Giving voice to homeless dogs’ need: adopt!

Trenton Animal Shelter

October is “Adopt a Shelter Dog Month” —and if Betsy, Marley and Serena could, they would say the same thing.  Shelters are not homes, no matter how good they may be.  They are way stations for homeless animals who need homes . . . like the 3 dogs mentioned above – and about 30 others, all living in the Trenton Animal Shelter (TAS) or under its purview with fosters.

                                                       Betsy                                                   

Dogs in shelters have food and water, and medical attention, toys and walks if they’re lucky.  Staff, volunteers and visitors may even lavish love on them, but that love isn’t permanent.  Shelter dogs simply don’t have the security and comfort of a loving home where they’re part of a caring family.  

“Home is where the heart is” may be a cliché, but at its best, it’s also true.  A stable home gives a dog the chance to be all s/he can be: healthy, playful, energetic, loving, trusting.  Shelter dogs often experience positive personality and behavioral changes once they’re out of the shelter.

Now managed by Trenton Animals Rock, the Trenton Animal Shelter is open to the public by appointment Monday-Friday 11-7 and Saturday 11-3.  Adoptable dogs in shelter and foster can be seen on Petfinder, along with pictures of each one, and info like age, breed, back story, temperament, health, adoption fee.

Marley

Here’s how to reach the Trenton Animals Rock (TAR) gallery of adoptable dogs: Go to tarnj.org, which takes you to Petfinder.  In the top-right corner, click on “View Our Pets,” then click on the image of any dog for additional images.  Finally, scroll down to read about the dog.  

Thanks to a TAR volunteer, here are descriptions of the 3 dogs mentioned above.  

Betsy -- She has had a tough time adjusting to the shelter.  Surrendered by her owner, she’s scared and confused, and cries in her kennel all day.  She had mange when she was surrendered and she has had at least one litter of puppies.  When out of her kennel, Betsy’s whole demeanor changes.  She becomes very playful and even has a favorite ball she likes to chase after!  She’s a very sweet dog who loves to be petted and cuddled.  She loves people and has been gentle with all the volunteers.  Betsy knows basic commands, is housebroken and walks nicely on a leash.  She’s 3 years old, about 45 pounds and dog-friendly.  She’d be fine to be in a home with children and also a great dog for a first-time pet owner. 

Marley -- This poor 8-year old guy lost his home when his owner became ill.  For months, he has been living with the coolest foster parents who adore him, but there is a small problem: CATS!  He likes them just a little too much!  Marley needs a home without cats so he can just be the big loving guy he wants to be.  He has a pretty funny personality -- he LOVES wearing his raincoat on walks!  He’s low-energy and happy with a few short walks a day.  He has moments of playfulness when his foster dad comes home from work, then it's right back to his favorite spot on the couch.  Due to Marley’s size and limited history, we recommend a home with children over 12. 

           Serena                             TAR images

Serena -- This beautiful girl came to the shelter in bad condition.  She was skinny, weak and covered with a skin disease.  After being hospitalized for a few days, she went to a foster home to start a feeding schedule to gain weight.  Now, Serena’s coming out of her shell: she loves cuddles and kisses and TREATS!  She is also just figuring out that she can bark and it's adorable; she’s pretty much learning to be a dog again!  Serena should keep gaining weight till about 50-60 pounds.  We believe she's about 2-5 years old.  In good health now, she’s up to date on all shots, housebroken and spayed. 

Just think: in adopting a shelter dog, you become an animal rescuer, you gain a new best friend and you make room in the shelter for another dog needing a home.  And, adopting this month gives your new family member time to adjust and enjoy being home for the holidays!  

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      The Trenton Animal Shelter is on Escher St. next to the Trenton Area Soup Kitchen (TASK). 

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Please comment at 1moreonce.blogspot.com – and tell us if you’ve adopted a dog this month, or plan to!

  

News briefs about animals: NJ to Arizona

At this time of year, media coverage focuses on school starting, especially now, with Covid debates raging.  But it’s also a season when animal advocates plunge even deeper into activism.  Hunting season is imminent, or in one reprehensible case, already underway.

