NICE — There were gray clouds with a tiny swath of light blue in the skies hanging over the Community Center gym of Robinson Rancheria on Saturday. The parking lot was crowded and a small Rottweiler mix darted toward a blue door, behind which was the two-day clinic put on by Orphan Dog, the local all-volunteer non-profit dog rescue; the gym where the spunky Rottweiler mix was about to be neutered.
Under the basketball hoop at one end of the gymnasium was the surgery ‘theater’ with tables where dogs and cats were being worked on by 20 veterinarian staff, which included five vets and three vet students from UC Davis. According to the head vet, Tracy Huang from East Bay Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, her team specializes in high quality, high volume spay and neuter procedures. A typical cat neuter takes less than a minute to do, a cat spay takes four minutes, dog neuter takes six minutes and a dog spay takes 15 minutes. Along with the procedure itself, there are several other functions that need to happen; intake, wrapping, sterilization of instruments and making sure everything flows properly.
On Saturday the gym was packed with animals waiting their turn in a wall of crates that over the years Orphan Dog has collected. One couple, Melissa and Tracy Enyeart of the Tattooed Cherries, a Clearlake music Rockabillies duo, brought in Jackson, their 1-and-a-half year old Deer Head Chihuahua-Fox Terrier mix and 3-year old Kalel, a German Shepard-mix, both to be neutered, microchipped and to get their shots. They have three more dogs at home. Jackson’s blind brother is the electric blue-haired Enyeart’s dog, said the tattooed redhead. “He loves Tracy. That’s his dog! Kalel is supposed to mean protector, but we really should have named him Scooby-Do.” It would take a couple of hours for both procedures to be complete, including recovery, and as the Enyearts left the gym, Melissa covered her ears so she wouldn’t hear Jackson’s plaintive cries.
Staff members stay with each animal in the recovery area until they are able to go home with their owners. The crate side was loud with dogs barking, making it hard to hear. Little Jackson’s bark was the loudest.
Erich Reinstadler brought in two cats, mom Opal, and son Thor, to be spay and neutered, respectively. He found out about the Orphan Dog clinic through an article in the Record-Bee and signed up immediately. Reinstadler found Opal, a local neighborhood stray, in August and didn’t know that she was pregnant. “She was looking for someone to be her family and she chose me.” She eventually had three kittens, two of which Reinstadler found good homes for. He proudly opened the cat carrier and showed off the inquisitive orange tabby Thor and calm tortoiseshell Opal. “We’re waiting,” Reinstadler said. “We’re up soon.”
According to Karen Schaver, director and founder of Orphan Dog, they raised $13,000 of which $4,500 went for all the medications needed for surgery and warmers and flea and tick medications. Another $3,400 was allocated just for vaccines. Everyone, including the vets, donated their time.
There were 25 Orphan Dog volunteers who worked tirelessly. Two young women wearing staff T-shirts, hefted bags of dog food over their shoulders and walked them out to cars for people. Pet Food Express and Blue Buffalo donated the food. Random people brought in a giant pile of blankets. Besides the use of the gymnasium, Robinson Rancheria donated large bed quilts that had been rotated out of the hotel, which were used to cover crates that housed dogs pre-surgery. “Robinson Rancheria was hugely generous providing the Community Center gym, they also had staff available to help all weekend, including the early morning openings and late night closings,” said Schaver. Walking over to three tables laden with food, Schaver told how three volunteers organized six meals for the vets, staff and pet owners. “Have to keep the vets happy,” she said.
When asked why head veterinarian Huang donated her time to the clinic, she replied, “One of the main reasons I’m here is to address overpopulation and try to advocate for animal welfare, knowing that in Lake County there’s an overpopulation issue with very limited access to affordable, accessible veterinary medicine. So setting up these clinics is at least an effort to address that issue.” Plus a huge part of the clinic for her is to, “Try to create a bridge with indigenous communities and to help support the human-animal bond there. It’ll take time,” she said, “and this is a start.”
The final tally for the two-day clinic was, 108 dogs and cats fixed. As Orphan Dog stated on their media page, “It was a good day at the office.”
