I’ve been thinking about getting a kitten for quite a while now and I thought going to the pound would be a nice way to give an unfortunate kitten a good home. So I fill out all these papers (they make you fill out shit just to HOLD kittens). I see a really friendly black one so I play with him and finally tell the “adoption guy” that I would like to get this little cutie. Well guess what? Because my mom breeds dachsunds (they’re not fixed obviously) I can’t have this kitten. I understand them screening people, but geez, the dogs are licensed, my mom sells them for $400 bucks, we aren’t running a puppy mill. I guess they would rather put the kitten to sleep that have it in a loving home with my dogs that like to hump eachother. I was even gonna pay the freakin’ $65 bucks for a kitten from a pound. This sucks, I want that kitten, he was so cute. Sorry for the babbling and complaining, but am I the only one who sees this as unfair?
What was the specific reason for not allowing you to have the kitten?
That your mother raises dachsunds?
That we have animals that are unfixed, and that’s against their beliefs.
I have worked for several animal hospitals and dealings with many shelters. This shelter sounds a little "wacky’. I have never heard of such a thing. Most shelters that I have dealt with just give you an insentive to have your addopted animal fixed. Some give you a form that the vet who does the surgery fills out, and then you return it to the shelter for a partial refund of the fee paid for the animal. Ther must be more shelters out there. I would try another one. You will fall in love again!
Wow.
I got my cat, Boojum, from the Pasadena Humane Society, and they never asked me any such questions.
Of course, that was 10 years ago. Yep. Boo’s 10th birthday is on or about Oct. 1st. And, yes, he was an all-black kitten, too. (In fact, that’s all they had, two weeks after Halloween.)
Anyway, I suggest you go down there when somebody else is working and don’t admit to anything except that you’re a “humane” being who just wants to adopt a kitten.
I found their policies to be quite reasonable: 24 hour waiting period to make sure you’re serious, and a promise to neuter your pet. They even gave me a coupon to take to my vet to get a discount on the operation.
Also, if you do get the cat, there isn’t any better feline vet in LA County than The Cat Clinic, Dr. Diegmann, on Foothill just east of Allen. (626) 795-5916 It’s a cat-only practice and they’re just awesome.
Good Luck!
Go back to the Humane Society and lie on the official forms. Yeah, it’s perjury and you could go to jail, and you’ll probably burn in Hell for all of Eternity for lying, but you’ll have your kitty. Isn’t that really what’s important. You’ll have your kitty.
-Rue.
I can see them requiring that the kitten be neutered, but…
In a sense, I can see their point. There are too many unwanted animals out there, therefore we should not breed more. But…
Personally, I think everyone should adopt from the pound instead of buying–except if they have a legitimate reason for wanting a specific breed. (And it’s not up to me or anyone else to judge what counts as a “legitimate” reason.) I would simply like people to consider a pound pup before buying a dog or cat.
It sounds to me like Venus’s values and motives are in line with this. His/her mom breeds purebred dachsunds. I assume that she sells these expensive puppies to people who really love the breed–a legitimate reason I suppose. But Venus wanted a cat simply as a companion animal and had no breed preference, so he/she went to the pound to get one.
Far be it from me to suggest obtaining an animal under false pretenses, but could you get a friend to adopt your kitty and then “give” it to you??
You can have the best of both worlds, Green Bean. Plenty of breeds have “rescue organizations” - adopting out dogs and cats of a particular breed who need good homes. Some need more care than others but plenty are fine, healthy animals who needs more love than they got the last time around. Plenty of these organizations are on the Net, complete with listings of li’l’ sweeties lookin’ for nice people like you.
VenusGirlTrap - it sounds like you ran into a real nutcake of an employee or one who’s not entirely clear on the society’s policies. I’d go back, ask to speak to the director, and confirm that they won’t give an animal away to a household with unfixed pets, even if you intend to spay or neuter the adoptee. If that’s actually the case, go find another humane society. It seems to me that any humane society would be damn glad of having serious people come to adopt their animals and wouldn’t dream of being so stringent as to deny someone on a technicality like this. I mean, really! What are the dachshunds going to do, crossbreed with the cat?!
No, of course, But, weren’t dachshunds bred for chasing rats and stuff into holes? Was the employee maybe afraid that the kitten would become dog-fodder?
That’s nuts. The dogs aren’t neutered because you BREED them. They are not going to magically impregnate your neutered Humane Society cat, right?