True to its mission and past practice, the Animal Protection League of NJ has lots going on to benefit animals, including the state’s geese, deer and black bears.  While some towns are interested in habitat modification, most reportedly don’t want non-lethal approaches – a disappointing turn of events, even when APLNJ does site visits and helps with habitat changes.

The organization’s activities range from attending town meetings and sessions with condo associations, to talking with the governor’s staff about non-lethal black bear management.  Its TNR program reports success at enlisting community groups to help vet two large cat colonies.

Details on many of these initiatives to follow . . . !

From a deer friend

·        Gardener alert!  Do you believe in “deer-proof plants”?  Truth is, there’s no such thing.  Even though specified perennials, annuals and trees may be labeled “deer-resistant,” some deer are hungrier than others! 

·       Numbers of fawns were aided before and during Hurricane Ida – from Jersey shore lagoons, after being injured and even one with his head stuck in a plastic trick or treat bucket.

·        Male deer shed the “velvet” covering their antlers once it has done its job: providing nourishment and protection to the antlers so they “mineralize” – grow big and strong.  This process signals the start of “the rut,” or deer-mating season.

Information like this about our native deer appears in a newsletter called The Bleat (alluding to the sound baby deer make to call their moms).  The publication is produced by Kimberly Nagelhout, a long-time deer advocate, activist for non-lethal deer programs and member of the Animal Protection League of NJ. 

Her commitment to deer shows in her related activities – from notable wildlife photography to the creative way she credits helpers and donors to her projects: “deer friends” and volunteers get a “4-hoof salute,” and “The Buck Stops Here.”  

Kim Nagelhout treating a fawn

Take a look at The Bleat here: https://conta.cc/3zN8Abg.  This link will also lead to the next edition.   

Felines’ ‘new’ life stages

New guidelines for defining cat life stages have been released by the American Association of Feline Practitioners and the American Animal Hospital Association.  Recommended by a task force of feline medical experts, the guidelines are intended to help veterinarians tailor their health-care plans for cat patients depending on both their biological and lifestyle needs.

The new feline life stages are Kitten – Birth to 1 year; Young Adult – 1 to 6 years; Mature Adult – 7 to 10 years; enior – 10 years and older; End-Of-Life – Any age.

Lots 'wrong with this picture'!

Starting this month, the National Park Service is allowing four 5-day “lethal removal operations” this year on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon National Park.  Translated, that means 12 selected volunteer hunters will be allowed to kill one bison each during his/her “operation” period. 

Up to 500 animals comprise the North Rim bison herd; they have lived peaceably there till being targeted for culling – a.k.a., “lethal removal.”  Non-lethal possibilities were dismissed earlier by the Park Service, whose logo features a bison!

An estimated 60 million bison once ranged from the Yukon all the way to Mexico.  History shows that they were nearly decimated.  And now, in a national park where hunting is prohibited, nearly 50 bison will be killed as a result of a “bison herd reduction environmental assessment.”  

The writer of the opinion column linked below protests the cull “for such intolerable offenses as foraging, drinking, defecating, wallowing and kicking up some dirt, these native animals are treated throughout the study as a constant disturbance, as if the ideal of management were sterile, picture-perfect scenery instead of a lived-in ecosystem.”   https://tinyurl.com/vv86r9u2

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Focusing on animals: an escape from human ills & errors

                                 Botswana baby                         Getty pic               

Summer is almost over and the world is a sick, crazy, cruel mess.  What else can go wrong?

Instead of downer-forecasts, let’s work on what might go right: take a bike ride or a walk along fields of drying grasses rimmed by yellow flowers, with crickety sounds rising from the brittle foliage.  Take deep breaths and look around at the blue-sky world.   

Or, re-pot a plant or two before it winters over inside, and clean up the garden a bit – leaving enough debris for small animals’ cover till spring. 

Or, brush your cat or take a walk with your dog, and feel extra grateful for pets, who can center and comfort us.

