Pet Talk

Are you a procrastinator? Did you wait till Christmas Eve to do your shopping? Do you start working on a project today that is due tomorrow, even though you’ve had a month to work on it? If so, you might not have licensed your dog yet, so I just wanted to remind you that this is the week to get it done to avoid any kind of late fees.
    Most people don’t realize that 90 percent of all dog license fees go directly to the animal welfare program to  support state cruelty investigators and other programs that help protect the animals in our state. Licensing your dog also assures that it is up to date on it’s rabies shot and where the fee is lower for a spayed or neutered dog, hopefully this is an encouragement for you to spay or neuter.
It’s a small price that we pay for the honor and privilege of owning a dog, and if we don’t just license our dogs but we actually put tags on their collars, it helps to identify them if they are lost. Sometimes it boggles my mind how many animals come into the shelter with no identification whatsoever. Shelters can’t help reunite these lost dogs with their owners if they don’t have any tags.
Now I can preach, but I’m no better than anybody else. My dog’s collar does have tags, but his most recent rabies tag is still sitting on the dining room table, just waiting for that “right moment” when I can go find a pair of needle nose pliers and attach it to the collar, removing the old one. I mean, geeze, that’s going to take what, all of five minutes? So it’s no wonder I’ve put it off for months!
This year we’ve tried to put together a hand-out that you can pick up when you license your dog. We just picked them up from the printers — thank you so much to Roz at Aroostook Print Shop for all her help in the design, and Houlton already has theirs and we hope to get the rest out to the other town offices shortly. So if you license your dog in Houlton, make sure to ask for this because this is a really helpful brochure. This will give you a list of all the local animal control officers, the local vets, reasons why you should spay and neuter, a list of things that could harm your pets, tips for finding lost pets, and a small section listing items that most shelters and rescues could use to help them continue their work.
This is not a campaign, a membership drive, a solicitation for funds, it is simply a fact filled brochure that you will want to put on your refrigerator and refer to often. Thank you Shirley Oliver for coming up with this idea. I’m really proud of the work that went into this and hope that you find it useful.
On another note, if you are a procrastinator, you might be looking at your year-end books right now and thinking that you need just one more deduction for your taxes. Keep in mind that Houlton Humane is a 501c3 non-profit and your tax-deductible donations are needed now more than ever. Winter is a very lean time for us, when income is down and bills are up. Fuel oil, trash removal, light bill (it’s now dark half the day!), you name it, it’s worse in the winter.
So if you are looking for a non-profit to bless with a financial gift before the first of the year, please consider Houlton Humane Society and mail your check to PO Box 548, Houlton, Me 04730.
To all my fellow procrastinators, here’s to living on the edge, waiting till the last minute, and then rushing to get things done!   Now, go out and license your dog. Happy New Year!
Cathy Davis is a longtime volunteer for the Houlton Humane Society. She can be reached at houltonanimalshelter@gmail.com or 532-2345.