You wrote:
>No, not all shelters are good.  Read some of the FML archives for Utah,
>Hagerstown, the Christmas Rescue, Titusville, and so many others.  If
>these shelters were encouraged to limit themselves, the tremendous hit
>that rescue volunteers had to absorb may have not been so bad.  276
>ferrets, 118 ferrets, Triage, ADV Testing, Cataloging, Vaccinating,
>Emergency Surgery, spay/neuter.  If a shelter cannot offer these basic
>services, it is up to those who perform the rescue.
 
I agree with what you have said here, not all shelters are good, but I do
think that it is possible that they started out with good intentions, or
at least hope they did.  What happens if donations aren't coming in, and
your numbers are getting higher, yes, it can become a disaster.  I would
like to see those disasters stop, and I think that some could be stopped,
if others intervened in a friendlier way.  Rather than flame them for
letting the numbers get high, help them by showing them how to network,
if several shelters in the area, split up some of the numbers between
themselves to take some off of the one shelter, that would help, also
becoming a referral for the placement of the ferrets would help, But ,
donations also help, if nothing is done, then it just gets worse and
becomes a massive rescue, and a burden on other shelters..
 
One thing I would like to say, all shelters at some point , sometimes,
need donations,, it's impossible to run a shelter without donations.  Not
just money, as i said before, people need to send food, and other items
from time to time.  It's just a fact, it cannot be done without some
help.
 
This is why I posted in the beginning, sometimes the flames end up
keeping the shelter from asking for help, then it does get out of hand
sometimes.  I just believe that if the community works together, that
shelter could stay open, get the numbers down and keep from being another
big rescue.  All with a little help from everyone.  Yes, I know the
community does work together many times , over and over, but it seems
that sometimes it doesn't work.  Does this shelter with 82 ferrets belong
to that group for shelter operators?  If not, maybe they should join and
start there with getting some advice and help.
 
You mentioned another big rescue as if you already know that there will
be one, if this is so, why isn't there some help on that one to keep it
from becoming a burden on other shelters.  There's got to be a solution,
or I should say, I am hoping we can find a solution to these problems
because it happens too many times.(big rescues)  There is a lot of
wonderful people on this list.  Let's start with some ideas before
another one happens.  How about one site with a list of adoptable ferrets
on it from the shelters.  List them by state, if someone is looking for
a ferret to adopt they can go to the site, see the pics and select a
shelter in their state to adopt from.  This would be good because every
shelter does not have a website and can't afford one.  Just an idea.  It
seems that the "giving Tree" does so well each year, so the website would
be something like that.  Try to get the website advertised, each shelter
could post it on boards at the local pet stores.  Many pet stores have
boards to post on.  also could be posted on boards at the vets offices.
Like I said, just an idea.  I don't know if it could work or not.  I
think it could.
 
Another idea, some shelters sell on ebay to raise funds, do some of the
rescues not want to sell , or do they not know how to do it.  Maybe we
could teach them if they would like to do it.  If they started, this
would help bring in some funds.
 
If you have ideas, please post them
 
[SI]
[Posted in FML issue 4310]