Week 5, Days 1-3: Oh my heck!

This post is entitled "Oh my heck!" because that's my favorite saying around here in Southern Utah. And, oh my heck, have I ever been busy lately! So you're getting three days in one blog post...

Monday

On Monday, I had my last shift in Horse Haven. I am sad that I won't be working there anymore, but I had a fantastic last day there. I got to say good morning to Squeaky the office pig:

And then I headed out to help muck the pastures. This pretty much sums up life in Horse Haven:

The best part of the day was when I got left in charge of the volunteers and got to drive Ruby (the 4-wheeler-type thing) from pasture to pasture! It was a bit of a rough ride for my poor passengers at first, but I got the hang of it:

We also got to go on an amazing tour of the canyons, where I saw my first petroglyphs. It was just a wonderful morning.

I spent my afternoon in Rescue Village, bonding rabbits and working on my project, finalizing my informational pamphlet on rabbit bonding. It was a productive afternoon.

Tuesday

Tuesday morning was spent working from home on my research for Dr. Frank. I'm still so thrilled that I have the opportunity to assist on the exact type of research I've always wanted to do. I'm getting a really good response from my work so far, so I'll be spending Friday morning working on that as well. I headed into Rescue Village after lunch and bonded rabbits again. The fab four, as I liked to call them, were doing great at bonding in their small indoor pen, but that changed a bit today, which I'll get to in a moment. If you ever wonder what I do at work, I spend hours sitting in rabbit pens:

Wednesday

Today was a really great day. My morning shift was an outing with Pepsi. He's seriously the sweetest, cutest dog on the planet! Everyone loves him, and once again, I couldn't make it through town without getting stopped a few times because of his celebrity status. We had a really great time and I started teaching him his trick for tomorrow's obedience class. I decided on "spin" because he follows the lure of a treat really well. He had a gift for me when I got there today, which was the sweetest thing ever: he gave me a t-shirt with his big ol' head printed on it! Pepsi and I had a great morning and did a variety of things. Here he is fishing in the pond by the Welcome Center and then trying to eat his entire bag of treats!

This afternoon, I spent my final shift at Rescue Village. I have really come to love the animals and staff there, so it was a difficult goodbye. The day was rather eventful as I took my four rabbits that I'm trying to bond outside for the first time into a bigger pen. It did not go well. At all. There were so many fights I couldn't keep track of it. I was disappointed that they all couldn't get along, but we were able to keep two of them out to see if they could bond together without the others. In order to assist in the bonding, I stressed them by placing them in a crate and driving them around on a motorized cart around the parking lot. They bond over their shared experience when that happens. Here they are in their cart:

Even though I didn't love the thought of stressing them, I have to say they were nearly letter perfect after that! I took them back to the indoor bonding area and they relaxed together. Luckily the rest of the afternoon was uneventful!

I can't believe I only have two days of work left before I leave here. I love it so much and I've met the most incredible people. I truly feel like I have family here now and I've been really enjoying my work and spending time with my Kanab family and friends after work. That makes keeping up a blog pretty tough, but I'll do my best for the final few days here. I'll have plenty of time to catch up on the plane ride home if I get behind again...

Week 4, Day 3: Pepsi, Clinic, and Bunny Bonding

Unfortunately, I do not have any good pictures from today, as my point-and-shoot camera has died. Well, the lens has died anyway, so it may not be working for a while. I'll do my best to post pictures from my iphone in the future and of course I'll bring my DSLR if I go anywhere particularly scenic.

Today's morning shift was an outing with Pepsi. We followed our usual routine and went to the training area called Tara's Run. Pepsi and I did some clicker training, he played on the agility equipment, and sniffed around. He loves Tara's Run! At one point, I was sitting on a table at one end of the building and he was at the opposite end. He decided he wanted to check in with me, so he launched into a full on sprint. Those strong little legs make him one very speedy dog! So I have a 70+ pound dog running full speed at me and he launches himself into a jump up onto the table and lands right next to me before gently crawling into my lap and slobbering my face with kisses. It was such an enthusiastic and loving moment. I know a some people would be frightened with a pit bull mix headed toward them at full speed, but Pepsi doesn't have a mean bone in his body. He's one of the gentlest souls I've met. He is proof that we should judge the dog, not the breed.

