The 3 day GREAT IDEAS FOR GIVING LOCAL blog - Day 2

Here is the next idea for helping local animals and you can even help your own dog or cat out in the process!

Event # 2

What: Rabies vaccination clinic

When: Saturday April 30, 2011 from 1-4pm

Where: Ashtabula County Humane Society, Austinburg, OH

To Benefit: Ashtabula County Humane Society

This event just has all sorts of good written all over it. First and foremost is the public health aspect of vaccinating pets for rabies. If you have been paying attention, you know that after quite a few years of not having a wild animal test positive for rabies in our county, we have had 3 raccoons in the eastern part of the county test positive. This is a big deal folks. Rabies kills. It kills thousands of wild animals, hundreds of domestic animals and a few people every year in the United States. And every year, I read stories in the national news of someone's beloved pet that got in a scuffle with a rabid wild animal and had to be euthanized because the pet did not have a rabies vaccination. How sad! I cannot for the life of me fathom why someone with a dog or cat would not get it vaccinated for rabies. Seems as though when you acquire a dog or cat, you should budget in a rabies vaccination, if not for the pet, then for the health of your family. And for those of you with indoor cats, they are not exempt from this. I remember a case quite a few years back of an indoor only cat whose family did not get it a rabies shot because the cat never went outdoors. One day a bat got into the house and the cat did what cats do and caught the bat. The bat turned out to be rabid and the cat had to be put to sleep. All the family's heartache could have been prevented by simply getting their cat vaccinated. End of the vaccinate your pet sermon.

The second part of this is that the rabies vaccination clinic serves to raise a little bit of money for the Ashtabula County Humane Society. They are not as big or as well known throughout the county as the APL is, but they are equally important. They serve a very different function too. The APL is an animal shelter that houses our county's stray and unwanted dogs and cats. The Ashtabula County Humane Society are the folks who investigate cases of abuse and neglect toward animals. They have a shelter too where they house dogs and cats and adopt out animals to new homes. And these are the folks that get to see the worst of the worst of animal abuse/neglect. I've seen some bad stuff in my time, but nothing compared to what the humane agents get to see. And remember, local Humane Societies are just that LOCAL. If you think giving to a big national organization like The Humane Society of the United States helps your local humane society in any way, then think again. The two have no affiliation with each other. HSUS is a multi-million dollar lobbying group that gives less than 1% of its budget to help animals in shelters. I will blog more on this in the coming weeks, but just remember if you want to help abused animals, keep your donation dollars local.

So if you have a dog or cat or ferret that needs a rabies vaccination, come out to the AC Humane Society on Saturday April 30th and get your pet vaccinated and help out your local humane society at the same time. For more information click on this link: ACHS Annual Rabies Vaccination Clinic.