This viral video of the tiniest little puppy that can fit inside a plastic cup might not be the kind of news you would normally see in the lead up to a discussion about the current practices in animal shelters from coast to coast. But that is exactly the discussion that needs to happen. Once you watch the video of this newborn puppy and her momma you will understand why I say this puppy could be the one who gives voice to hundreds or thousands of other mother dogs and their puppies that find themselves at shelters.
The fact that this puppy is even alive to be the voice to countless other voiceless dogs and lets face it cats around the world is a miracle over and over again. Like most dogs who find themselves in a shelter when they are pregnant the first thought was to Euthanize the mother dog before the puppies were even born. The reasoning for this is that they know the puppies will require round the clock monitoring and care as well as mulitple rounds of vaccinations before they are old enough and have built up a strong enough immune system to be ready for adoption. It also means they will need to keep the mother dog around for at least 2 months taking up valuable resources that they could use on mulitple dogs in that space of time. Many shelters run by a city or town do not have a foster animal program and so they do not have anyone who can care for pregnant dogs and cat or their puppies or kittens even if there are people in the community who would step up and do it. That in itself should be a blog post.
But for whatever reason it was decided that this mother dog should be kept alive. The next idea which happens quite often was to in effect kill the developing puppies by spaying the mother while she was pregnant. While a spay surgery is something veterinarians in the US do on a daily basis and are as safe (as a surgery can be) doing so while the female dog is pregnant is not safe at all. Everything is enlarged and inflamed which makes the surgery harder for the dog and the surgeon and makes recover much longer and more painful then normal. Just ask your vet how long they ask a dog owner to wait after a dog does into heat before they will schedule a spay the answer will be at least a month if not two months (unless there is a EMERGENCY situation). Now multiply that with the fact that there are little puppies growing in the areas they are doing surgery on and think about how complicated that surgery is and how long it would take that female dog to recover. But the surgery happens all of the time killing the puppies before they are ever born. Somehow it was decided that this mother dog would be spared that surgery as well and she would be allowed to have her puppies.
Then little Beyonce was born and not breathing and instead of her mother having her puppies in a kennel in the middle of the night with no one there to help somehow she was given assistance by a vet. The veterinarian saw that little Beyonce was born and that she was not breathing so he helped her along by giving her CPR and getting her little lungs started. Now in about 8 weeks there will be active little puppies ready for adoption and Beyonce will go to a home that will love her and care for her she might even turn out to be a big dog in a few few years.
How can we make little Beyonce the spokes puppy to help end the current practices at our nations shelters?
How true. So many never make it this far! Very sad for any dog to end up in a shelter, let alone a pregnant one.
Oh my what a beautiful little puppy. I think she defiantly has a story to tell and a bar to raise!
What a heartbreaking story with a great end for the puppy anyway!
What a story. It will be interesting to see how this develops
People need to know what happens at shelters. I think it is not the fault of shelters but the fact that they have limited resources at hand and, maybe, not enough people adopting strays. People need to stop romanticizing animals and see the truth of the short lives and deaths of many dogs and cats.
I saw this on Yahoo last night. I hope this little puppy thrives.
Amazing story
So sad that pregnant dogs end up in shelters 🙁
Awe, what a fabulous story. That touches my heart.
Wow, so cute. The iPhone picture with the puppy speaks by itself!
What a precious story. We’ve got a few no-kill shelters in our area, but I never thought about what happens when animals come in pregnant. Very eye-opening. Thanks for sharing.
Such a sad story but it warms my heart to know that Beyonce survived.
One lucky little puppy!
Saw this on the morning news and was amazed. Such a good story, thankyou for sharing it
thanks for the amazing story
aww such a sweet puppy 🙂 thanks for sharing
Cute little guy 🙂