January 29, 2025 • 34 mins
Amongst the heartbreaking devastation of the Los Angeles wildfires this year, thousands of animals have been impacted. Today, Martha talks to Dia DuVernet, President and CEO of Pasadena Humane Society, and Dr. Gary Weitzman, President & CEO of San Diego Humane Society; two organizations that have been working, along with many others, to save dogs and cats, and also goats, tortoises, goldfish, pigs, wildlife, a pony, and even a bull. Listen to learn how these groups have been rescuing, treating, rehabilitating, and reuniting these animals with their owners – as well as important strategies for protecting your animals from future disasters.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Since January seventh, we've all been watching the devastation caused
by the Los Angeles wildfires. The loss of lives, homes,
and entire communities has been heart wrenching, and I know
many of you, like me, think of the helpless animals
that have also suffered. We don't hear their voices and
(00:24):
they are sometimes not as prominent in the coverage of
these disasters. But thankfully there are many incredible people who
are helping address the challenges of rescuing and caring for
the pets and wildlife, including two people who are here
with me today. Dia Duvernet is the president and CEO
of Pasadena Humane Society, which has been responding to the
(00:48):
Eton fires. Her colleague, doctor Gary Weitzman, is president and
CEO of San Diego Humane Society, which has been supporting
their work. Welcome to my podcast, both of you, Gary
and Dia. Thank you so much for taking time out
of a very, very busy life work to visit with
me today. These fires have been blazing for several weeks. Now,
(01:12):
can you tell us a little bit about the situation
as it is today? How contained are the fires and
what is happening now?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Gary?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Yeah, I think Dea probably should talk specifically to the
Eaten fire. But this is a really terrible extension of
our fire season. We never expected fires like this in January,
but it's never been as dry as it is right now.
And we've been helping Dea and others up in the
LA area, and DIA's a good friend and a good
colleague of mine and really happy to be up there.
But the fires are starting to break out down here
(01:43):
in San Diego County too. Just yesterday we had one
breakout about five miles from the shelter, and the day
before there was one that was less than two miles
from our main shelter. So we're just watching it all
over southern California. They're getting control, but it's very very
nerve wracking. No, I think you'd agreed to yah.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Oh yeah, the winds were whipping up last night and
I said, oh my gosh, not these winds again. Now
we've got more fires. The good news about the Eating
fires it is about ninety five percent contained and so
but we just it's like rack a mole right with
all these fires.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Well, going back to January seventh, when the Palace Sades
and Eating fires started, can you describe for us how
things unfolded for you.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, So we had decided, given the weather report, that
the winds were supposed to be lowest between four and six,
and so we closed the shelter early at four so
that our employees could go home. And I got home
about six, and I live on the western edge of Pasadena.
Looking out, I can see the Griffith Observatory, and I
saw a ridge line on fire. The Pacific Palace sades
(02:50):
thirty miles from my house, and I said some bad
words and said, we got to get out of here
right now. I don't need to wait for anybody to
tell me to evacuate. And then it did get very
bad and the fire broke out. And the first thing
we did at the shelter was called Geary and other
friends of ours shelters throughout California, to say, come, please
(03:10):
take all of the adoptable animals out of the shelter,
because we know we're going to start seeing first of all,
animals with families who were evacuating and can't take their
pets with them. So it was remarkable that with you know,
we had over one hundred animals in our care that
were available for adoptions, so they're easy to transfer to
other shelters. It's something we do in normal times. We
(03:32):
will transfer shelters, you know, transfer animals back and forth
to shelters, depending if we're full or if someone you know,
has some space for So we already had the partnerships
in place, and so immediately Santa Barbara he made and
Gary San Diego, Sacramento. There were a couple others that
are escaping my mind right now. They came and that
(03:55):
very first Wednesday, they all, almost all the animals were
gone off to these other shelters in California where they
could be adopted, and there were a few less. So
Gary said, you know, we'll come back tomorrow morning. We'll
get the rest because they just numb enough room in
their trucks. And so that was one reason why we
were so well prepared to chart handling the influx of
(04:16):
animals that started coming in. Was about getting the animals
that we already had prior ifire out of the shelter.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Why do people.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Leave their pets when they were evacuating, Oh, well, the
often you know a lot of hotels don't take pets.
A lot of sheltered human shelters don't take pests.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Even in a disaster like this, they don't take pets.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Yes, Now, it was very unfortunate that in Pasadena they
set up shelter at the convention center and they did
allow people to bring their pets, and so we would
have had even more had they not made that very
wise decision. But you know a lot of people would
want to go stay with family and friends, and you know,
your sister might have a dog that doesn't get along
with your dog, but so you can come with your
(04:55):
dog can't come. And so we just started seeing, you know,
hundreds of people who were bringing us their pets to
care for them temporarily because they had to evacuate.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
The other thing was I could add is that they
this caught people off guard. I mean, it happened so fast,
and it grew so quickly. Some people were at work,
and we've all heard of or experienced ourselves. Traffic in
La without fires is untenable. You can't get back. And
then the roads were closed and it was unsafe to
go back, and that trapped a lot of animals out
where people live. And it wasn't their fault, the animals
(05:28):
or the people.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
It just happened Oh, so I understand the police and
the fire fighters could not let those people go back
to their homes. Yeah, how tragic. That is added major
stress to everybody, absolutely for that Martha.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
This was just when people were trying to evacuate, and
it happened so quickly, so people couldn't go home from
work to get their pets to evacuate. So we had
people who were bringing their neighbors pets because they knew
their neighbors weren't home, and so they had gone next
to work to get their neighbor's pets to bring them in.
And I have a very sad story of one of
our board members. Actually she lost her house in the
(06:06):
fire and she was trying to evacuate. She has two
cats that she adopted from Passing Humane and you know
when cats get stressed, they can hide, and she was
trying to find her cats to get them out of
the house, and then her house literally caught on fire
and she had to leave and the house is bring
down and we still go back every day putting out
food and water to see if somehow the cats survived.
(06:28):
But it happened that quickly. It's crazy.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
And what about larger animals? I saw a girl ride
fourteen miles on a freezer to get to get the
horse to safety. Were there a lot of horse deaths?
Were animals left in their stables?
Speaker 2 (06:46):
No, I think most of the horses made it out.
I am not positive about that. But we had one
gentleman who walked his pony all the way down from
Altadema to our shelter at Pasadena because of a lot
of the shelters were getting full and he didn't have
a trailer, so he walked many miles with his pony.
We don't usually house horses at our shelter because there
(07:09):
are other equin sheltering places. But then we quickly got
the hay and what our feed and whatever care our
veterinarians said the pony needed, and took care of it
in our parking lot until we could trailer it to
an equin shelter.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
What happens to wild animals, the apostums and the raccoons,
and the where do they all go?
