On Saturday, Downtown Dog Rescue was back at East Rancho Dominguez Park in Compton, offering free spay/neuter, vaccinations and microchips to dog owners living in Compton. Our day was booked solid, people on the waiting list had to be turned away there were so many dogs. We will be in Compton again next Saturday. Being in the clinic every month, we develop relationships with people in the community, as does any good business and our mobile clinic program is a business. We are in the business of getting every Compton dog spayed/neuter, a monumental task but one we are slowly chipping away at.

Sometimes, spaying/neutering is just not enough. I had a dog owner talk to me about “getting rid of her dog” last month. She was adamant about not taking the dog to the shelter or just giving the dog away to someone who might want to fight him. Her son bought “Max” a 90 pound Bandog, as a puppy and then he dumped the dog on mom, who is a senior and can’t handle Max, a very loving but out of control “youngster”. I had told her that the true test of a good home in Compton is going to be someone taking him although he is fixed. I offered to neuter the dog and help her find Max a home. To my surprise, she showed up with this big boy in a really small car, with her neighbor’s son Chris, who instantly became another DDR youth volunteer. Joel, who rides his bike over to the park every time we do a clinic also helped get Max in control, while we all waited for his name to be called by the vet tech. With these two boys and of course Edgar, my key volunteer and terrific dog handler, we were in good shape.

Max needs a forever home. He is eight months old, very social with all people, even young children. He seemed fine around all of the dogs, no growling, not even at the small dogs. This is a dog that just needs to learn some manners!

On Sunday, I was back at class, where I met our new volunteer handler, Barry, owner of Blue Collar Dog Supply, a terrific dog supply store in Echo Park. He worked “Pearl” in the class and I was handling “He Man”. When class was coming to a close, a woman pulled up with a pickup truck full of pit bulls. All total, she has over ten at the house and needs homes for all four puppies, two females and two males, all four months old. She also needs a home for “Mano” a two year old blue pit bull, who will not get along with Big Daddy, father of all the pups. She did not want to take everyone to the shelter, so we agreed to help.

All of the dogs will be spayed/neutered, Downtown Dog Rescue is going to pay for all the surgeries. If there was ever a photo for why not to breed pit bulls, it’s this photo, a cage full of older puppies that she could not sell, not even the one with the clipped ears.

Although, I wondered, what her plan was and why she bred the dogs in the first place, as this was not an accidental litter, I had to step back and consider, she didn’t want to sell or give the dogs away to just anyone, she did not want to see the dogs go to anyone who would fight the dogs and she was committed to not taking the pups or any of the dogs to the shelter. She will keep the dogs until we can find qualified homes for all the dogs. If you are a rescue and would consider taking one of the pups, please let me know. If you are looking to adopt a pit bull puppy, all of these pups have excellent temperaments, Daddy Dog is amazingly social, was kenneled in the crate with all the pups climbing all over him, he did nothing aggressive, not one correction bite, totally accepting of the situation. Some new class members were shocked about the situation and the condition of the dogs. I was grateful that this dog owner cared enough to seek me out and bring all the dogs to our class, looking for help.

Positive changes for dogs will only happen if we, who love dogs, stay close to the community that needs our help the most. Rescuing dogs from the shelter is a wonderful thing to do, but if we can prevent the litters from ever being born and continue to provide options for people who can’t keep or don’t want to keep their dogs, before they take their dogs to the shelter, we will see a positive end result! Please consider supporting Operation Safety Net

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