Or, and this isn’t as far afield as it may seem: think about the wildlife you love and advocate for.  Just move far away, mentally, and think about animals – those who fascinate you, those you especially care about. 

                                                   Elephant Crisis Fund pic

Recent news about elephants intrigued me (no surprise, right?), so I’ll go there.  And why not? They’re such remarkable-but-sorely endangered animals, and they need our help as well as our admiration for all the good they do in the world.

I used to report that elephants’ worst threat came from poachers who slaughtered them for their tusks, then sold their ivory to satisfy the world’s demand.  Habitat all over Africa is steadily being lost to development that affects elephants’ traditional travel routes; highways do the same.

But now, a growing hazard for elephants comes from the people who live and farm near them.  As human population increases and elephant habitat shrinks, elephants’ hunger drives them to invade people’s farms and threaten or destroy their crops.

Retaliation follows. With coexistence becoming ever harder to maintain, frustrated farmers strike back at the elephants, often killing them.  Fences can be ineffectual and the bees that elephants fear aren’t universal; nor are the animal advocates who set up bee-deterrents to keep elephants away from land intended for other purposes.   

                                                          Dodo-Shutterstock

Big-picture elephant news that should ultimately help conserve elephants: a decades-long study and its resultant product – “The Elephant Ethogram: A Library of African Elephant Behavior” – is an illustrated list of some 500 elephant behaviors and 110 behavioral suites in a wide variety of contexts, with still more to come.  Publicly available and invaluable to scientists and those working for elephants’ survival, this Ethogram includes more than 3,000 video and audio clips that illustrate the text.   

Dr. Joyce Poole’s “tens of thousands of hours spent observing, tracking and analyzing” African savanna elephants -- described as “the largest land animal on the planet and one of the most cognitively and behaviorally complex”-- led to this encyclopedic result. 

Poole and her husband, Petter Granli, compiled the Ethogram, released last May by ElephantVoices, a non-profit group whose mission is “To inspire wonder in the intelligence, complexity and voices of elephants, and to secure a kinder future for them.”   https://tinyurl.com/2kmy262m

Not only does the Ethogram look like a great thing to browse or spend days with, but also, the article below, where I first learned about it, is terrific all by itself, offering wonderful images and captions.  https://tinyurl.com/49dc4k45

                                                            MoizHasein-Stock

Now I wonder whether the elephant ethogram includes the many ways that elephants use their trunks, which turn out to be multi-multi-multi-purpose tools!  

With no bones or joints in it, the trunk is pure muscle, yet capable of delicate actions too: although it can uproot trees, it can also pluck a single leaf from a branch.  And it boasts a powerful sense of smell.

Elephants use their trunks to drink, store and spray water, and they can blow air through them to communicate, with bellows that are audible for miles.  With their trunks, elephants can apply suction to grab food too – a function formerly thought to be exclusive to fishes.  

But of what practical, or satisfying, use is it for an elephant to be able to suction up a single potato chip, as shown in this story?  Answer: that feat may suggest technological innovations in the human and robotic worlds.  Science at work!   https://tinyurl.com/4jzx69kw

 

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Please comment!  What do you do to escape the world's harsh realities?  1moreonce.blogspot.com

  

Drop that hamburger & come out with your mind open!

We’re hearing it more and more often: “Plant-based meat products are not only less harmful to the climate but also better for our health.”  When that claim comes from the founder and CEO of “Beyond Meat,” we want to know more.  

A vegetarian since high school, Ethan Brown started Beyond Meat in 2009 and took the company public 10 years later -- an arc that coincides with the soaring growth rate of plant-based meat.  His company produces burgers, sausages and more for supermarkets and fast-food outlets like McDonald’s.

Beyond more predictable reasons for plant-based meat, Brown “would rather not be responsible for the deaths of animals,” according to a full-page profile of him in the NYTimes business section last month.  