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Well? I think Gary and I, if I'm not mistaken,
we lead the only two shelters in southern California that
are licensed and permitted to do wildlife rehabilitation. There are
many other smaller wildlife for rescues, but we're the only
shelters that are able to do that, so we were
also able to provide coordinative response for the wildlife we
took and sick and injured, and we have lots of
(07:51):
partnerships with other smaller rescues that might be spec specifics,
so we would quickly be able to triage or just
send them straight to those places. But many of them
we took in and treated ourselves. But one thing we
really tried to let people know as soon as we
were able to get in behind the fire line was
that there were burst water pipes and so the wildlife
(08:12):
did have access to water, because that was something that
a lot of people were concerned about and we didn't
want people going in and putting themselves in danger thinking
that they needed to rescue animals because they would not
have access to water. And we even sent cameras in
overnight cameras with some of the strike teams going in
and said, if you could put these out near the
water so we can get some footage of the animals
(08:33):
coming to drink at night and put that out to
our public, we hopefully can prevent some of these people
from illegally and unsafely entering behind the fire line.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
I know you're an animal lover, Martha, and it's one
of the wonderful things about you. I lose sleep thinking
about animals that are trapped behind or left behind, and
especially wildlife in so many cases because their whole universe
is is gone. I mean, it's burning. There's no way
to comfort them or care for the So we opened
up our wildlife hospitals in San Diego just to be
(09:03):
ready and on call. We had notice from California Department
Official Wildlife that there was an identified bear that had
gotten burned, California black bear. And we take them in
on a regular basis, and we were just waiting to
get that bear in. But I think he's done well
enough that they're going to leave him in place, and
he seems to be surviving.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Okay, oh good.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
The animal part is just awful. It's better, I think,
you degree. It's better than it was back in the
days of Katrina, when we heard so many stories people
tying dogs up to fence posts and leaving them in
their houses just because there was no understanding. And now
we do have that understanding, and I think there's a
lot of generosity out there, a lot of compassion. Can
(09:44):
you imagine not being able to get to your home
where your dogs or your cats were every much your
livestock I mean, but especially you know the LA area,
people care deeply about their animals, and that was you know,
there were horrible stories, but then there were incredible stories
of just total care for their pets and for their livestock.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
And Gary mentions livestock. So one of the hardest calls
we responded to initially was a home in Altadena where
the bull and the goats and the horses, and so
we spent a lot of time around the table with
Gary's team and others trying to figure out how are
we going to do this, because I'm like, I want
to keep this bull where it is. I don't want
(10:26):
to bring the bull into the shelter. But the problem
was that the bullets, the animals did not have access
to water because it was a bridge going over to
the property that had come down in the storm. So
there was this deep ravine that you couldn't get across.
And then once you got up over the ravine, there
was a long winding road up to the pasture and
it was a burned out car along the road so
that no bull would be able to get past it.
(10:48):
And so initially what we were doing was just getting
you know, twelve packs of water across, and the owner
was carrying water up the hill for his life suck
so were so then we're thinking, well, I was like, well,
can we get the Army Corps engineers back to build
a bridge? And then we're like, but then there's still
the burnt car, and I said, well, we could push
(11:10):
the burn car over at the side of the hill
if he doesn't mind. And then we were like, well,
we could park a water truck on the side of
the very vein, and we could put an empty tike
over there, and we could pump the water up and
then pump it up, and so these were all the
strategies we're trying to do. And then finally the owner
brilliantly got a bulldozer in and started moving earth around
(11:30):
to make a temporary bridge, and then did push the car,
the burned out car over the hill so that he
was able to actually drive the water up to the animals.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
It's just incredible how cars burnt to in just shells
of cars, and that's how fierce that those fighters are
and the ember is falling on a roof and then
the house is up in flames in just a few seconds.
It's it's really really drastic.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Well, so another big challenge for us Martha initially was
here we have all these hundreds of animals coming in,
but the winds are still strong, and our shelter is
only ten blocks south of the evacuation line, and so
I was trying to come up with a very immediate
way to pop up an off site temporary shelter for
about six hundred animals in the case that we just
(12:21):
had to pick up and evacuate.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Do you know how many animals actually have been displaced
by a total?
Speaker 2 (12:37):
I think we took in over about nine hundred animals,
but those were including animals that were with us that
their owners had left in temporary custody, and then those
that these wonderful, amazing strike teams went in and rescued,
as well as strays that made it out or were rescued.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
This is justin Pasadena, Yes, what about all the Malibu people.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Yeah, we don't serve that area. We serve Pasadena and
ten other cities, including Alta Dina. But Altadena is really
unincorporated Los Angeles, and so unincorporated Los Angeles contracts with
us to provide regular animal control services, but we're not
connected to provide emergency services. So technically LA County had
(13:21):
jurisdiction but asked us to assist through a mutual aid agreement.
So we assisted, and we were the shelter for all
the animals that came out of the inn fire.
Speaker 3 (13:31):
What I heard in LA was there's a lot. I mean,
do you just mention nine hundred animals And I'm sure
there's at least twice that number really in her area
or more that aren't getting that help that we want
to provide. When this is over, we're unfortunately going to
find probably more deaths amongst people and animals than we're
going to have the stomach for. But LA as a
(13:52):
whole has been hit really hard.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Well, I think Gary that thanks to our collaborative efforts,
we did a phenomenal job with the search, secure recoveries
in the eating fire, and we are you know, we're
thirty miles away from the Palisades, and it's not our
service herea that's La Animal Services. So I really haven't
had a chance to even catch up on how their
rescue recovery efforts went. But I know that at the
(14:16):
Eaton fire, thanks to you and so many other partners,
it was just the most amazing experience to see how
we all mobilized and worked around the clock to help
every animal you needed our help.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
How do your field teams actually work?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
This is an interesting thing is that none of my
animal control officers are fire trained and equipped. You have
to have a lot of special safety equipment, and my
understanding is not a lot of the LA County officers
are either. So organizations like Mary's and the ASPCA and
(14:52):
the North Valley Animal Disaster Group and Kern County Animal
Services came in and they had the strike teams that
are properly trained and equipped to go behind the fire lines.
And so for us, we did not send our officers
behind the fire lines. But food is important, as you know, Martha,
(15:16):
and so we made sure that we were getting three
meals delivered for two hundred people every day to our shelter.
And when the strike teams went out, they were already
had their breakfast, lunch, all the beverages they knused, so
they didn't have to come back for lunch, and they
would go in and get the animals and then meet
our officers at the fire line so our officers could
transfer them back to the shelters, so that these specialized
(15:39):
folks who were trained in the rescue could focus all
their efforts on the rescue, and we were providing support
on the other side of the line.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
How are you tracking pets who've been separated from their
owners and how do you reunite those pets with their owners?
