Pets and humans coping with time change

Happy November Sonoma! How are you and your animals coping with the time change? Mine are not as quick to accept as I’d like with nudges to get up way too early. Hopefully they’ll catch on soon.

I actually welcome this time of year as I like the idea of the day being done when the sun goes down. Of course, that doesn’t always pan out here at work, but it does lend itself to the idea of hunkering down for the winter. Being a New England girl, it brings back that seasonal lifestyle I grew up with and conjures up lovely memories.

Speaking of seasonal, our kitten season seems to be drawing to an end with no new little kittens coming in over the last few weeks. We do have some wee ones that have been in foster over the last month that will be gracing the kitten room soon, so if you are looking for a little wild one, check out the kitten room over the next week or two.

We have a few kittens in the kitten room as well, who are a bit past the cute playful stage, but are sweet little love bugs as well.

We’ve had a run of older kitties make their way to us who also need their forever home, so please come down for a visit to meet them. The adolescent and older cats make really great pets for those who don’t really want to go through the wild and crazy, up all night kitten phase. We are giving thanks the whole month of November with $25 cat and kitten adoption fees.

This week is National Animal Shelter and Rescue Appreciation Week, which we at Pets Lifeline hold very dear. The work we do is very gratifying, but does seem at times to be taken a bit for granted, so it is nice to be appreciated.

We’ve been telling the story of Carli, who is a sweet little chihuahua mix that came in as a stray. She needed surgery for cataracts that would eventually have caused her to go blind. She is recovering nicely, but it is just one of the things we do to help the animals in our care. For more on this, please go to our website at petslifeline.org.

The canine wing of the shelter is full of all kinds of wonderful dogs. We have a sweet pittie named Paisley who we believe was bred and then turned out after the puppies were sold. She was found as a stray and still so full of milk, the staff had to milk her like a cow for over a week to help relieve her. She is beautiful with a fawn and white coat and sparkling blue eyes.

Leilah, is the 10-month-old German Shepherd mix that has been our in-house training project. She had no socialization or obedience training when she came to us. I am happy to report, she is coming along quite well and is a very smart and polite little girl now (most of the time). She’s a work in progress.

Molly is an Australian cattle dog mix who is the sweetest girl and oozes happiness when she gets love and attention. She’ll make a great family dog.

Until we meet again ... peace, love and paws!

Then we have the Not Ready for Prime Time play group, (all Chihuahua mixes), Florasita, Leroy Brown, Shakira & Rue. Rue is not on our website as she’s so shy we are still working with her to help her come out of her shell. She does great in the play group, but people are still a bit scary for her.

Then of course, there our lab/boxer mix Bessie. This is my dog Doc’s mother, who has now been here for more than a year. We know that perfect match is out there for her. Is it you? Call us to find out more about her. She’s been making remarkable progress with our volunteer canine handlers (God bless them). I cannot tell you what a gift our volunteers are to this shelter. We truly could not do what we do without them. So to all the volunteers who give their time and energy to Pets Lifeline (including our fabulous board of directors) we give many thanks throughout this month for that blessing.