Blaze settling in tonight. He let our vet do the blood test for feline leukemia/ fiv earlier today and tonight is chiling out for some pets. He will be neutered at the clinic due to his age.
Blaze is Home for Life! Good night!
More about Blaze: https://www.facebook.com/homeforlifeorg/posts/918540963645598
Her following has been clamoring for an update on Rue, the cat thrown from a 12th floor balcony who lived to tell.
This was a momentous week as she went thru the procedure to remove the bonding from her canine teeth. As some will remember, the surgeons enlisted the help of a human dentist to create an innovative solution to repair the broken jaw on the little cat without invasive and painful traumatic surgery: her pointing canine teeth were bonded together to hold the jaw stationary, to allow the fractured TMJ joints to heal.
Rue's bonding was removed successfully and her jaw palpates strong - no abnormal motion and not apparently painful. While she is still on "rest" the next few weeks for her limb fracture, we will ensure she is monitored for any difficulty eating or moving her jaw (opening/closing) now that the bonding is off. Her doctors recommend continuing with softer food (canned or water added to kibble) for the next two weeks to allow those weakened jaw muscles (from being immobile) to strength and to ensure she has no issues. Rue's range of motion was limited in that she doesn't have full opening range, but this is likely due to the muscles being inactive (which is why we want to keep an eye on her and make sure she doesn't have issues moving forward - her being comfortable and able to eat is most important) vs due to the subluxation and fractures she did have.
Rue is now able to eat, but is restricted to canned foods mixed with water, for hydration and so can more easily eat the food without further trauma to her jaw, and also the several teeth which are broken off from the impact of the fall. According to her surgeons, one of her canine teeth (upper right) that was fractured suspected from the fall is slightly mobile, too. With these new findings, it we will plan a full dental cleaning and radiographs in the next 2-3 months to treat dental disease and ensure no extractions are needed (whether from dental disease present, or injury due to the fall).
Back in February, we were contacted by a rescue in Oregon who knew of two puppies, small border collies, with cerebellar hypoplasia, a condition similar to cerebral palsy. We have been in touch since and finally had the ability to take them in late June.
April and August who are brother and sister came from a tough situation with a caring owner who nevertheless had many health issues herself starting with emphysema, and was unable to care for the puppies, who were are very affected by their condition. The rescue representative wrote " This poor lady has 5 dogs peeing and pooping inside her house and is in VERY bad health herself. She can’t lift these pups up and the stench of pee is overwhelming and bad for her emphysema amongst other major health issues.
She is on her deathbed and has been pouring out her heart to anyone that will listen. She wants these pups to be nurtured, happy and loved. She can barely care for herself let alone 5 dogs 2 of which have special needs. She has been looking for placement for them, or a vet who will euthanize them, because she can’t take it anymore. ".
We had planned to take them in this late summer, but when the rescue contacted us again about the deteriorating situation and health of their owner, and with a great transport person available, we decided the time was now and not to delay any further, even though we were overwhelmed with the addition of Haruki and Snowflake who had just arrived.
The most concerning aspect of this whole story is the extreme difficulty this owner had trying to get her dogs spayed and neutered. Appointments were out months, or not available at all, and too expensive for someone in her siutation as well as many rescues. So both puppies will need to be fixed after they settle in.
April is the smaller of the puppies, and August her brother, a bit larger, They are very gentle and sweet, attesting to the good heart of their loving owner. But they will need special care for the rest of their lives. If
Double Trouble!
Back in February, we were contacted by a rescue in Oregon who knew of two puppies, small border collies, with cerebellar hypoplasia, a condition similar to cerebral palsy. We have been in touch since and finally had the ability to take them in late June.
April and August who are brother and sister came from a tough situation with a caring owner who nevertheless had many health issues herself starting with emphysema, and was unable to care for the puppies, who are very affected by their condition. The rescue representative wrote " This poor lady has 5 dogs peeing and pooping inside her house and is in VERY bad health herself. She can’t lift these pups up and the stench of pee is overwhelming and bad for her emphysema amongst other major health issues.
