In the year 2003, three veterinary professionals formed Animal Protection and Education (A.P.E.), after noticing some of the needs of local animal shelters in rural Iowa. A.P.E. started by assisting in the placement (adoption) of special need animals, into homes that could provide for these special need animals until they were fit for adoption into permanent families via an animal shelter. We realized quickly that this was just one of many needs for rural shelters. Many shelters were sending out their animals with little or no veterinary care. A.P.E. knowing the overwhelming statistics of euthanasia in this country did not feel good about the idea of allowing any animals to be adopted unaltered, especially the ones we were assisting.
This unaltered status is what prompted us to hire a veterinarian to come to these rural areas to alter shelter animals. In addition, one of the shelters we have assisted, PAWS of Greene County, had also participated in Trap- Neuter-Return (T-N-R) of feral cats in the towns of Churdan and Paton, IA. A.P.E. being founded by one of PAWS' past presidents, decided that offering T-N-R services to communities and farmers for feral cat populations at nominal to no fee, could help provide enough work to make it feasible to have a veterinarian on staff for an eight hour days a few days per month.
The idea of altering for private families (farmers) was not taken lightly. The last thing we want to do is to is take revenue away from our local veterinary practices. However, in this situation farmers typically would not take their farm cats to a full service practice, solely because of the cost in doing so. Consequently, this service is not taking any revenue away from the area veterinary clinics. At A.P.E. we pride ourselves on the gentle care along with sterile techniques provided to all of our clients, with no exceptions, the same you would expect from a full service clinic. A.P.E. can afford to offer substantial discounts on these procedure while maintaining, the same high standard of care found in the full service clinics. We do so by reducing overhead, by holding the clinics in mobile locations, we have no mortgage or utilities. We do so by buying materials, such as syringes, absorbable sutures, and economy spay packs in bulk. In addition, being a 501 C 3, non-profit organization, we benefit from the donations of vaccinations and other pharmaceuticals from manufactures of these products. The greatest savings is that we have a team of volunteers, along with veterinary technicians that volunteer their time, assisting the veterinarian on the team, which until now was the only paid member of the team.
A.P.E. hopes to continue growing, and to continue to work with area veterinarians, providing these services to help reduce the overpopulation of animals here in central Iowa.
