Woman protests chaining of dogs
She spends birthday wearing collar attached to doghouse
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Article RatingAlthough the chain on her neck grew heavy, Lisa Fischer says spending her birthday chained to a doghouse was “fantastic.”
“I can't say that I had any expectations for the day,” says the Mt. Holly Springs resident, who turned 37 on Sunday and celebrated by taking part in the annual Chain Off event sponsored by Dogs Deserve Better.
For eight hours, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Fischer sat at a giant doghouse her boyfriend built for her, wearing a collar and chain.
“I started about 10 minutes early, and within 15 minutes I could feel myself already pulling,” she says. “Definitely I was very aware of the collar and the chain all day.”
But, she says, the weather was perfect, and she was buoyed by the support of friends, family and strangers who stopped by to chat with her.
“I kept expecting someone to come and look me in the eye and said, ‘What are you doing,'” she says. Instead, she says, the people who didn't know “simply started asking questions.”
“Everyone was just completely supportive,” she says. “I heard so many stories today from people, from folks that have seen dogs that have been neglected and abused and just didn't know what to.”
Steady traffic
She was glad to be able to give them literature - and to be able to donate the more than $1,100 to help further the mission of Dogs Deserve Better.
Fischer says she came across the nonprofit organization's Web site about a year ago. At the time, Fischer says, she was researching after noticing that a neighbor of her parents kept his hunting dogs in rabbit hutches in his back yard.
“It disturbed me so much,” she says. “I typed in ‘hunting dogs' and the Web site (for Dogs Deserve Better) came up.”
Fischer immediately found herself agreeing with the organization's goals, which includes helping people finds way to bring dogs - chained or in cages - indoors through training, funding for fences and more.
“As soon as I read about it, I responded,” she said.
“I talked to people all day long,” she says, estimating that between 50 and 60 people stopped by the Newville Road property where she placed her dog house to take advantage of garage sale traffic.
More time next year?
Friends gave her little crafting projects to keep her busy, she says, but she never got a chance to do any of them.
“I was fortunate, as opposed to dogs that have no activity all day,” she says. The lifelong animal lover's two dogs, Penny and Sierra, don't even wear collars unless they're going for a walk or to the vet.
“They'll never have to know that kind of horror,” she says of chaining her dogs.
Now that the collar is of, Fischer says, she's already planning next year's event - and since eight hours went so well, she's thinking of doing 24 next year. “It was a unique way to spend the day,” she says.
More information about the organization is available at www.dogsdeservebetter.com.
