Before the pandemic and ubiquitous Zoom meetings, I would sometimes work late, attending committee or other meetings. As I would leave, visitors and staff would have gone home. The animals would be asleep, or at least quiet. The building was big, empty and lonely, almost like a mausoleum. The shelter was designed to be a meeting place for people as well as a safe haven for animals, and when there are few people, it feels, well, a bit sad. That is how it has sometimes felt through lockdowns and health precautions over the past year and a half.
After a relatively mild July, August is turning into a scorcher. Whenever it gets this hot, I worry about dogs — specifically dogs trapped in overheated cars. We here at the Ottawa Humane Society do our best to get the word out. This, and every summer, we launch public campaigns with dual messages: don’t leave your dog in a car; if you find a dog trapped in a car, report it immediately. This year, we even made a video. But still I worry. I have witnessed the effects of excessive heat exposure in dogs. It’s horrible.
The global pandemic has created multiple crises in our community, in Canada and across the world. The OHS has not been immune — the last 16 months have felt like our work has been full of small crises.
A growing crisis at the OHS is a lack of foster homes. Foster volunteers are a large and essential element of our spectrum of care for Ottawa’s animals.
The recent reports of deceased cats were certainly unsettling to me and everyone here at the OHS. There are persistent theories that the killer is human, but the OHS has come to believe that the evidence points to the perpetrator as a coyote or coyotes. Here is the case:
I’m looking forward to a summer where many of us can safely return to our workplaces and reconnect with friends, family and the community at large. At the same time, I’m worried about our pets who may be unprepared for this transition.
I have always believed that organizations, especially not-for-profits and charities, need to stand for something. They need to provide informed thinking on issues within their domain. After all, if they don’t, who will? This is especially true for humane societies, most of whom for many years have used the tagline, “We speak for those who cannot speak for themselves.”
In 2020, the Calgary Stampede was cancelled because of the pandemic. In 2021, the Calgary Stampede is set to run again, but without chuckwagon racing on the bill. The organizers promise chuckwagons will return in 2022, but the event should never come back.
Here is what I wrote about the stampede and chuckwagon races just two years ago:
On a Sunday in mid-June, I received a call at home from OHS staff. The question: Would we pay to necropsy the cats found dead in Nepean? You see, earlier in the day, Ottawa Police Service had asked us if we had a veterinarian on staff who could perform the grim task (we don’t).
I am an avid fan of CBC Radio. I often joke that I wouldn’t know much of anything without the CBC. A few weeks ago there was an amazing segment on the research of Suzanne Simard. Professor Ms. Simard wrote the book Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest. In the book, she discusses her research on how trees actually communicate with one another.
On Tuesday, we learned through the media that Ottawa Police Service was opening an investigation of the death and possible torture of a number of cats in the Woodroffe/Hunt Club area in Ottawa. Everyone here at the OHS was deeply disturbed by the story. Our horror at the suffering of the poor felines was exacerbated by our knowledge of what is known as, “the link.”
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