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Affordable Spay and Neuter for your Companion Animals |
This past Monday, Marty Buck, an AT Board member, spoke to the 680 students of Bethune Elementary School, located at 15th Ave. & Buckeye, about the proper care of their pets with an emphasis on spay/ neuter. All the students were then given a flyer to take home announcing that Altered Tails' would be providing free spay/neuter surgeries, and vaccines, for all their pets on Thursday.
Yesterday, 16 dogs plus two kittens were sterilized.
Initially, there was only one kitten, brought in by a young girl, and one female pitbull brought to us by his proud 6-year old owner, Adrien, and Adrien's dad. Adrien was so excited to show off "Popcorn" that he was shaking. (Popcorn was brought to us on a rope.) Adrien served as an excellent interpreter for his Spanish- speaking dad. Adrien was so adorable, as was Popcorn, that we were all fussing over them both. After the Surgical Consent Form was completed, Adrien's dad instructed Adrien to ask if he could bring their two other male dogs. Obviously, we enthusiastically said, "Yes" and welcomed their large male pit and their elderly male husky mix.
An adult male chihuahua was brought to us by a retired neighbor. Faye, an AT Board member, spotted two stray puppies romping in the front lawn of the school. Acting quickly, and not wanting to miss an opportunity, Faye got two slip leads from the mobile, rounded up the pups and, happily, they were sterilized. Coincidentally, one of the students knew where the pups lived and took them home after surgery.
It was interesting to watch the parents of the students watching pets coming to our mobile clinic. A few of them ended up going back home and bringing us their dogs.
Altered Tails was disappointed we weren't able to sterilize more pets. We were told by a faculty member that despite what we thought was a low turnout, the reality was that we had an excellent turnout. Most of the parents of the students are illegally residing in this country and, therefore, will not participate in any activity where they have to provide personal information and/or sign paperwork. Altered Tails hopes we've come up with a way to overcome this challenge. We'll let you all know if our solution is a success after we visit the next So. Phoenix school.
October 19th 2007
October 21, 2007 will be Altered Tails' Fourth Birthday! The following are AT's s/n stats from our date of organization through 10/16/2007:
CURRENT STATS
11,804 Cats Sterilized
5,054 Dogs Sterilized
16,858 TOTAL STERILIZED
11/01/03 – 10/16,2007
When the Barnhart Clinic is up and running, we'll (hopefully) sterilize more than this total number annually!
Thank you to everyone for your contributions to AT's success in helping so many animals. You're all a blessing to every life we've helped through s/n.
October 8th 2007
Altered Tails Clinic
The building was previously owned for 25 years by Estelle Gracer. Estelle had her hand knit sweater manufacturing business in this building.
Don Overby will be the architect creating the required architectural and mechanical drawings. He'll then present them to City of Phoenix Building Department where the City will inform us of the mandatory building upgrades.
GMI will be the contracting firm. GMI specializes in building veterinary hospitals. GMI has worked with Don Overby on many veterinary hospital projects. It is AT's hope that this partnership will reduce problems with City of Phoenix and during construction.
Please keep your paws crossed that within one year lucky cats and dogs will be visiting the Altered Tails Barnhart Clinic to be spayed/neutered and the building will be full of happy barking dogs and meowing cats.
October 3rd 2007
Woman hopes to be lifesaver for pets
Steven Falkenhagen, For the Tribune
Pat Carpenter redefines the phrase "animal lover." She's the founder and president of Altered Tails, a charitable organization that operates a low-cost spay-and-neuter program.
The organization's goal is to sterilize 22,000 dogs and cats a year in an effort to reduce the number of animals that are euthanized.
Compassion compels her, she said.
"I do it for the humane reasons; 59,093 dogs and cats were euthanized in Maricopa County last year. And that was primarily because there were not enough homes," she said. "So my thinking is, 'Why not prevent the problem before it hits the ground?'"
Carpenter performs a variety of tasks for Altered Tails, but perhaps most importantly, she provided the impetus for the group's method of outreach: a 40-foot truck that contains all the tools needed for spaying and neutering pets. Altered Tails drives the mobile operating room to various locations in the community, where nearby residents can bring their pets to be sterilized.
Carpenter purchased the truck from a similar organization in Houston, drove it to the Valley, and for the first ninth months after the purchase, drove the rig to spay-and-neuter sites around the Valley.
A third veterinary technician has since come aboard, lessening Carpenter's truck-driving duties. Yet, she does other behind-the-scenes work for Altered Tails, tasks ranging from cleaning surgical instruments to planning the organization's black-tie fundraiser.
Kathy Lange, a former colleague of Carpenter’s at the Arizona Animal Welfare League, said Carpenter's work is motivated by a deep love for animals.
