Hello friends, welcome to Rough Life. There are
51 critters scheduled to be on the van tomorrow.
Hopefully they will all show up. 8 are adult
animals, which we love. We have got quite a busy
month coming up though, both in my personal life
and my work life. So if you don't want to hear
about all of this and you just want the background
stories, feel free to fast forward 5 minutes,
actually probably 10 minutes. I would do 10 minutes
to be safe. First, Justin and I just bought a
new house. We are so excited. We have been on
the hunt for about four years now. And if you're
in the real estate world, you know how absolutely
insane the market has been the last few years.
There was one house that we put an offer in on
less than 12 hours after it was listed. We offered
$10 ,000 over asking and they messaged us back
that night and said they were going with a higher
offer. It has been... unreal. We never thought
that we would find a place, but things have finally
started to cool down down here and someone listed
their home literally three minutes before Justin
just happened to hop on Zillow for his nightly
scrolling, so he sent the link to me immediately.
I texted the releter that night and we had a
walkthrough scheduled for the next afternoon.
We were the second people to see the house, the
first to put an offer in on it, and we offered
10 ,000 under asking this time, which we thought
there was no way that they would accept that.
But they had security cameras up and they said
that they just adored watching Mary Sue play
with their grandchild's toys while we were in
the living room waiting on my in -laws to come
by and see it too. They said Mary Sue sold them
on us and they had to pick us because of how
at home she looked there. If you don't know,
Mary Sue is my 11 month old baby girl. It is
a three bed, three bath home with a pool, a hot
tub, and a pond on five acres plus a pole barn,
two carboards, a shed. So there is lots and lots
of room for fostering puppies, but there is no
bathtub in the entire home. How weird is that?
Is that weird? I don't I think it's so weird.
There's three walk -in showers and not one bathtub
Poor Mary Sue is gonna be taking all of her baths
in the kitchen sink and the pool But anyways,
we have been so busy getting everything done
with like inspections mortgage paperwork walk
-throughs all that we close at the end of April
And then my dad came down from Chicago this week
to visit with Mary Sue, so we were spending the
week entertaining him, and by entertaining him
I mean asking him to fix all of the things that
we needed fixed around our current house right
now. Mary Sue's first birthday party is next
Saturday and I am unwell. I cannot believe she's
gonna be a year old. The theme is some bunnies
won so we've got some super cute lop -eared bunnies
coming for the kids to snuggle with and then
my aunt and cousins are coming to visit for a
little over a week right after that so they'll
be here for Mary Sue's actual birthday so you
know we have to have another party that day.
We're going to take her to Build -A -Bear 2 for
their Pay Your Age program. I'm super excited
about that. Then we have another transport. Then
we have Easter. Then we have our closing. And
then like 10 days after we get the house, we
go to the beach for a whole week. Justin said,
this is the last beach trip we are ever going
to take. After this, we're going to start saying,
we got the beach at home now. We're not going.
but it's his family's annual beach trip and they
pay for us to all stay at a big air bnb together
and it's so fun um and then we just pay for our
stuff down there but man things are about to
get really crazy down here Oh and so I'm also
hoping to have a setup in our office because
we'll actually have an office room now instead
of just a computer in our laundry room in our
garage. But I want to set up a spot where I can
video the podcast and post them on YouTube too
with like pictures and videos of the animals
that I'm talking about in each episode. I don't
know how to do any of that though, so I'm sure
it's gonna take me a while to figure it all out,
but it is a pipe dream that I'm working towards.
And then, on the wolf trap end, I don't know
if I'm supposed to tell y 'all this or if we're
gonna do like a big announcement or whatever,
but I guess this is your perk for being a faithful
foster and listening to my podcast. I'll give
you the 411. Um, so Jaclyn has officially left
us. We knew it was coming, but we're still really
sad to see her go. And I say that we knew it
was coming, but I think I was just in denial
that she was actually gonna leave because I am
so surprised that she really left us. Um, so
this transport is the first one with our new
intern foster coordinator Tatiana. And I say
intern because she may quit after this one. It
has been a doozy and I have certainly not eased
her into this job, but she has done so great.
I told her that I am reserving my final grade
until I see how intake goes on Sunday and can
safely say how everything went, but so far 51
animals and 5 are adult dogs. I am cautiously
optimistic and I'm trying, I'm trying really
hard not to get attached to her yet until I know
that she is in it for the long haul, but she's
making it hard. We're still looking to hire another
position or two, I think, but the part that I
am the most excited about, not that I'm not also
excited about getting to know Tatiana, but I'm
really excited that we have implemented a new
robot program, technically two robot programs.
