A View of Kennel Two

Well, lets start with a view of the kennels, and a few pictures. So in each kennel for example kennel 2 (K2), which I was in, has four quads or four sets of 9-10 runs each. K2 can hold up to 76 dogs, two in each run. When I was there we averaged around 50 dogs. The quads are labeled Front East, Front West, Back East and Back West. Between the front and back quads is a middle section, shown here. In this mid section is everything we need to take care of the dogs. Through the blue doors can be seen the front west quad. At the far side of the picture and behind me are doors that go out to community run. As can be seen in the left of the picture is one of the two med boards. This contains a list of all medications that need to be given to the dogs in k2. Not to worry, most of these are common ear or foot meds. Also at the far side can be seen the sink, where we wet the food and clean all of the bowls and other toys. Attached to the walls along the middle section are several tie downs and two crates, where dogs can be brought for meds, weekly body checks, cuddling, or office time (to de-stress). Behind me is a desk and cabinets that hold meds, grooming supplies, and a small fridge for making ice cubes and food filled kongs. Through the doors can also be seen where we store the food cart.

This is a picture of the back two quads. To the front right is another storage area (like the one in front where the food cart is kept). We keep our large squeegees here. These are used to remove water from the inside part of the runs and from the walkway after they are cleaned in the mornings. Yellow drains can be seen to the front of each kennel. The long red hose seen here is used to clean the inside. Four other hoses like it are located outside each quad in order to clean the runs several times a day after we scoop poop. There are 10 runs on the left and 9 on the right. As you can see, a few of the runs have open doors. These dogs are out with trainers. The door in the back leads to nowhere and we don't really use it.



In this picture you can see one of the runs. The guillotine door (previously discussed) can be seen at the back. This leads to the outside of the kennel runs and then to the community run. There is a door, much like the open one seen here, on the outside which allows us to let the dogs out directly into community run. The cable attached to the guillotine door is attached to a ring which can be pulled to let the dogs out and attached to a hook (middle left) to lock it open. Each water bowl (lower left) has its own faucet and can be filled by turning a valve located in the middle section. This allows us to water all of the dogs at once. At right is a hanging toy and although the baby puppies seem to enjoy them, most of the big dogs don't really care. Each dog has a name tag on the door of its run and labels indicate other important information such as the amount of food each dog eats. But more on that later.