#NerdsUnite: The secret life of a veterinary technician
<editorsnote> Nerds, meet my buddy Lindsay. She and I met ... well, somewhere in the social space. I think we might have started talking through this site directly, then through facebook - maybe ... I'm not sure. But she's awesome. I talk to her on twitter almost every day, and she's really rad and TOTALLY a big huge animal lover. Like crazy huge!! In these series of posts she will be talking about her life and random adventures with sometimes more than two legged creatures. I guess there's only one more thing left to say ... HIT IT LINDSAY!! </editorsnote>
#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @TheCraftafarian
Lately we have had an overwhelming number of kittens abandoned at my clinic. I'm not referring to the two recent kittens my clinic has taken in as fosters. I mean like I get to work and there are boxes taped closed with holes cut for air waiting. Or in this recent case they broke out of whatever duffle bag thing that was made into a cage--and were sitting on top of it! See!! I had to whip out a can of food I had for a foster to convince them not to run away--you can see the can in the photo as well as the mother cat tied to the pole.
There was a note taped to it. It said that her mom was making her get rid of the cats and to please take care of her babies. It said the other mother cat was sick and she was the mom of the smaller babies. Unfortunately there was only one mother cat when I got there. She however took over nursing all nine kittens!
The extremely sad part of this is that if people just educated themselves sometimes they wouldn't be in this mess. First off--spay and neuter your pets. Not just for reproductive reasons, or behavioral reasons, but also it vastly reduces the likelihood of developing reproductive organ cancers (mammary, ovarian, testicular, prostatic---yeah animals get all those cancers too). Secondly we actually have a sign that asks people to not leave their pets here AND also lists phone numbers/address where you can safely surrender your pet to SPCA which is a no kill shelter. It also lists the County Shelter for strays. It's not that we don't want to help stray animals, it's that we aren't able to help strays or our clients in need if we continue to have multiple animals abandoned on us. Thankfully with the help of my friend Kari I was able to find a rescue volunteer who will foster them until she can get them into her rescue group. FANTASTIC!
6 months ago we had a litter of 5 kittens dumped. We were able to place them into a rescue (who the entire time made snarky comments about the fact they were all black--apparently they don't get adopted as well). By christmas all those kittens found homes. 3 months ago a litter of 7 kittens were dumped, same style, same little faces (I think they were related). We have been unable to place them into a rescue (again all black) but we have found 4 of them homes. Then we took in two stray kittens. THEN wednesday I pull up the driveway to the clinic and I see the scene above. It's been really overwhelming. After tonight we will be back to 5 fosters. Which was already a lot. Of course my veterinarian has tested them for felv/fiv, dewormed, tested for parasites, and vaccinated--so that's another reason its overwhelming. The cost.
Whew, so this all got resolved today. I have a long 4 hours ahead of me but I have a lot to do all in the name of kitten rescue! Geez, I hope you guys aren't totally tired of my animal posts :)
#nerdsunite
<3 Lindsay
twitter: @thecraftafarian
blog: craftafarian.blogspot.com
email: craftafarian at gmail d c