Angela Speed, Vice President of Communications and Marketing at the Wisconsin Humane Society joining me this morning.
Hey, good morning, Angela.
Good morning.
Thanks so much for having me.
Yeah.
We have a pit bull that comes over every Friday.
That's like a rented dog.
My neighbor comes over and every Friday because our backyard is all fenced in so she can run and can't get out.
We give her the illusion of freedom because she can run around the place and I'll chase all the squirrels she wants.
But there's something I noticed about her.
When the storm is coming, even though it's still sunny outside, she knows and she starts hiding in the corner because she hates thunderstorms.
And I think they feel the barometric pressure change.
And that's how they know.
I'm pretty sure.
I
think you might be right.
And there's storms today, I think.
And we've started to hit summer weather for sure.
I've got I've got three.
One of them goes in the bathtub.
Thunders and lightning.
She does that over over our neighbor's house.
She'll go into the bathtub and hide in our house.
She goes into the closet and she just faces the closet and she won't come out until it's over.
And I feel terrible because she's frightened.
But, you know, maybe we all should be doing that.
Maybe she knows something we don't know.
All right.
All right.
So that's it.
Go ahead.
I got to say then, like that's a great reminder, too, with Fourth of July coming up.
If your dog does have really bad anxiety or fear during thunderstorms and fireworks, you might talk to your vet about some pharmaceutical options to help them chill out during those intense periods.
Well, we used to give our dog like a half a Benadryl.
Yeah.
Just a looper a little bit.
She didn't care about the fireworks.
And then it just lasted a few hours and then it was all over.
But she said, I don't think I heard the fireworks this year.
I was
all
loopy.
Anyway, let's talk about the pet walk coming up.
Got a big pet
walk in our
scene.
Yeah.
Yeah, we're super excited.
So our pet walk we're seeing Kenosha is Saturday, August 1st at Petrifying Springs Park, also known as Pet's Park.
And it's so much fun and we are gearing up for a huge event.
There's hundreds of people and of course dogs and sometimes other animals too show up and all of the proceeds from pet walk
go right back to help the animals and families served by the Wisconsin Humane Society.
And you can register to do the walk.
We're also looking right now for sponsors and vendors.
It's a great crowd to have a booth in front of if you're in a pet-related industry.
And it's just, it's a blast.
It's a lot of fun.
There's family-friendly activities for kids, food, this huge vendor village.
And of course, your participation makes a difference.
So we go to petrifying springs every few weeks.
And the reason we go is there's an aquifer that comes up there and you can get water from the aquifer.
It's supposed to be very healthy for you.
And it just comes up, there's a tap and you fill up your water jugs and everything you bring it home.
I don't drink it.
My wife does though.
But I'm told by a water person, it is extremely healthy because it's coming.
It's natural water from an aquifer.
And it comes from petrifying springs.
So we pull in there and
Always dogs, always dogs walking that trail, always year round.
It doesn't matter if it's hot, cold, it doesn't matter.
It's always dogs there.
And it's a great walk.
It's a beautiful park area.
And it's right there on 31.
You go down to, I think it's JR.
And you go right into Petrifying Springs.
So again, that dog walk is August what?
On Saturday, August 1st.
And there's also a pet costume contest, and there's a talent show this year.
It's going to be so much fun.
We're really excited.
And you can find more information on our website at wihumane.org.
David Letterman used to do stupid pet tricks.
Remember that?
Yes,
I do.
And some of these animals really
were
good.
Anyway, so that is coming up in August.
The pet walk at the Racine Kenosha Pet Walk at Petrifying Springs.
Let's talk about summer camps.
Is this for people or dogs?
It's for children, for kids.
And
really, the kids of all ages, from first grade to ninth grade, we've got camps for all ages.
And there are still some spots that are open in some of our summer camps in Racine.
Camp Critters, one of my favorites is for the younger kids.
And it's basically a full week of fun and animal related activities, crafts, games, tours, of course, getting to meet lots of animals.
And the next camp coming up with open spots is July 13th through the 17th.
And right now there's a great camp deal too.
Registration is discounted by $25.
So you can register for that on our website if you've got kids who are interested in animals and you're still looking for a camp.
