Valiant Efforts Save Lives of Hundreds of Pets : Animals: Owners and volunteers risk lives to bring variety of creatures to safe shelter. But flames still exact a heavy toll.

As tongues of flame licked down the canyon behind his Sierra Madre house, Andy Dotson knew that he had to get his most beloved possessions out quickly--just in case.

The choice was simple. He’d get his engagement ring later. The irreplaceable photo albums could wait. The brand new TV was left for another load. And he completely forgot the penguin security blanket--his “penguiy blankey”--that he’d relied on for 19 years, ever since he was 11.

Load No. 1 on Wednesday afternoon was alive: Spot the Labrador retriever, plus two cats and three newborn kittens.

“The animals come first, before everything,” Dotson said Thursday at a Red Cross shelter, training binoculars on the hillside above his home and applauding each time a helicopter dumped a load of water. “We took them up to South Pasadena, then came back for the stuff.”

This scene was replayed thousands of times throughout Southern California this week, as pet owners and volunteers risked their hides--and at times their lives--to ensure the safety of their treasured pets.

On Thursday, animal shelters were jammed with every form of furred and feathered creature, some boarded by their owners, others picked up by animal control officers as they combed through the fire areas. A film animal ranch in rural Ventura County was evacuated along with farms and ranches.

“We moved llamas,” recounted Kathy Jenks, Ventura County director of animal regulations. “We moved pigs. We moved cattle, horses, donkeys. (We) moved two elephants and lions and tigers, large cats.

“We have here a pet tarantula that a lady evacuated. It’s in a little terrarium--she didn’t want to leave it behind. She’s the same lady who owns the five wolves we have here.”

Hundreds of volunteers helped evacuate animals when the first of the week’s wildfires roared across mountains near Thousand Oaks, Jenks said. Many brought their own horse trailers, others offered their stables and veterinarians called to donate services. Feed stores delivered hay to the Ventura County Fairgrounds, where 93 unclaimed horses munched away Thursday afternoon.

Elsewhere, humane society volunteers and animal regulation workers set up command posts beside fire departments and police officials. The ritzy Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Laguna Niguel allowed evacuated animals to bed down along with their owners, and began offering cat and dog food through room service.

But not all reaction to animal rescue efforts was positive. “The first question many people ask is why would government devote resources to worrying about animals when there’s houses burning,” Jenks said. “But . . . people have cars. And people do stupid things like locking animals in the barn when a fire’s coming.”

At the Eaton Canyon Park nature center near Altadena, at least 40 animals, including an endangered desert tortoise, perished in the flames. A young panther and a lioness at the Animal Actors of Hollywood ranch in Ventura County were shot because they were too mean to be moved safely when the fire threatened, officials said.

A herd of cattle in the same general area had to be destroyed because the animals were so badly burned.

In the rural enclave of Winchester, an unincorporated area of Riverside County near Temecula, anguish was etched on the blackened face of Felice Bahner. Staring at a burned-out field covered with soot and rife with smoke, Bahner wept over losing her prized possessions--109 exotic birds, all of which perished in Wednesday’s pre-dawn fire.

Bahner assessed her loss as somewhere between $100,000 and $200,000, but said Thursday the real tragedy was incalculable. Pointing to cages gnarled, twisted and scorched black by the fire, she recalled a “gorgeous, big Moluccan” parrot that her mother had befriended before she died in June.

“One day, Mother said hello to him, and just as clear as a bell, he said hello right back,” Bahner said tearfully. “That was two years ago, and he hasn’t stopped saying hello since. I can’t believe he’s dead. The morning before he died, I walked in and he said, ‘Hello.’ And I smiled, thinking to myself that I’d be hearing my mother’s voice for the rest of my life.”

Hers was one of two exotic bird farms destroyed in Riverside County. Gail Worth, who lives up the street from Bahner, lost 115 parrots. Fire officials estimated her loss at $100,000.

In Altadena, it looked like Setrak Kopoushian’s dog would find the same fate as the Riverside area. Kopoushian was halfway down the hill, leaving his home in Kinneloa Canyon to its fate, when he remembered the dog.

“I said, ‘Oh my God, let’s go back,’ ” Kopoushian recalled Thursday.

By then, he said, power lines on the ridge above his house were exploding in the heat and three or four of his neighbor’s houses were afire.

“There were cannonballs coming down,” said Kopoushian. “They wouldn’t let me go back.”

Two hours later, Kopoushian returned to the neighborhood. His first glimpse of the soot-blackened front wall confirmed his worst fears. No house, no dog, he thought.

“There was no barking,” he said. “I thought the dog was . . . “

His house had been saved from serious damage. When Kopoushian opened the front door, there was the poodle, shaking like a leaf.

“He wasn’t hurt, just nervous,” he said.

Oh, yes. The dog’s name? Lucky.