I am considered the resident "animal person" where I work. I am known to be outspoken in my advocacy and that means people come to me for advice on a host of issues like re-homing a pet due to a death in the family, finding a lost pet, where to get the best prices for spay and neuter, which local rescue groups are the best, "what do we do about the bat hanging on the outside of the building," etc. I'm no expert on any of these topics, but I do try to steer people in the right direction while perhaps teaching them something in the process. I had an inquiry from a co-worker recently about getting a new-to-him dog in the wake of the passing of a beloved dog. My response was immediate: get a senior. Our attachments to animals are emotional and involve chemistry, so a lot of people gravitate to animals based on appearance or based on assumptions about future behavior. The reality of our culture is that people often get pets from breeders, stores or websites because they equate cost with value or worth and they believe animals from sources other than shelters and rescues are somehow superior. The flip side of that negative bias is that people assume that since animals die in shelters in all but our most progressive communities, they must somehow be damaged or broken. Neither or those assumptions is true. Animals in shelters are there due to no fault of their own and many may very well have been someone's beloved pet. When it comes to animals adopted from shelters, our other reality is that people tend to gravitate toward younger, cuter animals while overlooking animals who are older. In honor of Adopt a Senior Pet Month, here's my pitch for why you should adopt a senior animal. My personal hope is that some day after I retire, I'll adopt only senior pets and work to give them the best years of their lives. They deserve nothing less. What You See is What You Get. All puppies are cute, but it can often be difficult to tell how large they will grow and what kind of personalities they will have as adults. The same is true for kittens. When you adopt a senior pet, you know exactly what you are getting in terms of size, color and general physical condition. Some senior pets require a period of time to decompress from the circumstances which led them to you, but good shelters and rescues can tell you a lot about the animal's behavior and temperament so you know more about what to expect. Many animals adopted from rescue groups have been in foster homes so the group can tell you a lot about their personalities. The vast majority of animals adopted from shelters and rescues are also fully vetted so you know about their health and they come to you spayed or neutered, vaccinated and microchipped. Seniors are more mellow and predictable. As cute as a puppy may be, the reality is that they take a lot of work. They need structure and boundaries. We are responsible not only for teaching them our language, but learning how to understand the body language they use to communicate with us. Puppies can be destructive when bored and can be mouthy when playing. Even young cats can have a destructive side and can keep you up at night with nocturnal play. A senior dog or cat has been there done that and is simply going to be a more mellow addition to your household. Many senior animals have spent years living with a family and are socialized to people. Senior dogs may know basic commands and may very well be house trained. Even if an older dog is not house trained, many are very easily trained in a short period of time. All dogs and cats need exercise and mental stimulation but your senior pet just needs less to keep him or her entertained. Most senior pets don't require the same level of monitoring or training that younger animals require so they're a good choice for busy families with young children, for older people or for people with disabilities. Older Dogs (and Cats) Can Learn New Tricks. Training a puppy or a young dog can take a lot of time, effort and repetition. You have to be consistent and help the dog learn what behaviors are expected and which are not appropriate. This includes involving all members of your family, including your children. Adult dogs and cats are simply more focused and learn fast. If your senior dog needs to learn about how to function in your family, you can enroll him or her in an obedience class or consult with a behaviorist so you can learn how to read your dogs' behavior and how you can be a good pack leader. Although people perceive that cats cannot be trained due to their independent nature, most can be trained to follow basic instructions. You Still Have Plenty of Time With Them. Whether or not a dog is a senior is based on breed and size. In general, the larger the breed or size of the dog, the shorter the life span. Many large breeds are considered "senior" by the age of 6. Many smaller breeds are considered senior by the age of 10. Most cats are considered senior between the ages of 7 and 10. Regardless of the age of the senior, older pets still have plenty of great years left. If you get a medium sized dog who is 6 years old, he or she may have 10 good years left. If you get an 7 year old cat, he or she may have more than 10 years with you. You can talk to your veterinarian about ways to keep your senior dog or cat happy