Home for the Holidays?

Project Jessie needs YOUR help! Every creature taken in by Project Jessie is cared for in a foster home. This lets us get to know them as individuals - what they need, what their personality is like, what they prefer. We love them and care for them - for a short while or for a longer while - but eventually, each of them need and deserve a permanent home.  These particular Project Jessie friends have been in care - but we would really love to have them in homes before the holidays.  Please help us by considering adoption, or spreading their info to friends and family who are thinking of adding a new companion to their family. Anyone interested, can email shelly@projectjessie.ca or call 519-940-4712 Thank you! And have a wonderful holiday! Shelly ProjectJessie.ca AnimalAlliance.ca Willow This gentle soul is Willow - young, friendly and fabulous with everyone she has met. She is quiet and unassuming, very people oriented and a joy to be around. Izzy Five years ago, Izzy and her kittens were adopted to a family. This fall, they all came back to us because the family was having some troubles. Poor Izzy! Her kittens were adopted together by a new family, but she is still waiting for a second chance. She is 6 years young, good with other animals and loves to cuddle.  Cooper This handsome fellow would love to have an active family to love. Perhaps with some kids to play and romp with? Cooper is a young handsome boy with lots to offer. Great with other dogs, he would love to have a canine friend as well.  Thumbelina This petite lady has a sad tale to tell. Abandonned outside, she had several litters of kittens behind a strip plaza, where the people helped by rehoming some of her kids - but no one helped her. Now she is in from the cold, and loving it! But she is still looking for a permanent place to call home. Unfortunately, she has tested positive for FIV. What does this mean? It means that now that she is spayed, with good food and a low stress environment, she will probably have a long and healthy life. She is a very sweet little lady. Would you like to be her new friend?

Exciting news for Montreal!

For over 10 years, Animal Alliance has been advocating for a city-run shelter to service the animals and residents of the City of Montreal, QC.  Our last meeting with local rescue groups and supporters was in 2011, after the April airing of Enquête | Radio-Canada's investigative report on Berger Blanc.

We were ecstatic to receive this news, from our Montreal Board Member Anne Streeter:

 

SPCA eager for details about city-wide shelter

 

By Max Harrold, THE GAZETTE October 23, 2012 7:53 AM

 

Volunteers bring rescues puppies into the Montreal SPCA emergency shelter.

Photograph by: Peter Mccabe , THE GAZETTE

MONTREAL - The Montreal SPCA is eager for details about the city of Montreal’s planned new $23-million city-wide animal shelter so it can decide whether it wants to partner with the city and help run it.

The facility, which the city says could be managed by a non-profit group, won’t open until 2014 and it’s not known yet whether a new building will be built or if an existing facility — like the SPCA’s Jean Talon St. shelter — could be adapted.

Nicholas Gilman, executive director of the SPCA in Montreal, said the group is thrilled about the prospect of a city-run facility, whether or not the SPCA is chosen to run it, because pet overpopulation is still an urgent, growing problem.

An estimated 25,000 cats and dogs are abandoned or lost annually in the Montreal region and they generally end up at either the non-profit SPCA or the privately held Berger Blanc in east-end Montreal. Thousands of these pets are euthanized because not enough people want to adopt them. The two reasons often cited as the main causes of pet overpopulation are the lack of low-cost sterilizations and fines for irresponsible pet owners.

The SPCA and Berger Blanc have lucrative contracts with municipalities on Montreal Island and Laval to pick up dead and stray animals and provide adoption services. But the city of Montreal says it wants its one facility to provide shelter and pound services for all 19 boroughs and possibly the 15 other cities on Montreal Island. The city stated last week it prefers that a non-profit be in control, meaning that Berger Blanc — the focus of a highly publicized TV investigation in 2011 showing botched euthanizations there — could see its business nosedive.

Pierre Couture, president of Berger Blanc, did not return phone calls from The Gazette on Monday.

Gilman said the SPCA needs more information before it can say it wants in. He noted there could still be enough work for the SPCA in Montreal even if it does not play a major role in the new facility. It all depends on the division of responsibilities.

“For example, the city might take in all of the animals and the SPCA could commit to taking those animals that the city cannot adopt” out, Gilman said. “We could take animals that need a home but need more time to allow the public to shop for them. There are lots of ways we could work together.”

