I had a profoundly moving experience recently. I pulled up on a call to pick up a sick kitten and the song The Christmas Shoes came on the radio. I wrote about this song in The Secret Life of Dog Catchers because it always makes me cry. Sometimes I see so many sad, terrible things on the job that I lose the ability to cry even when I need to. A tender song can be a catalyst to release some of that pain. The Christmas Shoes is about man who is feeling caught up on the stress and commercialism of Christmas. He’s in line to buy something and the little boy in front of him doesn’t have enough money for his purchase. The child is trying to buy a pair of shoes for his dying mother to wear to heaven. The boy asks the stranger to help him and the man finds the true meaning of Christmas in helping a stranger.

The song had me feeling teary as I got out of my animal control truck and as I crossed the parking lot a woman called to me from a car. She asked me to please help them so I approached and saw a family holding a tiny, older Chihuahua in their arms. The dog, Lilo, was the special pet of the ten year old daughter and was critically ill but they had no money. Every vet clinic and shelter had turned them away. Veterinarians are generally hard working and compassionate people but they have to make a living just like everyone else and shelters are there for animals who have no owners.

Lilo probably didn’t weigh more than 3 or 4 pounds, with just enough gray around her muzzle to show her maturity without advanced age. The big brown eyes were resigned to her fate, whatever it may be and I could see that she was lethargic and dehydrated. The family was distraught and obviously adored their pet. I asked a few more questions and then called in my credit card number to a nearby vet clinic and asked them to please see the dog. The family and I embraced and exchanged some tears and I sent them on their way.

A couple of hours later the clinic called and said Lilo had a life threatening pyometra and needed emergency surgery to save her life. Pyometra is a nasty uterine infection common in un-spayed female dogs. The kind-hearted veterinarian gave me a break on the surgery and many generous people chipped in to help pay for it. Lilo ended up with major complications and spent 5 days in the hospital before she was well enough to be released. I was finally able to pick her up and drive her home and placing her in the daughter’s arms was one of the best feelings I’ve had in a long time.

Now animal control officers don’t make a lot of money. I buy most of my clothes at the Goodwill and drive a 20 year old car. We don’t spend much at Christmas other than some gifts for the kids. We have everything we really need and although I love giving gifts, I don’t like buying them just for the sake of buying them. Helping this family meant more to me than any gift I could ever get.

If I look close I can see my reflection in the dog’s eyes.

The holidays can present a different picture for animal control officers and shelter workers. It’s hard going to work each day and seeing all the homeless faces. Some eager and hopeful, some scared and lonely. All in need of someone to show them how good it can be. Of course not everyone can adopt a pet and certainly in most cases pets shouldn’t be given as gifts. The exception is a parent who is committed to the life of a pet giving a pet to a child or a family who is picking out a pet together.  It was once thought that no animals should be adopted out around Christmas but the thinking later changed to encourage people to give needy pets a home for the holidays. I’m all for taking things on a case by case basis. An easy-going family adopting a confident, happy dog can be a blast at any time.

Even if you can’t adopt, there are lots of ways to make life sweeter for homeless pets during the holidays. As we look at our beloved pets lounging in pampered comfort, remember the dogs who have no one. Contact your local shelter or rescue and ask for a wish list. Donate blankets, food, toys, treats or money. Volunteering to walk and play with shelter dogs is a great way to walk off all the rich food most of us indulge in this time of year and makes all the difference for a lonely dog.

The holidays can be a stressful time for our own dogs as well. Some dogs thrive on all the activity this time of year but many don’t. We often see cases of dogs biting visitors around the holidays. Even nice dogs can bite and dogs are limited in the ways they can ask for space. I constantly see well meaning people ignoring numerous stress signals from dogs. If your pet isn’t thrilled to see visitors, settle them in a quiet room with some treats and toys instead of subjecting them to the chaos of people who may push them past their limits.

 We can all benefit from slowing down and focusing on the real meaning of the season. What are you doing to make life sweeter for your pets and others?

Despite the open door, the sturdy little Beagle huddled inside the transportation kennel; it took him 10 minutes to put a paw tentatively on the unfamiliar surface, then move completely outside, high-stepping all the way. It was the first time this adult Beagle had ever walked on grass.

Everyone loves stories about dog heroes—the police dog who leads the chase for an armed criminal, the military dog who goes ahead of the troops to sniff out hidden bombs or the service dog whose devotion and skill give a person with a disability greater independence.

But what about the thousands of dogs who sacrifice years of their lives—or even their very lives—to science’s controversial pursuit of everything from cures for deadly diseases to safe cosmetics? Who speaks for them?

