of it for them...for those who are willing to take on a dog that may need some extra care, even if they weren't expecting it...I am at your service, and I know several people who feel the same way. Because our goal, above all else, is to get these dogs and cats to homes that really care about them, wherever the location.

Speaking of which, I would like to give a shout out to Wendy Lorden, who rescued one of the Highlands dogs recently. Wendy asked me to pull Diamond, an American Bulldog mix, for her. When I called to give her the awful news that Diamond was heartworm positive, she didn't flinch. When her transport plan fell through, she paid for Diamond's boarding and then drove all the way from Tennessee to Florida to pick up her new girl. She never gave up, or demanded that I figure out how to fix things. That's commitment!

All of us rescuers are committed to seeing every one of these dogs safe. But although it would be nice if it wasn't, money is a factor. Please keep this in mind if you are considering rescuing from out of state, and the whole process will be easier for all involved. :)

My Three Favorite Dogs This Week at Highlands County Animal Control (Sebring, FL)

This is turning out to be a rough week. I crosspost a lot of different shelters' animals, but my pet project is a rural high-kill shelter here in my home state of Florida - Highlands County Animal Control. They are in Sebring, FL, and their pets get relatively little exposure without the intervention of some dedicated employees and volunteers that are willing to take the information they are given about each animal and post them in Facebook albums. Their dogs are not on Petharbor, and they are not on Petfinder. These dogs and cats have a very low chance of being seen by rescuers or adopters, which is sad, because many of them are fantastic - my Lindy among them.

I crosspost daily, and of course every week I come away with a few dogs that I just can't stop thinking about, and can't stop posting, until I can see or post "SAFE" on their pictures. So today I am going to talk a little bit about my three favorite dogs that are currently on death row at Highlands County Animal Control, and why you should check them (and their fellow inmates) out in the albums I have posted on Facebook:

DOGS

CATS 

 This is Two Face. I met him last week when I went to help an adopter (my sister) pick up her new friend from Highlands County Animal Control. Two Face is beautiful - the first thing you notice about him are his really cool facial markings. He is a 4-year-old Cur Mix who seems like he has been largely ignored throughout his life, but still has hope that someone will give him a chance. He is calm and loving, and waits for you to extend your hand and calmly accepts any love you might offer him. He is on the bigger side of medium, and would make a great, loving, calm family dog and a devoted best friend. Two Face will die on Wednesday morning if no one steps forward for him.

This little boy is so alone in the world that he doesn't even have a name. He is a 2-year-old Cur Mix who still carries all of the hope in the world in his heart. This is amazing, considering the fact that he is underweight and his nails are long, showing a short life of not being cared for. When I walked up to his cage, he sat and wagged his tail, and as I put my hand through to him, he leaned into it, just so relieved for a person to be touching him in any friendly way. I scratched his face and he sat there, soaking it in like a parched sponge that has never seen a drop of water. This poor little boy is so sweet, but is a total underdog - not a fancy, flashy breed, not gravely ill, not the type of dog that it is popular to rally around...just a great, but overlooked, brown dog full of love that may be snuffed out on Wednesday. 

This sweet boy's name is Rocket, and he was abandoned at Animal Control by his family, who said that they were losing their home to foreclosure and just didn't have time to find him a home. Considering how long a foreclosure takes in Florida these days, the "I don't have time" argument doesn't fly with me. But they couldn't have cared much. Rocket spent all of his days being passed around and living outdoors, getting love where he could. He is low-key and gentle, and wants nothing more than to be petted and to lay at someone's feet, INDOORS, who really appreciates his beauty (both inside and out!). Rocket is on his second week (most never make it that far) and likely has no chance of making it past Wednesday without an adopter or rescue.

My work with this shelter, trying to help save dogs and cats that have no voices of their own, and very few advocates, can be very hard emotionally, as anyone who takes on a similar "pet project" can attest to. You get to know the dogs, either through pictures and descriptions, or in person, and you get attached. You take them into your heart and when they lose their lives due to the moronic actions of their owners, or their bad luck, not for anything that they have done...it cuts deep. Especially when you have poured your soul into saving them, in every way you can. I can't imagine what those who work at the shelters daily must feel like.

But I always say to myself, "If I stop acting on their behalf, that is one less advocate these dogs and cats will have, when they already have so few." If I can help save a couple more, maybe there will be more room and others can be held over, and I can try again next week. If I can help an out-of-state rescue take one of the dogs, that dog gets a new lease on life that he/she may not have had. If I can help connect people who want to help financially to those who want to help physically, more lives will be saved. My part may be little, but it adds to the sum of many amazing parts. Each of us put together - crossposters, donors, rescues, transporters, adopters, and rescue-friendly shelter workers make it possible for miracles to happen.

That's what keeps me going, even in the weeks where there seems to be no hope - the fact that I can do my part to help an animal live out a happy life that may not have had that chance. If you can help any of the Highlands County animals, please contact me. Thank you.

"Saving the life of one animal may not change the world, but the world will surely change for that one animal"

TIPS AND TRICKS: Find your strength, and go with it!

Everyone has their own set of strengths. The things that our friends are always saying "Wow, can you please show me how to do that?" or even, "Can you do this for me? You are so much better at it than I am." The things that we have going for us, the advantages that we were given in life, the skills that we have worked really hard to hone into expertise, the knowledge we have built up over time.