and healthy for many years after your lives together begin. Older Pets are Great for Seniors. A lot of older people don't get new pets because they worry about their ability to care for them for the entire life span of the pet. A dog or cat can live from 10 years to 20 years and some older people are worried that their pets may outlive them. When seniors adopt seniors, it can be a perfect fit. The older person gets an animal who is more mellow and who is more content to just spend time together and the animal gets a new life in a more mellow household where companionship is the focus of the relationship. Many animal shelters have Seniors for Seniors Programs in which adoption fees are either waived or greatly reduced and with programs in place to re-home an adopted pet if something happens to their adoptive family. Be a Hero, Save a Life. Older dogs and cats are often overlooked in shelters and end up being destroyed in all but the most progressive communities even though they are perfectly healthy. When you adopt a senior animal, you are quite literally saving that animal's life. If you have ever loved a animal into their old age, think about what a tragedy it would have been if that animal had never been given an opportunity to live out their last years in comfort. Although you may have fewer years together than with a puppy or kitten, your rescued senior may enhance your life in ways you never imagined. The health benefits of pets is well documented - they lower our blood pressure, reduce our stress levels and provide us with unconditional love that we rarely provide each other as humans. Older pets somehow just seem to know that you have done a good thing to help them and you may find yourself bonding with a senior much faster than you would with a younger animal. (images courtesy of Dana Kay Mattox Deutsch)
1 Comment
I have finished reworking my slide show about community cats and TNR in advance of National Feral Cat Day which is on Sunday, October 16th. My prior version from 2011 lacked some of the current terms of art we now use and it needed an upgrade. Thanks to Fisher for the music use. Thanks to Lisa, Chriss and others for the video clips and images. As I blogged about recently, my experiences with TNR (trap, neuter, return) are both personal from the colony I help manage and as a result of friends and contacts across the country who do TNR and have for years. Whenever I hear someone speaking out against TNR, I wonder if they actually care about cats. I’m confident from what I’ve read and from the research by Alley Cat Allies that TNR truly is the most humane method to reduce cat populations. And I am reminded of the cats we have helped as a result of TNR who may have suffered and died without our help, many of whom were social to people and were just lost or injured. Chloe, Abby, Romey, Dot, Ford, Locke, Hollis, Channing, Holton, Wynn, Larry, Sky.
A friend of mine in California who does TNR recently helped a male cat she named T.C. It took weeks to trap him and he was put into a foster home. It was later determined that T.C. was very sick and he ultimately could not survive his ailments. His foster mom, Nan, wrote this note about his passing and I hope you will take a minute to read it. And then you will think twice when someone says that free roaming cats should just be destroyed. If your cat was lost or went missing, you would want someone doing TNR to help him or her: It is with a heavy heart, deep sorrow, and much sadness, I bring the news that T.C. lost the fight for his life today - he passed away this morning in my arms. Though he was a fighter, "my trooper", after being neglected for so long, it was just too much for his frail body. I'm glad I was able to be here for him. I am going to miss his little smiling face, looking at me upside-down, as I would rub his full belly. Not many male cats will let you rub their belly without shredding your arm, he definitely was not a feral cat. My condolence lies in the fact that T.C. got to know what it felt like to have a full belly every day, along with a warm comfortable bed to sleep in without worrying about anything, and having someone doting on him, giving him all the love and affection he wanted. Getting to know him was priceless. Godspeed, T.C. I'm sorry you couldn't stay. But I'm thankful you were helped and loved and you received the best possible care in your last days. National Feral Cat Day is on Sunday, October 16, 2016. As we approach this national day of awareness and education, I wanted to blog about the topic of community cats. I know I tend to talk about dogs more than cats on my website simply due to my volunteer work for certain nonprofit organizations which help dogs, but the issue of community cats is one I deal with on a regular basis because of the managed colony of community cats where I work. What is a Community Cat? A community cat is a cat who lives outside. These cats are also known of as outdoor cats, stray cats, alley cats, feral cats, street cats, barn cats and tomcats. They originate from former domestic cats who were lost or abandoned and then learned to live outdoors or in environments involving little human contact, such as warehouses, factories or abandoned buildings. Outdoor cats live in family groups called colonies. They are bonded