Pepsi and I spent the rest of our morning at the Welcome Center, where he met with his fan club and introduced himself to a ton of new visitors. He made friends with everyone. Some are cautious to approach him (he does have a very large head!), but as soon as they seem him sitting in my lap, giving out kisses, and calmly lying down, they all come around to love him. Most people walk straight toward him because he is so adorable and has a completely magnetic effect. I truly cannot wait for him to find his forever home.

Pepsi and I ended our morning a bit early because the interns had a tour of the vet clinic before lunch. It was very interesting to see the clinic and all of the wonderful staff and equipment that help diagnose, treat, and maintain the health of the animals at the sanctuary. On a personal note, it was a tough tour for me to take because I've had a lot of medical trauma, mainly stemming from surgical issues, so even though this was not a human hospital with humans on the operating tables, it reminded me way too much of my experiences. I prefer to stay out of operating areas whenever possible! This is why, as much as I love animals, I could never be a vet. Luckily, there are many other ways to help the animals.

After lunch, I headed up to Rescue Village to smoosh some bunnies (aka bonding rabbits). We pulled together the four rabbits that we started bonding yesterday and worked on them again today. They did really well overall. I was able to be outside their pen for the majority of the time. They ate some greens and groomed each other, and relaxed a bit from yesterday. There was one small tussle, however, that required me to squirt them with a water bottle and break up the fight. They all calmed down afterward, but I was a little disappointed in that setback. I just have to remember that bonding rabbits does not happen overnight and I need to be patient.

I was exhausted after work today and didn't feel the greatest because I'd hit my head really hard on a metal frame earlier in the day! Talk about a headache! So I've been relaxing this evening and enjoying the company of my host family. It'll be wonderful to get a good night's rest tonight and look forward to a day full of dogs tomorrow. I get to work in one of my favorite areas of DogTown in the morning, followed by training class with Pepsi in the afternoon. I am so grateful for this experience. How lucky am I to look forward to my job everyday?! The people are amazing, the setting is paradise, and the animals heal my soul. No wonder it is called a sanctuary. If it weren't for a few things that I miss a lot while I'm here, I would be applying for a job at the sanctuary right this moment with no hesitation. I know it will be a big part of my life from now on.

Week 4, Day 2: Research, Creek, Bonding, and TNR

Today was a slightly different type of day: I worked from home for my morning session. I am lucky enough to be helping Dr. Frank with his current research project on dogs who come from hoarding situations. I spent all morning working on ways to accrue dogs to the study. I think I made some good progress, and I'll work on it again on Thursday. I also spent a little time researching more facts for my other project, a pamphlet on bonding rabbits.

After a productive morning at home, I packed a lunch and headed to Kanab Creek on the Best Friends property to eat lunch with the other interns. It was so beautiful down there!

For my afternoon shift, I was scheduled to work at Rescue Village bonding rabbits. Today was pretty exciting because we put together the two rabbits that I started bonding last week, Scooby and Piper, and we added in the other two that we'd initially wanted to bond them with as well: Gretel and Emmitt. Bonding four rabbits was a little intimidating at first because I had to keep an eye on all of them to make sure no one fought. Luckily, it was a great bunch and pretty soon I was smooshing them together and they were lying all in a row, grooming each other!

They still have a long way to go before they're bonded, but I'll work with them again tomorrow afternoon and hope that things continue to go well. Imagine what bonding four rabbits does for a rescue organization: it gives four rabbits a better life and opens up space to take in at least three more rabbits! 

Week 4, Day 1: Bonding

Well, I was supposed to be doing some rabbit bonding today, but that ended up not happening, which I'll get to later. Luckily, I still had a great day and bonded with others in the process.

My morning shift was spent entirely with Pepsi. He was super excited to see me this morning and I was beyond excited to see him. I just adore this boy! First, we went to Tara's Run, the training area, because he loves it there and he can run around and play on agility equipment and get some energy out, all while feeling safe and not distracted by other dogs. We had a blast in there today, going on the teeter-totter, the dog walk, the a-frame, through a little tunnel, over a hurdle, and jumping on on all the tables. Sometime in the middle of all this fun, I pulled him aside into a smaller enclosure to work on our homework assignment from last week's training class, called "101 Things to do With a Box." Basically, we were assigned to just clicker train our dog to pay attention to the box and then gradually shape a behavior out of it. Pepsi did great: by the end of our session he knew to put his front two paws in the box in order to get a "click" and a treat!

After our weekly visit to the Welcome Center, where Pepsi goes to see his fan club, we headed into town. He did very well in town and visited with several people. One staff member even pulled off the road to come get her "Pepsi fix" when she saw us out walking. I swear, there is not a single person I meet who does not love this dog! We met man in town, who Pepsi really took to immediately and this man really liked Pepsi. I thought for a moment I might have found his match. It was love at first sight for them both. Unfortunately, this man has a cat at home and Pepsi doesn't do well with cats. I was really bummed out because they seemed like they'd make a great team.

Next, Pepsi and I decided to take a hike together. He's a very athletic dog, but this hike was much rockier than I expected, so we both were scrambling! The views toward the top were amazing though!

We bonded deeply during this hike because we had to watch out for one another. Sometimes he didn't know how to navigate the rocks, so he'd look back at me, asking me to go first and show him. Other times, he led the way through narrow paths, with a drop off just to the side of us. He was always very careful to not pull me. For example, when he would get momentum up while going down a bunch of steep rocks, he would stop at the bottom so that I could go down the rocks too before we moved on. It was really an amazing partnership. We were both in a situation that was rather harrowing and dangerous in retrospect, but we were 100% there for each other. 

At one point, the trail split, and I let Pepsi decide which way to go. Unfortunately, the decision was not the right one because after walking for a ways, the trail suddenly ended in a sandy cliff that we both began to slip down! It was really scary. After we started sliding down a few feet, we slowed a bit and I just told him to hold very still. I started to slowly move back up, without causing an avalanche of sand and then told him to slowly follow as I was able to help pull him up back onto a flat surface. He acted perfectly and I could have cried as I hugged him and told him what a good boy he was for staying calm and listening to me. 

So we ended up getting out of our scary situation with no problems. Well, there was one tiny problem in that we ran into another dog on our way down. We pulled off to the side of the narrow trail to let it pass, but Pepsi is in love with other dogs, and though I was hanging on to a significantly sized rock to brace myself against his inevitable pulling on the leash towards the other dog, Pepsi was stronger than my rock and I stumbled and cut up my hand on some rocks. No big deal though: two bandaids later, I'm as good as new.

We were both exhausted after our adventure, so we headed home just in time for lunch. This was Pepsi on the ride home:

Thank you, dear Pepsi, for all the dog fur, slobber and paw prints that now adorn my rental car! I put him back in his run when he got home and after a big drink of water (I did have water with us on the hike for him to drink), he flopped down on his side and settled in for what I presume was a very good nap. I wish I could have napped with him!

After lunch, I headed up to Rescue Village to do my bonding with the rabbits, or as I like to call it, smooshing bunnies (because sometimes you literally have to smoosh them together!). However, they were way understaffed today, so Meghan (a fellow intern) and I ended up just helping out however we were needed. It was actually a really fun afternoon. Usually there aren't two interns working in the same area, but Meghan and I both happen to be doing projects up there, so we worked together and bonded while cleaning, feeding, and watering the rabbits. Having her there made the time go by so much faster!

I was happy to see that my first pair of rabbits that I did bond are doing great together. Someone even made them a special sign:

I got home from work today and, after an exhausting day with a not-so-great night's sleep last night, I lay down on the living room floor to greet all the cats and dogs that I live with. They all piled on top of me and I ended up falling asleep! I woke up in time for dinner and I'm looking forward to going back to bed tonight!

