Shelter me!

There was a story in the New York Times on January 1st about cloning pets. (”Beloved Pets Everlasting?” by Eric Konigsberg) One of the pet owners waxed poetically about the desirability of enjoying their dog for the equivalent of a human lifetime, as opposed to a dog lifetime. Hmmmm.

Personally, I have a hard time believing that it is possible to ‘clone’ an animal and recreate the same exact set of emotions and personality.

But I will admit that the cloning scenario breathes new life into the old nature vs. nurture debate: Are we (or our pets) the sum of a lifetime of experiences or simply the product of our genes? Or a mixture of both? I opt for the latter, in which case 100% duplication is not possible. Is it?

If we had not adopted a little Jack Russell Terrier recently, I might not be thinking about this at all.  He is so friendly to adults and children alike we tend to think he has been very well treated throughout his life, if not genuinely loved. But as far as we can tell, we are his third, possibly his fourth owners. Why has he been passed around so much? It is a riddle.

When I look at him, I can’t help but think that the experiences we have with him today and tomorrow will be unique because he is (and we are).  Therefore, the idea of trying to artificially extend our life with him or any beloved pet after its death — through a cloning procedure — strikes me as unrealistic. 

Are attempts to clone pets an expression of their owners’ desire to exert superhuman control over mortal events? It sounds a bit like that. But, as an old friend of mine used to ask, how does that affect the price of tea in China? So, let’s just say it seems sad and ironic that in the USA where 5-7 million cats and dogs are being surrendered to shelters every year (like our own little terrier pal) and 3-4 million of them are being euthanized, there is money to be made in cloning dead pets. 

Even if I took a hands-off position, “Caveat Emptor. It is not my business if someone wants to spend $150,000 to clone a pet,” I have to believe there is no such thing as replicating a dog’s personality in a cloning experiment. A pet’s personality (not unlike ours) will be a sum of genes and experience and the temperament and knowledge that grows out of that immeasurable brew. 

In the case of our dog, we knew he would have a high energy requirement because he is a Jack Russell Terrier and they are thoroughly energetic. We expected him to be an intelligent little guy because his breed is known to be very smart. What we did not expect is that he would have a prenaturally calm disposition and be so well-prepared to bond with us at the relatively advanced age of eight (which is roughly middle age for a JRT).

When we got him, all we knew for sure was that he was loveable. We had no idea that he would insist on welcoming every single person he meets on the street, that he would invariably greet babies by licking their nose, that he would sit rockstill on my lap for hours at a time while I worked on a computer, or that he would be capable of sleeping through the night for eight or more hours curled in a ball on my pillow. These are the unexpected delights and we cannot imagine another dog, never mind a clone, replicating his generous spirit. Maybe that is the way it should be.

  Sandy Bodner

An Interview with Dr. Nicholas Dodman, BVMS, MRCVS, one of the great animal behavioralists, about his new book. If you have ever wondered, as we have done, how to select a dog that matches your personal lifestyle and personality, this is superb reading.

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Here is another one that comes very highly recommended…

The Ahaaa! Moment

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Containment

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Checking the Kittens

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Cleaning the Cage (while cats are in it)

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Yesterday morning during cat volunteerism, I had an incident with a cat named Alfredo. I had literally just come in and was unlocking all of the cages and when I got to Alfredo’s cage and opened it a crack to pet him, all I saw was a black blur as he shot out of the cage like a cannon and started running wildly across Petco.

I high-tailed it after him and noticed that, in mid-flight, he had managed to spot a dead mouse laying on the floor between two aisles and picked it up in his mouth and kept running. As you can imagine, this gave me a few seconds edge on him and I managed to corner the intrepid feline in the dog food aisle. But then he ran deep under some shelves. Flinging myself to the floor, I saw him pawing at the mouse and realized that there were only seconds before he ingested the mouse which was probably poisoned to death, and I would be indirectly responsible for a feline casualty.