Oh well, we made a huge effort to keep all
of the animals that have evacuated during this time at
pasading Emain, doing whatever we could in terms of popping
up temporary shelter and our public training, the classrooms and
(16:10):
everywhere else we could so that all the animals would
be there. They were well cared for by our thousands
of volunteers and one hundred and fifty staff members and
five full time vets, and so when people were coming
to look for their pets, they only had one place
to go, or if they had left them in our
temporary custody, of course they knew where they were. But
there were a few problems because well these are sad problems,
(16:33):
because some people who thought that they were just bringing
us their pets to provide temporary care while they evacuated,
then found out that they had no homes to go
back to, So that's turning into a much longer custody
and care situation for us. But we are committed to
keeping all of those animals first, as long as it
takes for those families to rebuild their lives and take
(16:56):
their pets back, because when you've lost everything else, you
certainly don't want to lose your pet. So we have
the fabulous network of foster families, and you know, we'll
wait just a little bit longer before we start really
deploying these animals that we know are going to be
with us for a year or more to foster homes
they're willing to care for them, and as far as
(17:17):
the injured strays coming in.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
This is a really really really important message about and
we talk about this all the time, Gary, Right, everybody
needs to microchip their pet. If you're pets, the way
that they're going to get back to you is through microchip.
But we've had families who are coming in and not
recognizing their own pets because the animals are stressed, they
(17:42):
are burned, they are you know, have smoke in elation
and dehydration and they're not even responding to their owners.
And the only way that we were able to connect
owners with their pets was by you know, they said, well,
my pet was black, and so we're like, well, let's
scan all ten of these black cats and see if
they have microchips, and then we make the reunification from the microchip.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
So people should really pay attention to those kinds of
very important safety feet safety things, yeah to do.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
It's a great opportunity to say, everyone, please microchip and
license your pets so that if they ever go stray,
we can give them back to you without ever having
come to the shelter.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
I've been hearing about some of the injuries like burned
paws and burned fur and what are other injuries that
they're suffering.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Well, there was one really sad case of a dog
we had who was actually in the car evacuating with
his family, but somehow jumped out of the car and
then we our teams went in and rescued that animal.
Later all four paws were completely burned, but the animal
was fine, a fine. I think it was a cat. Actually,
I'm sorry it was a cat. I mean, we had
(18:52):
some terrible situations that we heard of of people going
behind the fire lines who were not authorized and making
animals pets and saying these people must be horrible people
because they didn't evacuate with their pets, not really day
at work or doing something else. The legal first of all,
pets are property. You're seizing someone's property. Any animal that
(19:15):
comes out of that situation needs to go immediately to
the shelter so that we can try to reunite it
with a true owner. But to blame these victims who
had no choice about leaving their pets behind, it's just
been really infurigating.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Do you have enough resources to help all the displaced pets,
enough veterinarians, enough medications? Do you have enough of that?
Speaker 2 (19:39):
We have been so fortunate and so desperately needing the
outpouring of support that we've received from the community. We
encourage monetary donations so that we could just quickly source
and supply whatever materials we needed when we needed them,
such as specialized medical supplies and whatnot. A lot of
(20:00):
people still want to donate, you know, bowls and leashes
and toys, and at first, actually that created a little
bit of a second crisis for us because we were
so happy that they were coming, but there were so
many people dropping off supplies that I mean, we had
tons of supplies. And I was on an interview with
(20:22):
Larry Mantle and our public radio station of Blockdown, and
he said, yeah, our employees could not get to work
because there were so many people dropping off supplies at
Pasadena Humane. And so we quickly were able to partner
with another shelter in our community at San Gabriel Valley
Humane Society, and we asked, you know, can we just
(20:43):
direct people to you to drop off the stuff. And
thankfully they have a field behind their shelter, and we
need this stuff. Because then we rented as many U
haul trucks as I could find and started putting all
the stuff in the trucks and supplying the pasta convention
center with whatever they needed for the families who were
(21:04):
sheltering there with their pets. And then we were supplying
pet owners who just needed help through our shelter where
they could come and just take whatever they wanted, whether
it was food or whatever they needed. And then also
once we had the strike teams in place, then we
set up kind of a drive through where all the
trucks that were going out to behind the fire lines
could drive by in the morning and stock up their
(21:26):
trucks with food, water, so whatever they might need out
in the field.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Did any shelters get burned?
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Not to by awareness, that's good.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
The generosity has been incredible. I mean, Dia was just
talking about up in Pasadena, but you know for us
here in San Diego where we brought animals in from
Pasadena Humane and we've learned so much, right do you know?
We've learned through all of the disasters that have happened
over the last fifteen years. We don't want to displace
the animals that are separated from their owners. We want
to clear shelters so that they can take in those animals.
(21:58):
And that's exactly what we were able to do with Pasadena.
But the generosity in La was incredible, But it also
was down here in San Diego. We put out a
call for fosters because we normally have anywhere from one
thousand to three thousand animals in our care per day.
Right now we're at about thirteen hundred. But people came
in and they took our dogs. And that's incredible because
(22:21):
you probably know there's been a dog situation across the
United States where there are so many, so many dogs
in all of our shelters, and people stepped up. We
had eight hundred and seventy five foster applications within a
matter of four days, and we really asked for the unicorn,
which was someone who could take a big dog. We
have lots of big dogs who didn't have a dog
(22:43):
because our dog, the dogs don't always get along and
probably didn't have children, so that they could take a
dog that might not be for every family, and they
were just able to step up. We basically got about
forty or fifty really solid fosters out of all that.
We're still getting them in, but it really it's heartwarming
to hear that people really cared, they care deeply, and
(23:06):
they came to all of our aid.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Well, Gary, I'm sorry, but I can top those numbers
because going into this, we had two thousand regular volunteers
and probably at roughly one thousand foster volunteers, and in
the past ten days we've had over the numbers have varied,
and don't quote me, but I know it's been at
least six thousand volunteer applications and yeah, so yeah, okay, right,
(23:32):
that's awesome's and so I've been saying, you know, please
be patient with us because you know, we're just dealing
with a rapidly evolving emergency situation, having to deal with
the immediate needs at times. So right now, we're trying
to keep all the pets at the shelter as long
as we can so that, you know, families can reunite.
But eventually we are going to have to start putting
a lot of animals into foster homes for longer term care.