It is so cool. Justin keeps telling me that I
have to say AI instead of robots, but robots
sound so much cooler to me, so I don't like saying
AI. We are using them. right now mainly for social
media so if you've noticed our posts lately they'll
say something like comment whatever word for
more information and if you comment that word
our bots get triggered and they will initiate
a conversation with you i have had so much fun
playing with it there have been some really funny
instances with them So I go in and I put the
dog's names, the age, the breed, and a link to
the profile. So if someone asks about a specific
dog, the robot will refer to that and then send
them a direct link to the profile. Well. When
I put the hot tea names in there it got confused
and I was testing it out and I asked about the
puppy Earl Grey and the robot wrote back and
said I'm sorry there seems to be a misunderstanding.
Earl Grey is a type of tea not a puppy. Are you
interested in puppies or teas? So I went back
in, I clarified it, and then I tried again. And
he said, Earl Grey is a boxer mix, not a type
of tea. We do not sell teas. We focus on adopting
out dogs and cats. But it was so wild to me that
it knew that because they don't have access to
the internet. Like I know, I know like Chad GPT
and Grok and all that, they do have access to
the internet, but These robots do not so they
only know the information that I input and I
never said anything about actual tease But then
this was my favorite then I was putting the potato
pups In there for this recent post that I just
did and it said I was testing it out and it said
I Would love to tell you about our new special
potato breed puppies So I went back in and fixed
it and then he said I would love to tell you
about the puppies from our potato transport,
but just to be clear, we do not have any actual
potatoes. I thought that was so funny. I told
Jenny I spend more time talking to robots these
days than real people, but I am so excited about
them. And then we have another AI program that
we're implementing that will help with like FAQ
conversations and reception type things. They
seem really cool, too, but we're just like in
the beginning stages of those. We're still fine
-tuning them. They're not live yet, but I was
practicing with one the other day and I asked
him what our adoption fees were and he was like,
our adoption fees vary and we will work with
you individually. Most of our adoption fees are
around $150. I thought that was so funny and
then I had Jessica Tess went out and he told
her that wolf trap will provide gas money for
all fosters and adopters, which we don't Like
do not go up to Dr. Burton and be like, where's
my five dollars gas money? Oh And he kept pronouncing
it cuz these these are like They voice it, you
know, it's not just over the computer that you're
talking to them on the phone, but He kept pronouncing
it what are so he was like what are will reimburse
you for all gas money? Because we were typing
out WTA are instead of saying wolf trap animal
rescue Anyways, they have given me quite a few
laughs lately. So if you ever come in contact
with one of our robots just now, they are very
close friends of mine. And I am working very
hard on making them top notch for y 'all. But
let's go ahead. Look at that. Ten minutes. I
knew it would take me 10 minutes to tell all
that. Let's get to the stories. The theme is
birds. It was going to be spring words. like
butterflies and dragonflies, tulips, stuff like
that, but we did that theme like last year or
the year before so I was having a hard time finding
words that weren't used then that I could use
now and it was mainly all birds so I ended up
just having to switch entirely. So Nashville
Warbler might not be on the van. He technically
does not, or she, it's a... Yeah, it's a girl.
She technically does not have a foster yet, which
is what I mean by I did not ease Tatiana into
this. I'm like, can we add this? Can we add this?
But on the off chance that she gets a foster
and she gets to go, I'm going to tell you her
story now. An elderly lady found her on the highway
all by herself and took her to Dr. Jamie's clinic
where Dr. Jamie found a foster to take her in.
Dr. Jamie, if you didn't know, is one of Dr.
Burton's students turned best friend. So we love
Dr. Jamie. We have reason to believe that she
is a litter mate to the T litter of three from
the SNL transport last month. I don't know what
those reasons are, but I do know that there are
reasons to believe. So I would love a DNA test
done on these guys so we would know for sure.
Hummingbird was found as a stray in town some
of mine and Jessica's friends run an in -home
doggie daycare and grooming place They saw her
sitting at a gas station in town when we were
having one of our super super cold spells in
January So they brought her home hoping that
it was just somebody's dog and they were looking
for her It wasn't no one's ever looking for their
dog down here after a few weeks They asked if
we could take her and we had zero availability
at the time So we referred them to several other
rescues who also had no availability at the time
so a couple weeks go by and then she reached
back out to us and Said that she thought the
dog was pregnant was gonna take her to the vet
to get checked They said that they would be willing
to keep her and her puppies until weaned but
then We ended up finding a foster that would
take the whole family, thank you Tatiana. And
we're just super glad that the puppies are gonna
be born in Virginia and get to skip the whole
transport part. American Cardinal is the mama
of the A litter of eight pups from the March
8th. Moss Universe Transport. We held her back
to give the family more time to decide if they
wanted to keep her or not and she had just been
spayed so it was just best that she hung back
for a few more weeks. But they do know that she'll
be happier in a home in Virginia. Remember this
is the mom of the litter of puppies that our
bottle feeder fosters took in for another rescue
and then the rescue was like, so could you just
keep the mom and all eight puppies forever because
we can't find a northern rescue that will take
them. I also found out more about their origin
story. The rescue had been asked to check on
a mama and puppies at a home because the neighbors
called and said that they were really worried
about them. The mom was literally a walking skeleton.
So the family agreed to let the rescue take all
of them and then they would keep the puppies
and they would return the mom when they were
weaned. But eventually they were able to talk
the owners into letting them keep the mama too.
Dove was found on the side of the highway by
an out -of -state truck driver during our super
cold spell in January. He picked her up and messaged
us, but by the time we read the message he had
already found someone else to take her, which
we were very happy about because we had nowhere
to put her. Then that night we got a message
from the somebody else with a picture of the
very same dog asking if we could take her. Still
we had absolutely nowhere to put her but the
picture of her sitting in the backseat of that
car hit such a soft spot with me. I told her
that if she would keep her until we had an opening
we would get her as soon as possible. So we sent
her food and supplies and vaccinated her and
once we had a spot open at our doggy daycare
we sent her straight there. They said she's a
great dog and she gets along with everybody.
She can however jump over a four -foot fence
with ease. And I will say though, I forgot that
we pulled this dog. So one day Jessica and I
were, cause like this was January. So one day
Jessica and I were going over our list and I
was like, wait, who, who's the dog at Doggie
Daycare? I don't remember. And she was like,
you know, it's the one that you loved when you
saw the picture. And she sent me a picture of
it at Doggie Daycare. And I was like, what? i
said i loved that i don't remember ever loving
that dog so she hunted down the original photo
of it in the back seat and sent it to me and
instantly i was like oh yeah that dog i do love
that dog so that picture of it in the back seat
is literally the only reason we pulled it if
they would have sent a different picture i probably
would have been like sorry we're full Eastern
Phoebe is the dog that I told you about on the
podcast last transport that was probably not
gonna show up. I think her name was Elaine then
but then I think some of the names got mixed
around. But I was right. kind of. They did not
show up on time at least. No one could get a
hold of them and our departure time came and
went so I just made the call to send the van
without her on it. We cleaned up and then we
all headed out ourselves and 45 minutes later
I get a notification on my ring doorbell that
they're at the dog house. So they finally called
us back and they said they were there. We told
them um it's too late everyone has left. They
were like well could you ask them to pull over
so we can catch up with them? We explained that
that's not how this works and like we have to
meet the Virginia drivers at a specific time
and They'll just have to keep her until the next
transport Well, the very next day, the lady fell
and broke her hip. She has had to go to an inpatient
rehab place for it and her husband is apparently
out of town this weekend or maybe he's staying
with her this weekend. I don't know. For some
reason though, we had to take the dog three days
early because they wouldn't be able to bring
her this weekend. I do know that she will be
on the van for sure this time. Virginia Rail
was sent to me as a single pup. I approved her
to go on transport. And then when our rescue
partner told the owner that I said the puppy
could go, she told her, well, there's actually
two. They're twins. They look identical. So when
they told me that it was a twin, I approved the
twin and I had them down as a pair on the spreadsheet.
And then five days later, I get another text
that the lady has given one of them away and
it's back to a single again. I'm like, oh my
gosh. So they had originally been posted on Facebook
as free to a good home. The finder said that
when she went to pick her up, pick up her boyfriend
from work, two puppies were following behind
him, I guess in the parking lot. This is this
is what the Facebook post said. I'm going to
read it exactly as it says. They had been living
in a burn pile and no one knew until it was too
late. Only these two babies survived. I don't
entirely know what that means or how they even
know that but I guess some of these puppies burned
or died of smoke inhalation and these two were
the only ones who survived. We did ask her to
reach back out to the person that she gave the
other puppy to and tell her that if she decides
to rehome her please contact us. Indigo Bunting
was picked up by a local rescuer. She said she
was driving through town trying to get her baby
to fall asleep and she came across people rubbing
the belly of a puppy at a restaurant. There were
no houses around so she knew it was a stray.
