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Long story short for now, I almost had to a bug out this weekend. Had my 6 cats confined to rooms so I wouldn't need to search for them, could corner them. Each has its own pet taxi with a spare or two for back up. Food in kibble and cans into the truck and food dishes, too. Toys on the second list.
But, what else? It occurred to me that I did not have collars, leashes, harnesses, so I ordered those. What about a cat pen, perhaps collapsable so it fits in the spaces of the truck (F-250 is my bail out vehicle). Finally, off the top of my head, what is a good kitten/puppy kibble with a long storage life, perhaps in a Gamma container? Admittedly in a bug out situation, it is not unreasonable to find those pets without their humans.
Most of my cats are chipped and those that are not will get it on their next dentist visit.
I'm not bugging out with cats, but the most important for any animal is to be able to catch them and to have a safe container for them to travel in.
Cats may be the hardest because if things are tense, they want to hide and aren't interested in being captured and chucked into the car.
My dogs are trained and drilled on running as fast as they can and jumping into the car. When I had horses, they were loaded and unloaded from the horse trailer frequently and fed treats inside the trailer so they were cooperative about getting in the trailer and experienced with road travel.
For my cows, they were trained to come to a whistle and I had the pens and chutes to load them into trailers with minimal fuss. For the sheep, I had the dogs to round them up and put them wherever I wanted them.
My dogs get home cooked food and it is frozen, so I can put several days worth into a cooler, and unless the world has ceased to exist, I have my credit cards and they can eat darn near whatever I eat and their stomachs are used to eating that way. For cats, a few cases of cat food or bags of chow on the ready to go . Perhaps a bag of kitty litter.
For the cats, if you have leashes, they would need to be leash trained before the leashes were needed. They would need something like an extra large folding wire dog crate that could keep them confined wherever you end up and still give them a bit of room to move around and room for a litter box.
For any animal, all vaccines kept up to date. I know a lot of people who don't vaccinate their cats because the cat never goes anywhere, but if you are evacuating, there is no telling what the cats might get exposed to. Better safe than sorry, so keep the vaccines updated and that is one less worry.
Last edited by oregonwoodsmoke; 08-08-2023 at 11:42 AM..
For any animal, all vaccines kept up to date. I know a lot of people who don't vaccinate their cats because the cat never goes anywhere, but if you are evacuating, there is no telling what the cats might get exposed to. Better safe than sorry, so keep the vaccines updated and that is one less worry.
I haven't needed to test this thank goodness, but it's also possible an evacuation shelter might turn away someone's pets that don't have proof of current key vaccinations.
Last edited by Parnassia; 08-08-2023 at 02:16 PM..
I haven't needed to test this thank goodness, but it's also possible an evacuation shelter might turn away someone's pets that don't have proof of current key vaccinations.
I keep copies of the rabies certificates in the glove boxes of every vehicle and another in my travel trailer. I'm going to have them if I need them.
It would work to have copies of all vaccinations on your phone.
A lot of evacuation shelters don't take animals. If they don't, I can sleep in my car. Because we get a cold winter here, all vehicles have blankets left in them full time.
Farm animals are a problem in an evacuation, but you can't lay low on your farm if the evacuation is wild fire or flooding.
My neighbors left their chicken coop open as they bailed in case the fire got that far. When they saw that it wouldn't and found out I was still in the area, they asked me to go over and close it up so the raccoons wouldn't get them.
Now, a side note on that, walking around an evacuated area, I carried my ID with me for that trip in case a deputy patrolling for looters came by. No such event.....but ready for it just in case.
But with farm animals, I am sort of at loss with them on how to bail out. I can offer my land as an LZ to those bailing out with them (but they would have to bring the food, experience, fencing, etc) but don't know what to do myself with them, if I had them.
Along the coast of Oregon, there used to be really severe flooding and the dairies all had "cow pads" which were built up flat topped hills so the cows could get up on top and be above the water.
That used to be how you would know if an area got bad flooding, you would look for the cow pads. I don't know what has happened to the flooding but for many decades, the floods have just been traditional creeks overflowing and no longer water 10 feet deep covering the area.
For fire, all you can do is to maintain defensible space and hope your livestock survives, unless your numbers are small enough to get them into a stock trailer.
Long story short for now, I almost had to a bug out this weekend. Had my 6 cats confined to rooms so I wouldn't need to search for them, could corner them. Each has its own pet taxi with a spare or two for back up. Food in kibble and cans into the truck and food dishes, too. Toys on the second list.
But, what else? It occurred to me that I did not have collars, leashes, harnesses, so I ordered those. What about a cat pen, perhaps collapsable so it fits in the spaces of the truck (F-250 is my bail out vehicle). Finally, off the top of my head, what is a good kitten/puppy kibble with a long storage life, perhaps in a Gamma container? Admittedly in a bug out situation, it is not unreasonable to find those pets without their humans.
Most of my cats are chipped and those that are not will get it on their next dentist visit.
I would add:
1. Any meds that your cats take on a regular basis. Any meds that your cats "may need" if they get sick/wounded.
2. A supply of CLEAN water.
3. Chip the rest of your cats.
4. A supply of cat box stuff.
Last edited by NORTY FLATZ; 08-13-2023 at 02:24 PM..
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