"She uses all her skills and energy and makes the rest of us look like chump change," Lange said. "She even drove to New Orleans two years ago to rescue animals from Hurricane Katrina."
The sterilization program provides benefits to the altered pets, as well as to the community, Carpenter said.
"Spayed and neutered animals are healthier, and barring any other medical problems, they will live two to three years longer," she said. "Sterile animals are also 91 percent less likely to bite than an intact animal."
The revelation to start a spay-and-neuter program came to Carpenter when the 51-year-old retired paralegal first started to perform volunteer work for the Arizona Animal Welfare League in 1999.
"It became obvious to me from working there and hearing phone calls from people who had litters of animals," said Carpenter, who lived in Scottsdale for a decade before relocating recently to Phoenix. "That's how I came to the decision to found a spay-and-neuter organization."
Altered Tails posts its schedule and prices online at
www.alteredtails.org.
The Scottsdale Tribune is profiling the 2007 Frances Young Community Heroes. The award pays tribute to those whose volunteer service directly benefits Scottsdale residents or organizations.
Today: Pat Carpenter
Thursday: Fred Christensen
Friday: Joe Garcia Jr.
Saturday: Courtney Harrington
Sunday: Karl McKinney
Monday: Ron Shoemaker
The organization's goal is to sterilize 22,000 dogs and cats a year in an effort to reduce the number of animals that are euthanized.
Compassion compels her, she said.
"I do it for the humane reasons; 59,093 dogs and cats were euthanized in Maricopa County last year. And that was primarily because there were not enough homes," she said. "So my thinking is, 'Why not prevent the problem before it hits the ground?'"
Carpenter performs a variety of tasks for Altered Tails, but perhaps most importantly, she provided the impetus for the group's method of outreach: a 40-foot truck that contains all the tools needed for spaying and neutering pets. Altered Tails drives the mobile operating room to various locations in the community, where nearby residents can bring their pets to be sterilized.
Carpenter purchased the truck from a similar organization in Houston, drove it to the Valley, and for the first ninth months after the purchase, drove the rig to spay-and-neuter sites around the Valley.
A third veterinary technician has since come aboard, lessening Carpenter's truck-driving duties. Yet, she does other behind-the-scenes work for Altered Tails, tasks ranging from cleaning surgical instruments to planning the organization's black-tie fundraiser.
Kathy Lange, a former colleague of Carpenter’s at the Arizona Animal Welfare League, said Carpenter's work is motivated by a deep love for animals.
"She uses all her skills and energy and makes the rest of us look like chump change," Lange said. "She even drove to New Orleans two years ago to rescue animals from Hurricane Katrina."
The sterilization program provides benefits to the altered pets, as well as to the community, Carpenter said.
"Spayed and neutered animals are healthier, and barring any other medical problems, they will live two to three years longer," she said. "Sterile animals are also 91 percent less likely to bite than an intact animal."
The revelation to start a spay-and-neuter program came to Carpenter when the 51-year-old retired paralegal first started to perform volunteer work for the Arizona Animal Welfare League in 1999.
"It became obvious to me from working there and hearing phone calls from people who had litters of animals," said Carpenter, who lived in Scottsdale for a decade before relocating recently to Phoenix. "That's how I came to the decision to found a spay-and-neuter organization."
Altered Tails posts its schedule and prices online at
www.alteredtails.org.
The Scottsdale Tribune is profiling the 2007 Frances Young Community Heroes. The award pays tribute to those whose volunteer service directly benefits Scottsdale residents or organizations.
Today: Pat Carpenter
Thursday: Fred Christensen
Friday: Joe Garcia Jr.
Saturday: Courtney Harrington
Sunday: Karl McKinney
Monday: Ron Shoemaker
October 2nd 2007
Thanks to our highly skilled veterinarians, Drs. Henckel, Isom, Kamiya, Shakelford and Snook, 550 cats and dogs were sterilized at 18 Altered Tails September mobile clinics; 159-non pitbull dogs, 35-pitbulls, 246-owned cats and 109 community cats (aka "feral"). An additional 8 cats were sterilized at Central Phoenix Animal Hospital.
19 mobile clinics are scheduled in October.
Effective January 1, 2008, Dr. Tom Shakelford has accepted a permanent position with Altered Tails working for us Monday through Thursday. For several years, Dr. Shakelford previously owned his own spay/neuter clinic in No. Phoenix.
Dr. Kamiya will continue to fly down to Phoenix from Denver, CO to work for Altered Tails the last Friday and Saturday of every month.
