The Massena Humane Society

After an exhausting day and a half of hauling trash out to the dumpster, I took a break and drove into Massena to replenish my food supplies and buy a new radio which, I hoped, would have better reception. But on the way home I decided to stop once again at the Massena Humane Society:

It's not a large place but has accommodating hours:

I'd never been in that little "Incoming Animals" building but once saw a State Trooper drop off a dog there which had been killed on the road. While that was sad, I was happy that they seemed not to be inundated with new dogs and I learned from chatting with a worker there that almost all their animals get placed:

I went inside and viewed their cats, presented in glass fronted cubicles in the front room. I suppose they have a "meet and greet" room for cats to get to know their potential new families, but I never saw it:

The cats were friendly and interacting with me as I snapped their photos:

"Sorry Mister, but I already have a new home:"

The dogs were loud, rowdy and mostly Pit Bull mixes. They were very difficult to photograph as most of them were hopping up and down as if they were on Pogo sticks:

This pair held still for only a moment:

This old terrier kind of reminded me of my college dog, Brandy:

I went back out into the front office and snapped a few photos of the much, much quieter cats:

And I stopped for a conversation with a friendly and welcoming worker. She answered all my questions about this Shelter and the other Shelters in the area. She said that they quickly adopt out small dogs. And elderly dogs also tend to go quickly, she said, because "people feel sorry for them." She helped confirm my impressions that the people in the area were, by and large, kind-hearted and friendly. I told her that I'd like to volunteer there when I move to the area and then I continued on my way back to the farm:

The Humane Society, Potsdam New York

I have volunteered at our local animal shelter and have a strong affinity for rescue work (as you might suppose from all my animals). I hope to volunteer again when I move up to the farm and have already toured the shelter in Massena, just north of my farm. But on this day I was checking out Potsdam, so stopped in at their newly remodeled shelter:

My first discovery was a cat socialization room where this woman and perhaps twenty cats were enjoying each other's company. She said that she grew up in Potsdam but moved to Burlington, Vermont. Whenever she comes home to visit, she stops in at the Shelter:

The cats were enjoying this very much and were all over her until I walked in. My entrance brought many of them to my feet to check me out:

Her husband was visiting the cats in the second of two cat socialization rooms. Everything was clean, relaxed and friendly:

And then I entered the dog adoption area. All the dogs were behind glass and anxious for someone to give them attention:

Most were Pit Bull mixes:

A big, happy goof ball:

This dog appeared to be a Great Dane mix:

And I got a big smile from this pooch:

While I'm sure the glass doors are wise because they keep fingers from poking through the wire as used to happen where I volunteered, it did seem to be a frustrating barrier both to me and to the dogs:

This dog had slobbered all over the glass on his door. It reminded me of my car's windows:

This short legged doggy of very mixed origins was the closest thing they had to a "small" dog. Apparently small dogs are more adoptable than large dogs in Potsdam, just as they are in Albany:

There was a large, glass fronted cat room and a large cage housing kittens:

Just as I was exiting, two girls approached the front desk to ask about adopting. They said they were students and the woman at the counter asked which university they attended. They replied that they were high school students and the conversation went on to instructions on getting their parents' signatures on the application. That was the end of my visit to the Potsdam Humane Society and time for me to travel on. I'll post more tomorrow: