California: Animal Rescue in the Wildfire Chaos

Within a few hours, the nearby mountains were in flames, and the fire began to encircle her.

"I packed 15 dogs and two cats into a black Prius," said Buturovic.

But she still had nine more dogs and a pig to evacuate, so she flagged down some 18-year-olds with a truck who agreed to take them to a shelter. Two ponies she could not take with her, but she left the enclosure open so they could escape if needed.

"That's how we evacuated almost 30 animals," she said. "It was crazy."

Shelters overwhelmed

Buturovic is one of many pet owners in Los Angeles who had to get themselves and their beloved animals to safety from the rapidly spreading wildfires that killed 11 people this week and burned down more than 12’000 houses and other buildings. Shelters are overwhelmed, and shelter managers have urged people to place their pets with friends or relatives if they are able to do so.

Wendy Winter and her husband decided to buy a few cat carriers to evacuate their home in Altadena with their cats Purry Mason and Jerry. Less than two hours later, it was clear they had to leave the house. The next morning they learned that the house where they had lived for more than seven years had disappeared along with the rest of their street.

They are hoping to find friends who can take in their cats for two months while they figure out what to do next. Winter said she and her husband are confused and unsure whether they can provide their cats with an environment in which they feel safe and comfortable. The climate crisis is further exacerbating such disasters.

Improvised emergency shelters for animals

Some people brought their pets to animal shelters because they were unable to evacuate with them.

The Pasadena Humane Society took in 250 pets on the first day after the fires broke out. Los Angeles County Animal Care looked after 97 pets — mainly cats and dogs, but also pigs, a tortoise, a bird and a snake, said Christopher Valles, a spokesperson for the agency.

Veterinarian Dr. Annie Harvilicz had moved out of an old practice of the Animal Wellness Center in Marina del Rey, but inspired by her brother's need to find a place for his pets, she transformed the examination, X-ray and operating rooms into an improvised animal shelter. She quickly took in 41 dogs, cats and a rabbit, and soon found foster homes for all but two of them.

On Facebook, she asked people to contact her if they needed a place for their animals. She expected a surge of animals in need of refuge, but instead she was inundated with people wanting to volunteer.

“I am very proud of the people of Los Angeles and truly feel that they are helping each other,” she said.

Horses trapped in flames

Some people wanted Harvilicz to take their donkeys, but she was unable to get a trailer to them before they had to be evacuated. The difficult transport of larger animals poses a greater risk to animals affected by thewildfires,

Julia Bagan, who is a member of the Facebook group Southern California Equine Emergency Evacuation, found five horses locked in their stalls in Altadena one day after the fire. The horses were huddled in a small outdoor enclosure attached to the stalls, but were unable to escape the flames entirely.

When a neighbor called for help and firefighters freed them with bolt cutters, one of the horses was already seriously injured, according to Bagan.

She drove through the remains of the fire to rescue the horses while damaged power lines sparked above the house. She described it as the craziest and most dangerous evacuation she had experienced so far. When she arrived, almost all the houses in the area had burned down.

The injured horse, a 3-year-old black mare she named after the film Flicka, had burns on her leg. Her halter had burned off, as had her tail and mane. The embers had caused eye ulcers.

A veterinarian at an emergency equine clinic gave the horse a 50:50 chance of survival.

"She simply had no chance, as she was locked in a stable and her owners just left her there," said Bagan.

Preparation saves lives

But some horse owners were prepared.

When Meredith McKenzie learned of the increased fire risk a few days earlier, she asked the people at her stable to evacuate her horse so she could focus on caring for her sister, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease.

"Horse people are not foolish when a fire breaks out. We are out before it starts, because once the smoke is there, the horses go crazy," said McKenzie. "It is difficult to control them because they simply want to run away."

The ranch where she had kept her horses, the historic Bob Williams Ranch on Cheney Trail, had burned down, she said. McKenzie lost her equipment, but another ranch agreed to give her a saddle and a bridle.

Suzanne Cassel was evacuated from Topanga with her two horses, a donkey named Oscar Nelson, four dogs, and two cats. They rushed to secure a place in an emergency shelter for large animals at Pierce College, a community college in Woodland Hills.

Her horses are together at the shelter, while the dogs and cats are housed in the horse trailer. Her donkey, however, did not feel comfortable alone in a stall.

"He is lonely, so I simply went in and sat with him in the stall for half an hour, and he liked that, because as a herd animal, one does not like to be alone," she said.

Buturovic, who runs the shelter, brought some of her dogs to Harvilicz‘ old clinic and others to a friend in Venice.

When she returned to the Topanga Ranch, it had already burned down. The cement building, which had withstood two or three other fires since the 1950s, was covered in soot, the roof was destroyed, and the windows had shattered. Her ponies had disappeared, as had two semi-wild dogs she had been feeding. She hopes to raise money to support Philozoia, her nonprofit organization that rescues animals from high-kill shelters.

"I don't know how things will continue from here," she said.