By Karen Gleason
The 830 Times
Volunteers from across the county and across the country joined forces at the Val Verde County Fairgrounds recently to provide free spay and neuter surgeries, vaccinations and a variety of other medical care to hundreds of local pets.
Jessica Halprin, who heads Border Animal Mission (BAM), Del Rio’s newest animal rescue organization, as well as volunteers from New Mexico’s Helping Paws Across Borders group, offered the free five-day clinic.
The event was held inside the 4-H shooting barn at the Val Verde County Fairgrounds, 1601 N. Main St., Jan. 16-20.
Halprin said she reached out to Helping Paws Across Borders and Wings of Rescue, an organization she has worked with which transports adoptable dogs rescued in Val Verde County to other parts of the country.
Halprin said Wings of Rescue also assisted BAM in getting a grant to offer the clinic.
Halprin said the coordination to offer the clinic and to bring veterinarians and other volunteers to Del Rio took months, but the clinic was running like a well-oiled machine when The 830 Times visited on Sunday.
Gordon Smith of New Mexico, a retired police K-9 handler, was helping out in a variety of roles during Sunday’s clinic. Del Rio residents who had received clinic appointments, dropped their dogs or cats off at the entrance to the shooting barn, which had been transformed into a veterinary hospital for the duration of the clinic.
Halprin said the clinic had spayed or neutered 96 dogs and cats on the first day of the clinic on Friday and 102 on Saturday. By the time the clinic ended, a total of 439 local pets had been spayed or neutered.
Halprin said, “We received 3,000 emails (requesting appointments), and there were 600 people that made it onto the wait list before we closed it.”
Halprin said the number of emails and requests for appointments shows Del Rio pet owners want to do the right thing by spaying or neutering their pets, but many just don’t have the financial resources to do so.
She said, “It’s obvious that the services are much-needed here.”
Smith added, “You have a huge, huge need here.”
He said, “Recently we’ve done four clinics in New Mexico at one of the reservations there and had the local humane society and people coming up to us and telling us that there were fewer animals being turned in, that they were seeing less strays on the streets, so the more we can get into a community with as many vets as we can get, that’s how we do it.
“If we have 10 vets, we can do a lot more than if we have three. We also need more Texas vets, because our vets here (in this clinic) are from out of state, and they had to get special licenses just to be able to operate in Texas,” Smith said.
Smith said three veterinarians volunteered for the Del Rio clinic.
“If you can get local vets involved and the local community involved, you can do a huge amount of work,” he added.
Smith said none of the clinic volunteers are paid and most pay their own way to participate in the clinics.
“We want to help each community we go to, but we need the community to help too,” he said.
At the Del Rio clinic, pet owners brought in their dogs or cats and headed first to the registration area to fill out paperwork. A veterinarian checked the animal’s heart to make sure it is healthy enough to be anesthetized and make sure there are no other medical concerns.
Smith explained, “Besides the spay and neuter, if there is another issue that we can take care of, like a serious cut or a decayed tooth, we’ll deal with that too, and once the animals are checked, we bring them to intake, where we give them a dewormer and a shot to calm them down.
“Once that’s done, we give them about 10 minutes to calm down, then they go to what we call ‘the knock-down,’ where the animals are anesthetized and vet techs shave the area where the animal will be operated on, put in a catheter and a breathing tube and prep them for surgery,” Smith said.
Each animal is then taken to one of three surgery tables, and all of the necessary medical procedures are performed.
Once the animal is done with surgery, the dog or cat is placed in an individual cage to wake up and fully recover from anesthesia. Cat cages were kept in a separate tent inside the barn to further separate them from the dogs.
“While they’re in recovery, we also clip their nails, treat them for ticks and fleas and clean their ears. We have them for about a half an hour, so we try to do as much as we can,” Smith said.
After the animal is fully awakened, its owner was called to pick up their pet. Each dog or cat was sent home with any necessary medication and a new collar and leash, if needed.
“We have food donations as well, so if they need pet food, we’ll send some home with them,” Halprin said.
Halprin said spaying and neutering “is the answer” to Del Rio’s animal problems.
“That is the solution to our overpopulation problem. BAM does process a lot of animals out of state to adoption centers, but the overall solution is spaying and neutering, so we want to encourage people to keep showing up when we offer these clinics and help us out by getting their animals fixed,” Halprin said.
Halprin said plans are already in the works to bring another free clinic to Del Rio.
She said, “We’re hoping to try again later this year. It’s going to depend on getting more vets to help out. It’s going to depend on the support we get from the community, restaurants helping out with donated breakfasts and lunches, as well as volunteers from the local area.”