Well, that sounds like
fun.
Yeah.
My kid is doing a junior vet camp.
at one of our campuses this year, and it's her fourth year returning to campus.
It's an absolute blast, and our volunteers and our youth programs team are just awesome with the kids.
And we talk a lot about dogs, but cats also at the Humane Society, we have this camera my wife got.
It's an outdoor camera, it's a little tiny thing, and it's motion sense camera, and it's for night vision.
And you put it outside, and you get to see the critters walking around your backyard when you're sleeping at night.
It's like Wild Kingdom back there,
my backyard.
I don't know
how they get in.
It's all fenced in.
And you see possums walking around, raccoons.
And occasionally, we had a cat.
We'll go put his face up right to the camera.
So on my TV, it's a giant picture of a cat face because they detect something.
But yeah, cats walking around.
It's like Wild Kingdom in my backyard all night long.
They come actually up to the stoop and everything.
I didn't know that.
And then when the sun comes up, they all vanish and go back to where they came from.
I don't know how they get over the fence.
We're talking about possums and raccoons.
Do they hop over the fence?
I don't know how they get up there.
They put a ladder down.
They went on that looking and they lower the ladder down and get over the fence.
But yeah, but the cat puts his face right up to the lens.
And they say, whoa, that's kind of scary when you put, when you pop that disc in your TV.
Let's talk about the matching funds.
You have a Rude Foundation, the Family Foundation Rude.
That's R-U-U-D.
Family Foundation has a matching gifts program going on right now.
Yeah.
So the Rude Family Foundation have been absolute champions of our work.
And once again this year, they are matching all new donations to the Racine campus.
They're highly involved in the Racine area and absolutely love animals and the services they provide to pets and their people.
So if you have never made a donation before to the Racine campus, your donation will double.
They are matching all donations and this goes through the end of the year.
So if you haven't considered giving before or have been on the fence, here's your sign.
Your donation will double to help animals and families in the community.
I'm a sucker for donating to animal causes.
We get, and I'm not exaggerating, 20, 25 a month from different organizations, including Wisconsin Humane Society.
And we get the National Humane Society.
We get Alley Cats.
We get the Equine Foundation.
You name the animal and the guide dog foundations, all those guide dogs.
And I just put a little money in the envelope and we send it off.
It makes me feel better.
But I had to check out each one.
I check it out to make sure the money's really going where it's supposed to be going.
And there's a website to go to to check that out.
And so they send it every month.
Every month or so, I just line up the envelopes.
You get five, you get five, you get five, you just pop the money in the envelope.
You guys get a little more, though, because you're local.
We appreciate it.
Thank you so much.
That is very true.
If you haven't given to a charity before, you can check them out on GuideStar or Charity Navigator.
That's what I do.
Charity Navigator.
I'm sure that they're transparent about financials and you can look into how much goes right to programs.
There's some great sources online that are third-party independent.
Angela Speed is joining us this morning by the president of marketing and communication for the Wisconsin Humane Society, talking about a whole bunch of things, and we'll review them in just a moment.
First, we got to talk about Richland Farms in Madison, the Beagle Rescue that took place there.
Tell me what you know about this from the beginning, because it's still in the middle of getting these Beagles adopted now.
Absolutely.
Wow, it seems like so long ago now, but we were contacted in May by the Dean County Humane Society and they asked us if we could commit to taking any beagles from Richland Farms.
And of course, we jumped at the opportunity to help and committed to taking a large group of dogs.
And in total, the Wisconsin Humane Society received 132 beagles from Richland Farms.
And they came in waves over the course of three days.
And I was there each day, not at Ridgeland Burns, but at the shelter.
And it was just an amazing operation to see our vets and our staff and so many awesome volunteers welcoming these dogs to the area.
And most of them went straight out to foster homes.
Although we have six shelters and a lot of space, we certainly did not have 132 available kennels.
So they got to decompress and cluster homes and then eventually go up for adoption after spay neuter surgery and medical checks and medical treatment, of course, for any issues that they were having.
And as of today, we've adopted 123 of the beagles.
Six are still in foster care, and then three are getting treatment at our shelters.