She stopped, she picked it up, she posted on
Facebook and as it turned out the puppy had just
escaped her death from animal control holding
just down the road from the restaurant. Quail
was posted on Facebook as a stray and this is
really funny probably just to me and no one else
but Quail is our Britney spaniel and Brittany's
are good quail hunters. So I named him quail
Someone found him on the side of a busy highway
posted his picture on Facebook saying like there's
this dog right here and Then left and just left
him there So a local rescuer went to get him
from the highway. She searched for two days but
never found him. Several days later he wandered
up to a house a few miles away and the homeowner
knew that this rescuer was looking for him because
she had been posting on Facebook. So she called
her and told her that she could come and get
him. She has been fostering him for well over
a month now and never found anyone looking for
him but she has fallen in love with him. She
said he is a fantastic dog. The aft litter of
two where owner surrenders a lady contacted a
local rescue saying that her neighbors Won't
keep their dog in their yard and they just let
him roam Her dog stays in her yard because she
has an invisible fence But the neighbor's dog
just comes over all the time the rescue told
her that they can't do anything about that because
they're in the county and there's no leash laws
and Since she never got her dog fixed. The neighbor's
dog just walked over and knocked her dog up So
then she called the rescue back a few weeks later
and asked them if they would take the puppies
before they got hit by a car and The rest you
said absolutely and wolf trap will pay to spare
your mom for free. So she is very happy about
that The oh litter of two So a foster has been
trying to help this really poor family and has
taken several bags of food to them over the last
few months But a month ago the owner asked her
if she could help her find a good home for two
of her puppies. After the foster saw them she
knew that she could not leave them behind there
so she contacted us. Their current foster says
they are the best puppies she has ever had. The
M litter of three are from our rescue partner
Debbie. We love sweet Debbie. These puppies were
originally scheduled to go on the March 8th transport.
But on March 1st, the Saturday before that, one
of my fosters was at the doghouse picking up
supplies when Debbie pulled up and asked where
everyone was. My foster was like, uh, you know,
transport is next week, right? So Debbie had
to turn around and drive an hour all the way
back home. I texted her on Monday and was like,
um, were you at my house on Saturday? She said
I was hoping you wouldn't find out. I can't believe
I got my days mixed up. But then we had to cut
puppies from the March 8th transport. And since
Debbie's were the youngest and the smallest,
I asked her if she would keep them until transport
on the 15th. She said no problem. It's one more
week. Easy peasy. but then we decided to postpone
the 15th until the 22nd because we had terrible
storms predicted for the 15th and we really did.
It was a horrible day on Saturday. I'm so glad
we moved transport. We had baseball -sized hail
and so many tornadoes. Anyways... I completely
forgot to tell Debbie that we were postponing
it. So like two hours before transport was supposed
to start, I'm frantically texting her telling
her not to come. And she said she was so worried
about blowing away trying to get to transport
that she didn't even mind keeping them yet another
week. So here we are 22 days later after her
first attempt to drop them off and we're finally
taking them. She said that the mama dog was shot
and killed when the puppies were 10 days old.
That happens so often down here, it makes me
so mad. People mistake the dogs for being aggressive
instead of protective, and then they kill the
moms. Anyways, she thought the little girl pup
would die for sure because by the time the owners
got the puppies to Debbie, the little girl was
so cold and completely limp. Debbie had to force
feed her with a syringe, but she made a full
comeback and she's doing great now. But then
a few days after she got them, the little brown
boy took a dive and she had to carry him around
for 24 hours straight, keeping him warm and fed.
But they're all doing fantastic now. And she
said the little girl took the longest to wean
from a bottle and she's still just a widow baby.
And she'll take little nips off of your chin
like she's looking for a baba still. She said
she loves anything soft. and cozy and she will
take as many snuggles as you'll dole out. The
W litter of four. So a city worker in a nearby
town called our rescue partner Tasha saying that
he found four puppies dumped near the city park
in a Rubbermaid tub and he knew that they shouldn't
go to the pound because they would get parvo
and die. So he took them to Dr. Jamie's clinic
who we love. We love us some Dr. Jamie and Tasha
found a foster to keep them safe until transport.
