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I went down to Louisiana in the beginning of October and brought two semi-loads of dogs back to be distributed among the shelters in Iowa. It was an incredible experience for me to actually see how they had set up the temporary facility. I was moved to tears by the tireless volunteers from all over the United States who were feeding, cleaning, walking and caring for the scared, lonely animals at the Lamar-Dixon Expo Center, a horse show facility with barns, arenas, and grounds in Gonzales, Louisiana. The Humane Society of the United States rented it to be used to temporarily house rescued animals. Volunteer workers moved thousands of animals through this temporary facility over the course of about six weeks. Animals were shipped to shelters all over the country to make room for more to be moved in after being rescued.
It took a while to get a system in place. … By the time I arrived all the systems were in place and all organizations were working together pretty well.
I left Dubuque with a backpack and a one-way ticket to Baton Rouge. I caught a ride into Chicago, spent the night, and left very early the next morning for Louisiana. I flew in to Baton Rouge and got picked up by Scott Jetter, an animal behaviorist from Des Moines, Iowa, who had been there for three weeks working with the most severely stressed out and behaviorally challenged dogs. He had selected 65 dogs from his barn for me to bring back; otherwise these dogs would be euthanized. Some of them were aggressive, and some were just scared. The barking on the grounds was incessant, and many dogs (and volunteers) were completely exhausted and totally stressed out. Scott and I selected 19 more dogs, bringing the total to 84 coming to Iowa. While there, I witnessed a large, middle-aged gentleman “following his ears” to where his little Yorkie was yapping away in the quarantine section (it had bitten someone). He walked to the stall door and softly spoke the dog’s name. The dog went totally nuts! The man broke into tears (me too) as they were reunited! The man had tracked the dog because he recognized the barking.
We waited until evening to load because it was cooler for the dogs. At nine o’clock that evening, we left Louisiana and jounced our way to Iowa. The semi I was riding in arrived in Cedar Rapids at about 5:30 p.m. the following day and unloaded at a vet clinic. The other semi went on to Des Moines to distribute animals among central Iowa shelters. The animals were quickly assessed by the vet and vet techs from Kirkwood College, divided up among seven eastern Iowa shelters and we were on our way home. I am very proud the way the eastern Iowa shelters worked together to help the animals in disaster.
Kim, Jackie, and I brought eight dogs back to Dubuque, arriving about 9 p.m. Pete and Paul met us at the shelter to help us get the dogs settled in kennels in the garage. We had three dogs no other shelter would take, and it took Paul several hot dogs to get one out of the truck. We had to drop pole one of the others out of its traveling kennel. Both of these dogs have turned out to be okay now. We have reunited two of the dogs with their owners and flown them back down to Louisiana. Three of the dogs were heartworm-positive, we treated them, kept them in quarantine for a while, and planned to cautiously adopt them out a few weeks later.
Nearly every day, we were getting calls from volunteers still working on reuniting people and their pets in Louisiana. We hesitated to adopt animals out as long as people were still working on reuniting them.
As for lessons learned from the Katrina disaster, when Rita hit, people were able to evacuate with their animals. Here at home, we’ve met with the Emergency Management people and with the Red Cross, and we designated several places in the county where we could possibly set up a temporary shelter for people and their pets. I believe that people finally realize that, for many, “pets are family.” They will not evacuate without them.
We were sincerely grateful to those who donated to the Dubuque Regional Humane Society for the “animals in disaster”; they made a difference for many animals.
Jane McCall is the Executive Director of the Dubuque Humane Society in Dubuque, Iowa.
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