It was just a joy and a privilege to be a part of this operation.
The community just absolutely floored us.
We had 132 dogs, but about 700 foster applications to process.
What was really cool is that a lot of the people who didn't end up getting to foster or adopt a beagle,
took somebody else home or decided I'm going to foster a cat instead.
And so it really helped to grow our network of people who love animals and want to support them.
So we just have a couple left at the Wisconsin Humane Society.
And as we understand it, any of the remaining dogs at Richland Farms are also being released, which is great news.
Now, for people that know Richland Farms, this is not a farm where they just had beagles running free.
They did experimentation on beagles.
And the reason they used them, beagles are trusting gysile dogs.
They don't cause a problem.
And that's, I don't know what kind of experiments they did on them.
And I don't want to really know because it's all over now, but it wasn't good.
It was cruelty to animals.
And the people that they stormed Ridgeline farms originally, police were there because they got to want to get these beagles out of there.
And it was a real.
police presence and everything when they finally did it.
But Richland Farms agreed to release 1,500 Beagles.
And I think just recently they said they're closing down, you can have the rest.
And I've been watching these videos on YouTube and also on Facebook, on The Reels.
And it's heartbreaking.
These Beagles, they're opening the cage and the Beagle has never felt grass under his feet before.
And he's slowly touching the grass, pulling his paw back, because he doesn't know what it is.
He was born in the cage, lived in a cage his entire life, and now he's going to feel.
And within two weeks, the Beagles are running around playing with other dogs, rolling on the grass.
And for the first time, they're being held, they're loved, they're getting, you know, they can play with other dogs and run out in the sunshine.
And I feel good about it, but I feel awful.
This ever, ever, ever happened.
And I'm glad Richland Farms is out of business, they're done.
No more Beagle experimentation.
All the remaining Beagles are being released.
And it's, you know, I had five Beagles.
So I love Beagles.
I had five of them forward adopted and one we actually got as a puppy.
But the other four were adopted and each one had their own personality.
I mean, it was just great.
My neighbor said, how did you?
We always had three at a time.
He said, how did you deal with three dogs?
I said, here's what happened.
When one went out at midnight, we woke everybody up.
You're all going out.
We're not going
to do this every hour on the out.
Everybody up, everybody out.
We used to send them all in the backyard at one o'clock in the morning, whatever.
If one got up, they all went out.
We're not going to do this all night long.
And I love animals.
I love dogs and especially beagles.
I have a special heart that's placed in my heart.
And I'm glad Richland Farms is out of business.
Never have to deal with them again.
And we got to get these beagles adopted 1500.
And I think there's a couple hundred, 400 more, something like that.
I mean, there's a lot of them.
Yeah, I think there were 450, 425, something like that that are being released now.
And those are the last ones there.
And you're right, like the transformations were just amazing to watch.
And every adopter and foster parent was provided with literally a 33 page guide.
that included information about fearful, shy dogs, exposing them to new things, a little bit of background on dogs from research facilities.
We've had similar situations in the past where we've received dogs from medical testing facilities.
And so they do have some pretty unique needs.
They've never walked on leash.
They've never played at the toy.
Many of them had never felt grass.
Like it's really kind of hard to comprehend.
And some of them, like,
absolutely made a transformation within a day or two and we're playing and would come to the front of the kennel and want to be pet and held and then others are still really taking some time more time and more positive reinforcement and sometimes with those older dogs who have just been breeding for years and years they may never quite fully feel like a normal dog whatever that is but um
Yeah, there's just a range of behaviors that we've seen.
Some of them have been absolutely drawn to children, which has been really interesting, you know, quiet, appropriate children who know how to be your own dogs, but maybe because they're smaller and less threatening.
So it's been really interesting to watch all of their stories, especially in social media, all those amazing videos.
I know, and I cry when I see them.
especially the one who was afraid to touch the grass and didn't want to come out of the cage because you know what the grass was, you know, it
was
harmful if it was going to hurt.
And then two weeks later, running around playing with all the other dogs.
Let's talk about your adoption programs you have.
Yes.
So we're right in the start of really busy summer season and our animal population is definitely feeling it.