(23:55):
But you know, people keep calling back. I called, I
want to foster, and it's it's not that we don't
want your help, it's just that we can't respond to
you right now, and we're gonna need you, so please
stand by and we will get to you, and we
really appreciate it. But right now, what we're trying to
do is just get the monetary and other resources we
need to properly care for these animals at our shelter.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
How do you rehabilitate I mean, it takes a while
to heal a wounded animal, and they do, they stay
right in the shelter.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Well, Gary's a vets, so he'll have more details on this,
but we have five full time vets on our staff,
plus we brought in a lot of specialty vets who
deal with species that we don't normally treat. We've had
tortoises and cockatoos, and we had a goldfish. I think
that's the first time we rescue a goldfish, but it
came in a lon jar. So we've gone from goldfish
just like a goldfish in a bowl, we've gone from
(24:57):
goldfish to a bull.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
Well though there was also a a koi pon. The
koi teams go in and actually go and tend to a.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Koi pond, so one koi pon Gary. There were a
lot of koi and those were very challenging rescue situations
that reguard specialized equipment, and then we had to figure
out where do we take the koi And so some
of the gardens in our area were so nice. So
Wisconsin Gardens let us bring koi, and then Huntington Botanical
(25:26):
Gardens let us bring koi because they already have lots
of koi pons. And so luckily this has been a
big lesson to me, is that networking and relationships, that's
not what you do when you're in the middle of
the disaster. That's when all the networking relationships that you
have already built just really pay off. And I can
call Gary on his cell phone and say, Gary, can
(25:46):
you send a truck up and take these animals out
of here so that we can be here for the
animals that need to be evacuated. And when you have
those kinds of friendships with your colleagues and relationships between organizations, it's,
you know, a true lesson in the real power of collaboration.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
So, if you're a pet owner, what are like three
or four things you should do to prepare for such
an evacuation. I mean, I can think of what I
would do, But what do you suggest to people to do.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
We're always telling people that we are really wanting people
to prepare ahead of time. DA set it perfectly. You
take care of all of the planning before you need
to start to execute. So definitely start with microchip Please
entire world, please microchip your pets, microchip your horses, microchip
your turtles. I mean, we do microchip clinics all the time,
(26:35):
and I know Pasadena does as well. Santego Human Site
is one of the most biodiverse areas in the country.
We've got tons of not only wildlife, but also companion
and livestock animals. Microchip everybody, Microchip your spouse if you're
have to. So that's the number one thing. A caller
with a tag still the old way works. That's a
great idea. Make sure you have a couple of days,
(26:58):
three days worth of hat, food, handy that you can
just grab that because what happened in Los Angeles people
having to leave within five minutes, you don't have time
for anything. Have that bag ready, food, bowl, water, a
couple of bottles of water just to take on with you.
It really it could be a difference.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Of life for that. You know, my pet was already
with a pet sitter at the time because we had
just traveled down to San Diego for a weekend, and
so I didn't have to worry about my pet. But
I knew I had to leave fast. And it tells
you what's important. And to me, the one thing I
grabbed was my son's baby book. It's heartbreaking you hear
(27:40):
about So you have a if you have a cat,
have a cat cage, handy.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
All those things. Oh yeah, so you could just throw
the cat in the cage.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
And oh yeah, medications, medications, veterinary records, you know all
that will be very help.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, the veninary records, I mean, see that's something and
probably people don't have that handy, just like they don't
have their birth stritripic is handy, and they can't find
all their personal papers.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
Another really interesting thing is we really tried to train
people here to actually trailer train their horses, because if
you can't get those horses out of there in something
with an engine and wheels, you have lost the chance
to save your horses. So definitely make sure those horses
get trained to get into a trailer.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
And the trailer situation at Altadeen was a bit of
a crisis at first, so you know, people who didn't
have trailers, the ones that were able to keep getting
back in, kept going in, bringing the horses, going back
and going back in.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Can you each tell us a really nice story, a
nice a nice reuniting storys or something that's uplifting.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
I can go first. The one for me was there
was a gentleman who was not able to evacuate with
his dog, left the food and water. We were able
to rescue the dog. It turned out that the dog
had originally been adopted by this man from our shelter,
and the dog had been tied an abandoned outside our
shelter of fence when he had adopted him. So for me,
(29:09):
that is a full circle story to have reunited that
for taylored dog with that gentleman who adopted him originally
for our shelter when he was abandoned and neglected. That's
really kind of like give me chills.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
Yeah, that's really nice. We have at San Diego. He mean,
we have an emergency response team, which was what we
were able to provide to Dia along with her troops.
We trained them to go behind fire lines and we
actually get them certified by CalFire and basically FEMA training
that Calpire certifies. But they went have you ever heard
of the Zorthian ranch in the LA area. Yeah, very
(29:48):
famous place. Yeah, a lot of animals and these team
members went behind the fire lines, had to hike really hours.
It was precarious to get there. Actually, that's where they
found the ball and the cows and other animals and
we're able to provide food and water and make sure
that they were okay. A lot of people know about
those animals and that place has been around for well
(30:09):
over maybe seventy five years, and I know it took
some damage, but the animals were okay, And honestly, that's
all that becomes important in the world is your family
and your animals and make sure that that is okay
and they were able to do that.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
What do you suggest that we here, like on the
East Coast do to help.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Really, honestly, Martha, monetary donations or the way that we
respond not only to this disaster now, but I think
Gary and I are pretty committed to working to continue
to build a collaborative response network and animal welfare community
to respond to other disasters. And we know that there
will be more. And I think we have just demonstrated
(30:52):
with this eaten fire like what can be done if
you quickly mobilize, and that as nonprofit organizations, Geary and
I are really nimble and quick. We don't have to
deal with a lot of red tape and we can
get stuff done. One of Kiri's people who I met
in this her name is Summer, and she's one of
the fire trained people, and she is just so wonderful
(31:15):
and she and I developed a really special connection, and
so she gave me a big hug, and she said, like,
what we've done here has just been so amazing and
the care you provided and food, and we also had
mental health support on staff and chair massages and anything
we think of to bring in to just keep the
people going who were working around the clock. And so
(31:36):
she we're hugging and she's talking, and she's and my
PR manager is standing there and he says, so summer
is what you're saying is like best disaster Ever, how
became our little tagline amongst the group. You know, it
doesn't sound like an appropriate thing to say, but you've
got to have a sense of humor in this work
(31:58):
on a good day and especially in the disaster. And
it really was the best disaster response that I think
most of those who are very experienced had ever seen
because of the power of the collaboration. So give us two.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
Addresses that people can send funds to so that we
have something real here.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Do you what do you suggest Pasadena Humane dot org.
Speaker 1 (32:24):
Gary, do you have a suggestion?
Speaker 3 (32:25):
Well, we want to be able to help others in
affected areas and ourselves with our emergency services, so I'd
have to say Sdhumane dot org for San Diego humane,
but really right now, we're not the ones that are
needing it. It is really up in Los Angeles right now,
but you know we're watching fires now. So I'd say
even more importantly is to tell everybody around the country,
(32:48):
you know, prepare for disasters more coming. We know that.
Just make sure you've trained yourself and you can get
your pets to safety and just be prepared.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Well. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
I am so sorry for everything that you're going through,
and I hope that these fires stop soon. I hope
the winds die down and we don't have too many
more eruptions.
Speaker 2 (33:10):
I have one question for you, Martha, because I think
just to help, is that I would love to invite
you to come for a visit to Pasting, Maine so
you can meet some of these animals. But I also
I bet you have like a favorite dog biscuit recipe,
and I think if you could share that recipe and
just ask everyone to make some dog biscuits and take
it to their local shelter, that we would have some
(33:32):
very happy dogs.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
That's a very nice idea. We're a friend of mine,
Aery Katz, and I are starting a new Instagram blog
called Raising the Perfect pet and all of this stuff
will be covered in that blog.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
Look for that.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
It'll be up and running shortly. But the first one
was a recipe for making your own dog food, so
which I do. We made fifty seven quarts of dog
food the other day, and I wish, I wish I
were closer. I could bring it to your shelter. It's
so delicious.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Well, just send me your send me your biscuit rep.
