Please save somebody today

Posted by Kerry through Flickr

Save a cat or dog
Originally uploaded by rikkis_refuge.

Robin at the Shenandoah County Animal Shelter in Shenandoah, Virginia is in need of desperate help. She writes, “We have 32 dog runs in our shelter and we have a total of three open today. With more dogs coming in today. If I don' find some help soon we are going to have to put several down tomorrow. All are good dogs, most are altered with rabies shots. If you know anyone who can help me please call me at 540-984-8955. As always I appreciate everything you do for us and the animals.”

Robin does an outstanding job of trying to save the animals. But the general public keeps dumping them. By law, she has no choice, when they are full they must move them out. The law doesn’t care how they are moved - dead or alive. Robin does everything possible to avoid killing them to move them, but if somebody doesn’t take them home, she is given no choice.

Please help a dog and Robin today.

Thanks, Kerry

As I walked through the LD Chicken Center I heard the file drawer snap shut

Only one thing makes that sound. Meg, evil office kitty, shutting herself inside a file cabinet. Yes, you read that right. Not only can Meg open a file drawer, she can close it behind herself. For years, we wondered how it was that we would frequently find her inside a shut file drawer, dresser drawer, kitchen drawer, or any other type of drawer. Then one day I saw it. Meg is a climber. She came to us in 1999, healing from a broken hip. She wasn’t able to jump for the next couple of years. So she learned to climb any surface. Right up the front of the kitchen cabinets, desks, file cabinets, and walls. Nothing stops Meg.

Meg climbs up the front of a file cabinet, hangs on to the handle of the drawer just below the one she wants to get into, reaches up and pulls the handle on the drawer over her head, and as the drawer begins to slide open, she heaves herself up and into the opening. Now this is pretty clever for a cat. Of course, I frequently wonder who is the smarter species around here! But the next step is what absolutely amazes me. She reaches out, and pulls the drawer shut, sealing herself inside. Never once is she stuck, because when it's time to get out, she knows how to push the drawer open from the inside.

Meg, the amazing office cat. Meg, who has a voracious appetite for paper. Bad, bad combination in your file drawer.

Of course there are supposed to be no cats in the LD Chicken Center, only my developmentally slow chickens. I do hope Meg has not learned how to open the door to their room too. I suppose if she has, she can sell the tickets for quite a large sum. There's always a long line of hungry kitties outside the LD Chicken Center. Meg, you better remember the rules about not eating other residents of the Refuge !