For those of you that don’t know this already, we have been unable to get Immiticide which is the treatment for dogs that are high Heartworm Positive. Merial, which is the manufacturer of Immiticide had to quit production this year due to problems at their plant. Immiticide is the only proven treatment for dogs that are on the high positive list to rid their bodies of the worms. We have been doing a slow kill on all of the animals while we were waiting for Immiticide to come back into distribution. Surgery is an option but only for dogs where the worms have invaded the valves in the heart. None of our dogs have reached that point or we would have already had the surgery on them. The European division of Merial still produces Immiticide. It has been approved for the European market but has not been approved for the USA market. It takes years to get the FDA to do the necessary studies for any product to be approved. The products are identical. After thorough tests we now feel confident the product is the same as the original product Merial manufactured here. An animal has to be in the late stage of Heartworm Disease to be eligible for the treatment. All of the above dogs are eligible and have been approved for the treatment based on their medical history and the fact they will eventually die from the disease without the treatment. The product is given based on weight and is very expensive. We do not take Immiticide treatment lightly because of all the side effects it can have. It needs to be done in a calm controlled medical environment where the dogs are kept quiet and closely monitored. That is what we have arranged for each animal. Please, help us raise the funds so each one of these special animals can live a long healthy life free of heartworms and the pain and suffering they cause.

I know the holiday season is a difficult time for everyone, money-wise, but you might consider donating to these amazing dogs in someone’s name – what an awesome gift! Here’s the donation link and more information.

Sam

We need rain here in Texas. Badly.

That’s a picture from Big Dog Rescue’s Facebook page. They’re located in the Austin area, and their Vice President just had her house burned down and they’re looking for fosters to take in animals displaced. The Bastrop County Animal Shelter was evacuated as well and thanks to the awesome folks at Austin Pets Alive and the Austin Humane Society, all the animals were saved and they’re looking for donations and temporary fosters. You can find more detailed things they need by going to their facebook pages:

• Austin Pet’s Alive Facebook Page
• Austin Humane Society’s Facebook Page

*** Williamson County Regional Animal Shelter needs fosters ASAP! They took in 15 dogs from the Leader Fire and have run out of space. Please check out their facebook page for more updated information. If you’re a shelter/rescue/someone looking to adopt, please help them out!

If you haven’t heard, Central Texas is being hit HARD with fires right now. The biggest being the one in Bastrop that has burned up to 25,000 acres since yesterday, jumped the Colorado River twice, and has desecrated more than 300 houses. Over 5,000 people have been evacuated so far, and a mother and her 18-month-old child were killed. The winds from the recent hurricane aren’t helping. You can keep updated about the fires by checking the Austin Statesman.

We are located in east Austin and while the fires are supposedly moving away from us, we’ve still come up with our evacuation plan (packing up 20 animals is no easy feat). Standing outside in our front yard, the smell of smoke is strong. It’s scary. If we didn’t have so many fosters already, I know we’d both be at the shelter taking in animals right now. I’ll be continually nagging friends all day to make sure they’re okay.

Please send good thoughts, positive vibes, and lots of rain.

*** We will be updating our twitter account with information as we get it. Follow @RescueAnimals on Twitter!

Write a Post, Help a Dog

Every year, more than 4 million dogs end up homeless. That’s A LOT of dogs on the search for their forever homes. Shelters are filling up faster than kennels can be built and with funds being eaten up by the cost of food, few shelters are able to keep up with the demand and have to resort to capping the amount of animals they can house. And we all know what that results in.

So if we can help the shelters by supplying them with food, the money saved is going to help the shelters in other ways. Like funding the building of more space, better vet care, more time to work with dogs that need it. Pedigree understands this and that’s why they are once again joining up with bloggers to bring you the 2011 version of “Write a Post, Help a Dog” campaign. How it works is this: For each post written for the “Write a Post, Help a Dog” campaign, the Pedigree Foundation will donate 20 pounds of their new dry Pedigree food for dogs to shelters. And they are going to give up to 10,000 pounds of food! That’s a whole lot of food for a whole lot of dogs.

Helping Pups Hurt by Hurricane Irene

Because of the timing of this year’s campaign, the Foundation is focusing its efforts on shelters that were hit hard from Hurricane Irene. At the moment, they are pouring through the extensive list they have and we’ll get back to you with the exact shelters that will benefit from this project.

So Here’s What You Need to Do

01. Read this post. Good job.
02. Write your own post about “Write a Post, Help a Dog” and what the Pedigree Foundation is doing to help. This needs to be done by MIDNIGHT EST, SATURDAY SEPTEMBER 3RD! TODAY!
03. Link it to the BlogHop at the bottom of this post.

Easy peasy. Voila! You are helping donate food to a shelter dog in need. The Pedigree Foundation has already raised more than $376,570 so far this year against its goal of $1.5 million to carry out its work to fund grants that not only help shelters operate, but to further shelter innovations. The Foundation depends on charitable contributions from individuals to carry out its mission to help dogs find loving homes. With the help of bloggers around the world, we can make a difference. One post matters.