In crossposting, you can be incredibly helpful by identifying your strengths, and figuring out how to focus on those. By utilizing your strengths, and aligning with others that have different strengths, you can help save many more lives. For example:

* Do you have a way with words? Consider writing creative bios for animals that can be posted with their photos. A lot of ACs and rescues don't have the time to write up a really compelling story for each dog or cat.

* Are you good behind the lens? Consider going to your local AC or rescue and donating some of your time to take attractive pictures of the dogs they have available (a good picture can make a HUGE difference in how much attention is paid to a dog or cat online). Most ACs or rescues don't have access to the kind of skills and equipment a photographer possesses.

* Are you artistic? I have seen a few people add borders with information and adorable speech bubbles to pictures in an attempt to draw in the viewer, and it seems to really help!

* Do you have some money each month that you can set aside to help with emergency rescue efforts? Often when an emergency comes up (a senior dog, a sick cat), the rescues that would love to help don't have the money readily available to pay for transportation or surgery. People who help with the financial aspect of rescue are vital - remember that rescues are not businesses that make profit! Often, they are people with big hearts that are running on donations and credit card balances. Your $25 here or there can make a big difference.

**NOTE: Make sure before you donate that your money is going to a trusted individual or rescue. Unfortunately, there have been people out there that have used animal rescue as a front for deceit. PLEASE check out any person asking for donations BEFORE you give, so that you know that your money is going to the right place (helping animals)!**

* Are you good with organization and using Facebook? Offer to post animals at an AC or rescue in an album on FB and help keep track of their status. A lot of times, organizations don't have the time and resources to keep everyone directly informed of what is going on with the animals. A good photo album setup is a great start, so that crossposters can easily see the animal's information, location, and status. I will do a post about this subject later.

These are just a small number of examples of strengths that one can leverage in the pursuit of helping to save animals. What are your strengths? In what ways are you using your gifts to help save the lives of animals?

TOOLS AND INFO: The Rescue Shelter Network

Today I want to share a neat site that a fellow crossposter showed me a while back. It's called The Rescue Shelter Network.

The Rescue Shelter Network

It allows you to search a list of breed-specific rescues for all sorts of animals, based on geographic location. This allows you, as a crossposter, to not only share those pictures on Facebook, but to contact rescues that may be interested in that dog or cat directly.

For example, you see a Boston Terrier listed as urgent in a rural shelter in Georgia. You select "Boston Terrier" from the Dog Breed drop-down menu. This takes you to a page where you can select the state..."Georgia Boston Terrier Rescue Groups" (you can also select to see all groups nationally). Once you get to the Georgia page, it will tell you that there are no rescue groups for Boston Terriers in Georgia that are listed on this site, but it does give you links to the closest rescues to Georgia. You can then find these groups' contact information, and send them the information for the dog. Sometimes out of state rescues will be willing to help dogs in other areas, if they are a breed that fits their rescue.

Remember to be as thorough as possible when contacting rescues, as they sometimes don't have the extra time to look up information on a dog that they may be interested in, but came to them with limited information.
Making sure that you give a rescue all of the information they will need, even if you have to look some of it up yourself, makes it easier for the rescue to act on saving animals that they are interested in. And we all like to see "SAFE", right?

What tools do you use in your crossposting efforts? Give me a shout and let me know. 

My Crossposting Story - What's Yours?

I was introduced to crossposting animals on Facebook when I started to get into animal rescue volunteering again. I friended a few local animal rescue organizations, and from there, found that there was a whole community of people who spent hours, and sometime days a week, sharing death row animals in the hopes that they would be seen by that perfect person or rescue group. Sometimes there was triumph when an animal was saved, and sometimes heartbreak when they were listed in an RIP album. But these people kept going, stopping for a bit to mourn the lost, and continuing to fight for those still in peril.

Koba is in a foster home, looking for his forever home

I found precious little information online about how people did this, so I jumped in with both feet and vowed to figure it out, in hopes that I could help make things better too. I started on my own personal profile, but I soon realized how difficult it was to keep track of things, so I started a dedicated profile, Animalrescue Crossposting. I wasn't sure how to make "friends", so I just friend requested every rescue that I could find, any death row animal listings from shelters, and other people with "crossposter" or "crossposting" in their profile names. I began reposting the dogs and cats that were out there looking for homes, especially the ones labeled "URGENT". Over time, more people began to friend request me, and I built up a great network of people who see my posts and can act on them (and vice versa). 

Teaki was saved from AC in N FL.

I have learned a lot about what it takes to save animals from certain death, and I learn more every day as I do this. I have learned the importance of fosters to rescue efforts, the joys and pitfalls of long-distance adoption, the plight of smaller rural shelters with tiny budgets and lack of manpower. I have learned that there are people that spend their every waking moment fighting to save dogs and cats from all over the country that they have never even met, and that there are people that use the animals' misfortune to line their own pockets. I have learned that rescue is a labor of love which often comes with a lot of needless drama...and that running a small rescue is a job that pays only in dog kisses and pictures of animals in new, happy homes as opposed to in cages. I have learned about breed specific legislation, and the different sides that argue for and against it.

Still waiting to be saved from AC in Sebring,FL.

All of this has led the formation of this blog. I don't know everything there is to know about crossposting and rescue, but I would like to share what I have learned with others who are taking the same path. I also want to give other crossposters the opportunity to share what they know, and get a much-deserved (but often forgotten) pat on the back for their hard work and dedication.

Thank you to everyone who undertakes this sometimes joyous, sometimes grim journey with me. The animals depend on all of us.

What's your Crossposting Story? What got you started in helping to save shelter pets?