Lynchburg Humane Society Blog

I would never tell anyone how they should donate their hard earned money. But, I can't resist blogging about an incident that happened here at the Lynchburg Humane Society. A nice woman came in to our facility with an arm full of towels, papers and some food. She approached our counter with her checkbook out and asked if we were No Kill. When the front desk staff member said no, but we are working towards becoming No Kill. The woman loudly said, "well, I only give to No Kill organizations." She closed up her checkbook and left. That got me thinking. Why wouldn't you give to an organization that was in the process of becoming No Kill. This is the time when those types of organizations need the support from the community the most. It is expensive to create a No Kill community. It is much easier to raise funds when you are No Kill but why not get on the wagon early to help bring about these types of efforts? Unfortunately, this person didn't allow us to expl...

Copied from an article by Jessica Bullock in the News and Advance At the Lynchburg Humane Society, we always chuckle to ourselves when people come in the shelter looking for a “house dog.” When confronted with this phrase, most people think of Chihuahuas, Yorkies, Dachshunds and other small breeds. Some people have the mistaken impression that small dogs are easier to deal with in a home—however, that is not necessarily the case. Any dog can be a house dog, regardless of whether he or she is five pounds or 80. It all depends on the dog’s personality. We have had a number of large dogs that would (and are) perfect for any home. Some recently adopted dogs are great examples of large house dogs. One was a 60-pound lab/chow mix named Bear. He loved to relax and be loved on. Sure, he sometimes liked to get out and run, but he would have been a wonderful dog for any sized home. The same scenario goes for the 45-pound Bella, a black lab mix who was fairly quiet, shy, and housetrained to a fau...

On September 2nd I lost my dog Parker very suddenly to a cancerous tumor that bled out in his abdomen. For those of you who follow this blog Parker was featured in a number of posts but most recently in a fun blog about my office affair. If you are like me, your pets are like kids. Even after I had a two legged child of my own, my dog was still very much my four legged child. So to have him pass away so suddenly has left a real hole in my heart. Parker was a special dog that was famous in his own right. He was featured on an Animal Planet "adoption story" called Cooper, he was in Newsweek, USA today, The Times Dispatch and was in TV commercials for the Richmond SPCA because he was so well trained and represented the family dog so well. He was special to me and everyone who met him. So while this is extremely sad for me and my family, it is in my nature to find the positive in any bad situation. About a week before Parker's sudden passing, I brought home a fo...

Copied from an article by Ann Holland in the News & Advance His name is Paddock and he is our puppy. My husband and I had planned to adopt an older dog in large part because we did not want a puppy. Puppies are a nuisance – housebreaking, chewing, jumping – no, thank you! And yet somehow here he is. In our house. Chewing on our baseboards. It is a tremendous responsibility to raise a puppy to be an upstanding member of society. And when things aren’t going as planned, it’s easy to become frustrated and overwhelmed. When a puppy is little, his adorableness makes it easy to forgive him for eviscerating your throw pillows. Young puppies are also fast learners, which makes training fun. But once a puppy reaches adolescence (a period ranging from 6 to 18 or more months), watch out. Suddenly he has “selective hearing,” forgets that he’s housebroken, chews on everything and is, in general, an obnoxious brat. To make matters worse, adolescent puppies a...

What to do when you lose your pet? It is unfortunate, but most people don’t start by calling their local animal shelters to see if their pet has shown up there and to place a lost pet report. Only 1 percent of the stray cats we take in go back to their owner — last year that was only eight cats. Our dog rate is much better and is currently around 45 percent. But you wouldn’t believe how many purebred dogs and cats come in here with no one calling about them. By law, we have to hold a stray animal without a collar five days, but we typically hold them for seven; with a collar, it is 10 days, but we usually hold them for 12. We try to give owners ample time to find their pet and are always disappointed when they don’t come. There are several measures that can be used in order to find your pet more quickly. Tags are important because if an animal control officer or a private citizen finds your pet they can contact you directly and the pet never has to come to a shelter. Mic...

I was recently watching one of my son's cartoon shows with him this weekend and they had an animal control officer playing the bad guy, trying to catch a dog that was running lost. And it struck me that many shows portray this job in a negative light. So I thought it was time to talk about all the good that Animal Control Officers do to help the animals in our community. Yes, the owners of the dogs running lost may not appreciate getting tickets or having their dog picked up. But, the alternative is that their dog gets injured and they have major medical costs involved. And when there are injured lost dogs or cats they make sure they get the medical care they need to stay alive. Animal control officers keep animals safe. They also investigate cases of neglect and abuse. Just the other day they had a dog that was discovered with a large logging chain embedded in his neck. The wound was very deep and appeared to be months old. They charged the owner with cruelty and took the ...

We get asked all the time, how do you work here? How do you do what you do? Honestly, how do we not do what we do? I can't imagine working anywhere else. We are trying to make a difference and save animals and we are all very passionate about our jobs. But I think when people ask that question they are really asking how do you see all you see (negative stuff) and still come in to work everyday with a smile. Simple answer, we all try and focus on the positive. Yesterday was a hard day here if you focused on the 8 year old pit bull that was brought in by his owner because they had moved into a place that didn't allow pit bulls and her relatives, who were watching the dog, didn't want to deal with it any longer, which I think was all of a week. After talking to her about how crowded we were and asked if she could wait just a little bit of time to give her dog the best chance possible she said that today was the only day she could do it because of work and her schedule. E...