The article includes a series of Q&As that should put many pro-animal meat arguments to rest: everyone else eats meat so why shouldn’t humans; how is a Beyond Burger healthier for me than a hamburger; is Beyond Meat’s meat loaded with chemicals; how does Beyond Meat differ from Impossible Foods; how do you reconcile your emphasis on health with your partnerships with fast-food partnerships . . .  . ?

An accompanying graphic shows how Beyond Meat's footprint is smaller than that of a quarter-pound beef burger.  For instance, Brown’s product is responsible for 90% less greenhouse gas emissions and uses 46% less energy.    https://tinyurl.com/3b5r36b7

Poor butterfly

A sad sight from earlier this month: As I stood outside, a single monarch butterfly fluttered by me, flying in slow, low swoops down the street, as if looking for something.  Had the insect fallen far behind in the mass migration (if there was  one)?  Was s/he hoping to come upon a long-lived milkweed plant?    

I soon lost sight of the orange beauty, and felt sad because I couldn’t help. Our milkweed bush had long since given up, after attracting too few butterflies.  I wondered how far this one would get, without nourishment and with predators all around.

Monarch 

Then yesterday, I saw Margaret Renkl’s column, this time about “a troubling summer in the yard,” including the dearth of butterflies there in Tennessee, where she lives.  It’s not a happy picture, even though Renkl tries hard to make the most of it.     https://tinyurl.com/5cw39tbm

Bruce the handybird

Online animal sites often run stories about how people help animals walk or fly again after injury,  overcome fear or shyness, and even search for food.  

But Bruce, a New Zealand kea (parrot) with a broken beak, said in effect, “I’d rather do it myself,” and proceeded to devise a new way to preen his feathers.   

Rather than beak surgery that would allow him to perform the necessary feather job, Bruce has chosen to comb himself with the point of a pebble between his tongue and lower beak.  His system effectively rids him of parasites and dirt.

Kea bird

All it takes is careful selection of the right size pebble, then getting to work.  No surgery needed.  The researcher who studied and wrote about Bruce said he doesn’t need a prosthesis – he has his own.  

https://tinyurl.com/54j29wfk 

 

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Sick songbirds, deep sea life & animal traps

It's worrisome for warblers like goldfinches (NJ's state bird), sparrows and chickadees, and those who love them: Songbirds in our area are sick, and the cause is still unknown.  

The Mercer County Naturalist Newsletter recommends cleaning and putting away bird baths (10% bleach and 90% water) and feeders for the time being, while this “mortality event” that’s “occurring in nestling and fledgling songbirds in the mid-Atlantic, extending into the Southeast and eastern upper Midwest” is investigated.   https://tinyurl.com/y5epfsrx

Numerous young birds – also including orioles, woodpeckers, blue jays, robins and cardinals – have been found to have eye and neurologic issues, the publication continued.

American goldfinch

Although birds are susceptible to several viruses and bacteria, it’s already known that this outbreak was not primarily caused by salmonella, chlamydia, avian influenza virus or West Nile virus. 

Those who see birds with head tremors, partial paralysis or weakness in the legs; or birds falling to the side or unable to stand at all may contact the NJ Division of Fish and Wildlife's Wildlife Veterinarian Dr. Nicole Lewis (Nicole.lewis@dep.nj.gov) or call 877-WARN-DEP for any additional instructions.

The article linked here looks at this issue beyond New Jersey.  https://tinyurl.com/yay333ct

Will this season come to be called the "silent summer"?  We pray not. 

Unfinished ocean business

Soon after my last post, about marine creatures, the NYTimes book review section featured a cover

Tufted titmouse

review of two new books about ocean life.  The essay itself included myriad surprises about who lives in that vast watery world, and where – with much of the information only recently discovered, and fascinating.  If you lack time or book-length interest, at least read the review and enjoy the cover illustration. https://tinyurl.com/dux8rp5a

Trapping: a year-round horror

“The question I want to ask is simpler than [whether human beings have the right to take another animal’s life, and if so for what reasons].  I want to know why it is still legal to kill animals in ways that cause inexpressible pain and fear and destruction, to both the targeted animals and an immense range of others.”

