How Pathetic
From Fox News, KABB San Antonio:
“A couple saved a dog near Piedmont and East South Cross today. They say they heard the dog crying for a couple of weeks. They called the city’s public works hot line by dialing 3-1-1 over and over. However, they had no luck getting someone out there. They called Animal Care Services repeatedly as well. The dog was trapped in a storm drain. They were able to remove the cover and pull the dog to safety themselves. After they rescued the puppy, they realized how unhealthy it was. The dogs ribs were very visible. The family says pulling the dog to safety was worth the risk, even though removing a man hole cover is against the law. Relatives plan to keep the dog and nurse it back to good health.”
This was a news brief I read tonight, online. It’s the epitome of what the city of San Antonio and is surrounding areas is like. In this town, very few care about the homeless animals within it. Very few care about the corpses left on the highway breakdown lanes. I use those very highways on a daily basis, see the dead dogs, dead cats, dead raccoons and yes dead deer. A beautiful 8 point buck, dead, on a major highway, will lie there until its nothing but bones, teeth and perhaps its antlers. Someone may pull over long enough to grab the antlers, I bet. But I’ve seen corpses lie there under the sun until there’s nogthing left but a few scraps of fur and teeth. What? Can’t anyone clean up the dead around here? I’ve seen 1 (one) city clean up crew pick up a dead dog in the six years I’ve lived here.
I went for a walk one day in my neighborhood and heard a kitten calling to me…I took him home, covered in his own diarrhea. I have trapped, let’s see, two cats in live traps on dealership car lots. Another came to me when I called to her. All four I adopted and gave a home to. Another I nearly ran over as she tottered into the path of my car as I drove from the access road onto the highway. I stopped my car over the brilliantly colored calico kitten, barely old enough to have her yes open. How did she get onto a major city highway? Three guesses and the first two don’t count. I still have her. Her name is Rae.
People here dump animals anywhere and everywhere. I rescued an adult Rottweiler a few years ago, an older male, intact, with such horrible heartworm I had to put him down a week later. This dog no doubt lived with his owner(s) until they a) decided he’s too old, or b) decided he’s too sick, to keep any longer. Yes, I found him on a car lot. I took home a young, energetic Labrador (took responsibility when no one else would) and he drove my Vinny away. The orange cat I found on my walk went feral and I never saw him again. The price I pay for my compassion. I found a home for the Labrador, but it cost me my Vinny.
Someone once made a comment about how a society is judged by its treatment of criminals, another by a society’s treatment of children. San Antonio no doubt treats its criminals and children with justice and mercy. But its homeless and hurting animals? The local Humane Society tells folk who find a homeless animal to put it back where they found it. They have no room, they have no facilities. Leave it to be killed by a car, a coyote, starvation, disease…who cares?
I do.
