Hamsters Galore, sigh

Over the weekend 40 hamsters were relinquished along with their housing and water bottles. Most of them are unsexed and may be housed with the opposite sex = MORE HAMSTERS!! We're dealing with them around, and there may be a rescue home available for many of the hamsters.
Shelly was telling me they tried to consolodate them into the large rabbit cage but that they were attacking each other and not getting along. I've definitely seen this before, and at first it was devastating, how can we keep these hamsters if we can't put them in the cages together, we can't have 20 cages sitting around. As I was looking down on them forlornly I remembered a pet smart visit I'd made where I ran into my friend who worked there. He was unloading hamsters that had come in. He gave them a short little squirt with something before he put each one in the holding tank. I asked him what he was doing because it looked pretty bazaar to me, and he told me he was spraying dog cologne on them so they would all smell the same to each other.
I immediately ran back and told Shelly.
We dug out some cologne sprays from the grooming cabinet and I stashed one in the small animals cabinet. I gave the ones that had already been put in the adoption room a little spritz just in case they weren't done fighting (they were all sleeping in one house though and looked pretty congenial).

Hello Bently

So, Bently, a bichon frise/poodle mix is back. This is his third time at the shelter. He came in during one of my first weeks here and has been adopted and relinquished twice since then. Its hard to imagine what could be wrong with him that he can't hold down a home. He's a cute little dog.
I'm starting to understand how everyone can recognize the animals here, even though there are thousands of animals that come through the shelter, each one is different.

Back from a weeks vacay

There are only three of the six small animal crates to clean. The guinea pigs and rabbit must have been adopted, cause there's only two rabbits and the hamster remaining. They don't euthanize the animals when there's room for them and they weren't replaced.

Cleaning half the cages than usual is really easy.

Euthanizations and the "ET" room

Drawing blood from an alert and cohesive animal is hard, even when you do it every day. We draw blood for heart worm tests on adopted dogs that are 6 months of age or older before we send them to the vet. I've observed Kim and the other staff strugle and fight against dogs for a small sample of blood over one hundred times with in the last 5 weeks. Very few dogs sit by without a struggle and it's pretty hard to predict how a dog will react, although the smaller breeds usually make a bigger fuss about needles, the MinPins especially.

Yesterday, Lauren offered to let me try to draw blood from a dog. The one she had lined up for me was a young black lab she thought would be calm enough for a beginner. She began by demonstrating and talking me through the process when under Shelly's grip the lab began to growl. Lauren decided it would be best if she draw the blood given the reaction of the lab. I agreed.

She said that today I could practice on the euthanized dogs and cats, or at least that's what I thought she meant. What she actually meant was practice finding the veins in order to administer the leathal dose. So I euthanized several tranquilized cats and dogs.

One cat was a mother who had abandonned her kittens. The kittens were cold and Bill thought they were dead but when he brought them to the ET room they started crawling and crying. They were the tiniest kittens I'd ever seen or touched. They were euthanized with an injection to the stomach. Lauren said that everyone thinks that an injection in the abdomen is really painful but really they only imagine that its painful they don't really know. She said she's had injections to the abdomen and that it really isn't painful at all. Lauren says it is the most humane way to euthanize the kittens, but because the chemical is absorbed instead of injected directly into the vein death is slower.

I euthanized a pit that bit a baby on the head and face. How some people can put their children in a situation like that is beyond me. People are so irresponsible.
The other pit had attacked and killed a MinPin and another small breed dog.

They bring the aggressive dogs in on a stick and corner them behind a chain link gate that's mounted on the wall. Then they tranquilize the dogs, remove the stick and latch the gate against the door. When the dogs eventually go down they're put on the table for euthanization.

The cat's brachial vien is much harder to find and stay in thant he dogs' vein. They showed me three different points, the brachial, the hind leg and the tounge, where the injection could be made.

I'm a little surprised that Lauren suggested I try this considering how I reacted to vaccuming the hamster (I cried like a baby all day). I'm glad the hamster incident didn't affect her opinion of me as someone who's weak and not able to cope with things.

In any case, I'm alright, I even noticed that my hands were steady throughout the whole thing, not shaking at all although I was nervous, I didn't show it.
Lauren told me to stick around for ETs tommorow too, I hope I will do better and gain some skill.

Dog Adopt Procedure

Today I helped Kim out in the Dop Adopt kennel. The rules for cleaning this room are much more relaxed than the puppy kennel.

1. Clean empty stalls
2. Check for excrement, if none is present sweep food out
3. If excrement is present move the dog to a clean stall
4. Clean by sweeping out
5. Spray with quat. solution
6. Scrub down the walls, floor, plastic bed board, and gate
7. Rinse and sqeegie

Nail Trimming Success!

Day two of the guinea pig nail trimming attemps, a success!
I trimmed all six of they're back nails and trimmed several front nails.

As I was holding the black and brown one the white one nipped at my finger and I immediatly flinched and let the litte guinea pig free to inspect my finger. No blood and no pain, whew. I felt bad about rewarding the guinea pigs actions but she didn't hurt me just nibbled so I decided a new tactic with the brown and black one (from now on referred to as B) I picked her up completely and held her with one hand against my chest. To my surprise she was completely still and never struggled as I imagined she would. Just before you take them completely off the ground they struggle because they are afraid of being picked up but once you've picked them up there's nothing they can do. In this way they're back toes were spread and the nails do not exhibit the curling that the front ones do so the trimming was quick and easy.

The front nails of B are a sad story. They're lenth prevents proper hygine and posture. I removed a deal of grime before I could get to the nails. There is one that spirals around like a cork screw that is the worst for hygeine but accesible to trim. And there is another nail, I think on the other paw, that is curled up under the next toe so that the tip is flush with the top of the foot. I tried but wasn't able to get the right angle on the nail or to move it out from under the toe to trim it. There's always next time.
I consider today a nail trimming success.

I see many animals in the shelter that have long nails, alothough the situation of overgrown nails on dogs is much different than that of the guinea pigs, I can't help but cringe. I think that most people just don't trim their animals nails because it's not a fun experience, normally the animal hates it, even though it's for their own good and sometimes it's impossible to restrain the animal for the trimming. This doesn't seem to be the case with the guinea pigs based on my success during a second attempt. The owners were most likely ignorant and neglectful.
I new nothing about the trimming of guinea pigs nails befor these two females came it, but I saw the damage, got the information, and acted.


On another note, the kittens in holding seem to have mulitplied over night. There are so many we can't keep them in the banks we have to set up carriers and stack them around the garage to keep them. This is the image Kim painted on my first week. I'm sure the numbers can still get worse and seeing them all like this makes me want to take one home. I've been very good so far about getting the gimmies but the daily care of the animals makes you feel like they are yours and you get to feel responsible for them. And who can resists kittens, especially when they're coming at you from all directions.

Guinea Pig nail trimming, harder than it looks.

So I made a first attempt to trim the Guinea Pigs' nails. I've been bitten by a rat before and didn't like it. Since then I've had trust issues with small animals like that. I had a glove on hand that I would use if I saw that biting would be an issue but did not wear it today.

I held the guinea pigs in one hand with my palm on their stomach my thumb under one arm, the other arm split my fingers between the pointer and middle fingers. I left their back feet on the floor of their cage because they begin to struggle when they feel as though they're being picked up off the ground. I was able to trim 3 or 4 nails from the front paws of the white one, but wasn't able to pick up her brown and black friend who has the worst nails of the two.

I'll try again tomorrow.