In December 2010, the Beagle Freedom Project (beaglefreedomproject.org) joined the list of those who advocate specifically for these small hounds, and since then, it has mounted multiple efforts on their behalf. Founded by animal-rights attorney Shannon Keith to help a group of Beagles she learned were about to be released and needed homes, BFP now has six full- or part-time paid staff and has helped place or foster 215 lab dogs since its inception. (Keith also founded BFP’s parent organization, Animal Rescue Media Education [arme.tv].)

More than 95 percent of the dogs used in research are Beagles. The same attributes that make them great family pets—“docile, people-pleasing, forgiving, gentle, easy to care for”—also make them desirable research subjects, says Kevin Chase, director of operations for BFP.

BFP had its first legislative victory earlier this year when Minnesota governor Mark Dayton signed into law an act that requires the state’s higher-education research and related facilities receiving public money to offer their dogs and cats to nonprofit animal rescue organizations when the animals are no longer needed.

The law, based on BFP’s “Beagle Freedom Bill,” is a modest first step. Similar bills have been introduced in California and New York. Other states will follow, BFP organizers hope.

“The law is meant to bridge two sides of a very polarizing debate over animal research,” says Minnesotan Chase, who spearheaded the law in his home state. Although BFP opposes any use of animals in research, the legislation is intended to allow adoption as an option for “retired” research dogs and cats. It fills the regulatory gap between the care animals are mandated to receive while being actively used and what happens afterward, when they’re no longer needed.

“If a dog is at the end of its utilization with research and can be placed with a family, why not? It just makes sense,” says Minnesota Senator Scott Dibble, who authored the legislation along with Representative John Lesch. But though it did indeed make sense, it wasn’t easy. As Dibble admits, “It turned out to be a little more contentious than we anticipated.”

In 2013, when the idea for the law was first floated, the University of Minnesota—which, along with the Mayo Clinic would be the most affected—was reluctant to support it, and the bill was shelved. This year, Dibble and Chase approached the university again and got, if not support, at least no overt opposition.

The Minnesota law includes a provision that eliminates certain liabilities for research facilities that release lab animals, something the university requested in discussions with Chase and Dribble, according to the Office of the Vice President of Research.

In statements released through Communications Director Andrea Wuebker, that office said of the law, “This legislation allows the university opportunities to do what we can to offer dogs and cats, available after the study concludes, for adoption without threat of liability by potential or future owners regarding any unforeseen behaviors by the animal. What this law will do is help us partner with outside groups to make available animals for adoption, should the animal not be adopted by the researcher or persons close to the animal, at the end of the study.”

Exactly what kind of impact the new law may have remains uncertain. A U.S. Department of Agriculture report cited 317 dogs and 278 cats as being used in research at the university in 2013. Of those, 307 dogs and 273 cats were from humane societies or other animal shelters, or were student-owned animals, and were returned to the shelters or students after use.

That number is, however, a fraction of the 4,148 dogs listed for research in Minnesota in a fiscal year 2012 USDA report (the most recent year for which figures are available). Minnesota ranked fifth in the nation that year in the number of research dogs. With 9,434 dogs, Wisconsin ranked first, and in the United States as a whole, the report cited 72,167 dogs and 24,578 cats.

HSUS estimates that 25 million “vertebrate animals” are used each year in research, testing or education, while the USDA tallied 1,110,199 animals in their FY 2012 report. After mice, rats and birds, research animals used that year—in descending order of frequency—included guinea pigs, rabbits, hamsters, non-human primates (including monkeys and chimpanzees), farm animals (including pigs and sheep), dogs and cats.

At the University of Minnesota, research involving animals is mostly medically based, according to the Office of the Vice President of Research, related to cardiovascular devices, isolated working heart models and dental implants as well as understanding and treating strokes, epilepsy, overactive bladder syndrome and other human or veterinary diseases.

Like the Beagle Freedom Project, HSUS advocates an end to the use of animals in research, particularly in product testing, encouraging companies to use some of the 5,000 chemicals already tested and approved for human use. Others believe that animals have and still play a critical role in the development of live-saving treatments.

“Indeed, if one reviews the history of medical science, it is clear that every major medical advance has depended on animal experiments … Almost every vaccine used by humans had to be first tested on animals to ensure that it would be safe and effective. Insulin, which has saved millions of diabetics from an early and painful death, was discovered through research on dogs; until relatively recently, the only way to test insulin during the purification process was to inject it into mice and monitor the effect on their blood sugar,” the late John Vane, an Nobel Prize–winning British pharmacologist, said in a “Pfizer Forum” speech.

Both under the new Minnesota law and elsewhere around the country, when laboratory animals are made available for adoption, their actual research history is rarely, if ever, disclosed. That makes it difficult to predict the animals’ adjustment needs. In general, however, BFP has found that many of the Beagles they place are not house-trained, and tend to be shy around people and new situations, certainly at first. Also, because laboratory diets are generally formulated to reduce the amount of cleanup necessary, the dogs initially have digestive trouble with the richer food commonly fed to companion animals.

