Brown County Humane Society: Senior Pet Adoption Assistance Grant Report

How did this grant help your organization and the pets in your care?

The grant money was used to waive adoption fees for senior dogs and cats.

Having waived adoption fees for seniors provided a unique way to market the pet and gave us extra talking points when discussing specific pets with potential adopters. It set those seniors apart from other, younger pets. Seniors typically take extra time to find homes for, and the grant helped to bring attention to them and to decrease their length of stay. Getting them into happy homes quicker is a win for everyone!

How many pets did this grant help?

The grant covered adoption fees for five dogs: Blue, Clifford, Harmony, Kaden, and Nadia; and four cats: Boo Boo, Boom, Marvin, and Roo.

Please provide a story of one or more specific pets this grant helped.

Blue (first photo) was found wandering around a rural part of the county. Neighbors had been seeing him for several days, but no one recognized him. Upon arrival at the shelter, he was terribly underweight, his coat was in bad shape, and he had a horrendous ear infection, so bad that he would yelp if you barely touched his ear; however, he was microchipped. Unfortunately, the contact information associated with the microchip was no good and his owner was never found.

After a veterinary work-up, it was discovered that Blue had diabetes insipidus and would need to be on medication for the rest of his life. Blue is estimated to be 9 years old, and with an ongoing medical issue, finding an adopter for him was a challenge. In addition, his kennel presence was terrible. He was so desperate for attention that he would bark nonstop when he saw anyone walk by, scaring potential adopters away.

Thanks to the grant, he was adopted relatively quickly, but the resident dogs at his new home did not accept him, so he was returned to the shelter. However, from that adoption, we learned what an awesome dog he was in a home and were able to do a lot more marketing.

After a few more weeks, a nurse from several states away read about Blue and decided he was the dog for her. She had been looking for just the right senior and was not concerned about his medical issue. She drove nine hours to meet Blue, fell in love with him and adopted him on the spot. Blue is now living his best life, and the grant helped us connect Blue with his new family.

Boo Boo (second photo) was surrendered by his family after living with them for 11 years. The reason? Not using the litter box. The family was not willing to pursue veterinary care to see if there was a medical reason for the recent change in his litterbox habits.

At the shelter, it was quickly determined that he had crystals in his urine and that was potentially why he was not using the litterbox. We put Boo Boo on a special diet and placed him in a foster home to evaluate his potty habits.

The foster reported that he did not have any accidents outside the litterbox and that he loved children. Boo Boo had been reserved with people in the foster home until the 8-year-old nephew came to visit. Boo Boo went right up to the nephew for pets and was rubbing on his legs and even started purring. Those details, along with the waived adoption fee, helped us to create great marketing for Boo Boo and to find his forever home.