She is on her deathbed and has been pouring out her heart to anyone that will listen. She wants these pups to be nurtured, happy and loved. She can barely care for herself let alone 5 dogs 2 of which have special needs. She has been looking for placement for them, or a vet who will euthanize them, because she can’t take it anymore. ".
We had planned to take them in this late summer, but when the rescue contacted us again about the deteriorating situation and health of their owner, and with a great transport person available, we decided the time was now and not to delay any further, even though we were overwhelmed with the addition of Haruki and Snowflake who had just arrived.
The most concerning aspect of this whole story is the extreme difficulty this owner had trying to get her dogs spayed and neutered. Appointments all over the state of Oregon were out months, or not available at all, and too expensive for someone in her situation as well as for many rescues. So, both puppies will need to be fixed after they settle in.
April is the smaller of the puppies, and August her brother, a bit larger, They are very gentle and sweet, attesting to the good heart of their loving owner. But they will need special care f
Grace pays a visit
Dachshund Grace came to visit us at the sanctuary today and it was a like miracle to see how well she is doing. Grace was adopted by a family from a local rescue but then became paraplegic after she was attacked by a larger dog in the home who had become jealous. The rescue had no fosters available after Grace was injured so couldn't take her back in her condition and, Grace was facing euthanasia at only a couple of years old without help. We are so grateful to longtime volunteer Christine who is a dachshund person, and agreed to foster Grace for us after the owner called us last fall to help. Chris had had a doxie who had become paralyzed and she worked with Dr Becca of Perpetual Motion | Animal Chiropractic to restore that dog's mobility. Chris felt she could help Grace, so Home for Life agreed to cover all vet and therapy costs, and Chris got her to the therapy sessions, and did all the rehabilitation work at home between appointments.
In the course of several months, with alot of patience and hard work, Grace steadily made progress, and Chris and her husband soon believed they wanted to adopt Grace to continue to work with her.
Today's visit was so incredible, to see Grace be able to move with so much energy and actually run, remembering that when we took her in as part of Home for Life, she could only drag herself along and was incontinent. We are so grateful to Chris and Dr. Becca for this restoration of Grace's mobility and quality of life after such a close call! Read how it all started here: https://www.facebook.com/homeforlifeorg/posts/717655080400855
Last year we created what we call chutes on the east and west sides of the main dog building's south dog runs. The chutes, fenced in and accessible by dog doors give our dogs the ability to enjoy the mid run and upper exercise run which were constructed on a slope of a hill, like tiers. We used to have staircases, with no risers on the stairs which made it hard for our fearful dogs and older, arthritic dogs to access the upper runs, that are all connected by gate systems. The chutes built on a gentle slope now make it easy for our dogs like Samson, who is fighting degenerative myelopathy to still get to the larger exercise runs to stretch his legs and play with his friends. With DM dogs it's so important to encourage them to stay active as long as possible. Samson also gets acupuncture and special supportive medications and supplements to foster his mobility.
Other dogs of ours like Peter who has epilepsy found the staircases without risers intimidating to use. So we have a ramp with a deck leading up to the south cat run that works great for Peter and his roommates Makwa, who came to us a paraplegic, Perilla who was also paraplegic and had reconstructive surgery on her feet so she can now walk and Louie, one of our Redbone Coonhounds who is nearly age 10 and struggling with prostate cancer. . See the photo of the deck constructed this spring in comments below.
More on Samson: https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=635841418582222&set=a.340509884782045
More on Peter, a black shepherd mix who has epilepsy: https://www.homeforlife.org/node/934
#TeamHaruki: Haruki's first spin on the green grass!
