This weekend was the grand opening of the Spay Neuter Express at the Pet Expo, which was held in the Deltaplex.  It was a great weekend for it, as there were over 5000 people who came to the expo.  The Spay Neuter Express is a project that I have developed to help reduce the number of healthy adoptable pets that have to be put to sleep because of the lack of homes.  It is a mobile veterinary clinic in which spays and neuter surgeries will be performed for pets from low income families, rescue groups and shelters.  It is also for feral cats, barn cats and cat colonies.  I had 51 patients on Saturday.  I did not have any plans to do surgery on Sunday, but one of the local rescues, Safe Haven Humane Society, in conjuction with Ionia County Animal Shelter adopted out all of its dogs on Saturday.  They then spent Saturday evening raiding some kill shelters and rescuing more dogs.  I agreed to spay and neuter them first thing on Sunday, so I ended up with 14 surgeries.  All of these pets then found homes on Sunday.  

 The Spay Neuter Express is currently working on booking a schedule of regular stops.  Right now we are going to Newaygo on Mondays, and will be going to Ionia on Tuesdays, and Allegan on Thursdays.  Once I get some more vets hired, and get the logistics of the locations worked out, I will likely be sending it to Muskegon and Montcalm counties also on a weekly basis.

My long term goal is to get the first unit up and operating smoothly, and then to add additional units, expanding the area of coverage.