Other Ways You Can Help

If you want to help in other ways, Pedigree is encouraging consumers to donate online at The Pedigree Foundation or you can purchase some cool Dogs Rule Gear here, where the proceeds go to the Foundation. Likewise, shelters can apply for grants from the Pedigree Foundation by completing a form at The Pedigree Foundation website.

Sorry this is all short notice, folks. With the hurricane and earthquake on the East coast, it took Ash and I a bit of time to get back from vacation. Please write a post today if you have a chance and help us help the dogs that need it! Thank you!

Hey everyone! I hope you’ve all enjoyed the holiday season! We’ve been spreading the cheer around here, taking the pups to the dog park, feeding the ferals wet food for Christmas, etc. I can’t believe 2011 is just around the corner! We’re super excited to launch our 365 Days of Animal Advocacy on the first! I really hope we can make it really take off – it’s going to take a lot of work, organization, advertising and, of course, shirts! If you haven’t heard of it yet, please check out its page. Do you have a favorite animal rescue or organization? Let them know about it! Think your friends, family, or followers would find it a cool project? Spread the word! Together, we can make it happen!

As we head into next year we are also hoping that we can finally raise the rest of the money for O’Malley’s recovery. O’Malley is the miracle cat that I found on the side of the road, hit by a car and left to die, covered in ants. He had a broken pelvis & dislocated hip. He has undergone surgery to fix his hip that involved cutting the head off of his femur and has recovered amazingly. He even survived the dreaded water treadmill as he underwent physical therapy to help him rebuild his muscles. He has been neutered and received all of his vaccines. Altogether his cost came to about $700 and as you can tell by his ChipIn donation page, we’ve raised a little bit of the money to cover his vet bills. 16 wonderful people have stepped in so far to help us help this amazing cat and we are so grateful. We realize that money is tight for everyone. Trust us, it’s been difficult for us as well. On top of O’Malley’s bills, we also recently had another foster require an emergency vet visit and after care at our regular vet which resulted in just over $500 in bills. That’s $1200 spent on our fosters over only a couple of months. It’s been rough but they are all recovered and doing amazing and that’s what’s really important!

You Could Win A Pet Portrait!

We are so happy to announce we have another incentive for all of our O’Malley supporters! Adriana Willsie, a fantastic pet portrait artist, has come forward with a great idea to help O’Malley in her own way. Adriana is offering a chance to win a gorgeous 4″x4″ bite-size portrait, normally worth $40, to anyone who donates $10 or more towards this cause. Once we have raised enough to meet our goal, we’ll do a random drawing of eligible donors and announce the winner.

But wait! There’s more!

Adriana is taking her support one step further by offering a 50% off coupon towards one of her 6″x6″ pet portraits for anyone who donates $20 or more! That’s a savings of $75! The only stipulation is that you use your coupon by the end of 2011. We’re really hopeful that this will help us raise the rest of the donations. It’s a very worthy cause and now you could have the chance at receiving something in return. You know, besides the warm, fuzzy feelings. ^_^ This of course applies to anyone who donated before this post. Also, if you have donated previously but would like to donate more to reach one of these levels, all you have to do is donate the difference. We really appreciate that you donated even without incentives.

Thank you so much to all of you who are willing to help this boy gain a new life! We all appreciate it! I know times are tough, but if a lot of you can make a small donation, it can make a HUGE difference to us! Happy holidays and I hope 2011 is your best year yet!

Hey everyone! Again, life gets in the way. I have huge plans for ILRA in 2011. I just need the time to implement them all! I’m sure many of you can understand! Anyway, just wanted to give a huge thank you to everyone who has been helping with O’Malley. Thanks to 11 incredible people, we have raised $145 towards our goal of $700! As mentioned in the last post about O’Malley, we have a couple silly incentives. Unfortunately, one of the videos I wanted to upload when we reached our halfway mark has messed up audio. So we’ll substitute it with a video of me teasing the dogs at dinner time. No, trust me, it’s cute.

Also, O’Malley will be going in for his neuter, X-rays, & FVRCPL booster in the next week or two, so we’ll have some news on how his healing is coming along soon. I’m excited to see the difference! Anyway, if any of you can afford to donate anything towards this boy’s recovery, we would very much appreciate it! Even $5 helps! We’re also hopefully going to be able to start looking for a home for him soon. If any of you live in the Austin area and are interested in this amazing boy, please stay tuned! Don’t forget that we have our beautiful Storm as well, who would LOVE to have a home for Christmas! Please help her have her miracle – the poor baby has been with us for around 8 months! We love having her, but we all know that she would love even more having her very own forever home.

Donations for O’Malley

Any amount counts. If you have any issues with the ChipIn widget, you check out his official page here. (Also note that this is the second ChipIn we’ve had to set up for him since the first didn’t reach the goal and was closed. This one takes up where that one left off.)

Thank You To O’Malley’s Supporters!

These wonderful people have chipped in for O’Malley and we want to thank every one of them. You guys are part of his story and I know that he is full of gratitude to all of you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

And a special thank you to Dash Kitten and Whiskr for supporting our ChipIn and showcasing it on your blog. And thank you to all of you have continue to blog about O’Malley and share his story. The world is full of good people and every day I am reminded of this. Thank you all!

And don’t forget to check out how you can help O’Malley AND win an awesome custom pet portrait!