The S litter of five are full siblings of the
M litter from the January 3rd, 2024 Matthew Perry
Transport. This is the home that many, many litters
of kittens have come from and at least four litters
of puppies. We gave the owner a spay voucher
for both the mom and the dad so hopefully there
will not be any more litters of puppies from
this home. They did not get a spay voucher for
the mom last year for the Matthew Perry litter
because they insisted on keeping one of the puppies.
We often use that as a threat of not giving a
spay voucher unless you surrender the whole litter.
Usually people don't call our bluff on that but
sometimes if they do we will still give them
a spay voucher anyways. But these people had
no business keeping a puppy, especially after
how many animals we had taken from them and how
many animals they still owned. Our rescue partner
that deals with them has also personally paid
to have at least 10 of their adult cats spayed
and neutered. So hopefully they're realizing
now that they do not need to keep any unaltered
animals around. The sea litter of five were being
given away on Facebook and a foster saw them
and begged them to please let a rescue help.
They have been moved around to different fosters
for the last month but they are very happy to
be getting out of Mississippi. Bluebird mama
and her seven bee babies are so sweet. A lady
had just bought a new house and when she went
to put some stuff in her shed the very first
day she found this mama and four -week -old puppies
scooting around all over the place inside the
shed. So she called animal control and they went
and picked them up and then he called us. The
kennels at the shelter have a gap at the bottom
and there's no way that he would have been able
to contain the puppies inside of the kennels.
They would have scooted all around to all the
other kennels with the other dogs and who knows
what would have happened. Fortunately we had
just emptied out the doghouse that morning so
we had a place for them to go. They were soaking
wet and shivering and so pitiful. We kept them
there for a few days before Mama Becky took the
whole family. And she has loved, loved, loved
having the mama, which is so rare for Mama Becky.
She is usually just a puppy person and hardly
ever has adult dogs to foster. And when she does,
she just complains about them the whole time.
But she has gotten really attached to this one.
She probably would have kept her, but between
her and my stepdad both having stage four cancer
right now, it's just not a good time to get a
permanent dog. And for the cats, Loon was posted
on Facebook as a stray that came up and a cat
foster went and got him from Houston, Mississippi,
which is like well over an hour from us. The
G litter of three are owner surrenders. We've
taken multiple kittens from this family before,
but they are always just picking up strays and
bringing them in. The rest of the cats are from
our Alabama shelter friends and we love them,
but we know that they don't always have the most
detailed stories. So Kildee, by the way, do you
guys say kill deer or do you say Kildee? We say
Kildee. down here. Like we just dropped the R.
I actually rehabbed three baby Kildee a few years
ago when I was in my prime wildlife rehabber
era. Someone brought me three eggs and I raised
them from hatchlings to full -blown birds before
I let them go. They were so fun. Anyway, Kildee
the cat was just a stray that was picked up by
animal control. Turkey Vulture was an owner surrender
after the owner died. The shelter workers told
me that he came in with the other long -haired
cat, Never Touch a Grumpy Bunny, from the February
23rd Baby Bugs Transport. But when I picked those
cats up that day, they told me that one and only
Ivan was the cat that was brought in with Grumpy
Bunny. So I don't know if there were three or
they just got confused that day and told me Turkey
Vulture's story instead. But Turkey Vulture and
Grumpy Bunny look similar, so I would bet that
those two are the two that came in together and
Ivan just had the wrong background story. But
anyways, the owner died and the family loaded
them up. the same day in one crate and handed
them crate and all to the shelter. The pea litter
of two came into the shelter very sick. They
thought they were going to lose them for sure,
but they worked around the clock to nurse them
back to health and now they're doing great. Robin
and her five R babies actually do have a crazy
story. The kittens were taken from the mom way
too young and dumped in a box at the local police
department so the shelter went and got them and
started bottle feeding them. Then two days later
someone came into the shelter to surrender their
mama cat with no kittens. When the workers asked
where the kittens were the owner told them that
he dropped them off in a box at the police department
a few days earlier. And I know you may be thinking
oh that poor mama being ripped away from her
babies. No Robin is not winning mom of the year
anytime soon She has hated taking care of her
babies and wouldn't even take them back after
they were reunited at the shelter So they had
to wean them sooner than we typically like just
because she was hissing at and biting them all
the time Which I'm not saying I blame her I'm
just saying she's not getting an award for it.
But that is all the stories for today. Thanks
for always listening and caring about my animals
down here. If you get a chance, make sure to
rate, review and subscribe to the podcast so
that I can quit my job. I'm going to get in trouble
for saying that someday when someone hears it
and doesn't understand why I say it. But it's
a rough life, but someone's got to do it.