Margaret Renkl’s opinion column last fall, “How not to kill an animal,” is powerful.  She writes against inhumane ways to kill animals when that is to be done, including animal traps, a hideously cruel vestige of earlier, less enlightened times.  Animal traps, which can torture any animal caught in them, maiming or killing pets and people, are outlawed elsewhere, but not in most of the US.  https://tinyurl.com/29tr3jx9

House sparrow

One antidote to the horrors involved with animal traps is the Sept. 14 webinar from the Humane Society of the US (described below), “Protecting your pets and wildlife from traps.”  Yes, the fall hunting season is closing in, but trapping animals happens all year round – made legal with phony claims of predator control or “nuisance” wildlife control -- and it must be fought. 

Here are details about both the trapping issue and the webinar, including a registration form.  I hope you’ll take a look and consider attending next month’s session. https://tinyurl.com/4nwjhw4e

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Please note: AnimalBeatII will return from vacation next month. This is the 200^th AnimalBeatII blog post, so if you want to keep reading about animals, your course is clear! 

 

Dive into the watery world of sharks & more

How many times this seashore season have you heard someone mention Jaws . . . again?  Or talk up merely being near blue water, or extol the healing properties of salt water?  Add to that liquidy mix this summer’s excess of  wet weather, and you’ve got good reason to think about watery creatures.

When you think of animal life in water, sharks probably come to mind early and often.  So let’s start there, and go way back to earlier shark life — an existence that almost vanished  forever yet still limited the array of sharks even now.   

These days, the worst that can happen to sharks is overfishing and man-made killings, like finning – the barbaric practice of catching sharks only to cut off their fins for shark fin soup, then to toss them back into the ocean.  There, the helpless sharks die of suffocation, blood loss or predation.  

“Humans kill 100 million sharks annually,” according to Humane Society International, with hundreds of millions killed for shark fin soup alone.  https://tinyurl.com/vehx4pup

                      Great white shark                NYT image          

About 19 million years ago, long after dinosaurs were wiped out, sharks nearly went extinct, and even now, they’re still not fully back.  Exactly what happened then is still not known, but a mysterious mass extinction occurred in the world’s oceans that decimated sharks’ diversity.

Scientists studying “dermal denticles,” the microscopic scales that entirely cover sharks’ bodies like protective armor, found in sediment cores that shark diversity had so declined that only a fraction of shark species survived that event.

And now, sharks’ abundance is severely threatened, making for a double whammy that some believe may ultimately amount to the worst extinction of all.  https://tinyurl.com/3eyr293m

Scalloped hammerhead sharks

“Shark attacks” -- or those two words, anyway – are disappearing.  That’s because shark scientists hope to change how people regard sharks: not as blood-thirsty predators, but as animals “whose population has plummeted by 71 % since 1970,” mostly from overfishing.   

One shark expert put it: “A lot of what’s called a shark attack . . . is actually provoked by humans” – plus: the great majority of person-shark meetings don’t involve a bite.   So the suggested alternative wording is preferable because it’s less sensational and more accurate.  For instance, “shark incident” or shark interaction" or "shark encounter."

This fascinating story includes examples of myriad possible “shark interactions,” including when a person accidentally steps on a tiny one or a passing shark touches a person and keeps going. (Remember, sharks don’t know what humans are!)   https://tinyurl.com/3t5adnfp

Whale shark

Time out on sharks for awhile.  Maybe later, dogfish sharks and ghost sharks, from among the more than 500 shark species: small and colossal, glowing and roaming, according to one source.

