Mission Statement
To place Beagles in need into
loving, permanent homes and to provide educational resources to help
prevent future displaced Beagles.
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CBR-EAST IN THE NEWS!!
"New Leash on Life: Guards for Dogs”
Behavioral experts give beagles a second chance
By Miguel Riera
PLUS Staff
Permission granted to reprint the text portion of this article
Daily Record, PLUS March 29, 2006 issue (www.dailyrecord.com)
MOUNT OLIVE — Sam is a 4-year-old rescued beagle that was deemed unable to be adopted because he had bitten his adoptive owner. What no one knew at the time was that Sam suffers from a sleep disorder. Sam bit his owner while sleeping, never realizing what he had just done.
Sam’s future did not look too bright. He was returned to the shelter and a few months later, was facing euthanasia.
Fortunately for this beagle, he met Carolyn Sterner, a board-certified behavior analyst who offered Sam a new lease on life. Sterner is also the co-founder of Cascade Beagle Rescue East, an animal rescue group.
Dogs like Sam are one of the reasons why on March 1, Patricia Scully of Budd Lake and her friend, Sterner, formed the first New Jersey chapter of Cascade Beagle Rescue. The two pioneers and directors of Cascade have spent years volunteering for other animal rescue groups, finally deciding to take their love for beagles and their experience with unwanted dogs to the next level.
Like many others
The story of Sam can be recognized in dozens of other dogs that Cascade has saved. Even though sleep disorders may not affect other beagles, rescued animals still are in great need of adoptive homes.
Sam, Sterner said, has a rare sleeping disorder known as parasomnia that prompts him to bite or act as if he were biting while he is at the REM, or rapid eye movement, sleep cycle. The REM stage is usually when dreams are experienced, and they are more intense and vivid, according to Sterner.
Parasomnia is defined as any of several disorders that frequently interfere with sleep and occurring especially among children, including sleepwalking and night terrors, according to The American Heritage Dictionary.
“He experienced these episodes once or twice a week,” Sterner said.
New and improved
Veterinarian Kenneth Werner of Werner Animal Hospital in Morris Plains said that organizations like Cascade are formalizing animal rescue by developing new and better guidelines and rules, and offering good care to beagles. “I’m actually pretty impressed with their enthusiasm; they do this out of love. If we could have more organizations like Cascade, animal welfare would be conducted even better than it is today,” he said.
Today Cascade has 15 volunteers and has saved seven beagles during the few weeks since its creation, according to Scully.
The parent organization, based in Portland, Ore., is a nonprofit animal rescue association that is mainly active in the western part of the nation. The mission of Cascade Beagle Rescue Inc. is to place purebred beagles into loving permanent homes and to provide educational resources to help prevent future displaced beagles, according to its Web site.
“We match the dogs with the best human partner possible,” Scully said.
Welcome additions
After careful consideration and an application process, Scully said, Cascade places beagles in homes where they are certain the pets will be welcome and will be seen as a wanted and positive addition to a family or new owner.
“We take weeks before giving someone a rescued beagle. It is very important to have the right match,” she said.
Harriet Digney of Budd Lake owns five beagles, three of them rescued from shelters.
“There is something about beagles,” Digney said. “I can’t exactly explain it; there is something in their eyes and the way they look at you. They have human eyes.”
Millie, the last one she adopted, came from upstate New York.
“They found her in a cage with three other dead dogs inside the cage,” she said.
On another occasion, Digney said, she received a call from a shelter asking if she would take in another dog. Shilo, a 14-year-old beagle, was about to be put down.
“I went down and picked him up just before he was to be euthanized,” Digney said. “He looked very sick, and everybody said he wouldn’t live for more than a month, so I decided to take care of him until he died.
“Years later, Shilo is alive and doing great,” she said.
Never refused
In the past, Scully said, she has been able to place 18 beagles in homes around New Jersey, and not a single one has ever been refused.
“Beagles are extremely friendly animals; they are great with children and very sweet. The rate of return in adopted beagles is very small — almost inexistent,” she said.
