Me too. I thought she was off to a good start, but I guess not. I hope this
time she might be with a foster parent who enjoys her affectionate nature.

Geez. That is really sad. I feel for her (and for you). I know what
it's like to love a little thing despite it's "issues" and work with
it to try to help and how your hopes get really high and then come
crashing down. I work with lots of troubled cats and you just hope
that somehow a person will come along who will have the patience to
bring out the beautiful cat inside.

I'm sure that your work with Hushpad DID make her more adoptable and
will stay with her on the way to the right home.

I adopted one perfect cat and one with major issues - and as much as I
adore the perfect one, the troubled cat (who is doing beautifully now)
will always have a very special place in my heart. (She's sitting in
the sink right now and smiling over at me - as only a creature that
out you through months of hell can do).

Thank you for what you did with her as a foster mom.

We're a very small Humane Society.  Our Board consists of 15 members, and
right now, we're only at 11.  Those 11 and maybe 5-6 other adult volunteers
are about it when it comes to doing *real* work at the shelter.  The
Adoption Committe consists of 3 members, and they are the ones that do the
vet references and home visits, and that's pretty much all they do.  Anyone
can take an adoption application, but the Adoption Committe is the one to
process it and talk with the prospective adoptor.  That again adds another
balance to emotions swaying an adoption.  Applications typically take 5-7
days to process because everyone is a volunteer and does have a real life.
In additon, not all of our animals are spay/neutered on the front end.
Sometimes we have to wait for that adoption fee in order to schedule the
operations and be able to pay the vet.   And we operate out of an open
admissions City Shelter in the South that is not a no kill operation.  We
work darn hard, and have kept our euthanasia rate at 13%, and that is *with*
the more rigorous screening process.

Well, you do the vet reference first, and that takes maybe 10-15 minutes if
the adoptor hasn't lied to you and not included all of the vets they have
used. Sometimes they have been forgetful or less than truthful and you can't
proceed until they fill in the gaps.  If they pass the vet reference, then a
home visit is usally a formality that takes another 15 minutes tops.  No
sense in visiting a home of someone who doesn't pass a vet reference.  We
handle approximately 700 adoptions per year, and it doesn't work out to too
much of a burden on any one person so far, unless it's around Christmas when
additonal help is enlisted.  We have written vet reference questions to
enable other Board Members to assist if we get overwhelmed.  Any
"questionable" adoptions have to be kicked around by the Adoption Committee
and sometimes will go before the whole Board.

Here's a list of Vet Questions if you'd like to present them to your own
group.  In the end, it takes less time and energy to do this on the front
end than it does to try to work out a bad adoption on the hind end.

When is the first time they came to you? If they are recent new customers or
have animals older than the length of time at this vet, where did they go
previously to this vet? If they can't provide adequate documentation at the
vet listed, ask where else the animal may have a record and phone that vet..

How many animals do they have on record with you? If they have more animals
on file with the vet than they admit to in the questionnaire, what happened
to them? If they have fewer animals on file than they admit to, why haven't
these animals been to the vet?

Are all of the animals current with their rabies shots? By state law, all
dogs and cats must be vaccinated by a veterinarian with the rabies vaccine.
Individuals cannot legally give their own rabies vaccine.

What other vaccines have the animals received? Have the dogs been vaccinated
with 7-in-1 or other vaccine? Have the cats been vaccinated with 4-in-1?
What about feline leukemia or FIP for the cats? If they give their own
shots, what type of records do they maintain? A journal? A notation at their
vet's office?

Have any of the animals on record been treated for trauma? Has one of the
cats been hit by a car, or one of the dogs gotten into a fight? How serious
was the injury?

Do they have any aggressive animals? Has the animal ever injured anyone in
the office? Plenty of Chihuahua's are far worse biters than Rottweilers are,
so if they do have an aggressive animal, it's a judgement call whether or
not our animal could be safe with theirs.

Have any of the animals been treated for an illness that could have been
vaccinated against? Did they get a puppy mill dog that was only vaccinated
against distemper and it came down with Parvo? Is one of their cats feline
leukemia positive?

Have the customers purchased heartworm preventative from you? Are they
current in their purchases? Dogs need to be on heartworm preventative year
round in our climate.

Are their animals spayed and neutered? If not, why not? If they have mixed
breeds, there really is no good excuse. If they have purebreds, it's still
highly desirable but not absolutely required. If they have an unaltered
purebred, how many times has s/he been bred? If the dog has had puppies
every 6 months, there's a big problem. Having puppies because of the
financial rewards is the poorest possible reason to breed an animal. Once or
twice in 5 or 6 years time could be OK.

Have they met their financial obligations to you? People who have a hard
time affording vet care for the animals they already have don't need any
additional ones.

Kelly--I agree. One thing that's very good with prospectives is.. let them
talk. And let them keep talking. The undesirables will usually hang themselves.
They'll tell you about how many kittens their rottweiler has killed, or how
many they've taken to shelters, or how many litters Fluffy had last year before
she got ran over.
And, you probably already know this, but people get really angry when they're
turned down. You just have to let it roll off.

Sherry

circa 29 Jun 2004 04:40:52 GMT, in rec.pets.cats.health+behav, Sherry
(sriddles@aol.comkitty) said,

Oh, this is NYWriter's new name?

Laura

circa 30 Jun 2004 06:41:32 GMT, in rec.pets.cats.health+behav,
Luvskats00 (luvskats00@aol.com) said,

Most of your posts are so inane that I never had reason to give a
rat's behind who you were. Nothing to keep up with- it's called
"disinterest".

Laura