“On the whole,” says Chase, the dogs “have never been on grass, have never been on a leash for a walk, they’ve never been on steps. They’re like adult puppies; the whole world is new to them.”

To date, BFP has received lab dogs—and a few cats and a pig—from California, Colorado, Nevada, Massachusetts and New Jersey as well as the Midwest, and has had great success both in fostering these lab-released dogs and then matching them with appropriate families. None of their adoption placements has been returned, even from the group of 40 Beagles flown from Spain who were suffering severe health and anxiety problems. The search for additional adoption and fostering homes is, of course, ongoing.

Sometimes, the organizers themselves end up providing the first line of fostering. Kevin Chase already had Junior, now seven and rescued when he was four. But when Chase organized a gathering to solicit foster parents for 10 former lab Beagles, he ended up bringing home Raymond, three, the last Beagle in the room.

“We let the families and the dogs kind of choose each other,” Chase says of the December gathering. “I wasn’t anticipating taking home one of the dogs, but nobody chose Raymond because nobody could catch him. He was afraid of everybody … I said, ‘Come on, buddy. You’re coming home with me.’ Once we got home, he wasn’t going anywhere.” Chase chuckles about how quickly “fostering” became “adopting” with Raymond. These days, he says, Raymond “loves his walk, loves lying in the sunshine.”

Some day, BFP might be able to add a Minnesota senator to its list of adopters. “If my life ever calms down so that I can be home,” dreams Dibble, “I’m totally going to get a lab Beagle.”

Shop Ethically

Go to the Beagle Freedom Project website for a link to the Cruelty-Cutter app, which allows you to use your iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch to scan products and identify those that have been tested on animals.

Interested in helping out a lab Beagle? Click on beaglefreedomproject.org/adopt_or_foster to find out how to do it.

Mac was the hardest for me. He arrived about a year ago, just before Thanksgiving. He was my sixth foster dog in about as many months, and the first one who truly tested my commitment to the big-picture cause of rescue.

He was still a pup, less than a year old, a purebred yellow Labrador who would command well over a thousand bucks from any breeder with a decent website. Mac’s body, though, made it clear that he’d been neglected. On the day he pranced into my back yard giving love and kisses, I could see not only his ribs, but also his collarbone and spine. I wondered if he’d been left tied to a tree, or was perhaps abandoned by a family who simply moved away, before he landed in the gas-chamber shelter that gave him three days to live. He had terrible diarrhea following his transport from the Carolinas to the rescue in Pennsylvania; at first, he didn’t even want to eat. Poor Mac’s stomach must have hurt every single day of his life.

Mac and my own dog, Blue, became immediate pals. They ran in the yard, played tug in the den and cuddled in front of the fi replace on chilly nights. I fed Mac the same high-quality food that Blue gets, took him with us on walks in the park and treated him like a member of the family. As his health issues vanished and his body recovered, his spirit exploded with an even stronger glow. He looked like a completely different dog, and everywhere we went, people stopped me to comment on how gorgeous he was.

They were absolutely stunned, literally set back on their heels, when I told them he was a gas-chamber rescue now available for adoption. The very thought of a dog like Mac being abandoned really messes with most people’s ideas about who shelter dogs are, just as the thought of a normal-looking person like me being a foster mom messes with many people’s belief that only “crazy dog ladies” have foster pups in their homes.

Valerie Price has been shattering those same misconceptions for the past fi ve years. A student adviser at a college in the San Francisco Bay Area, she has fostered more than 150 puppies for Smiley Dog Rescue while working as a student counselor and studying for a master’s degree in business administration.

“People are always surprised when I tell them that these puppies were going to be put down in the shelter,” Price says. “These are beautiful, wonderful puppies. The problem is not with the dogs. It’s the owners who need to be more responsible. I wish people would spay and neuter and stop backyard breeding. That’s why I do this. There’s nothing wrong with these dogs, and I want to speak for them.”

Price has two dogs of her own, Whiskey, a Husky-Samoyed, and Misty, a mutt. Whiskey likes to be in charge, which is why Price sticks to fostering puppies instead of older dogs. Whiskey accepts puppies and often helps nurture them, even when the litters are as big as eight. Price went so far as to build a “dog room” onto her home, a space with a doggy door to the yard and furniture that looks like a bedroom. There’s even a television that the puppies can listen to between her lunch-time visits.

She’s had a few pups like my foster Mac, dogs who, for whatever reason, stuck out and made her want to adopt. But she found the strength to let them all go after the rescue cleared the adopters via its application process and an in-home visit.

