Student volunteers join pre-Christmas effort to find homes for homeless pets

Before students at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine head home for the holidays, they will work to find permanent homes for stray and abandoned cats and dogs.

Student volunteers for No More Homeless Pets in Alachua County are helping to organize Home for the Holidays, the area’s largest pet adopt-a-thon, to be held on Sunday, Dec. 2, from noon to 4 p.m. at the college on Southwest 16th Avenue.

No More Homeless Pets is a new countywide initiative created by a coalition of members that include the local government shelter, the humane society, pet rescue groups, private animal organizations, animal advocates, veterinarians and veterinary students and volunteers dedicated to ending the community’s pet overpopulation problem. By partnering to better use available resources, the coalition’s five-year mission is to end euthanasia of healthy dogs and cats.

“This adopt-a-thon is our first big event,” said Julie Levy, D.V.M., Ph.D., assistant professor of small animal medicine at the college. “The veterinary school has been very generous to donate the space so that we can bring all the groups together under one roof and try to find a home for the holidays for every pet who doesn’t have one.”

Pets available for adoption will include stray and purebred dogs, cats, rabbits and potbelly pigs.

Volunteer hospital and research technicians will bathe, groom and dress the dogs in Christmas bandanas the day before the event.

Participants in the event include the Alachua Humane Society, Alachua County Animal Services, Feline Friends, Operation Catnip, Gainesville Pet Rescue and Puppy Hill.

No More Homeless Pets is joining 1,000 animal shelters throughout the country for Home for the Holidays 2001. From Nov. 13 through Jan. 6, shelters nationwide will attempt to bring thousands of animals together with lifelong friends.