Way to go, Marlene! by articulating the realities of a large shelter
environment. In a perfect universe, yes, we'd have "clean" rooms, and
halfway houses, sterile rooms and a dozen spare rooms just waiting to
hold ferrets with unknown vaccination histories. We'd have scrub rooms
and staff scrubbing up and changing clothes before and after entering
each ferret room and/or touching a ferret.

The reality is that most shelters have 1 or 2 rooms they can house
ferrets in and are darn lucky if they have a 3rd spot to stash the ones
that are going to be tossed onto the street if you don't take them.
The shelter operator is overworked trying to juggle their shelter life
along with a personal life while trying to earn a living to keep the
roof over everyone's head. Staff is non-existent and help is a luxury
few shelters have.

All do the best they can. And I can bet I speak for most shelter
operators, it is never the ferrets that drive us to the edge, its
the people we have to deal with.

As for the Washington shelter bashing by an anon poster, that is
precisely why I rarely visit the FML any longer. (Sorry BIG!). It
just gets my blood pressure up.

I appreciate Kevin's openness. Having been one of the shelters who
survived the initial outbreak of ECE with all the confusion, fear and
anger that comes with not knowing what is happening or why, I know
just what they've gone through.

Ann Gruden
Ferret Association of Connecticut

[Posted in FML 7101]