Week 3, Day 4: Dogs, Dogs, Dogs

I haven't felt very well today. I've been having a flare up all day of some of my chronic illness issues, including an upset stomach and really bad fatigue. I didn't feel too bad this morning when I started my morning shift at the Fairway in DogTown. But the first thing I did was take a little chihuahua on a walk, and I could hardly make it through the walk. Luckily, a lot of the rest of my morning was spent socializing shy dogs, so that did not require much exertion on my part. It was really rewarding to work with a couple of dogs who would not allow me anywhere near them a couple weeks ago and watch them start to make progress. Two dogs in particular got to the point where they'd take food from my hand and allow me to pet them. I could tell it was hard on them, but I'm so proud of their progress.

One dog I worked with is named Mocha. She is such a sweet dog! I have never been able to get near her. Today I sat outside with her on a leash and I tried to feed her peanut butter, just to associate being outside with me with something good. This was how she was when we first got out there: lying as far away from me as the leash would possibly allow!

She would not eat the peanut butter from me, but if I put some on the ground near her, she'd eat it when I walked away. By the end of our time together, she ate one single lick from the spoon of peanut butter in my hand. Later, I worked with her in her run. This is when we really made progress. She flinched the first time I touched her, and tucked her tail as I pet her, but slowly over time, she started to get more comfortable. After a while, she was giving me kisses!

Success! It was a really satisfying morning. Too bad I felt sick for most of it. After lunch, it was time to pick up Pepsi for training class. He was excited to see me, which was really nice. Last week's class did not go very well because he gets too excited and distracted when he's around other dogs, but this week we worked really hard on not barking and on staying focused. He did a great job! We also all worked on loose-leash walking, which he is very good at. But I found that when he was on the road with cars, and all the other dogs from class, he struggled and wanted to pull. Every time he pulled, we stopped walking. By the end of the walk, he was doing great again.

At the end of class, a lot of what we were doing was just sitting and listening to the trainer. Pepsi has trouble with this because he wants to be doing something, especially if it involves greeting the other dogs. But we sat through the whole thing and he didn't make a peep. Granted, I was feeding him a million treats, but hey, whatever it takes! He was getting so slobbery from the treats and dirty from the dirt flooring the he got himself (and me!) totally caked with slobbery muddy dirt. Look at his paws!

After class, we have the opportunity to take our dogs on outings. Pepsi gets very stressed during class, so I personally think the last thing he needs after class is more stressful stimulation. So instead, we went somewhere quiet and sat together. He was on my lap of course. This was also good for me because I really wasn't feeling well by this time.

I was hoping to go to the Blessing at Angel's Rest tonight, which is a blessing of animals who have crossed the rainbow bridge. I actually donated money in honor of my last dog, Soda, to Best Friends and had her commemorated at their Blessing last year. So it's an emotional thing for sure, but I really wanted to go. Unfortunately, I'm just not up to it. I hate when I have flare-ups of my illness and I don't even know what really caused them. All I know is that I need to rest in bed, eat the right foods, and hope my stomach doesn't start to feel even worse! Hopefully a good night of rest will make me feel better.

Oh, and to end on a positive note: I checked in with Rescue Village this morning and my first two rabbits that I helped bond spent the night unsupervised and it went really well! They were cuddling all day today and continuing to groom each other. What a success!

Week 3, Day 3: Halfway Point!

I can't believe I'm halfway through my internship already! I feel like I still have so much to do and so little time! Today was one of my favorite days so far, and I'll explain why in a bit, but first I have to do a little photographic rewind and post some pictures from yesterday to make up for last night's photo-less blog post. I mentioned I worked in horses in the morning. There are two horses in particular that I really enjoyed being around: Helen and Amir. Helen has been blind in one eye her whole life and has gradually lost sight in her other eye over time. She's a beautiful horse, but she just makes me laugh because she lies down and groans all the time. The first time I witnessed it, I thought she was dying! But it's just how she is! Here she is in her beautiful surroundings:

The cool thing about Helen is that she has a boyfriend, Amir. They live in the same pasture and he is her eyes. I love them together. He's a very handsome horse, with a great personality. Here I am with him:

If you aren't familiar with horses, you may be wondering why they're both wearing masks. Those are fly masks to help keep the flies off their faces. Oh, and yes, I'm wearing two jackets in this picture because it was freezing out in the morning, but in the high 80s later that afternoon. Crazy Utah weather. A huge thank you goes out to Ron for letting me borrow his jacket to wear over mine!

