Animal shelter volunteers pay it forward for pets

It’s been raining more than just water today. There are plenty of cats and dogs at both of Creston’s non-profit animal rescue shelters waiting to be adopted.

June is “Adopt a Shelter Cat Month” and Creston Animal Rescue Effort director Mycale Downey said she would like to find homes for CARE’s felines, and would also like to make some changes to improve their quality of life while they’re at the shelter.

CARE, which is the official city pound at 701 S. Lake Shore Dr., south of the McKinley Park Campground.

“This is such a stressful place for cats. We do our best. We let them out of their cages every day. They get handled, petted and they get to play,” Downey said. “But unfortunately, that’s maybe two hours a day.”

She said she would like to see them enclosed in glass instead of stainless steel, and be housed in such a way litter boxes weren’t right next to their food and water. The building doesn’t have air conditioning. The heat index Thursday was 106°F.

It also lacks a restroom which is inconvenient for Downey and other volunteers, especially in the winter when the city shuts down and locks up all bathrooms at nearby McKinley Park.

Downey said the average stay for cats is about six months, and that younger ones tend to get adopted more quickly. She said she tries to be as transparent as possible so that new owners don’t get any unwanted surprises. She gets blood work done on senior animals to screen them for health issues.

“Lucy, she has the NFIB virus, which is not as contagious as the leukemia virus but her immune system does not work well. So she’s going to need a little extra care,” Downey said. “Primarily she needs to be kept indoors. If she gets a cut, it might not heal properly. If she gets a respiratory infection, she’s going to need antibiotics.”

She said CARE has a program called Trap Neuter Release.

“That is an effort to curb stray cat populations, like neighborhood cats and barn cats,” she said. “Ideally, it should be done in the same neighborhoods every year for several years to make an impact. So we try to go back to the same places. And with our limited funding we can only do a few animals for a few cats at each place. So let’s say we get enough money to do 10 cats. Well, we don’t want to spend all that money in one area.”

She said they’ll typically do two to three cats in a given area, targeting females for maximum population control. Downey said both vet clinics in town, Creston Veterinary Clinic and Southern Hills Veterinary Services, have been charitable. They have TNR programs and only charge CARE $100 to test, vaccinate and spay cats.

“Without that savings, it would cost me like $300 or $400 just to spay a female cat,” she said.

Downey said CARE doesn’t euthanize animals unless they are overly aggressive or have highly contagious diseases like feline leukemia virus.

She said many dogs end up at the pound because many people fail to do proper research on dog breeds.

“A lot of those dogs, they’re bred for a purpose. They’re high energy and if you don’t do something with them, they become destructive. Then they get tossed aside, given away or taken to a shelter, or some people worse than that. They just drive them to the country and let them out. If you’d done your research, and been realistic and honest with what you can handle, you never would have had to destroy this dog’s life like you have. So that’s kind of what happened with him,” she said in the fenced in dog yard while petting Juno, a black lab-pitbull mix.

Downey said there are many labs and pitbulls in the area, so it’s not rare to see that combination, and reasons why people give up their dogs. She said Juno’s owners were expecting a child when they got him.

“Well, they were told that he was big and active and busy. They got him anyway and she was pregnant at the time. And then after she had her baby, they were just like, ‘Uh, he’s gonna hurt the baby.’ So they tied him up outside and largely ignored him. We said, ‘Why don’t you just release him to us?’ So they did,” Downey said, adding that Juno’s been there for about seven months.

Another dog, Rock, is a pitbull with aggression problems, which decreases the likelihood he’ll ever be adopted. Downey said she would like to have a few isolated kennels for dogs like him who are aggressive and bark too often, because when one starts barking incessantly, all of the others get irritated and it sets them off too.

“One thing I would like to do is replace the dog kennels. They’re old. They’re worn. They’re rusty,” she said. Since the kennels are all side by side, sometimes the dogs fight amongst each other through the fencing.

The city owns the building, helps with accounting, pays utilities and maintenance. Downey said everything else is funded by donations, which go straight to the shelter. She said she’s grateful to the city for everything they’ve done to help her cause.

Downey said she’s conflicted between continuing to make efforts for further renovations, and just buying or building a new shelter. Getting a new building would be tough because she would need the city’s support to do so.

The shelter has been open since 1998, and that about 2010 the city helped with some renovations and an addition that roughly doubled the size of the building. They added a space so cats and dogs could be housed in separate rooms.

Downey said she has several volunteers, some part time with designated roles like her dog walker, and the volunteer who cleans cages and takes care of cats on Tuesdays. Others are more full time and they clean regularly, come to meetings and help with fundraisers. She said that because it’s volunteer run organization, they don’t have employees to staff the facility at all hours of the day like bigger city shelters in Des Moines.

“It’s hard to get volunteers, mostly because we’re not open. So you can’t just show up, ‘Oh I’ve got two hours on a Saturday with my kids, let’s go volunteer.’ I have to be here, open the door, let you in and I have to stay while you’re here,” Downey said, adding she does give a key to volunteers who’ve been coming for over a year.

“We’ve got a great group of volunteers, really great. Just dependable, hard working, they get supplies out of their own pockets. Sometimes if they see we’re out of bleach or dog treats, they’ll just buy those items and bring them down,” she said.

Janel McLain, who runs Dog Gone Rescue from her home, said she’s also received a great deal of support from the community. She currently has five dogs and three cats up for adoption.

She said she had more people interested in adopting during the pandemic, but that covid prevented her from holding her annual “Doggy Wash” and bowling fundraisers. McLain is collecting lightly used shoes to raise money, and said they can be dropped off at 205 S Sumner Avenue.

“I’m extremely grateful for all the support I’ve gotten over the years,” McLain said. March was Dog Gone’s 10 year anniversary.