Animal Care Network volunteers have been out every single day checking on dogs and cats in the extreme heat and humidity. We have been on water patrol and fly patrol. Our phone is ringing off the hook, over 70 calls a day with concerns about animals.

Unfortunately the majority of the addresses that we have visited have had bone dry bowls. There are always many excuses; “they keep tipping over the bowl”, “he already drank it”, etc. The teams make the owners come out and look at the empty bowls and fill them up on site every single time. If no one is home, the volunteers do the same and leave a note and the hot weather tips on the door. Another problem, the flies are brutal right now, eating the dogs ears until they become a bloody mess, which attracts even more flies. Every address is educated on heat and the fly problem; number one solution, bring your dogs inside! But as we know that will not happen in most cases so we stress the following: keep your area clean, pick up the feces immediately, make sure the area is trash free, put up no pest strips in the trees, purchase fly off spray and ointment at the pet store or veterinarian and apply daily.The teams definitely get an A plus for trying and persistence.

We have also been calling upon Oakland County Animal Control on a regular basis and they have been awesome, responding to EVERY SINGLE call, with a great response time. These guys that patrol the streets of Pontiac are awesome, they have a really difficult job and definitely have their work cut out for them and then some! ACN is extremely appreciative for their presence. Imagine a city like Inkster with NO animal control whatsoever. The animals would be in a world of trouble if Oakland County Animal Control was not patrolling Pontiac.

Remember at the ACN, we are just volunteers and we do not have the authority that animal control does, so we must rely on them every single day. Let’s give them a big thank you for their work on the streets!