Some may have been following the journey of nearly 300 cats and dogs from Kabul Small Animal Rescue to the United States where they will join rescues across the country to find new homes. Two of the dogs, Snowflake in this video, and puppy Haruki, will be coming to Home for Life, a care for life sanctuary. Snowflake is fear aggressive, and has been known to bite unfamiliar people. Placement was attempted for him, but there were no takers due to this behavior. Haruki the puppy suffered trauma to his chest and ribs and will need medical care upon landing here, although he was cleared to make the international flight. Both dogs suffered terrible abuse: Snowflake was abandoned by his family during the fall of Kabul, then the people who took over the house where he had been left tied him to a tree outside, and amused themselves throwing rocks at him, barely feeding or watering him, let alone taking care of his long coat. Finally, after weeks of watching this, a gardener at the property, stole Snowflake in the dead of night and brought him to Kabul Small Animal Rescue, begging the staff not to say where the had obtained Snowflake as he was scared of retaliation- apparently the people who had moved into Snowflake's abandoned family home were police. Haruki was kicked in the chest as a small puppy and his ribs crushed. He barely survived the pneumothorax that resulted. See the video of his intake below. He is healed, and a leggy adolescent with many people who have followed his story, and it is possible he may be able to find an adopter but needs to have further medical care which no other rescue was able to assure Charlotte at Kabul Small Animal Rescue that they would obtain for him. So he is also going to be coiming to Home For Life Animal Sanctuary, at least to start with and we will go from there.
I want to address one factor concerning our taking these dogs in. Home for Life has received none of the generous donations that were raised to help with the air lift from
Buddy, a 1 year old Shiba Inu mix who was code red at Minneapolis Animal Control, was tagged by Home for Life in the nick of time. There was a lot going on for me personally at the time, but we didn't want to lose the opportunity to save the life of this deserving young guy.
Our update on Buddy is that he has been at Your Dog's Best Friend in Minneapolis, so he could be taken off the medications he was on for his behavior and so we could get a better idea of his temperament and behavior challenges, to stabilize him before we took the next step to help him. Head trainer Max Bitterman thinks he is a terrific dog and after a month now, it is time for Buddy to take the next step in his life. Tomorrow he will be neutered at Mission Animal Hospital, and then a potential adopter, a person well known and trusted by us, will meet him to see if he might be a fit for her family and home which features a large fenced yard, older children and a laid back young cat! As always, once under the sanctuary umbrella, Buddy will always have a home for life with us if placement does not work out.
Below is a video of Buddy with his best friend at the boarding and day care, shared by Max of Your Dog's Best Friend .
Wish Buddy luck tomorrow as he takes the step on his journey to a home for life!
Read our original post about Buddy, when his life hung in the balance and he was saved in the nick of time. Indeed, he was released unneutered as it was such a close call, MACC did not want to do the procedure if he was only going to be humanely euthanized.in the end. We are so happy that was not his fate!
https://www.facebook.com/homeforlifeorg/posts/838397628326599
It was good to see the sun the rest of the week after the anticlimactic eclipse we had due to the cloud cover.
Ollie & Roxanne are two dogs who had tough lives before arriving at Home For Life Animal Sanctuary so it's especially heartwarming to see them enjoying the nice weather and running together- with their brindle coats and love of speed they surely have some sighthound heritage. Both started life as street dogs and Ollie, who has the more curly tail. in particular faced much hardship before being rescued - a large scar on his side from what looked like a knife wound, half of one of his ears missing, probably from being cut off with a knife or scissors and the trauma of being attacked by a pack of other dogs. His life was saved by a little boy who saw the melee and drove off the bully dogs. He then hailed a taxi and persuaded the driver to transport him with the injured Ollie to Kabul Small Animal Rescue where Ollie was taken in and received medical treatment. But as a result of repeated traumas, Ollie was extremely shy, and nearly catatonic, terrified of people. He was one of 7 dogs who came to Home for Life before the fall of Kabul. Read the incredible story of the rescue of Ollie and the other 6 dogs here: https://homeforlifesanctuary.blogspot.com/2021/12/doing-impossible-afghanistan-dog-rescue.html