And I'll post it and at least uh other people
will I know, Thank you, I will all right.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
Well, Thank you Gary, thank you Dia, and and best
of luck in the coming day. Thank you, Martha, Thank
you so much.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
What a pleasure talking to you.
Since January seventh, we've all been watching the devastation caused
by the Los Angeles wildfires. The loss of lives, homes,
and entire communities has been heart wrenching, and I know
many of you, like me, think of the helpless animals
that have also suffered. We don't hear their voices and
(00:24):
they are sometimes not as prominent in the coverage of
these disasters. But thankfully there are many incredible people who
are helping address the challenges of rescuing and caring for
the pets and wildlife, including two people who are here
with me today. Dia Duvernet is the president and CEO
of Pasadena Humane Society, which has been responding to the
(00:48):
Eton fires. Her colleague, doctor Gary Weitzman, is president and
CEO of San Diego Humane Society, which has been supporting
their work. Welcome to my podcast, both of you, Gary
and Dia. Thank you so much for taking time out
of a very, very busy life work to visit with
me today. These fires have been blazing for several weeks. Now,
(01:12):
can you tell us a little bit about the situation
as it is today? How contained are the fires and
what is happening now?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Gary?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Yeah, I think Dea probably should talk specifically to the
Eaten fire. But this is a really terrible extension of
our fire season. We never expected fires like this in January,
but it's never been as dry as it is right now.
And we've been helping Dea and others up in the
LA area, and DIA's a good friend and a good
colleague of mine and really happy to be up there.
But the fires are starting to break out down here
(01:43):
in San Diego County too. Just yesterday we had one
breakout about five miles from the shelter, and the day
before there was one that was less than two miles
from our main shelter. So we're just watching it all
over southern California. They're getting control, but it's very very
nerve wracking. No, I think you'd agreed to yah.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Oh yeah, the winds were whipping up last night and
I said, oh my gosh, not these winds again. Now
we've got more fires. The good news about the Eating
fires it is about ninety five percent contained and so
but we just it's like rack a mole right with
all these fires.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Well, going back to January seventh, when the Palace Sades
and Eating fires started, can you describe for us how
things unfolded for you.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, So we had decided, given the weather report, that
the winds were supposed to be lowest between four and six,
and so we closed the shelter early at four so
that our employees could go home. And I got home
about six, and I live on the western edge of Pasadena.
Looking out, I can see the Griffith Observatory, and I
saw a ridge line on fire. The Pacific Palace sades
(02:50):
thirty miles from my house, and I said some bad
words and said, we got to get out of here
right now. I don't need to wait for anybody to
tell me to evacuate. And then it did get very
bad and the fire broke out. And the first thing
we did at the shelter was called Geary and other
friends of ours shelters throughout California, to say, come, please
(03:10):
take all of the adoptable animals out of the shelter,
because we know we're going to start seeing first of all,
animals with families who were evacuating and can't take their
pets with them. So it was remarkable that with you know,
we had over one hundred animals in our care that
were available for adoptions, so they're easy to transfer to
other shelters. It's something we do in normal times. We
(03:32):
will transfer shelters, you know, transfer animals back and forth
to shelters, depending if we're full or if someone you know,
has some space for So we already had the partnerships
in place, and so immediately Santa Barbara he made and
Gary San Diego, Sacramento. There were a couple others that
are escaping my mind right now. They came and that
(03:55):
very first Wednesday, they all, almost all the animals were
gone off to these other shelters in California where they
could be adopted, and there were a few less. So
Gary said, you know, we'll come back tomorrow morning. We'll
get the rest because they just numb enough room in
their trucks. And so that was one reason why we
were so well prepared to chart handling the influx of
(04:16):
animals that started coming in. Was about getting the animals
that we already had prior ifire out of the shelter.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Why do people.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Leave their pets when they were evacuating, Oh, well, the
often you know a lot of hotels don't take pets.
A lot of sheltered human shelters don't take pests.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Even in a disaster like this, they don't take pets.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Yes, Now, it was very unfortunate that in Pasadena they
set up shelter at the convention center and they did
allow people to bring their pets, and so we would
have had even more had they not made that very
wise decision. But you know a lot of people would
want to go stay with family and friends, and you know,
your sister might have a dog that doesn't get along
with your dog, but so you can come with your
(04:55):
dog can't come. And so we just started seeing, you know,
hundreds of people who were bringing us their pets to
care for them temporarily because they had to evacuate.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
The other thing was I could add is that they
this caught people off guard. I mean, it happened so fast,
and it grew so quickly. Some people were at work,
and we've all heard of or experienced ourselves. Traffic in
La without fires is untenable. You can't get back. And
then the roads were closed and it was unsafe to
go back, and that trapped a lot of animals out
where people live. And it wasn't their fault, the animals
(05:28):
or the people.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
It just happened Oh, so I understand the police and
the fire fighters could not let those people go back
to their homes. Yeah, how tragic. That is added major
stress to everybody, absolutely for that Martha.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
This was just when people were trying to evacuate, and
it happened so quickly, so people couldn't go home from
work to get their pets to evacuate. So we had
people who were bringing their neighbors pets because they knew
their neighbors weren't home, and so they had gone next
to work to get their neighbor's pets to bring them in.
And I have a very sad story of one of
our board members. Actually she lost her house in the
(06:06):
fire and she was trying to evacuate. She has two
cats that she adopted from Passing Humane and you know
when cats get stressed, they can hide, and she was
trying to find her cats to get them out of
the house, and then her house literally caught on fire
and she had to leave and the house is bring
down and we still go back every day putting out
food and water to see if somehow the cats survived.
(06:28):
But it happened that quickly. It's crazy.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
And what about larger animals? I saw a girl ride
fourteen miles on a freezer to get to get the
horse to safety. Were there a lot of horse deaths?
Were animals left in their stables?
Speaker 2 (06:46):
No, I think most of the horses made it out.
I am not positive about that. But we had one
gentleman who walked his pony all the way down from
Altadema to our shelter at Pasadena because of a lot
of the shelters were getting full and he didn't have
a trailer, so he walked many miles with his pony.
We don't usually house horses at our shelter because there
(07:09):
are other equin sheltering places. But then we quickly got
the hay and what our feed and whatever care our
veterinarians said the pony needed, and took care of it
in our parking lot until we could trailer it to
an equin shelter.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
What happens to wild animals, the apostums and the raccoons,
and the where do they all go?
