5-year anniversary: Rescued puppies galore at Paws Across Pittsburgh in Tarentum
There’s nothing like a parking lot of homeless puppies on a Saturday in Tarentum.
But it’s a typical occurrence at Paws Across Pittsburgh, which is celebrating its fifth year of animal rescues, now topping more than 2,000 dogs and 740 cats.
Paws Across Pittsburgh is a nonprofit that is a foster-based rescue where animals go straight into foster homes. There is no shelter. However, some cats are kept at the organization’s Tarentum headquarters before they are fostered.
On Saturday, the rescue received about 27 animals, including 20 puppies, seven older dogs and four cats. They came from animal shelters in West Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio, said Jackie Armour, president of Paws Over Pittsburgh.
Many are puppies whose mothers met misfortune, such as getting hit by a car. The older dogs might have been strays, kept outside or have a medical issue.
“Every Saturday when we do it, it’s emotional,” Armour said. The rescue develops plans and program to help the special-need animals.
Marcie Metnick of Buffalo Township was on hand Saturday with one of the rescue’s special cases, Hoxie, a bulldog who was thrown out of a car last year. Luckily, he wasn’t injured in the incident; however, he was infested with fleas, and that caused health complications.
Metnick fostered Hoxie, taking the dog to the vet and rehabbing him.
“He’s the love of my life,” Metnick said of the dog she now has taken on permanently. “Hoxie is the most lovable and grateful dog.”
There’s a lot more Hoxie stories out there.
During the past five years, the grassroots organization has grown from picking up a couple of dogs with a few cars to owning a large box truck to rendezvous with rescue trucks from other states.
Paws Across Pittsburgh fills an important niche: Some of the animals, like the puppies, senior and disabled dogs, don’t always do well in large shelters.
For example, some of the puppies rescued Saturday will need to be fed a bottle every two hours, said Yvonne McAvoy of Cheswick, a longtime volunteer who works on the nonprofit’s website and fundraisers in addition to fostering animals.
Such a formidable feeding task can be best handled by a foster owner in their home.
It’s the cadre of about 80 volunteers who foster dogs, taking them to the vet and getting to know them, that accounts for the precision and success in placing the pets in permanent homes, Armour said.
The nonprofit tries to make it easy for the foster pet owner, providing them with supplies, food, payment of vet bills and other help, McAvoy said.
“All they have to do is take the animal in and love,” she said.
Additionally, Paws Across Pittsburgh offers other programs to help pets find and live in the best home possible, such as paying the medical costs of senior dogs after they are adopted by their new owners. It also has another program for pet owners who can temporarily relinquish their pet, while volunteers foster the animal at no cost while the pet owner deals with a home or health issue.
“We’ve had about 60 pets go through our program, ‘Dolly’s Dogs,’ for handicapped and disabled dogs,” Armour added.
The nonprofit is becoming known for its special casework for dogs and cats.
As recently as Friday night, they were alerted about a dog that got hit by a car with no identification tags or chip. They plan to work with that animal in near future, she said.
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