On to another watery creature I’ve never seen but recently read about: the cuttlefish.  This cephalopod (seh·fuh·luh·paad) has lately become a lab darling for curious (aren’t they all?) scientists.  But first,

A cuttlefish is one member of the molluscan class Cephalopoda that also includes squid, octopus and nautilus.  These exclusively marine animals are characterized by bilateral body symmetry, a prominent head, and a set of arms or tentacles modified from the primitive molluscan foot. --Wikipedia

Ranging in size from about an inch to more than 2 feet, cuttlefish boast one of the largest brains among invertebrates.  They can regenerate their limbs and camouflage, blending with their environment to hunt or escape, and they possess amazing skin that can mimic surrounding textures and colors.  These attributes make cuttlefish attractive for exploring how and when intelligence evolves.  https://tinyurl.com/3xe3vd8c

Cuttlefish competing for a female

Feeling like a nice dip in the ocean about now?  Or would “high and dry” be your destination choice?

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Companion animal loss displaces other topics today

You’ll probably recognize this situation: Knowing exactly what you want to say (or write, in this case), you unexpectedly come upon something else that hits you hard and can’t wait.  So it went with this blog post.

Yesterday I attended a superlative webinar offered by Jackson Galaxy, the multi-media cat specialist ("Cat Daddy") I’ve followed off and on for years.  First it was “My Cat from Hell” on TV – usually well worth the watch -- then various other programs of his.  Most recently it was his seasonal “Cat Camp,” which I discovered only after it went virtual.

Norman

The high quality of that series surprised me; each session taught me things I wanted to know, and did it well.  Yesterday’s webinar, “You're Not Going Crazy, You're Grieving: Navigating Animal Companion Loss in a Post-Pandemic World,” was timely and excellent.

Joined by Stephanie Rogers, a grief counselor who specializes in animal companion loss support, Galaxy spoke in touching self-disclosing ways about the effects of pet deaths on their people.  At some length, the two discussed desirable ways to handle such grief-filled times.  

BTW, “grief” was defined as the internal expression of loss; it’s a process we go through after losing a beloved pet.  “Mourning” is the external expression of internal experience of grief, such as crying, sharing stories of those who died and rituals.

Bernie

Rogers shared her formula for grief: “We grieve in direct proportion to how much we love.”  That is, “Our grief experience will be every bit as big as our love.”  We can expect deep, lasting pain after the death of a companion animal we deeply loved; it’s the price we pay.

“Disenfranchised loss” is one major impediment while a person grieves for a lost pet.  When society doesn’t view grief for an animal’s death being as important as grief for the loss of a person, that only adds to the mourner’s sorrow.

The person grieving for a lost animal often wonders, “What can I do to stop the grief, the pain?”  And Rogers answers: Nothing can be done to move on faster and get past this.  We need to understand grief as a transformational life experience; we should “embrace our grief” and acknowledge the intensity of our loss, naming and claiming it.  “It takes more strength to mourn than to keep a stiff upper lip,” she says.

(For more about Stephanie Rogers, visit her website: EmbracingYourGrief.com.  And for more on the subject of grief from the same team of experts, register for this CatCamp summer session on Saturday, August 28 at CatCamp.com. It will cost $10 – a bargain!)

Dupree

Animal nits & bits

 ·         Monarch butterflies: going, going gone?  Judging by monarchs’ interest in my milkweed plant this summer, the sad reports I’ve read must be true – these beautiful creatures are just not showing up in anything like their (former) usual numbers.  I saw just 3 monarchs around the milkweed flowers, and later, only 2 caterpillars among the leaves.  

Will future generations never see monarchs?

 ·         Local sightings with one surprise:  Deer, now more visible everywhere, this time included what I suppose was a young buck, with appreciable antlers – not way high but definitely getting there.  He stared calmly at me while I slowed down for a closer look at him.

·         A fox strolled along the sidewalk-outskirts of Princeton’s    main street, cool as a Kirby cuke.  

Tee shirt surprise

It’s an old pale blue tee with top and underside views of horseshoe crabs in dark blue – a happy reminder of Stone Harbor’s Wetlands Institute.  Finally, this summer, I read the italic wording: Limulus polyphemus. 

How about that?  Polyphemus: a literary allusion to the one-eyed giant Odysseus encountered, and defeated, in his travels.  Now I’m wondering why horseshoe crabs were named so colorfully. 

Moral of the story: Read your own tee shirts!

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