Eva Demianowicz, of the Humane Society International Canada, said her group would not be interested in ongoing daily operations of an animal shelter but could offer the city advice.

Martine Painchaud, a spokeswoman for Montreal Mayor Gérald Tremblay, said the city will soon put out a detailed request for bids from non-profit groups to run the new facility. Each of the borough councils should also soon vote on new animal control policies covering things like the maximum number of animals permitted per household (the city says it should be four with no more than two dogs).

This way there will be a “harmonized” set of policies throughout the city, she said. The boroughs will have the choice to send their stray animals to the new facility or not, she said.

Plateau Mont-Royal Borough spokeswoman Catherine Piazzon said the borough’s participation “will come down to the details of what is being offered and how much it costs.” The borough currently pays the SPCA $65,000 a year for animal control in the borough.

Sud-Ouest Borough Mayor Benoit Dorais said “there needs to be a mechanism of accountability” for boroughs to feel comfortable participating in the new citywide facility. Sud-Ouest Borough had to renew its $120,000 annual contract with Berger Blanc in 2010 because the pound was the sole bidder, he noted. The borough “is definitely interested” in a new facilityl but it will depend on the details, Dorais said.

Dorval Mayor Edgar Rouleau added that his city would also probably be interested. “We all have stray dog and, especially, cat problems,” Rouleau said. “We need to make improvements.”

mharrold@montrealgazette.com

© Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette

The New Etobicoke Humane at 67 Six Points Road

The new Etobicoke Humane shelter (EHS) is more of a haven for homeless cats and dogs than a traditional shelter, with its poor lost animals lined up in small cages.  EHS has recently moved into its own detached building in central Etobicoke, easily accessed by car or TTC (bus from Islington or Kipling subway).  It has several separate rooms, so that there can be a room for every important purpose.  The kittens, for example, have their own “kitten room” full of climbers, toys, and soft beds.  Cats can be quarantined  until they are free of contagious conditions such as upper respiratory infection.  Cats in need of greater socialization before being adopted can be separated from the others.

There is space for dogs – something that the old, small shelter completely lacked.  And the dogs can be walked outside.There are no stairs for the public and shelter volunteers to climb.The building is accessed from street level, and is entirely on one floor. And, to make the cats and dogs even more comfortable and happy – the “cages” are enclosures 10 x 10 feet.  The cats have space for playing with their many toys and climbers, for sleeping on soft cat beds, for roaming about, for playing with one another.  One very dedicated young man, who has exceptional love for .and understanding of, animals, walks the cats on leashes. What a pleasure to adopt a cat who will accept a leash!  Like all the shelter volunteers, this helper goes far beyond  physical care of his charges; he socializes them and showers them with human love.

One amusing and touching story, made possible by the non-cages set up, is the friendship between Kramer, a Siamese male, and his best friend Brooke, a 3 month old female.  Brooke decided that she did not want to stay in the kitten room.  When she emerged from it and mixed with the older cats, she discovered Kramer. Whenever Brooke was returned to the kitten room, she would meow and meow so piteously for Kramer that the shelter people would just have to let her go back to him! Kramer decided to love her in return.  They have become inseparable, and, fortunately, the volunteer who chose to adopt Kramer is taking Brooke along with him.  In fact, contrary to commonly held belief, cats like companions of their own kind just as humans do.

EHS has many volunteers who foster cats and dogs, kittens and puppies.  The foster parents perform very valuable tasks, often looking after young kittens and puppies, and socializing them, and often looking after animals who need medical help. When I visited the kitten room one day, all 6 kittens wanted to be on my lap at once.  They had been well socialized to accept humans as their friends!

Licensed cruelty investigators working for EHS are, unfortunately, very much needed.  Often, they bring many animals at one time into the shelter, animals rescued from abusive and/or hoarding situations.  The new shelter can provide for these emergencies now that it has space and separate areas.

EHS does such great work for Etobicoke that I can only provide a short sketch here.  Their website is www.etobicokehumanesociety.com.  Look for their sweet animals waiting for forever homes, and for their open house details of June 23.

Yeaaah – way to go, Etobicoke!

Lynda Nanders
AAC and EHS volunteer