After mucking, we had to dump all the fragrant horse poop in its proper place. I captured this gem of a shot of Ron, in his new favorite Fredonia t-shirt, in the act of dumping tons of horse poop!

Okay, so now that we're caught up with photos, I can tell you why today was one of my favorite days so far. The first thing I got to do today was go to puppy socialization class. These puppies had amazing manners already and were so precious! The puppy I worked with, along with my fellow intern, Megan, was named Utter. Here she is:

It's almost too much cuteness to handle! After working on some manners and commands with the puppies, they were allowed to have a little playtime. Here's a clip of it for your viewing pleasure:

After working with the puppies, I headed over to another area of DogTown called Maggie's. I've been wanting to work in Maggie's since I found out about it. Maggie's houses dogs who need to live alone and who have some behavioral issues to work on. But they are sweet, wonderful dogs. Usually it's just one or two things that bother them, so we really try to work on those things with training so they can be adopted. I loved the dogs I met there today and I really liked the caretaker. I walked several of the dogs and took notes on their behavior throughout their walks. I like that this particular dog run takes special note of animal behavior and training. I am excited to focus more of my time there in the coming weeks.

In the afternoon, I was back at Rescue Village, bonding bunnies. I'm really enjoying this work. It's really rewarding to me to help a rabbit find a companion and also free up space for more rabbits to be rescued. My first pair that I started bonding have been together each day, supervised, for about a week now. They are Benjamin and Fargo. They're doing so great that tonight, they are being allowed to sleep in the same run, unattended. I'm praying it goes well, and I think it will, given how close they've become this week:

I will be calling Rescue Village first thing tomorrow morning to see how they did overnight! Today, I started bonding a new pair of rabbits: Piper and Scooby. They were very nervous the whole time, but showed no aggression towards one another. We'll have to see how they do in the next few days. Assuming it goes over well with the powers that be, I will be doing bonding as my internship project, and writing a pamphlet to hand out to visitors and potential adopters about why we bond rabbits and how to do it. The rabbit staff is really excited about this project! I love the staff up there. I'm even recording some video of the bonding so I might make a supplemental youtube video on bonding as well, as time permits.

After work today, I went to a talk by one of the founders of Best Friends, which was interesting and fun, but made for a long day. I came home and spent some fun time with my host family. Now I'm getting to bed too late! Tomorrow, I'll be in DogTown all day, first at the Fairway, where I worked my first real shift a couple weeks ago, and then in training class and on an outing with Pepsi, my project dog. After work, I'll be attending the blessing at Angel's Rest, where the sanctuary animals are buried once they've crossed the rainbow bridge. It's a beautiful place and I know I'll cry, so I should probably bring a box of tissues! Anyone can have their pet honored at one of these blessings. When my last dog died, I sent in a donation to Best Friends in honor of her and specified for her to be part of the blessing at Angel's Rest. A ribbon with her name on it was hanging with many others from the tree branches at Angel's Rest. 

One more thing before I end this blog (mostly because I don't want to end it on a sad note!): I heard from one of the vets who works here and does a lot of research in animal behavior, which is my biggest interest. I had asked him if he wanted help with anything that I could do for a project and he got back to me today saying there might be something I could do to help him with the current study he's working on. I'm really excited about that and will meet with him Friday to talk more about it! 

Week 3, Day 2: Horses, Dogs, Bunny Bonding

This morning turned out not to be a morning full of Parelli training, but I was able to discuss with the trainer better times to schedule my work sessions for that. So in the future, hopefully that will work out. For today, I mucked horse pastures, which was actually fun because there were several of us doing it, making jokes, talking, and of course enjoying our beautiful surroundings.

