Shaggy survivors hanging on after Katrina

Kim Campbell Thornton • E-mail

More than two months after Hurricane Katrina blew in, animals are still being found alive in New Orleans, pulled out of attics and from beneath flooring or off of the streets, where they’ve been surviving on sheer will and the kindness of strangers who leave food for them.

Some are little more than skin wrapped around bones. Starving, dehydrated and depressed, they still greet people trustingly, perhaps somehow recognizing that they represent salvation from their utterly bewildering circumstances.

In the past month, volunteers with Animal Rescue New Orleans, run by Jane Garrison of Charleston, S.C., have rescued more than 400 animals, delivering them to the Best Friends animal shelter on the grounds of Saint Francis Animal Sanctuary in Tylertown, Miss. Garrison’s crew sets out food and water around the city to keep animals alive until they can be coaxed into custody or humanely trapped. The team also responds to phone calls reporting animals that are trapped.

Silver was one of those pets. Garrison says they received a call from a construction worker whose company had been contracted to gut a house.

'Like a skeleton with skin'
“When they went in there, they found this sweet little cat that couldn’t even move,” she says. “She was lying in her own urine, skin and bones, just like a skeleton with skin. She had a collar around her neck with the name Silver and a phone number. We took her to the animal hospital, and I tried to call that number. I couldn’t get through, so I tracked down the construction company’s main office and found out who owned that house. He was completely speechless on the phone; he couldn’t believe she was alive.”

At last report, Silver was getting intravenous antibiotics and fluids, but wasn’t yet eating.

The same week, a woman called to report that every time she went back to her apartment building, there was still a dog there that had been left behind. She would give the dog what food and water she could find, but didn’t know what to do with him otherwise until she saw one of Garrison’s flyers.

“We went there, and we found this little Chihuahua hiding under the blankets in this apartment,” Garrison says. “He was very frightened, very depressed, extremely thin, of course, filled with fleas, and very dehydrated and hungry. While we were there, we started hearing meowing. We pulled down the stairs to the attic, went up there, and found a tabby cat still alive.”

At last count, the Best Friends shelter held 320 dogs and 154 cats, all waiting to be placed in foster homes across the country. They’re photographed and information about them and where they go is carefully recorded so they can be easily tracked if and when their owners come in search of them.

Up for adoption
No one knows yet how many people and animals have been reunited. At Best Friends, there have been only 112 such reunions so far. It’s likely that a number of pets will be adopted into new homes, says Michael Mountain, president of Best Friends Animal Society.

“I think what’s going to happen is there are a lot of people who really would like to reunite, but they find themselves in a different part of the country now, they don’t have a job, they’re living with family," he says, "and … for many people life will move on and they’ll be grateful for the fact that somebody else has got Fluffy or Fido.”

Most shelters that have taken in Katrina pets are placing them in foster homes until Dec. 31, to give owners as much time as possible to find and claim them. After that, they’ll be made available for adoption.

For some, the single most important thing is getting back together with their dog or cat. One woman was so distraught by the loss of her cat that she had to be hospitalized in intensive care. “They found the kitty, and it’s given her new life,” Mountain says.

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