Scully, a technology consultant for a mayor insurance company, grew up with beagles, and her first pet was a beagle named Poky. After seeing Poky die at age 7 from a long renal illness, she said she promised to do more and to help as many beagles as possible to have a better life.
Sterner said she came to know these dogs after buying her first beagle, Bailey, at a pet store while she was still in college. Sterner said she has vowed never to purchase from a pet store again.
“I got Bailey,” she said, “and a couple of days later, he became very ill.”
Bailey suffered from glaucoma, kidney failure, arthritis and a heart murmur, Sterner said. “After going to many veterinarians, we discovered that Bailey was a true puppy mill,” she said. Sterner said she spent thousand of dollars on medical treatments for Bailey. When he died in 2004, however, he was 7 years old.
“I see the need to educate people. Why buy a beagle if you can get it almost for free at a shelter or animal rescue organizations?” she said.
Through the years, Sterner and Scully said they have adopted three beagles each. Some came from shelters, some from research laboratories, others from owner surrenders.
“Coddie and Penny are two laboratory-rescued beagles,” Scully said. “Not all lab dogs are horror stories. My dogs are wonderful pets, and they have adapted to their new environment extremely well.”
Scully said that beagles rescued by Cascade are spayed or neutered, then trained for a few weeks before being given to a new owner. The volunteers absorb most of the expenses associated with preparing the animal for adoption, and there is a nominal fee required from future adopters.
Cascade also is looking for alternative ways of funding, including the help of Shelters on Wheels, a Parsippany-based nonprofit that provides assistance to welfare animal groups. The organization collects empty ink jet cartridges, used laser printer cartridges and old cell phones.
Out of love
The process of saving and caring for rescued beagles is expensive, Scully said, and nobody makes money doing rescue. “You do this only because you love it,” she said.
Adopted beagles come equipped with their own leash, collar, food and an electronic microchip under their skin, according to the pair. If they get lost, shelters and veterinarians anywhere in the United States that have a universal scanner can determine the origin of the animal.
Beagles, Werner said, are becoming family dogs. They have a mind of their own, he said, so owners may have to put more effort in training them,
Overall, beagles are very good pets, he said.
“They are small enough to pick up and large enough to play ball with. You can take a beagle hiking with you or to the beach, or they can sit next to you and watch television,” Werner said.
The two volunteers said they spend more than 20 hours a week working for the organization and several hours during weekends when they drive to other states to pick up unwanted beagles.
“Sometimes, we meet with other volunteers half way,” Scully said.
Education important
Sterner said that part of their job is educating people on how to live with beagles. She said that beagles, if left alone, will run away if they smell another animal.
“Owners may think their dog is disobedient, but if (they are) kept on a leash, the problem is solved,” she said.
As for Sam, Sterner said, his problem currently is under control. After observing and taking care of Sam’s diet and environment with the help of veterinarians and behavioral experts, she said she was able to develop the same relationship with Sam that anyone would have with any other dog.
“It was so simple. I watched him for few weeks and realized how he would only do (the biting) while sleeping. So I put his bed away from my other two beagles.”
Every time he would bite, Sterner said, she would wake him up, and he would stop and go under the bed. “He is so sweet; he has never showed any consciousness of aggression,” she said.
“I have had him for over a year now, and not once has he bitten me or done anything to Pippin and Rosie, my other two rescued beagles.”
Last year, Sterner said she presented Sam’s case of parasomnia to the N.J. Sleep Society after being contacted by Dr. Carlos Schenk, the co-discoverer of REM behavior disorder in humans.
Schenk’s upcoming book on the subject will feature Sam’s story in a chapter on pets with RBD.
There are hundreds of beagles waiting to be rescued, CBR East directors said, and they hope the organization will grow and that more volunteers and adoptive owners will foster rescued beagles.
“Our ultimate goal is to find loving homes for loving beagles,” Scully said.
Miguel Riera can be reached at (973) 428-6630 or mriera@gannett.com.
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