We have about 1400 animals in care right now.
And between Racine and Kenosha, there's about 500 animals.
And so we have some special promotions going on to encourage people to take a look and make that leap.
You can name your own feed for cats six months and older.
And that counts as a donation.
It can be a dollar.
It can be $100.
but all cats are named your own fee if they're six months and older.
You also get to name your own fee for bench warmer dogs and dogs who have been with us longer than usual.
And then we have kitten buddy pricing.
So if you've got two kittens, you can take 50% off the second adoption fee.
And those are running through the month of June.
And we hope encourage people to check out not only the Wisconsin Humane Study, but other shelters in Wisconsin, because this is the beginning of our highest intake season.
You know, the other couple of weeks ago, I'm pulling into my driveway and there was a cat.
The neighbor's cat was sitting there.
Just sitting in the middle of the driveway, wouldn't move, staring at me.
Just head on the stairs.
It was like, I dare you to run me over.
I double dog dare you to run me over right now.
I dare you to move that car one step closer.
He just sat there.
I finally got out of the car.
I said, move.
But it was like, I dare you.
I don't think you'll do it.
Cats are like, dogs would move.
Cats don't want to.
Yeah, we'll see who's boss.
Anyway, I've had cats, dogs, hamsters, turtles, pigeons, cockatiels, you name it.
I've had it fish, every kind.
I've never been in my life without a pet, and I love them.
You know what I feel sad when they say, the pet is part of your life, but you are 100% of their lives because you're going to outlive them for the most part.
All right, if anybody wants to know anything about what we talked about, how do they go about it?
Give it to your website.
So the website is wihumane.org and you can see we just launched a new website actually and it's a lot easier to search for animals now and navigate through the website.
But all of the hours are listed and if you're interested in adapting, stop in at a shelter.
Adoptions are first come first served as long as it's a good fit.
So you'll get paired to work with an adoption counselor who will talk with you about the individual animals and their needs and what you're looking for, but we do same day adoptions.
And hopefully, and you can also fill out an adapter profile in advance of your visit.
That's not an application.
It's basically to gather information and get you into our system and that will stay on file for 60 days.
So still have that adoption profile and then step on in.
We went to this place.
I'm not going to mention it, but they're not there anymore, but they were shelter for animals.
The lady, her heart was in it, but she didn't do a good job at it.
And we walked in there and there was a beagle with the, the oddest looking face.
And he was sleeping under the desk and I walked in and I stood there for a minute and he sat on my foot and I said to my wife, that's the one.
Let's take him.
His name was Herbie and we had him and that dog picked me out, sat on my foot and wouldn't
let me
move.
And I fell in love with him and we had him.
Herbie.
He
had like this big like soot on his face.
It wasn't it was just this coloring.
And he just had an odd face.
He's had a lot of soot on.
Maybe I'll send you a picture of him.
You got to see what this dog looked like.
But when he sat on my foot and wouldn't leave, I said, we got to take him.
That's
a sign.
Thank you.
That's a
sign.
He picked me.
All right.
It's okay.
Give it the website one more time.
WIhumane.org.
WIhumane.org.
I would give money and I'm going to give a little more because I want to get these beagles adopted and you still have a few left, you said, right?
Yeah, there's just a handful left.
Nine and a couple of them are being adopted by their foster parents, but there should be a couple more that trickle up into our adoption program.
I couldn't be a foster parent because I wouldn't let them go.
That's the problem.
You know, you can give me 12 dogs and they're not going to, I'm keeping them now.
We
welcome foster failures though.
You get first dibs on adopting if you
foster an animal.
Wait, is that what I'm called a foster failure?
Is that what you call those?
Yeah, foster failures.
Also successes though, the animal stays in the home, that's awesome.
I'm a foster failure.
Angela Speed, thank you very much.
Angela is the Vice President of Marketing and Communications for the Wisconsin Humane Society.
If you get a chance to make a donation, they do wonderful things in Wisconsin Humane Society, as do a lot of pet organizations around the country.
But this is our local one, Wisconsin Humane Society.
Angela, thank you very much.
Do appreciate it.
Thank you, John.
