Shelter’s Edge

OK, so what’s going on here?“At the start of our first-ever 24-Hour Super Adoption Event last year, we had every cat condo in the shelter filled to the brim,” says Zachary Black, Operations Manager at Lewiston, ME’s Greater Androscoggin Humane Society. “In less than 24 hours we had all of the cats and kittens in the condos pictured adopted, all because of our amazing supporters who shared the news about our ASPCA $100K Challenge kickoff event.”

How would you like to take a similar before-and-after photo at YOUR shelter this year? This Wednesday, February 8, at 3PM ET, Zach and his colleagues at GAHS will reveal the secrets to their success during a free, 60-minute webinar, Life Saving Tips for Small Shelters. Find out which of their adoption promotions had people lining up at their door—and also hear about the promotions they won’t do again.

Register for Life Saving Tips for Small Shelters here. Small agencies who think big will especially benefit, but there are great ideas for promoting adoptions for organizations of all sizes.

P.S. And there’s more where that came from—check out these upcoming webinars presented by your colleagues in the animal sheltering field:

Community Engagement: Using Synergy to Save Lives, February 15
Presented by Humane Society for Greater Savannah

Strategizing and Energizing to Save Lives, February 22
Presented by The Humane Society of South Mississippi

Municipal Agencies Share Their Life Saving Tips, February 28
Presented by: City of Independence Animal Services
Cobb County Animal Control
Riverside County Animal Services

Planning for Success: Life Saving Tips from the 2011 $100K Challenge Winner, March 7
Presented by Austin Pets Alive!

Increasing Capacity for Spay/Neuter Before Big Events, March 8
Presented by: Kathleen Makolinski, DVM, ASPCA
Lesli Groshong, DVM, Humane Society of Boulder Valley (2010 $100K Challenge Winner)
Carolyn Brown, DVM, ASPCA

Related links:
Upcoming Webinars
ASPCA $100K Challenge
“Keeping Up with the Contestants: Party in the USA!”
Hosting Large-Scale Animal Adoption Events

…and may even give you a grant to do it!

As you may already know, several months ago many of the national groups and shelter experts (American Humane Association, Asilomar, ASPCA, HSUS, Best Friends, Maddie’s Fund, National Federation of Humane Societies, National Animal Control Association, PetSmart Charities, SAWA and UC Davis agreed upon a minimum data set that all animal sheltering agencies (foster-based or physical facility) should collect. While many of the participating groups collect this minimum data set plus more, these “naked data” items were all things we all agreed were vital for collection.

You also may already know that this caused much glee and jubilation among the data geeks of the animal sheltering world. To be able to speak the same language, and compare apples to apples amongst each other when talking about these basic data sets, is really a great and historic step.

The National Federation of Humane Societies had volunteered to take on the bulk of the work in the development of a basic data matrix so that animal sheltering organizations could give the data set a try. And now, they have finished a version that does your addition for you! Download the form here.

I would love for you to try the matrix. Monitoring these simple but important pieces of shelter data can indicate for you what programs and processes (if implemented at different times) are effective for saving lives in your organization, and which are not. With limited resources, this due diligence is necessary to assure you continue to grow your organization’s life-saving ability.

For those of you who may have recently implemented an ASPCA Shelter R&D program (such as Less is More, Fosters as Adoption Agents, Meet Your Match or fee-waived cats or other you learned about through this blog or ASPCApro.org), I have an added incentive for you…

Send us your baseline (prior to program implementation) and implementation data and we can both help you to interpret the data and help you to apply for Shelter R&D grant funds to support your work.

Contact me and send me information on what program you’ve implemented and when, and we will determine how much baseline and implementation data we would need to measure impact.

Related links:
Basic Data Matrix (pdf.)
“Able, Willing and NAKED”
ASPCA Research: Shelter R&D

Boring lecture? Not even close! The ASPCA’s Dr. Z (otherwise known as Stephen L. Zawistowski, PhD, CAAB, ASPCA Science Advisor) examines the broad history of animal welfare in this 60-minute webinar you can use to lend big-picture historical perspective to your orientations for new board members, staff and volunteers.

Did you know: The first humane animal shelter was developed in Philadelphia by the Women’s Auxilliary of the Pennsylvania SPCA in 1874.

Visit our webinars page on ASPCApro.org to access the recording and slides for Dr. Z’s presentation, “A History of Animal Welfare.” (It’s the second under the “Animals in Crisis” heading.)

We’d love to hear about your agency’s history, too. When was your shelter founded, and what are some of your important milestones?

Related links:
Webinar: “The History of Animal Welfare”
Staff Recruitment & Hiring: Employee Orientation
Upcoming Webinars

He was charging toward me, head down, shoulders forward… I could see the tension in his thighs as he climbed the hill between the two of us, and I stood my ground waiting for him to get closer. I took a few deep breaths and turned so my back was facing him. I covered my face and crouched, and just as I heard him just feet behind me, I turned and yelled, “I am going to get you!” He stopped short of the cage barrier, then leaned his belly in and I responded by tickling him. Then, he made a sound that struck me deep in my gut each time I heard it… He huffed and squeaked while his mouth was open wide, lips pulled back…

Bahati, the creative, silly chimp I had known for several years, and I were playing our favorite game… “Tickle me ‘til I laugh.”

The vocalizations that occur during play are still new to formal animal behavior study. We have learned much from chimps and some other species, but still have much to learn. Several years ago I had the honor to meet the late Dr. Patricia Simonet. Dr. Simonet had done some great work around the play vocalizations in canines. She called the behavior a laugh – which, depending upon one’s definition of “laugh,” is accurate.

The sound is one that is likely familiar to most of you – it is that breathy huffing that often occurs during play. You can listen to one of her recordings here.

Dr. Simonet not only confirmed that this behavior occurs during times of play, but she also found that the recorded sound decreased arousal in a kennel situation. While playing these sounds in a shelter is not likely to have a lasting impact (as playing any sound over time with no paired stimuli is likely to be quickly habituated to), Dr. Simonet’s data clearly shows that huffing, or laughing, is an important vocalization for our canine companions. I captured a bit of the behavior in my own dogs – take a look:

This behavior is important to us for several reasons. First, and likely most importantly, it is a great educational tool to help folks understand just how much dogs are like us… Dr. Simonet’s work received tons of public attention several years back, in part because she called the behavior a laugh, not a huff… powerful stuff to help increase the bond! Next, by producing the sound ourselves, we can help dogs engage in play together – or with us. Finally, by understanding another cue that indicates play, we can better assess whether a dog is playing – the breathy huffs are clear cues that the game is on!

Unfortunately, Dr. Simonet is no longer alive – she lost her battle with cancer late in 2010. A dog park in Spokane was named in her honor – perfectly named the Laughing Dog Park.

How might you keep her research alive in your shelter?

Related links:
“What Did He Just Say?”
“Should We Say ‘Lulla-Bye-Bye’ to ‘Calming’ CDs?”
“There Is Chimp Poo Hanging On My Office Wall”

Who’s involved in dogfighting? How do you collect evidence, handle the animals involved and partner with prosecutors to fight this violent crime? The U.S. Department of Justice and the ASPCA have teamed up to create the Dogfighting Toolkit for Law Enforcement, a free 96-page manual to help law enforcement agencies tackle dogfighting in collaboration with prosecutors, ACOs and veterinarians.

Get yours: Due to the sensitive nature of the material in this publication, the toolkit cannot be downloaded or viewed on the Web. Click here to request a free copy of the Dogfighting Toolkit for Law Enforcement from the US Department of Justice.

Better together: Developed as an accompaniment to the Dogfighting Toolkit, Combating Dogfighting is a self-paced, free online course that teaches you how to detect, investigate and take action against dogfighting within your jurisdiction. Note, the course runs less than two hours and has been approved for Certified Animal Welfare Administrator continuing education credit.Watch a short clip of the course here. Warning: contains graphic images of animal cruelty.

Photo: Respect A Bull, Leslie Hallberg & Michelle Godecke

Related links:
Types of Animal Fighting
Fighting Animal Cruelty: Resources and Related Links
Webinars: Prosecuting Animal Cruelty