to their environments due to the resources they find there: food, water and shelter. They are also bonded to each other for companionship and protection. What is a Feral Cat? A feral cat is a community cat but not all community cats are feral. A feral cat is one who is not socialized to humans. You can often tell the difference between feral cat and a cat who is social to humans through body language and behavior. A stray cat which may be social to people will often approach people, houses, porches and cars. A feral cat will not approach people and will seek out places to hide. A stray cat might walk or move much like a house cat with his or her tail in the air. A feral cat may crawl, crouch or stay low to the ground and protect his or her body with the tail. A stray cat may look at you, blink, make eye contact or even vocalize near you. A feral cat is unlikely to make eye contact or vocalize at all. Shouldn’t We Just Destroy These Cats? Some people would argue that community cats should be destroyed in order to remove them from the ecosystem or to prevent them from destroying birds. Free-roaming cats live in certain areas because of the resources available there. If you destroy the cats, more will simply take their place. This is called “the vacuum effect.” The arguments that feral cats destroy wildlife or spread rabies are myths. Habitat destruction and pesticides are the main cause of diminishing wildlife. According to Alley Cat Allies, the last confirmed cat to human transmission of rabies occurred more than 40 years ago. Outdoor cats are as healthy and pet cats and can have the same life span. In stark contrast, more than 70% of cats who end up in shelters nationally are destroyed. When it comes to community cats, that number rises to 100% in all but the most progressive communities. A national survey conducted by Alley Cat Allies showed that more than 80% of Americans believe that leaving a stray cat outside to live out his or her life is more humane than having the cat caught and killed. More than 40% of Americans have cared for an outdoor cat; it is clear that Americans want compassionate approaches for cats. How Do We Help These Cats? Studies have shown that Trap-Neuter-Return - TNR - is the only method proven to be humane and effective at controlling community cat population growth. Using this technique, all the cats in a colony are trapped, neutered (or spayed), vaccinated and then returned to their territory where caretakers provide them with regular food and shelter. It is customary to “ear tip” the left ear of the cat during surgery so the cat be easily identified as a cat who has been sterilized and vaccinated. Young kittens and friendly adults trapped in TNR are placed in foster care and eventually adopted out to good homes. TNR stabilizes the size of the colony by eliminating new litters. The nuisance behavior often associated with feral cats is also dramatically reduced, including the yowling and fighting that come with mating activity and the odor of un-neutered males spraying to mark their territory. What Are Some of the Indirect Benefits of TNR? In addition to helping cats who live outside, another significant advantage to TNR is that it lessens the number of kittens and cats flowing into local shelters. It is more humane and cost-effective to use TNR to control cat populations so that tax-dollars are not needlessly spent on what is sometimes referred to as a "catch and kill" method of handling free-roaming cats. Another indirect benefit of TNR is what cats who are social to humans, but who are just lost, scared or injured, are helped in the process. A cat who is outside and who needs help is often hard to distinguish from a feral cat. It is only in the process of doing TNR that rescuers and people who help cat colonies are able to help cats who require veterinary care or who are completely social to humans and just need a new home. Why Would Anyone Oppose TNR? The topic of feral cats is one which is the subject of a lot of controversy nationally. In spite of numerous studies to the contrary, there are those who are simply convinced that free roaming cats are a danger to wildlife, they harm the environment and they should just be destroyed. I simply could not agree more. I will leave it up to organizations like Alley Cat Allies to fend off the blows of the cat haters with science. For me, this is just a simple issue: TNR works. My Personal TNR Story. I work at an office building in a centrally located area of a fairly large city, next to the major thoroughfare which runs through the city from north to south. We have been doing TNR of community cats for years with the help of a local rescue group called Forgotten Felines. I know for a fact that in the years we have been doing TNR, 90% of the cats we have helped were actually social to people and were not feral at all. Many of them acted unsocial at first, but once they were trapped and helped, we found that they actually seemed relieved to be safe and in the company of people. Yes, some of our cats really are feral and they live outside in our managed colony, moving between parcels primarily through the street drainage system. They are fed once a day 365 days a year, we monitor their health by observing them and I dare to say they have it pretty good between