I ducked out of my morning shift early for a special intern opportunity. We got to go with one of the caretakers to her building of dogs, which tend to be very aggressive. Most of them are red collar dogs, and some will stay at the sanctuary forever because they cannot safely be adopted out into society. She talked about their behavior, some of the things they'd been through, some reasons behind why they do what they do (it's actually usually a lack of confidence, just like shy dogs!). If you think about it, that makes a lot of sense: when shy dogs get scared they use the "flight" response and when aggressive dogs get scared they use the "fight" response. At least one dog had a neurological condition where he's sweet and wonderful most of the time, but then basically loses his mind and goes crazy and can be aggressive until the episode passes. The vets still aren't sure what's causing that. A lot of these dogs are actually sweet a lot of the time, but pose dangers because they could flip to an aggressive side. It is great to know that they have such an amazing caretaker, who sees the good in them and does not give up on them, even if they'll live the rest of their lives at Best Friends. These dogs get playtime, walks, treats, training, and everything else the other dogs get. They live a good life. Some will eventually be adoptable to the right person as they are rehabilitated.

My afternoon shift was at Rescue Village again, which is definitely going to be one of my focus areas. I'm really loving helping out with bonding rabbits. My first pair that I probably mentioned last time I worked there is Fargo and Benjamin. I sat and watched them again today and supervised their interactions. They did so well! They've begun grooming each other and snuggling on their own without me having to smoosh them together. I'll work there tomorrow afternoon again, and the caretakers said if things go as well tomorrow as they did today, they think the pair will be bonded enough to try to stay the night together without supervision. It makes me nervous because they're my first bonded pair and I want them to do really well! I think they will. If all goes well, I'll move onto bonding another set of animals, and this time, we might bond up to four rabbits together at once! Should be exciting! I'm trying to come up with my intern project idea and I think maybe I'll do a pamphlet on rabbits and bonding. It's something I knew nothing about, but is so important to the rabbits. Now that I know, it would be great to help educate the visitors and potential adopters at Best Friends about bonding. The caretakers were excited at the prospect of this project, so that makes me happy.

I'm very excited for tomorrow because I have such a great day lined up: first I get to sleep in because I'm working at the Puppy Socialization Class, which doesn't start until 9:30 and I can't interact with other dogs before that, since the puppies don't have all their shots yet. After playing with puppies, I get to head over to Maggie's, which is an area of DogTown I've been wanting to work in since day 1. They really focus on animal behavior there and I've heard nothing but good things about it. Then, I get to spend my afternoon with the bunnies again. I'm not only growing fond of rabbits, but I love working up there because the staff are really great. So, even though I never thought I'd actually feel this way, I can't wait to go to work tomorrow!

Week 2, Day 5: Emotional Roller Coaster!

I cried twice at work today, once of sadness and once of happiness. If my job was an office job, that would probably be frowned upon, seen as something too emotional or inappropriate. But both times today, my tears were shared and understood by the people I worked with.

Rescue Village

I began my day with a shift in Rescue Village, which houses rabbits. All the rabbits in the yurts at Rescue Village came from one giant rescue mission from a hoarder in Reno, NV. They are not kidding when they say rabbits multiply quickly. I think when Best Friends got the call to help out, there were about 1,000 rabbits. By the time they got there, there were 1,600. The situation looked like this:

Rabbits carry a parasite called Encephalitozoon cuniculi (EC). For many rabbits, this will never become a problem, but for others, it causes neurological damage that often results in partial to full paralysis and many other degenerative conditions. So Rescue Village houses these rabbits, many of whom need special medical care.

I began my day walking around the yurt to which I had been assigned with a caregiver. We were feeding the rabbits as we went. Then we both saw it: one rabbit in the next run, lying on her side, not moving. The caregiver jumped into action as I gasped. Sure enough, she had passed away during the night. I've seen my fair share of dead animals (all you have to do is drive down a road and see all those hit by cars!) and I've seen many animals and people I've cared deeply about die too. So you may not think that the death of a rabbit who I didn't know would affect me, but it was an incredibly sad sight. Her name was Lissa. Rabbits bond for life. Lissa was bonded to two other rabbits in her run. It makes me so sad to think of what all of them went through that previous night as she died. The staff at Rescue Village were all wonderful and came to check on me to make sure I was okay and apologize for me having to see that. I was okay - it is part of the cycle of life. It's just hard to see.

