Making Headlines

There are days I wonder what I’m doing, but then I get reminded how much I love my job when we receive such diverse types of calls. Not only that, but when you think you are going out on an ordinary call, it turns out to be anything but. San Diego has provided some interesting challenges for me including traffic, freeways, and parking, but you can’t beat walking the Ocean Beach Pier looking for an injured seagull. Unfortunately we were not able to find the person that called or the seagull, but it did make for a nice photo op.

Then we got called out for a raccoon that had been stuck at the top of an electric pole all night. The pole was in someone’s backyard and their dogs chased the raccoon up the pole. We thought it may not be alive when we first arrived, but then it turned its head and looked right at us. The poor thing was scared stiff. We contacted SDG&E to get a cherry picker or something to get the little guy down and I was getting excited I might be able to go up in one. They were busy at the time so we left and planned to return with them when they had time. I guess they showed up without us and decided they would not do anything and the raccoon would come down on its own. We went back to the property and thankfully it had come down somehow, we checked for footprints and possibly and injured raccoon (if it had fallen), but found neither. Hopefully he is doing well now.

Then we arrive for a basic dog running loose call at a park. The call had come in earlier in the morning so we figured the dog would be long gone by the late afternoon when we arrived, but it wasn’t. The dog was very skittish and would not let anyone near her. She was hanging out by a busy street and we were afraid she might get hit, or worse yet, get hit while we were trying to catch her. After twenty minutes of trying to win her over with hot dogs and wet food, we had almost given up and were going to return with a dog trap when the dog ran under a car parked on the side of the road. Two citizens had somewhat trapped her there. With help of a couple people surrounding the car and me and my trainer working together to get her on leash we were able to catch her. She was a still a little freaked out being on the leash and we slowly walked back to the truck. By the time we got to the truck she was willing to let us pet her. When we got her back to the shelter she became our best buddy. I would squat next to her and she would lean on me and jump on me. Here she is even performing sit and shake for her photo!

Okay, I know this is a long blog, but while planning out our typical day, we received a report for an injured duck that had arrows stuck in it at a local lake. When we arrived one of the park employees had the duck in a crate for us. We were amazed that despite the arrows the duck was standing inside the crate. We brought it back to the shelter and everyone was as surprised as we were. We took the duck to the vet where we got to watch as he removed the arrows and we collected them for evidence. Then we got to submit the arrows for evidence. It is pretty neat getting to investigate on a case like this, and hopefully we catch who did this. And to make it even better, the duck seems to be doing very well!

When we returned the crate to the employee, the news cameras were on scene and they got me and my trainer on camera. I’m the one sitting in the truck. It’s hard to see because of the glare though.
http://www.fox5sandiego.com/news/kswb-duck-shot,0,396264.story

I am still waiting for my next rattlesnake call, but for some reason I think they hide until I’m off shift. I haven’t had one in almost a month. Although, we did get a call about a king cobra and we were asked to go out and investigate with our public information officer as a news van was on scene. It seems that this was a hoax, but the camera got me and my trainer as we were standing in a parking lot nearby. I think they know how deathly afraid I am of possibly having to talk on camera, so they like to pick on me and make me go out on these types of calls. I’d rather of handled the king cobra than talk on camera! (and Karen, for obvious reasons, you may not want to watch this clip!)
http://www.cbs8.com/Global/story.asp?S=11354683