The Humane Society can be a little…er…stringent. Which is mostly good, because you don’t want rescuers of abused and neglected animals to people who won’t take care of them. But sometimes it’s a bit extreme.
When I went to adopt my cat, I wanted a kitten. The woman wouldn’t give me just one kitten. I had to take two so they could be “socialized” together. I lived in a studio apartment at the time, and two INSANE kittens would have been overwhelming. I ended up with very young adult cat that she supposed I could take alone.
Then I had to promise that I’d never let the cat outside, ever. Which is cool, because I lived in a city then and I live in a city now and it would be a bad idea. But not EVERYONE who adopts from them live in a city - my parents live way out in the country, and we’d always let our cats outside. That’s why we GOT them - to keep the garden clear of varmints, and they LOVED being outside. Sure, more stuff happened to them, but it was worth it.
I had to promise never to declaw, which is cool, because I do think it’s evil. My roommate’s cat has been declawed and consequently he’s a biter and when he drags his pathetic clawless fingers down the scratching post it makes me sad.
She also wanted me to promise I’d never feed the cat anything but the most premium cat food. I nodded and smiled and said yes and took my kitty home. She’d caught ringworm in the shelter and weighed about 6 lbs, with ribs sticking out, but now she’s a beauty.
Go back to the shelter and LIE or have a friend get the kitty for you. Or go when there is a different person working. I mean, are they gonna let that kitten DIE just because they oppose your unneutered dachsunds?
Ghod, it would have to be some sort of super-sized steroid-laden Überdachshund with rabies in order to threaten the kitty with fodderdom. Every Doxie I’ve known has enjoyed teasing kitties, as any good dog should, but never have they seemed to get it into their heads that kitties were objects to be destroyed, and mercilessly at that. Yes, Doxies were bred to hunt rats (and badgers too, I hear) but that doesn’t mean they’ve got the killer instinct for everything.
Of course there is the problem of being ounumbered ten to one, but human intervention usually helps in those cases.
Anal rules like this are probably the reason why so many pets are destroyed each year. They probably get plenty of people who are interested in adopting pets, but reject many of them for really stupid reasons.
If someone had told me that I can’t have a kitten because my mother breeds dogs, I would have said something to the effect of:
<rant>
Listen, retard. If we fixed every dog and cat on the planet, we’d have no pets at all. And by the way, we’re talking about my mom here, so I fail to see what that has to do with me. And by the way, you had better give me this kitten and waive the $65 fee or I’m going to go to the local newspaper and tell them how freaking ridiculous this whole situation is. Before you know it, you’ll be fired and you’ll have to work at Petland Discounts, cleaning rabbit cages and feeding bugs to big fat snakes. Now move your hydrocephalic ass before I get really upset.
</rant>
It’s all in the delivery. Trust me. Say it with conviction and it’ll work.
I dunno… I’ve had a Doxie and a cat at the same time, and Oscar (the Doxie, obviously; whoever named him had no imagination – and I swear it wasn’t me) came damn close to doing the cat in, mainly over turf issues. Since she was a little bitty thing at the time, she didn’t know she was supposed to be bitter enemies with the dog. She went up to him, did her little head-butt thing, and blew his mind. He mellowed a little after that.
And, FTR, both pets came from the local humane association, both were fixed, and both turned out to be good pets, although the cat turned into a psychotic lesbian and the dog died. 
Robin
I can see why - poor little kitty wants to give nothing but love and almost gets annihilated. Who wouldn’t swear off men after that? 
What a coinincidence. My all black cat, Fred, will be 10 on September 27th (we got him the day after Thanksgiving 1991).
But when we got Fred, the pound made us step into some disinfectant (with our shoes on, of course). But then, like bughunter said, it was ten eyars ago.
I vaguely recall seeing a newspaper article about animal shelters that took some heat for maintaining McCarthy-esque blacklists of people somehow deemed unfit to adopt anything.
VenusGirlTrap:
Sheesh. Do they actually want to see cats and dogs become extinct, or are they just unaware of basic laws of nature?
I can see both sides of this one. I’ve definitely experienced the wrath of the overzealous Humane Society worker. I went with a friend of mine to pick out a kitten for her mom, but they said she couldn’t adopt any cats because she wanted to take it home to Louisiana.
Then, every time I hear about dachshunds and cats together, I think about these kids I used to babysit for. The little girl gave a kitten to one of her friends who had a dachshund and the kitten was killed by the dog. Does the Humane society not neuter the animals before it releases them?
-Lil