“The community has really stepped up,” Canfield said.
By: Lydia Crawley
The Parsons Advocate
The month of August saw a near record number of intakes at the Tucker County Animal Shelter. Shelter Director Stacey Canfield thanked the community and rescue partners for their assistance during the crisis during a recent meeting of the Tucker County Commission September 11th.
According to Candfield between August first and 31st, the Shelter took in 14 cats and 27 dogs with 19 dogs taken in within a five day period. “We had quite a large number of intakes at once,” Canfield said. “We took 14 cats and 27 dogs.”
According to Canfield, the Shelter has relied on fosters to help with the influx of animals. “With only have eight kennels that was a pretty big hit for us,” Canfield said. “So we are relying pretty heavily on fosters. Staff is fostering right now, which is a big help.”
Canfiled credited the community for its help during the crisis. According to Canfield many of the volunteers and community members that had only heard of the influx of dogs, had reached out to help. “The community has really stepped up,” Canfield said. “We’ve had a lot of people take in dogs that have strictly volunteered before. Some people who didn’t even know we existed, when the word got out that we had taken in so many many dogs. Out of the 27, 19 of them were in five days.”
One foster had a litter of 12 and an adult pit bull under her roof, according to Canfield, at one time. Tucker County Commission President Mike Rosenau sent his thanks to the foster and others for their hard work and dedication. “In less than 30 days, she has moved seven of the puppies,” Canfield said. “She’s just moving them right along.”
Another partner, Heart For Animals, also stepped up to take in four cats and five dogs in one day for the shelter, Canfield said. “Because unfortunately, when we got seven dogs in one day after hours, we already had four puppies that were definitely needing more attention than unfortunately staff was able to give them at the time,” Canfield said. “So at the drop of a hat, within six hours, they took a large number of our dogs out of our kennels to help us out.”
Canfield said she is appreciative of the partner rescues the Shelter has. “So we are very appreciative to the partner rescues that we have made,” Canfield said. “Marion County has also reached out to us recently just to see what supplies we need. They’ve heard of the influx of dogs that we’ve had specifically.”
Canfield said the Shelter had no other option then to rely on fosters to care for the new arrivals. “At the shelter, in all reality, we didn’t have anywhere safe for them to go, so we really did rely on the community to step in and come together and get them into their homes for relief from staff and for safety measures in the shelter,” Canfield said.
Canfield said the newly arrived animals are being adopted quickly, though. “Considering that we took in 27 dogs last month and we currently only have 25 in the shelter here as of yesterday, we’re moving them pretty fast,” Canfield said.
Many of the adoptions are taking place out of state, Canfield said. “A lot of adoptions have taken place out of state,” Canfield said. “We did an adoption event at Tractor Supply in Oakland and we had a lot of people from the Maryland area come in and adopt.”
