Animal shelter reaches goal for help for ‘Big Red’

“Big Red is a 5-year-old Bloodhound that was brought into our shelter several weeks ago with a serious eye condition called bilateral intropian,” shelter officials said. “This is a condition where the eyelids are turned in causing the eye lashes to grow inside the eye against the cornea. It is a very painful but treatable condition with surgery.”

Last week, the shelter reached out to the public asking for donations to cover the $1,200 procedure.

“Donations trickled in for several days,” shelter officials said. “It looked like we would have about half the money by the time of the initial consult at UGA on Aug. 8, but by the next Friday afternoon we were up over half and then the donations really started coming in. People were stopping by the shelter, mailing checks, donating through PayPal, you name it and they were doing it.”

As of Saturday afternoon, the fund had reached $2,100 and will use any extra funds in the Guardian Angel Fund with the money that is over and above what was needed for Big Red.

“Your generosity towards Big Red has saved his sight and will put him in a great position to be adopted,” shelter officials said. “Your overwhelming support has started us on a path to save those special needs pets that we just couldn’t help before.” For those who would like to stay up to date on Big Red’s surgery and progress, you can join MOAS at Big Red’s blog by going to www.moaspets.org. “The Madison Oglethorpe Animal Shelter would like to thank everyone who has donated to make this surgery possible for this amazing dog,” shelter officials said. “If you are interested in adopting Big Red you can stop by the shelter and fill out a pre-adoption application and as soon as he is fully recovered from his surgery, he will be able to go home with his new loving family.”

Shelter officials also offered a special “thank you” to an anonymous donor who contributed $550 towards Big Red’s surgery.

“As Immanual Kant said, ‘We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals,’” shelter officials said.