My Delilah and A New Law Restricting Pet Stores To the Sale Only of Dogs, Cats and Rabbits From Animal Shelters & Non-profit Rescue Operations
Her name was Delilah, intriguing, especially for a dog that didn’t even weigh six pounds. Was she named after the Biblical tale of Samson and Delilah, the temptress that helped lead to the strongman’s downfall? Or was it because of the Tom Jones’ song, Delilah. That’s what everyone kept asking me.
Right, an Affenpinscher, circa 1915; credit W.E. Mason, Dogs of All Nations. Wikipedia
Besides my own pop culture ignorance — I’d never heard of the song — I had no idea because she was a rescue dog that I found online.
Someone else named her. That was just the beginning of the mystery about to unfold for me, the mystery involved in adopting such a dog, both the joys and sorrows.
I’d been looking online for almost a year to replace my Australian terrier whom I lost to liver disease and old age, scanning humane societies and other shelters and rescue outfits throughout my home state of Washington and adjacent Oregon. I believed in the slogan, you not only save a pet but you also create a space to save another.
Delilah. I looked up the biblical reference. Yes, she was the one responsible for Samson’s haircut and subsequent loss of power. As for Tom Jones’ song. that was the story of a crime of passion, of a man who stabbed Delilah after he learned she had cheated on him.
For me, Delilah the dog, indeed, was a temptress. The rescue operation featuring her said she was a Yorkie-poodle mix. One with black straight hair and gray highlights with a profile picture online of her face that was reminiscent of my Aussie. Both shared the same characteristic nose bump.
That was just enough to push me over the edge and make me apply for her adoption, even though it would mean a drive through treacherous Portland traffic en route to her temporary home in the timber wilds some 50 miles to the west. It was time. My hip replacement surgery earlier in the year was well healed. My own age was catching up on me, if I didn’t do something soon about a new pet I might not last long enough to see one through. Delilah’s age, five, plus her small size made her just about perfect.
I rolled through the traffic seamlessly thanks to the GPS in my car and out into the countryside. Then north through raw timber cuts till we came to Delilah’s rescue, a 501-C non-profit run by a local woman. She chose to remain anonymous for my story.
The ranch house was surrounded by separate fenced areas, all for the dozens of small dogs she cares for there. I was met by the happy yips and yaps of a multitude of petite dogs. Everything from fluffball Pomeranians to Chinese crested dogs to various mixes of Chihuahuas and Papillons.
Many of them are second chance animals that they received, I learned, from California. It this year became the first state to put in place a new law* restricting pet stores to the sale only of dogs, cats and rabbits from animal shelters or non-profit rescue operations. People can still purchase those animals directly from breeders. The new law is aimed at stopping puppy mills some of which in the past operated in deplorable conditions.
Perhaps the new law will help reduce the number of pets euthanized every year in the United States. The ASPCA, American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, estimates that 6.5 million companion animals enter US shelters. It says of those, 1.5 million companion animals are euthanized every year.
That represents a decrease of over one million since 2011, due largely to an increase in adoptions. The ASPCA estimates that 3.2 million shelter animals are adopted each year, 1.6 million of them dogs, the rest cats and rabbits. The organization and others also transport at-risk animals to areas like Oregon and Washington where they need more adoptable animals.
But the operator of Delilah’s rescue operation didn’t think it would impact her operation much. She said if there is a reduction in the number of last chance animals to her from California, it will just mean she will be able to take more from other states.
Delilah did not come from California. She was a product of the shelter to rescue system set up in Oregon. A system that gives hard to place animals that second or third chance by sending them to rescue operations that take more time to deal with problems.
Delilah is just such an animal. The poor little thing was surrendered to the Multnomah County pound east of Portland when her family of five years had to move and couldn’t take her. They listed her as a mixed dog, a yorkie-poo.
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