“The first few times I fostered, I cried when they left,” she says. “I wanted to keep the second one that I fostered, and the rescue lady told me to be strong. She said the first or second ones are the hardest. It felt like I was losing a child. But the people who adopted those first ones live nearby, and I got to meet the families, and we still stay in touch. The only thing that made it easier is that if I kept the dog, then that would be the end of fostering. I want to have my home open because there are more dogs who need me.”

My first five foster dogs for Lulu’s Rescue  came and went so quickly, I barely got to know them. They were puppies, and puppies are usually adopted the fastest; some of my fosters stayed less than two days. I’d been nothing more than a way station on their journey, a place for them to be safe until their families could collect them. I thought they were cute, but we didn’t even come close to bonding.

Mac, though, stayed for six weeks. His sloppy kisses and wagging tail became a part of my daily routine, and my own dog’s playtime, too. A month and a half is a long time to steel your heart against a dog who wants nothing more than for you to love him back — especially a dog who lives with you through Christmas and gets his very own presents under the tree.

On the day the rescue told me they had a great application for Mac, I, like Price, felt as though I was about to lose a child. I thought about saying no and officially becoming a “failed foster,” an all-too-common label for folks who tried but just could not say goodbye.

It’s happened more than once to Charlene Jackson of Coming Home Rescue in Rockaway, N.J. She’s had at least 300 foster dogs during the past 15 years, when she’s not busy at her job as an IT professional with Novartis. Her own pack helps with the fostering: Biscuit, a two-year-old Greyhound/Pit Bull mix; Emme, a five-year-old Australian Shepherd/Pit Bull mix; Sam-I-Am, a six-year-old Australian Cattle Dog; and Molly, an 18-year-old Golden Retriever.

“We call her Queen Molly. She came to me full of milk, so we think she was a thrown-out kennel bitch,” Jackson says. “To this day, she will investigate the puppies and sniff their ears to make sure they’re all right. I find that fostering is good for my own dogs. They learn to be sociable, and they learn to share. They open their hearts, too.” Dogs, like people, can become bonded to fosters — especially the ones who end up staying a while. “Time can make it hard, when they just become they’re happy, or it’s a special case and you start to feel like a protective mama bear,” Jackson says. “I’ve seen lots of fosters fail the first or second time. They often keep the first foster dog. Then with the second foster, they cry as they say goodbye. But then they get an email about how well that dog is doing, and they start to understand that this is a cycle. There’s another one waiting. You don’t have to cry for long. He’s in a crate waiting for you.”

For me, it makes things easier to think of that cycle as a pipeline, a pipeline that comes to a clogged stop if the foster person adopts the dog. Keeping that pipeline open is the only way that I could even conceive of saying goodbye to a dog as great as Mac. I kept telling myself that there was another dog just like him scheduled to die in a shelter tomorrow, and that I had to let Mac go, to make room.

The application arrived just before New Year’s. It was from a family about an hour away with a black Labrador who needed a playmate. The husband was willing to drive up to meet Mac even before the application was approved. He brought one of his three sons and their dog, Thomas, who played in my yard with Mac like old pals. The man apologized for his wife’s absence; if their application was chosen, he said, she’d quit her seasonal job early so she could be home to give Mac a proper first few weeks of settling in.

On the day Mac went home with them, I wept. My dog Blue wandered around the house in a daze, too. Mac, though, walked happily out my front door on his leash, his tail in a fullon wag. In my driveway, the family opened the door to their car and Mac jumped right in. He wanted to go for that ride. He didn’t even look back.

I’ve had 13 more foster puppies since then, each one just as deserving of happiness as Mac. Mine wasn’t the ideal home for every one of them — the poopers and chewers … well, I was happy to wish them good luck in life — but a few here and there have touched my heart deeply. For that reason, I’m glad I let Mac go. One of the greatest rewards of fostering is knowing that you’re not only helping one dog, but also the next one in line.

Another great reward is that they never forget you. A couple of weeks ago, I did a reading at a bookstore about a half-hour from my home. My dog Blue was with me, sitting quietly and politely as always. As the reading ended, Blue started tugging and tugging on his leash, trying desperately to get into the crowd. I looked up and saw a gorgeous adult Labrador with his tail wagging wildly, right there in the middle of the bookstore. Within five seconds, Blue was in a full-on play bow.

I looked at the man holding the Lab’s leash, confused about why another dog was inside. The man grinned and said, “You don’t remember him, do you.”

Mac had gotten bigger. And somehow even more gorgeous. His whole family had come to thank me for saving their dog’s life. More than a few people waiting for me to sign their books stopped, stared and wiped away tears.

I wonder if any of them are thinking about fostering now, too.