Making a Difference in Your Community : At This Home, a Lot of Tails Are Wagging

When Mary Duque reports to work on Thursdays, she is greeted by a cacophony of wails, yowls and yips.

As the Burbank Animal Shelter volunteer walks through a long corridor of cages, dogs rush to the doors--jumping, scratching, demanding acknowledgment. Duque has something to say to nearly each one.

“Nobody’s come to fetch you, huh?” she said recently to a blue-eyed husky-collie mix, who was staring through the cage, bewildered, slowly wagging its tail.

“This one came in a week ago. He’s up for adoption today,” she said, petting a small black Labrador puppy. “He should be gone by the end of the day.”

“Oh, you’d scare my cats to death,” she said to a persistent poodle who had been up for adoption for two weeks.

Every Thursday is the same. She walks through, greeting the shelter’s temporary, tail-wagging residents on her way to clean cat cages in the back.

Duque is one of about 10 volunteers, but the shelter needs more.

“The volunteers just make it a lot easier,” said Fred DeLange, the shelter’s superintendent.

The shelter needs volunteers to answer telephones, show animals to the public, feed the animals and clean cat cages, a job that Duque does on Thursdays. “What a noisy kitty,” she said to a tiny, gray and white kitten yowling with the lungs of a lion.

Duque also takes schoolchildren on tours of the shelter and its petting zoo full of rabbits, pheasants, crows, a goat named Nanny, and the black sheep of the shelter, Charger.

By 10 a.m. this particular Thursday, the Labrador puppy had been adopted by a beaming middle-age couple.

“That’s the fun of the job. Watching little cuties like that go home with people who will love them to death,” Duque said.

The unfun part should be obvious.

Summers are toughest, Duque said, because more animals are picked up or brought in than any other time of the year. And more animals are put down.

“That gets pretty depressing,” she said.

Strays are held a minimum of five working days before they are put up for adoption, DeLange said. They are kept longer when the shelter isn’t full.

In 1992, the shelter picked up 1,666 dogs and 1,600 cats. Of the dogs, 656 found new homes and 670 were returned to their owners. Only 46 cats were returned home and 574 found new owners.

Elementary math shows the number destroyed: 340 dogs and 980 cats.

“What you learn to do is not get attached to any particular animal,” Duque said. “Although I did get attached to Alice and Patrick.”

Patrick is a brown tabby that Duque picked up from the shelter. “His number was up so I said OK, he has to come home with me.” Alice also came from the shelter.

Some volunteers, afraid they’ll face a huge menagerie if they work with animals, request office work.

Other volunteers, such as Duque, do anything the shelter needs.

“I just love it. It’s my weekly therapy,” Duque said. “I’d rather do this than anything else.”

The Burbank resident, who has been volunteering at the shelter since August, 1992, beamed as a brown and black puppy licked her face and a photographer snapped away.

“What can I say?” she said, dodging a tiny paw. “It’s a tough job, but somebody’s got to do it.”

To volunteer at the Burbank Animal Shelter, call (818) 953-8719.

Other volunteering opportunities:

* The Conejo Valley Art Museum in Thousand Oaks is seeking volunteers, including a volunteer coordinator and an exhibit coordinator. Please contact Maria Dessornes at (805) 492-2147 or call the museum at (805) 373-0054.

* Burbank’s Retired Senior Volunteer Program is looking for a choral director for a choral group, which will meet one afternoon a week at the Don Tuttle Adult Center in Burbank. Prospective volunteers should ask for Dee Call at (818) 953-9503.

Getting Involved is a weekly listing of volunteering opportunities. Please address prospective listings to Getting Involved, Los Angeles Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth 91311. Or fax them to (818 ) 772-3338.