Castaic’s Los Angeles County-run animal shelter has accepted several dogs from county-run shelters in Lancaster and Palmdale to help them make way for the hundreds of dogs and cats rescued from a Lake Hughes property last week.
While it’s common practice for animals to be transferred between shelters as needed, this week’s influx is specifically in response to the Lake Hughes operation, where a little over 300 dogs and cats were confiscated from a nonprofit rescue, Rock N Pawz Animal Rescue.
The county revised its initial report of 700 rescued animals on the day of the operation to 250 dogs and 66 cats. The revision was announced on the Department of Animal Control’s Facebook page Friday.
Castaic’s shelter isn’t anticipating it’ll receive any animals directly from the Lake Hughes property, said shelter manager Paul Maradiaga, but for the shelters that will be, the transfer will help relieve the “pressure of over-capacity,” he said.
A total of 12 dogs were transferred from the Lancaster and Palmdale Animal Care Centers on Monday.
“We have a good success rate when it comes to adoptions, and we collaborate with other organizations, nonprofit organizations, to come and help us with our capacity,” Maradiaga said.
Getting those dogs adopted is the next step for alleviating shelter pressure. L.A. County shelters were open for an extra day last weekend between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. Sunday to help promote adoptions. Maradiaga said two cats and a dog were adopted that day at the Castaic shelter.
Before the Castaic Care Center opened to the public Wednesday morning, Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station deputies visited the shelter to shoot a series of social media videos to promote its available animals, featuring Capt. Brandon Barclay.
Maradiaga said the station reached out to the shelter on Tuesday to set up the promotion event.
“(It’s a) great collaboration to promote adoptions on their social media,” Maradiaga said. “They’re going to engage with our animals, engage with our staff, and hopefully we can get some good adoptions.”
Barclay said the purpose of the posts is to help the L.A. County shelter system clear up space, and that Castaic’s shelter has “beautiful dogs” ready for adoption.
“There was a recent search warrant that was conducted, and several hundred animals were taken,” Barclay said. “We’re here to try to clear up space, to relieve the strain on the several animal shelters that are out here … there’s some beautiful dogs here. I just saw a blue-eyed husky and a French bulldog.”
The city also collected videos to promote Castaic’s adoptable animals Wednesday. City spokesperson Ilyana Capellan said they’d be posting on the city’s Facebook and Instagram accounts.
“(We’re) just really trying to get the message out there that adoption is priority right now, and we’re trying to make space for the animals when they’re available for adoption,” Capellan said.
Capellan said donations to help the L.A. County animal shelter system can go to the L.A. County Animal Care Foundation at lacountyanimals.com.
More information about the dogs and cats immediately ready for adoption at Castaic’s shelter, or any other shelter in the L.A. County shelter system, can be found at tinyurl.com/5baxz953.