Altered Tails continues to push forward with the remodel of our Barnhart Spay/Neuter Clinic. We are currently holding a capital campaign to raise the necessary $700,000 needed to bring the building up to City of Phoenix building code, make slight interior renovations and for the purchase of veterinary equipment and supplies. Bea and Dick Barnhart, who paid cash for the building, have committed to match dollar-for-dollar all donations Altered Tails receives toward the clinic building project! Altered Tails currently has $100,000 in the bank, earning interest, for this important and exciting project. Will you please help Altered Tails by asking your animal-loving friends, family members and co-workers to make a donation? Please ask them to earmark their donations "clinic". As soon as the clinic is open, the goal is to have four full-time veterinarians working seven days per week and sterilizing 22,000 needy dogs and cats annually.
Thank you all for your support of Altered Tails!
Pat Carpenter
Wednesday 25th July 2007
Dear Friends of the animals and Altered Tails,
Altered Tails has again been blessed by a munificent donation from our Board member Bea Barnhart and her husband, Dick.
Yesterday, Bea and Dick opened escrow to purchase the 5,300 sq. ft. commercial building at 950 W. Hatcher in Phoenix for Altered Tails to build a fixed spay/neuter clinic. Escrow will close on or before August 31. Bea and Dick are making this amazing gift in honor of their beloved doggie girl, Princess. The Barnharts believe spay/neuter is the only way to control companion animal overpopulation.
The goal of this clinic is to sterilize 22,000 dogs and cats annually. During escrow and remodeling of the building, Altered Tails will be busy announcing the transportation component of our business plan. All area rescue groups will be invited to participate in our program to insure the clinic reaches its goal of 22,000 annual surgeries. The rescue groups will be asked to participate by scheduling spay/neuter appointments from the public that call their organizations asking for references for affordable spay/neuter surgery. Transportation of pets, as well as feral cats, will be provided from designated pick-up points within a 100 mile radius of the clinic.
During the past 14 months since Altered Tails has been driving our mobile clinic to our needy neighbors around the valley, the mobile has proven that not only do people need affordability to sterilize their pets they also convenience. Many of our "customers" do not have transportation.
Needless to say, this is a very exciting time in the growth of Altered Tails' community service. I look forward to keeping you all up to date on the progress of this project.
In the meantime, if anybody knows how Altered Tails can adequately thank Bea and Dick, please let me know. I'm at a loss!
Pat Carpenter
Altered Tails
Saturday 14th July 2007
A special FREE cat spay/neuter day for the public was hosted today by Altered Tails and 57 cats were sterilized. Dr. Laura Henckel, who drove up from Tucson, was our surgeon for this special day.
A collaboration of the following groups were the muscle behind this successful day:
1. Animal Care & Control allowed Altered Tails to park our mobile clinic in the parking lot of their Cat Adoption Center on 35th Ave. north of Camelback. AC&C also had flyers at all three of their facilities announcing the event.
2. Pam Kalish, of Spay/Neuter Hotline, created and passed out the flyers and handled making all the appointments. She also trapped 17 ferals and transported them to our clinic.
3. AzCATs provided humane traps for the ferals. Jan Raven, of AzCATs and Altered Tails, worked on the mobile cleaning instruments post-op and wrapping spay packs for the next spay day. Suzie Jones, of AzCATs, helped transport ferals and some owned cats.
4. Altered Tails provided the clinic and all medical supplies, paid the veterinarian and two vet techs. I drove the mobile.
It was a fun and successful day. 57 cats lives will be greatly enhanced through spay/neuter. Potentially thousands of lives were prevented and, therefore, saved through spay/neuter.
We all look forward to working together again soon.
Saturday June 2nd 2007
In the month of May, Altered Tails mobile hospital conducted 21 mobile spay days at various locations throughout the valley and sterilized 538 cats and dogs. (179 dogs + 23 pitbulls + 200 cats + 136 community cats (aka "ferals" or "free-roaming"))
We are grateful to the following highly-skilled veterinarians who worked for us in May:
Shannon Carey,
Laura Henckel,
Frank Isom (also an Altered Tails Board member),
Cristie Kamiya (who lives in Denver and flies to Phoenix one weekend per month to help us),
Derek Osterheld, and
Rick Snook.
All of these doctors work for Altered Tails on their days off! They are all committed to spay/neuter.
Two of the May mobile clinics were held at schools in low-income school districts. A few days before these two clinics, Marty Buck, an AT Board member, spoke to the entire student body about the proper care of and commitment to companion animals with an emphasis on spay/neuter.
In June, our mobile clinic is traveling to an extremely poor neighborhood, in zip code 85008, that is overrun with community cats. Altered Tails is partnering with AzCATs in this effort.
Altered Tails is also collaborating with "Body Positive". This organization works with people who are living with AIDS or are HIV positive. Dr. Isom is volunteering his time and Altered Tails is providing our services free on this special day.
Thank you to all of you who support Altered Tails' important community service.