I keep watching the Katrina animal rescues and reunions

[CatWoman]

and it makes me bawl like a baby.

Animal Channel has shown it several times.

[madrchsod]

1. shit missed this

hope it will be on again this week..i`ve lost three dogs in the last year and half do to old age and a little kitty that was runover by a kitty killer in a car..it`s been tough ,so i know how much animals mean to people who have lost everything...

[hlthe2b]

2. I don't have cable... but I've been reading articles on the rescues...

If you have access to "BARK" magazine (sort of a newer doggie magazine with sort of an upscale kind of approach), the entire current issue is on Katrina rescues. I was looking at it, while in line at Wild Oat's (the competition to Whole Foods in Denver) and thought it was so uplifting, I bought a half dozen copies to send as gifts for Christmas (to friends/family who have been as depressed as I over NOLA and the GULF catastrophe).

Thank God for animal lovers....

[CatWoman]

3. they have a little of it posted on their web site

http://animal.discovery.com/features/katrina/katrina.html?clik=netmain_feat1

[hlthe2b]

5. Nice... someone posted the Times Picayune story of the guy

(Muslim)businessman who stayed behind, rescued many neighbors, tenants, and cared for their pets--until he got arrested for looting in his own house (!) It was more than 3weeks later before he got out-horrible story. But, all the dogs he was caring for died. Reading this, just about killed me...Sometimes I am just beyond being angry....:cry:

It is nice to read some of the good story outcomes. Thx.

[MazeRat7]

4. I have a hard time understanding either.

Having spent many many hours working with the Austin Humane Society, I still don't understand. Yes we have seen both "reunions" and "adoptions" of NO animals... but my problem is that these animals were put in this predicament to start with.

The great unanswered question is: How does one justify abandoning life forms placed in our care (eg Pets) ? Would these same people abandon humans (eg "the children")? I doubt it.

No, given my placement in that situation either we all (my wife and my pets) survive together or we don't. While I am glad these folks are being reunited with their pets, I would like nothing more to give them the business for their gross negligence and dereliction of duty where pet ownership is concerned.

MZr7

[hlthe2b]

6. Ditto.... some were forced to leave their pets during "rescues:

I think they would have had to shoot me...

My own dog has never had it so good though. Every time I think of these poor "left behind" animals, I can't help but reach out to my own pampered pooch and do "just a little more for her." I can't bear my pup to be even "pouty" in her own pampered expectations. Maybe walk her just a little further or go once again to the park? Stop at her favorite doggie store in hopes of getting a little treat? Come home a bit early today? Share just a little tiny bite of that turkey?

By contrast, how on earth can people who cared for their animals turn their backs on their own survival? I just can't understand..

[Warpy]

7. I saw it on PBS

and have promised my own two furballs that they're going into the carriers and coming with me if I have to run for some reason.

The stupidest thing they did before the storm was forbid people to take pets in carriers and cages. There was no earthly reason for them to do that, although I do think even leashed dogs would be a disaster in crowded evacuation centers.

After the storm is another matter. That was stupidity, callousness, and incompetence.

PBS gave the figure of 15,000 pets rescued out of an estimated 250,000 left behind. That's an incredibly sad figure, representing so many abandoned and terrified animals dying miserably.

One small vignette was of an elderly man who had made the trip into town several times. He carried the cat carrier, food and water for the kitty, nothing for himself. He found the kitty but discovered that he'd lost everything else. Somehow, finding the kitty was enough.