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Well? I think Gary and I, if I'm not mistaken,
we lead the only two shelters in southern California that
are licensed and permitted to do wildlife rehabilitation. There are
many other smaller wildlife for rescues, but we're the only
shelters that are able to do that, so we were
also able to provide coordinative response for the wildlife we
took and sick and injured, and we have lots of
(07:51):
partnerships with other smaller rescues that might be spec specifics,
so we would quickly be able to triage or just
send them straight to those places. But many of them
we took in and treated ourselves. But one thing we
really tried to let people know as soon as we
were able to get in behind the fire line was
that there were burst water pipes and so the wildlife
(08:12):
did have access to water, because that was something that
a lot of people were concerned about and we didn't
want people going in and putting themselves in danger thinking
that they needed to rescue animals because they would not
have access to water. And we even sent cameras in
overnight cameras with some of the strike teams going in
and said, if you could put these out near the
water so we can get some footage of the animals
(08:33):
coming to drink at night and put that out to
our public, we hopefully can prevent some of these people
from illegally and unsafely entering behind the fire line.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
I know you're an animal lover, Martha, and it's one
of the wonderful things about you. I lose sleep thinking
about animals that are trapped behind or left behind, and
especially wildlife in so many cases because their whole universe
is is gone. I mean, it's burning. There's no way
to comfort them or care for the So we opened
up our wildlife hospitals in San Diego just to be
(09:03):
ready and on call. We had notice from California Department
Official Wildlife that there was an identified bear that had
gotten burned, California black bear. And we take them in
on a regular basis, and we were just waiting to
get that bear in. But I think he's done well
enough that they're going to leave him in place, and
he seems to be surviving.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Okay, oh good.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
The animal part is just awful. It's better, I think,
you degree. It's better than it was back in the
days of Katrina, when we heard so many stories people
tying dogs up to fence posts and leaving them in
their houses just because there was no understanding. And now
we do have that understanding, and I think there's a
lot of generosity out there, a lot of compassion. Can
(09:44):
you imagine not being able to get to your home
where your dogs or your cats were every much your
livestock I mean, but especially you know the LA area,
people care deeply about their animals, and that was you know,
there were horrible stories, but then there were incredible stories
of just total care for their pets and for their livestock.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
And Gary mentions livestock. So one of the hardest calls
we responded to initially was a home in Altadena where
the bull and the goats and the horses, and so
we spent a lot of time around the table with
Gary's team and others trying to figure out how are
we going to do this, because I'm like, I want
to keep this bull where it is. I don't want
(10:26):
to bring the bull into the shelter. But the problem
was that the bullets, the animals did not have access
to water because it was a bridge going over to
the property that had come down in the storm. So
there was this deep ravine that you couldn't get across.
And then once you got up over the ravine, there
was a long winding road up to the pasture and
it was a burned out car along the road so
that no bull would be able to get past it.
(10:48):
And so initially what we were doing was just getting
you know, twelve packs of water across, and the owner
was carrying water up the hill for his life suck
so were so then we're thinking, well, I was like, well,
can we get the Army Corps engineers back to build
a bridge? And then we're like, but then there's still
the burnt car, and I said, well, we could push
(11:10):
the burn car over at the side of the hill
if he doesn't mind. And then we were like, well,
we could park a water truck on the side of
the very vein, and we could put an empty tike
over there, and we could pump the water up and
then pump it up, and so these were all the
strategies we're trying to do. And then finally the owner
brilliantly got a bulldozer in and started moving earth around
(11:30):
to make a temporary bridge, and then did push the car,
the burned out car over the hill so that he
was able to actually drive the water up to the animals.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
It's just incredible how cars burnt to in just shells
of cars, and that's how fierce that those fighters are
and the ember is falling on a roof and then
the house is up in flames in just a few seconds.
It's it's really really drastic.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Well, so another big challenge for us Martha initially was
here we have all these hundreds of animals coming in,
but the winds are still strong, and our shelter is
only ten blocks south of the evacuation line, and so
I was trying to come up with a very immediate
way to pop up an off site temporary shelter for
about six hundred animals in the case that we just
(12:21):
had to pick up and evacuate.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Do you know how many animals actually have been displaced
by a total?
Speaker 2 (12:37):
I think we took in over about nine hundred animals,
but those were including animals that were with us that
their owners had left in temporary custody, and then those
that these wonderful, amazing strike teams went in and rescued,
as well as strays that made it out or were rescued.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
This is justin Pasadena, Yes, what about all the Malibu people.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Yeah, we don't serve that area. We serve Pasadena and
ten other cities, including Alta Dina. But Altadena is really
unincorporated Los Angeles, and so unincorporated Los Angeles contracts with
us to provide regular animal control services, but we're not
connected to provide emergency services. So technically LA County had
(13:21):
jurisdiction but asked us to assist through a mutual aid agreement.
So we assisted, and we were the shelter for all
the animals that came out of the inn fire.
Speaker 3 (13:31):
What I heard in LA was there's a lot. I mean,
do you just mention nine hundred animals And I'm sure
there's at least twice that number really in her area
or more that aren't getting that help that we want
to provide. When this is over, we're unfortunately going to
find probably more deaths amongst people and animals than we're
going to have the stomach for. But LA as a
(13:52):
whole has been hit really hard.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Well, I think Gary that thanks to our collaborative efforts,
we did a phenomenal job with the search, secure recoveries
in the eating fire, and we are you know, we're
thirty miles away from the Palisades, and it's not our
service herea that's La Animal Services. So I really haven't
had a chance to even catch up on how their
rescue recovery efforts went. But I know that at the
(14:16):
Eaton fire, thanks to you and so many other partners,
it was just the most amazing experience to see how
we all mobilized and worked around the clock to help
every animal you needed our help.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
How do your field teams actually work?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
This is an interesting thing is that none of my
animal control officers are fire trained and equipped. You have
to have a lot of special safety equipment, and my
understanding is not a lot of the LA County officers
are either. So organizations like Mary's and the ASPCA and
(14:52):
the North Valley Animal Disaster Group and Kern County Animal
Services came in and they had the strike teams that
are properly trained and equipped to go behind the fire lines.
And so for us, we did not send our officers
behind the fire lines. But food is important, as you know, Martha,
(15:16):
and so we made sure that we were getting three
meals delivered for two hundred people every day to our shelter.
And when the strike teams went out, they were already
had their breakfast, lunch, all the beverages they knused, so
they didn't have to come back for lunch, and they
would go in and get the animals and then meet
our officers at the fire line so our officers could
transfer them back to the shelters, so that these specialized
(15:39):
folks who were trained in the rescue could focus all
their efforts on the rescue, and we were providing support
on the other side of the line.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
How are you tracking pets who've been separated from their
owners and how do you reunite those pets with their owners?
Oh well, we made a huge effort to keep all
of the animals that have evacuated during this time at
pasading Emain, doing whatever we could in terms of popping
up temporary shelter and our public training, the classrooms and
(16:10):
everywhere else we could so that all the animals would
be there. They were well cared for by our thousands
of volunteers and one hundred and fifty staff members and
five full time vets, and so when people were coming
to look for their pets, they only had one place
to go, or if they had left them in our
temporary custody, of course they knew where they were. But
there were a few problems because well these are sad problems,
(16:33):
because some people who thought that they were just bringing
us their pets to provide temporary care while they evacuated,
then found out that they had no homes to go
back to, So that's turning into a much longer custody
and care situation for us. But we are committed to
keeping all of those animals first, as long as it
takes for those families to rebuild their lives and take
(16:56):
their pets back, because when you've lost everything else, you
certainly don't want to lose your pet. So we have
the fabulous network of foster families, and you know, we'll
wait just a little bit longer before we start really
deploying these animals that we know are going to be
with us for a year or more to foster homes
they're willing to care for them, and as far as
(17:17):
the injured strays coming in.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
This is a really really really important message about and
we talk about this all the time, Gary, Right, everybody
needs to microchip their pet. If you're pets, the way
that they're going to get back to you is through microchip.