I began cleaning the runs in that yurt, with the image of Lissa always in my mind. When I got to her run to clean it, I just broke down crying. There was vomit and urine near where she died and I just hope she didn't suffer much. As prey animals, rabbits hide illness and injury very well, so she was thought to be completely healthy until her death. I cleaned the run and cried the whole time. I replaced all the blankets with fresh ones and made it as nice as I could for the remaining two rabbits. Lissa, may you rest in peace.

I never came to Best Friends thinking I would focus any significant time in Bunny House or Rescue Village. Rabbits seemed cool, but I didn't have a huge interest in them except that they are cute and soft. But in my short time working here, I've learned so much about them and how amazingly complex they are. I love that they bond for life. They really need to have a companion to be happy. So, affected by the death of Lissa, and seeing some of the other rabbits at Rescue Village who had also lost their bonded partners, I decided to focus some of the remainder of my internship doing a little "matchmaking" and working on bonding pairs of rabbits. That may sound easy, but there are three species of mammals who will fight their own kind to the death: humans, dogs, and rabbits. I had no idea! They are very picky about who they are put with and will kill each other if it doesn't work out! But once they're bonded with the right rabbit, they will always have each other's backs. So today, I started bonding Benjamin and Fargo. These are Fargo's and Benjamin's current companions, respectively:

Clearly there's room for improvement! So we started the two rabbits together in a pen, highly supervised. Here they are:

Fargo is on the left and you may notice his back legs leaning off to the side. He is affected by EC and is mostly paralyzed in his lower body. Benjamin is on the right; EC has not affected him. Both have relatively recently lost their previous partners. The introduction went pretty well! I smooshed them together and pet them a lot to get each one's sent on the other one. I also rewarded them with carrots when they were being calm and not chasing or biting at each other:

By the end of my shift, I left them looking like this:

While I watched them, I made a special treat for the rabbits called Angel's Mush. I hope you're not eating as you read this because it looks disgusting:

But the rabbits adore it! It gets made into frozen treats. Here's the final product:

DogTown: The Clubhouse

For my afternoon shift, I worked in an area of DogTown called The Clubhouse. It houses a mix of all colors of dog collars, so there were few dogs that I could actually interact with. I worked in the small dog building. I cleaned every run (with the world's heaviest mop) and made sure all the bedding was fresh. All the dogs were kept outdoors while I worked on their indoor run. They looked very cozy by the time the dogs were allowed to come back in and get ready for dinner. There is usually a dog in the kitchen while the food is being prepared, but today I had a bonus and we got two kitchen dogs! I completely fell in love with one of them and wanted to take her home! She was so sweet! She had been hit by a car, so her back is broken and she has very limited use of her back legs. But she is a happy, sweet girl, full of kisses. And she loves to take walks, go to physical therapy, and just be a dog! Her name is Thumbelina:

The other little office dog was Isiah, who was a complete lap dog (and totally mischievous!):

So let me tell you about the second time I cried today. This time, my tears were out of happiness. I got to witness my first Best Friends dog go to his forever home. It was a small dog named Sammy and he was getting picked up by his eager new momma. She waited outside while the caregiver got him ready to leave. It was very bittersweet for the caregiver, who had grown very attached to this dog. I watched as he gave Sammy one last kiss on the head, told him he loved him, and handed him off to his new mom. She could hardly contain her excitement and Sammy started licking her chin immediately. It was so beautiful, I couldn't help but tear up! I wish Sammy the absolute best in his forever home! It's sad to see a dog you love leave, but it's so wonderful for that animal and it only makes room for us to rescue more animals!

After concluding our week with our weekly intern meeting, I left feeling like I'd had a pretty productive day. There can be a lot of sadness in animal rescue and a lot of cruelty and things you don't even want to imagine. But when the little victories happen, like when two very shy dogs who are terrified of humans ate their meals out of my hands today, it warms my heart like nothing else. And when the big victories happen, like an animal finally going to a forever home, it makes everything worth it. There's no better feeling in the world.