Jul 15, 2010

Animal Rescuers Answering Machine Message

Hello, You have reached 555-5555, Animal Rescue. Due to the high volume of calls we have been receiving, please listen closely to the following options and choose the one that best describes you or your situation:

Press 1 if you think we are veterinarians and want free medical advice.

Press 2 if you know we are a rescue organization but want to save money and have us give you free, untrained medical advice anyway.

Press 3 if you make $200,000 a year but still want us to pay to spay the "stray" in your yard (house).

Press 4 if you have a 10-year-old dog and your 15-year-old son has suddenly become allergic and you need to find the dog a new home right away.

Press 5 if you have three dogs, had a baby and want to get rid of your dogs because you are the only person in the world to have a baby and dogs at the same time.

Press 6 if your dog is sick and needs a vet but you need the money for your vacation.

Press 7 if you just got a brand new puppy and your old dog is having problems adjusting so you want to get rid of the old one right away.

Press 8 if your little puppy has grown up and is no longer small and cute and you want to trade it in for a new model.

Press 9 if you are elderly and want to adopt a cute puppy who is not active and is going to outlive you.

Press 10 if your relative has died and you don't want to care for their elderly dog because it doesn't fit your lifestyle.

Press 11 if you are moving today and need to immediately place your 150 pound, 8-year-old, unneutured, aggressive dog.

Press 12 if you want an unpaid volunteer to come to your home today and pick up the dog you no longer want.

Press 13 if you have been feeding and caring for a "stray" for the last three years, are moving and suddenly determine it's not your dog.

Press 14 if you are calling at 6 a.m. to make sure you wake me up before I have to go to work so you can drop a dog off on your way to work.

Press 15 to leave us an anonymous garbled message, letting us know you have left a dog in our yard in the middle of January, which is in fact, better than just leaving the dog with no message.

Press 16 if you are going to get angry because we are not going to take your dog that you have had for fifteen years, because it is not our responsibility.

Press 17 if you are going to threaten to take your ten year old dog to be euthanized because we can't get to your house in the next hour.

Press 18 if you're going to get angry because the volunteers had the audacity to go on vacation and leave the dogs in care of a trusted volunteer who is not authorized to take your personal pet.

Press 19 if you want one of our perfectly trained, housebroken, kid and cat friendly purebred tiny dogs that we have an abundance of.

Press 20 if you want us to take your dog that has a slight aggression problem, i.e. has only bitten a few people and killed your neighbor's cats.

Press 21 if you have already called once and been told we don't take personal surrenders but thought you would get a different person this time with a different answer.

Press 22 if you want us to use space that would go to a stray to board your personal dog while you are on vacation, free of charge, of course.

Press 23 if it is Christmas Eve or Easter morning and you want me to deliver an eight week old puppy to your house by 6:30 am before your kids wake up.

Press 24 if you have bought your children a duckling, chick or baby bunny for Easter and it is now Christmas and no longer cute.

Press 25 if you want us to take your female dog who has already had ten litters, but we can't spay her because she is pregnant again and it is against your religion.

Press 26 if you're lying to make one of our younger volunteers feel bad and take your personal pet off your hands.

Press 27 if your two year old male dog is marking all over your house but you just haven't gotten around to having him neutered.

Press 28 if you previously had an outdoor only dog and are calling because she is suddenly pregnant.

Press 29 if you have done "everything" to housebreak your dog and have had no success but you don't want to crate the dog because it is cruel.

Press 30 if you didn't listen to the message asking for an evening phone number and you left your work number when all volunteers are also working and you are angry because no one called you back.

Press 31 if you need a puppy immediately and cannot wait because today is your daughter's birthday and you forgot when she was born.

Press 32 if your dog's coat doesn't match your new furniture and you need a different color or breed.

Press 33 if your new love doesn't like your dog and you are too stupid to get rid of the new friend (who will dump you in the next month anyway) instead of the dog.

Press 34 if you went through all these 'presses' and didn't hear enough. This press will connect you to the sounds of tears being shed by one of our volunteers who is holding a discarded old dog while the vet mercifully frees him from the grief of missing his family.

Author Unknown

2 comments:

Nike Chillemi said...

This is kind of where we're at. Only we did get through to one resucer and she wanted a donation to take the squirrel. We felt she might not have the financial resourced to care for the squirrel so we didn't go for it.

So, now we've have the squirrel (Peanut) we found at about 5 wks old in a ferret cage for 5-6 weeks. When we found her we at first thought she might have some brain or nerve damage as she was moving in a strange manner. But once we got her home to some food and water that changed. And she seems normal.

We successfully released a squirrel four years ago, using the same ferret cage. So, we kinda know what we're doing.

It's getting colder outside and we want to release Peanut so she can make a nest and survive the winter.

We put the cage outside one splendidly warm day last week and she was very timid, didin't want to come out of the little nest area of the cage but eventually did and just sat there. The other squirrels we feed every day came and they got a look at Peanut and she got a look at them, but she didn't move around the cage at all.

Then this week we took her out and left the cage out overnight. It wasn't that cold, a very warm day...reached 60 during the day and the 40s at night. She didn't leave the nest, made really angry sounds when I check on her and reduiced her eating a lot.

Any suggestions. We're want to release her and it's getting colder every day.

MissDolittle said...

Thanks for taking care of the squirrel.

You don't seem to be aware of the fact that wildlife rehabilitators do not get any funding and rely on donations from the public. It was only fair to ask for it.

Depending where you live..if it snows and freezes, it is not a good idea to release a squirrel during winter months.

They had no time to bury food and hoard supplies. It's not making a nest that's the most important, it's the food.

In addition, this squirrel has no idea how to deal with other squirrels, knows it's predators or how to deal with anything outside.

It takes at least a few weeks safely outside where the squirrel can learn how to climb, get used to the noises, finds a save place and hopefully will be provided feed throughout the winter.

I would still suggest to get this squirrel to a licensed rehabilitator with other squirrels and the necessary outside enclosures to give this baby a good chance.

Thanks again for caring!