But we've had families who are coming in and not
recognizing their own pets because the animals are stressed, they
(17:42):
are burned, they are you know, have smoke in elation
and dehydration and they're not even responding to their owners.
And the only way that we were able to connect
owners with their pets was by you know, they said, well,
my pet was black, and so we're like, well, let's
scan all ten of these black cats and see if
they have microchips, and then we make the reunification from the microchip.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
So people should really pay attention to those kinds of
very important safety feet safety things, yeah to do.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
It's a great opportunity to say, everyone, please microchip and
license your pets so that if they ever go stray,
we can give them back to you without ever having
come to the shelter.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
I've been hearing about some of the injuries like burned
paws and burned fur and what are other injuries that
they're suffering.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Well, there was one really sad case of a dog
we had who was actually in the car evacuating with
his family, but somehow jumped out of the car and
then we our teams went in and rescued that animal.
Later all four paws were completely burned, but the animal
was fine, a fine. I think it was a cat. Actually,
I'm sorry it was a cat. I mean, we had
(18:52):
some terrible situations that we heard of of people going
behind the fire lines who were not authorized and making
animals pets and saying these people must be horrible people
because they didn't evacuate with their pets, not really day
at work or doing something else. The legal first of all,
pets are property. You're seizing someone's property. Any animal that
(19:15):
comes out of that situation needs to go immediately to
the shelter so that we can try to reunite it
with a true owner. But to blame these victims who
had no choice about leaving their pets behind, it's just
been really infurigating.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Do you have enough resources to help all the displaced pets,
enough veterinarians, enough medications? Do you have enough of that?
Speaker 2 (19:39):
We have been so fortunate and so desperately needing the
outpouring of support that we've received from the community. We
encourage monetary donations so that we could just quickly source
and supply whatever materials we needed when we needed them,
such as specialized medical supplies and whatnot. A lot of
(20:00):
people still want to donate, you know, bowls and leashes
and toys, and at first, actually that created a little
bit of a second crisis for us because we were
so happy that they were coming, but there were so
many people dropping off supplies that I mean, we had
tons of supplies. And I was on an interview with
(20:22):
Larry Mantle and our public radio station of Blockdown, and
he said, yeah, our employees could not get to work
because there were so many people dropping off supplies at
Pasadena Humane. And so we quickly were able to partner
with another shelter in our community at San Gabriel Valley
Humane Society, and we asked, you know, can we just
(20:43):
direct people to you to drop off the stuff. And
thankfully they have a field behind their shelter, and we
need this stuff. Because then we rented as many U
haul trucks as I could find and started putting all
the stuff in the trucks and supplying the pasta convention
center with whatever they needed for the families who were
(21:04):
sheltering there with their pets. And then we were supplying
pet owners who just needed help through our shelter where
they could come and just take whatever they wanted, whether
it was food or whatever they needed. And then also
once we had the strike teams in place, then we
set up kind of a drive through where all the
trucks that were going out to behind the fire lines
could drive by in the morning and stock up their
(21:26):
trucks with food, water, so whatever they might need out
in the field.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Did any shelters get burned?
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Not to by awareness, that's good.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
The generosity has been incredible. I mean, Dia was just
talking about up in Pasadena, but you know for us
here in San Diego where we brought animals in from
Pasadena Humane and we've learned so much, right do you know?
We've learned through all of the disasters that have happened
over the last fifteen years. We don't want to displace
the animals that are separated from their owners. We want
to clear shelters so that they can take in those animals.
(21:58):
And that's exactly what we were able to do with Pasadena.
But the generosity in La was incredible, But it also
was down here in San Diego. We put out a
call for fosters because we normally have anywhere from one
thousand to three thousand animals in our care per day.
Right now we're at about thirteen hundred. But people came
in and they took our dogs. And that's incredible because
(22:21):
you probably know there's been a dog situation across the
United States where there are so many, so many dogs
in all of our shelters, and people stepped up. We
had eight hundred and seventy five foster applications within a
matter of four days, and we really asked for the unicorn,
which was someone who could take a big dog. We
have lots of big dogs who didn't have a dog
(22:43):
because our dog, the dogs don't always get along and
probably didn't have children, so that they could take a
dog that might not be for every family, and they
were just able to step up. We basically got about
forty or fifty really solid fosters out of all that.
We're still getting them in, but it really it's heartwarming
to hear that people really cared, they care deeply, and
(23:06):
they came to all of our aid.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Well, Gary, I'm sorry, but I can top those numbers
because going into this, we had two thousand regular volunteers
and probably at roughly one thousand foster volunteers, and in
the past ten days we've had over the numbers have varied,
and don't quote me, but I know it's been at
least six thousand volunteer applications and yeah, so yeah, okay, right,
(23:32):
that's awesome's and so I've been saying, you know, please
be patient with us because you know, we're just dealing
with a rapidly evolving emergency situation, having to deal with
the immediate needs at times. So right now, we're trying
to keep all the pets at the shelter as long
as we can so that, you know, families can reunite.
But eventually we are going to have to start putting
a lot of animals into foster homes for longer term care.
(23:55):
But you know, people keep calling back. I called, I
want to foster, and it's it's not that we don't
want your help, it's just that we can't respond to
you right now, and we're gonna need you, so please
stand by and we will get to you, and we
really appreciate it. But right now, what we're trying to
do is just get the monetary and other resources we
need to properly care for these animals at our shelter.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
How do you rehabilitate I mean, it takes a while
to heal a wounded animal, and they do, they stay
right in the shelter.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Well, Gary's a vets, so he'll have more details on this,
but we have five full time vets on our staff,
plus we brought in a lot of specialty vets who
deal with species that we don't normally treat. We've had
tortoises and cockatoos, and we had a goldfish. I think
that's the first time we rescue a goldfish, but it
came in a lon jar. So we've gone from goldfish
just like a goldfish in a bowl, we've gone from
(24:57):
goldfish to a bull.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
Well though there was also a a koi pon. The
koi teams go in and actually go and tend to a.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Koi pond, so one koi pon Gary. There were a
lot of koi and those were very challenging rescue situations
that reguard specialized equipment, and then we had to figure
out where do we take the koi And so some
of the gardens in our area were so nice. So
Wisconsin Gardens let us bring koi, and then Huntington Botanical
(25:26):
Gardens let us bring koi because they already have lots
of koi pons. And so luckily this has been a
big lesson to me, is that networking and relationships, that's
not what you do when you're in the middle of
the disaster. That's when all the networking relationships that you
have already built just really pay off. And I can
call Gary on his cell phone and say, Gary, can
(25:46):
you send a truck up and take these animals out
of here so that we can be here for the
animals that need to be evacuated. And when you have
those kinds of friendships with your colleagues and relationships between organizations, it's,
you know, a true lesson in the real power of collaboration.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
So, if you're a pet owner, what are like three
or four things you should do to prepare for such
an evacuation. I mean, I can think of what I
would do, But what do you suggest to people to do.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
We're always telling people that we are really wanting people
to prepare ahead of time. DA set it perfectly. You
take care of all of the planning before you need
to start to execute. So definitely start with microchip Please
entire world, please microchip your pets, microchip your horses, microchip
your turtles. I mean, we do microchip clinics all the time,
(26:35):
and I know Pasadena does as well. Santego Human Site
is one of the most biodiverse areas in the country.