While I could not reach Alfredo no matter how hard I strained to reach him under the shelf, I could in fact reach the deceased rodent. Glancing desperately around the floor, I spotted a stray piece of discarded plastic wrap and grabbed hold of the debris. I then reached under the shelves and extracted the mouse by its tail using the plastic wrap as a makeshift antibacterial shield. Realizing that if I dragged the rodent across the floor, simulating a lifelike rodent’s movements, I could possibly draw the crouching Alfredo from his lair; I did so.

Seeing the mouse magically come to life, Alfredo was duped and he crept out to reclaim his stolen prize. I then grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and was met with outraged pandemonium of growls, yowls, hisses, claws and teeth. Despairing, I was about to admit defeat when Alfredo, my arch nemesis, grabbed hold of the deceased mouse again in vengeful teeth. I carried cat, mouse, and all to the cage and had a somewhat disgruntled Petco employee extract the offensive corpse. One thing is for certain: neither Alfredo nor I will ever be the same.

This past summer, I was dropping my cousin off at the local auto shop and saw a worn out and dirty looking black and white cat. I got out of my car and the cat came up to me and rubbed against my outstretched hand. I asked the owner about her, found out her name was Bootsy, that she had a bed and food inside the auto shop, but was in essence a stray. The owner also informed me that she was having three or four litters every year, and when I asked why he didn’t spay her he said it was too much money. I braced myself for a full fledged debate on why he should let me spay Bootsy- the rampant overpopulation, the dangers of uterine cancer - and found myself surprised when he quickly agreed to let me take Bootsy to get spayed.

Three days later, I brought Bootsy to the vet. (In the waiting room I discovered that Bootsy HATES dogs. A cute little terrier came up and tried to sniff Bootsy’s cage, and she almost knocked her carrier over trying to get to the dog.) When I brought her in to see the vet, he told me that she was pregnant. I asked if he was sure, and the vet told me that he could feel four kittens.

In the world of shelters and rescue operations the normal thing to do would be to abort the kittens. With anywhere from 4-6 million healthy cats and kittens being euthanized each year because there are not enough homes for them; it is almost selfish to bring more into existence. But my vet was not comfortable doing this; the kittens were too far along. So, I left the clinic, brought Bootsy back to the auto shop, and tried to figure out who I could cajole into fostering her.

The next day, I somehow managed to convince my friend, Lucy and her mother Barbara, to foster Bootsy (and her not yet born kittens). Triumphantly, I called up the owner of the auto shop and informed him that I was going pick up Bootsy. As a side note, he mentioned that Bootsy had a huge bump on her side. I rushed over to see how bad it was and discovered an abscess the size of a fist violently protruding from her shoulder. I brought her to the vet and was informed that if she had gone much longer with this wound, she would have died. Boosty had to undergo a tricky surgery and I kept her at the vet for 10 days since she had to have a tube inserted into her to drain the wound.

Unfortunately, when an unvaccinated animal gets any kind of wound, it is labeled a wound of unknown origin. The string of logic then goes that this wound could have been inflicted by the bite of another animal and thus, the attacking animal could have transmitted rabies to Bootsy. Because of this, Massachusetts state protocol demands that any unvaccinated animal with a wound of unknown origin go into quarantine for 6 months. The first thing on the list of what the state thinks you should do in this situation is to euthanize the animal. Seeing as how this was not an option in my mindset, I managed to convince Lucy and Barbara to keep Bootsy for the quarantine.

This past August 5th (2007), Bootsy gave birth to three black and white kittens and one orange and white kitten that we named Banana. She is one of the best mothers I have ever seen. She would come out of her birthing box to eat, accept a few pats and then go back and nurse her young.

The black and white kittens are Huckleberry (also known as Mr. Moustache), Blackberry (Bootsy the sequel), and Blueberry. The odd kitten out is Banana (or Creamsicle depending on whom you ask) and is a kittenwar.com champion for her pretty looks.