Pets threatened as homes burn

With 18 wildfires ravaging Southern California, there is a lot of good and useful information being disseminated about how to keep pets safe during times of disaster.

The San Diego Humane Society is working non-stop within the fire zones to rescue animals that cannot be reached by their owners. Their site has regular updates on information important to pet owners, including evacuation centers that can accept them and their pets as a family. Another article gives practical advice for pet evacuation. Some of the tips include:

Always look for personal solutions (especially friends and family) and only use public services as a last resort. During a disaster, animal shelters and other public services become overwhelmed with thousands of animals very quickly.

Locate pet-friendly lodging in or around your area. Sometimes these facilities waive their no pet policy for one or two smaller animals in times of disaster...

Look for animal day-care facilities in the area, and if you are in a potential path of danger, do not leave your animal home alone for extended periods.

Birds and horses are extremely susceptible to smoke. Place birds in enclosed rooms without many windows and keep horses in a barn to cut down on smoke inhalation.

and probably the most chilling one is:

• If fire is rapidly approaching your home and there is no time to safely evacuate, release your animals rather than leaving them confined. This will allow them to escape (make sure the animal has a collar and tag with a cellular telephone number).

This is staggering work: consider that 1500 homes have been affected by this fire to date, and the evacuation of over 500,000 people is now the largest in California's modern history. A very conservative estimate of animals affected is easily in the thousands.

If you'd like to help support this effort, the San Diego Humane Society is accepting donations, including a wish list of supplies that will enable them to support the influx of pets they are saving for families like ours.