Katrina’s Sponsorship Program
In August of 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. The City of New Orleans was decimated and the damage reached as far north as Mississippi. Families across the South were displaced and many were forced to abandon their pets to save themselves. Like any other city, not every dog in New Orleans lived in a house with a family prior to Hurricane Katrina. When GDG’s Katie Bray volunteered with the animal rescue and recovery effort, a little Staffordshire Bull Terrier mix caught her eye. This little female dog was found on the roof of a shed just before it collapsed. When Katie met her and found out no one was looking for her, she adopted her, brought her back to Kansas, and welcomed the little lady into the family.
Unfortunately upon her first visit to the veterinarian, it was discovered that the little blonde bombshell, aptly named “Katrina,” was heartworm positive. But Katrina wasn’t the only one rescued from the hurricane who was infested with heartworms. The swampy South and heat of the Midwest is a perfect breeding ground for perpetuating the parasitic infection in dogs and cats. See a map here. Click here to learn more about the life cycle of heartworms and how a dog becomes infected. The treatment for heartworms is expensive and dangerous, although strides of improvement have been made in the last five years to reduce the risk to the animal being treated.
Katrina sailed through her heartworm treatment without complication and is now a happy and healthy family pet with no residual effects. Game Dog Guardian set up Katrina's Sponsorship Program to ensure the dogs in our rescue program stay heartworm free and if they are infected with heartworms when they come to us, we can afford to treat them.
We accept donations of Heartguard, Interceptor, and Revolution for the dogs in our program. You can order them from 1-800 Pet Meds. (The dogs in our program are anywhere from 30 to 90 pounds.) Please contact Anthony here to get shipping information. You may also donate here to contribute to our fund for heartworm treatment.