Couple run shelter out of their Maryland home.

[AZBlue]

Thanks to dedicated people like Bob and Katherine Rude, many homeless animals in Maryland will have a warm home this winter.

The Maryland couple currently cares for 116 cats and six dogs at Rude Ranch Animal Rescue, which they run out of their home in Harwood.

"We take in a lot of abused and neglected animals; animals that for whatever reason find themselves down on their luck," Katherine said.

The more we got involved, and the more we found out about the world of animal rescue, the more we found out there was a lot more need. ...We felt we could fill a void," Katherine said.

(snip)

A few years later, they bought a ranch house in Harwood and converted it into a shelter. Eventually, Bob and Katherine left their government jobs to work at the shelter full time. They now work seven days a week, morning through night, caring for their cats and dogs.

"Now we're doing adoptions, we're doing search and rescue, we're helping people out with spay and neuters, and we're helping out other animal controls with animals that they can't place, but think deserve a shot at a life," Katherine said.

The Rudes originally planned on keeping the shelter on one floor, and living in the rest of the house. But they quickly found that many of the cats required full-time care, so they expanded the shelter throughout their home.

"We still have a bedroom that's sort of ours, but we share it with a bunch of special-needs animals. We have anywhere from two or three dogs and 10 to 12 cats that share a bed with us," Bob says.

The extra space has allowed the Rudes to take in cats that most shelters cannot. Cats that require special attention or medical care -- those that have been abused or are suffering from feline immunodeficiency virus, for example -- all have a place at the ranch.

Katherine says this was one reason they started their own shelter. "It was for ... the ones that maybe don't have an alternative, don't have somewhere else to go. We figured they had as much of a chance at a life as someone else," she said.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/wayoflife/12/23/rude.ranch.animal.house/index.html

To find out more about the shelter or to donate, please visit: www.ruderanch.org.
I hope to someday create a shelter of my own too!

[BrklynLiberal]

1. Really wonderful people...Thank goodness for people like this to make an attempt

to balance out the disgusting "humans" who abandon and toss creatures from cars...


Thanks for posting.

[Azlady]

2. There site is currently down from so many hits -

I know the animal shelters in my area are so hurting with the economy. The Pet Food store I go to has decided to keep up the Holiday big barrels they set up for people to buy and donate cat & dog food in. Also they have established a Pet Food Pantry for those that can not afford to feed their 4 legged kiddos.

People are dropping off their pets to shelters,as they can not afford to take care of them anymore, so there has been a big blitz on TV letting people know about the places to get food/low to no cost vaccines & exams. Keep your pets, that is what they are asking people.

I wish I could afford to donate to this wonderful at home shelter, those sweet wheeties. What angels those people are.

[Muttocracy]

3. I recommend the slide show - wow, their home is so tidy! nt