We've got tons of not only wildlife, but also companion
and livestock animals. Microchip everybody, Microchip your spouse if you're
have to. So that's the number one thing. A caller
with a tag still the old way works. That's a
great idea. Make sure you have a couple of days,
(26:58):
three days worth of hat, food, handy that you can
just grab that because what happened in Los Angeles people
having to leave within five minutes, you don't have time
for anything. Have that bag ready, food, bowl, water, a
couple of bottles of water just to take on with you.
It really it could be a difference.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Of life for that. You know, my pet was already
with a pet sitter at the time because we had
just traveled down to San Diego for a weekend, and
so I didn't have to worry about my pet. But
I knew I had to leave fast. And it tells
you what's important. And to me, the one thing I
grabbed was my son's baby book. It's heartbreaking you hear
(27:40):
about So you have a if you have a cat,
have a cat cage, handy.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
All those things. Oh yeah, so you could just throw
the cat in the cage.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
And oh yeah, medications, medications, veterinary records, you know all
that will be very help.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, the veninary records, I mean, see that's something and
probably people don't have that handy, just like they don't
have their birth stritripic is handy, and they can't find
all their personal papers.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
Another really interesting thing is we really tried to train
people here to actually trailer train their horses, because if
you can't get those horses out of there in something
with an engine and wheels, you have lost the chance
to save your horses. So definitely make sure those horses
get trained to get into a trailer.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
And the trailer situation at Altadeen was a bit of
a crisis at first, so you know, people who didn't
have trailers, the ones that were able to keep getting
back in, kept going in, bringing the horses, going back
and going back in.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Can you each tell us a really nice story, a
nice a nice reuniting storys or something that's uplifting.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
I can go first. The one for me was there
was a gentleman who was not able to evacuate with
his dog, left the food and water. We were able
to rescue the dog. It turned out that the dog
had originally been adopted by this man from our shelter,
and the dog had been tied an abandoned outside our
shelter of fence when he had adopted him. So for me,
(29:09):
that is a full circle story to have reunited that
for taylored dog with that gentleman who adopted him originally
for our shelter when he was abandoned and neglected. That's
really kind of like give me chills.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
Yeah, that's really nice. We have at San Diego. He mean,
we have an emergency response team, which was what we
were able to provide to Dia along with her troops.
We trained them to go behind fire lines and we
actually get them certified by CalFire and basically FEMA training
that Calpire certifies. But they went have you ever heard
of the Zorthian ranch in the LA area. Yeah, very
(29:48):
famous place. Yeah, a lot of animals and these team
members went behind the fire lines, had to hike really hours.
It was precarious to get there. Actually, that's where they
found the ball and the cows and other animals and
we're able to provide food and water and make sure
that they were okay. A lot of people know about
those animals and that place has been around for well
(30:09):
over maybe seventy five years, and I know it took
some damage, but the animals were okay, And honestly, that's
all that becomes important in the world is your family
and your animals and make sure that that is okay
and they were able to do that.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
What do you suggest that we here, like on the
East Coast do to help.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
Really, honestly, Martha, monetary donations or the way that we
respond not only to this disaster now, but I think
Gary and I are pretty committed to working to continue
to build a collaborative response network and animal welfare community
to respond to other disasters. And we know that there
will be more. And I think we have just demonstrated
(30:52):
with this eaten fire like what can be done if
you quickly mobilize, and that as nonprofit organizations, Geary and
I are really nimble and quick. We don't have to
deal with a lot of red tape and we can
get stuff done. One of Kiri's people who I met
in this her name is Summer, and she's one of
the fire trained people, and she is just so wonderful
(31:15):
and she and I developed a really special connection, and
so she gave me a big hug, and she said, like,
what we've done here has just been so amazing and
the care you provided and food, and we also had
mental health support on staff and chair massages and anything
we think of to bring in to just keep the
people going who were working around the clock. And so
(31:36):
she we're hugging and she's talking, and she's and my
PR manager is standing there and he says, so summer
is what you're saying is like best disaster Ever, how
became our little tagline amongst the group. You know, it
doesn't sound like an appropriate thing to say, but you've
got to have a sense of humor in this work
(31:58):
on a good day and especially in the disaster. And
it really was the best disaster response that I think
most of those who are very experienced had ever seen
because of the power of the collaboration. So give us two.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
Addresses that people can send funds to so that we
have something real here.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Do you what do you suggest Pasadena Humane dot org.
Speaker 1 (32:24):
Gary, do you have a suggestion?
Speaker 3 (32:25):
Well, we want to be able to help others in
affected areas and ourselves with our emergency services, so I'd
have to say Sdhumane dot org for San Diego humane,
but really right now, we're not the ones that are
needing it. It is really up in Los Angeles right now,
but you know we're watching fires now. So I'd say
even more importantly is to tell everybody around the country,
(32:48):
you know, prepare for disasters more coming. We know that.
Just make sure you've trained yourself and you can get
your pets to safety and just be prepared.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Well. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
I am so sorry for everything that you're going through,
and I hope that these fires stop soon. I hope
the winds die down and we don't have too many
more eruptions.
Speaker 2 (33:10):
I have one question for you, Martha, because I think
just to help, is that I would love to invite
you to come for a visit to Pasting, Maine so
you can meet some of these animals. But I also
I bet you have like a favorite dog biscuit recipe,
and I think if you could share that recipe and
just ask everyone to make some dog biscuits and take
it to their local shelter, that we would have some
(33:32):
very happy dogs.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
That's a very nice idea. We're a friend of mine,
Aery Katz, and I are starting a new Instagram blog
called Raising the Perfect pet and all of this stuff
will be covered in that blog.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
Look for that.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
It'll be up and running shortly. But the first one
was a recipe for making your own dog food, so
which I do. We made fifty seven quarts of dog
food the other day, and I wish, I wish I
were closer. I could bring it to your shelter. It's
so delicious.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Well, just send me your send me your biscuit rep.
And I'll post it and at least uh other people
will I know, Thank you, I will all right.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
Well, Thank you Gary, thank you Dia, and and best
of luck in the coming day. Thank you, Martha, Thank
you so much.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
What a pleasure talking to you.
Host
Martha Stewart
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