nutritious food and some cat houses which are actually insulated with spray foam. For those who oppose TNR, saying it is cruel or not effective, I say this: if you really care about the welfare of cats, you simply cannot discount the fact that TNR reduces cat populations, keeps kittens from being born and helps pet cats who are social to people. We have helped cats who were so thin they were on death’s doorstep. We had one cat with multiple broken bones in her front left arm that had to be treated by an orthopedic surgeon. Still other cats have had infections which gone untreated may have killed them. But for us doing TNR and helping the cats who make their way to one of our feeding stations, they would have died and in many cases their death would be slow and painful. And but for us doing TNR and helping cats here, they would likely have ended up in our municipal animal shelter where they would have been destroyed using tax dollars. If your cat was lost or went missing, you would want someone doing TNR to help him or her. I was on my way to work and stopped at a light when I detected movement to my right. I looked at the vehicle next to me and that's when I saw it. A small white dog, sitting on the lap of a woman driving a mid-sized sedan. She was talking to the dog, stroking his ears and just before the light turned green, she kissed his head. At a glance, the image was sweet. She clearly loves her dog. But inside I was seething and mentally trying to find a way to communicate with her before the light changed. I am the first to admit that I have strong opinions on a lot of issues and that I sometimes use my blog to rant. Well, - Rant Alert. Traveling in your vehicle with pets, dogs or cats, is the same as traveling in your vehicle with small children. You would not hold a baby in your lap and you would not put a toddler in the bed of your pick-up truck. When you take your pets with you in your vehicle, it is your responsibility to ensure they travel safely from point A to point B. You may be the best driver on the planet. But the drivers around you are not. We have seen time and again how the increased used of phones and electronic devices while driving can lead to disaster in the blink of an eye. You can engage in defensive driving and situational awareness all day long, but you cannot control the driver next to you who is sending a text or who is so caught up in a phone conversation that only 20% of their focus is actually on driving. There was a time when I really didn't give a lot of thought to how pets travel in vehicles. I am old enough to have grown up at a time when there were no seat belts and no such thing as a car seat for children. I often wonder how we all survived, but we did. I completely changed my mind on the topic of pet travel safety about 15 years ago and as a result of the tragic loss of a co-worker. I will spare you the specific details. I will say that when you are in an accident with your pet in your vehicle and your pet is not restrained, her or she becomes a living projectile. You can do your best to react quickly enough to try to keep your dog or cat from flying forward, backward or to the side, but is it unlikely that you will succeed. If your pet is anywhere near an airbag, he or she will probably be killed. If your pet is unrestrained in a back seat, as was the case with my co-worker's dog, he or she is likely to be thrown toward either a window or windshield, causing catastrophic injuries. If you really love your dog or cat, as the woman I saw this morning surely does, do not travel with them in your lap, standing up with their head out of a window, in a seat near and airbag or unrestrained in any way. A split second can mean the difference between life and death for both you and your pets and since you surely will be wearing a seat belt, your pet should be safely restrained also. Because of the size of our dogs, I am partial to the Sleepypod Clickit Sport Harness. It comes in sizes to suit most dogs and is the only harness approved by the Center for Pet Safety. If your dog is smaller or you are traveling with a cat, you can use a travel carrier that is designed for inside of a vehicle. It took Aspy a couple of trips to get used to his harness, but once he figured out that he could stand, move around and put his head out the window, he stepped into it easily. I dare say that he enjoyed wearing it because he knew he was safer and he could lean just a little further out the window and smell the life going on all around us. I know that I always felt safer knowing he was restrained. He might have broken a bone in an accident, but I knew I had done all I can to keep him safe and with no regrets. I hope the woman I saw this morning made it safely to her destination with her dog unscathed. As long as she continues to carry her dog in her lap, she is risking the life of her dog with every mile traveled. Should something happen to that dog, it will surely change her life forever and that's just incredibly sad to me.
Be safe. Be responsible. Please. |
AuthorI am an animal welfare advocate. My goal is to help people understand some basic issues related to companion animals in America. Awareness leads to education leads to action leads to change. Archives
August 2023
Categories
All
image courtesy of Terrah Johnson
|