"To fight fleas and ticks, he has used a folk remedy. A tobacco chewer, he saves the juice and sprays it on the lawn."

Sometimes creativity and home remedies are the only things that allow people living in rural areas without free spay clinics to help an ever increasing population of stray or abandoned animals.

Link... [1]

"Tina Churchwell, head of the humane society in McNairy County, where Finger and Selmer are situated, calls 12 dogs her own and has set up a makeshift shelter at her home, kennels holding 22 other dogs she hopes might be adopted. The society is searching for money to build a proper shelter on land the county has offered, but community support is lacking, Ms. Churchwell said."

The Humane Society does what it can, but too few vets and a population that can't afford to pay for their services is creating a potentially serious health situation. Tammy Rouse, the Applachian coordinator for volunteer service has her hands full.

“It’s like putting a Band-Aid on a gushing artery,” she said. “Spay-neuter has to go hand in hand with education and legislation.”

It sounds like the only thing that could turn this situation around would be to have a team of vets and volunteer assistants form a group similar to "Doctors Without Borders". There probably aren't enough of these here in Tennessee, so it would have to be an effort that would attract vets and vet students from all over the country. A kind of tent meeting of professionals that could set up for a week or two. There is a long history of tent revivals here. Why not use this old fashioned idea to save the souls and lives of all the unwanted dogs and cats in areas that are too far from vet services or owned by people too poor to afford them? This would of course take a combination of county, state, and federal monies.

Fat chance of that.

We've gone over this territory before, and some people will say there should be laws to stop poor people from having animals, but that is about as logical as expecting poor people to not have babies. Education is always the best answer of course, but in the meantime the crisis is growing.

It's really sad to know that local problems that only affect a few rural people can't be resolved because most of our state and federal money is going to large causes like homeland security. We are slowly becoming a bankrupt nation. Little is being done to improve employment in rural areas.

Domesticated animals are low on our priority list in spite of the fact that dogs and cats have been our loyal best friends for generations. In cases like this one it will take more than local resources to get the situation under control.

Fat chance of that.