purposeforporpoise

Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.  He was old, aloof and tough. During a brawl with another rabbit, Bongo lost a dime-size piece of his ear. His first home is unknown. His second was an animal shelter in rural Pennsylvania that reached rabbit overload and transferred him to another shelter here called Animal Friends.

Animal Friends takes abused, neglected and unwanted animals and tries to find them families. That can be challenging. Who wants a banged-up old rabbit? Or elderly cats and dogs that have thinning fur, missing teeth, cataracts and arthritic hips?

"A lot of folks aren't willing to adopt an older animal," says Ann Cadman, health and wellness coordinator at the shelter. "I had one woman say, 'Why would I want a used animal?' "

Ms. Cadman, who has adopted several elderly dogs, says they are affectionate and attentive. http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com/
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http://louis9j9sheehan9esquire.blogspot.com/But she needed a way to persuade other people to adopt old animals, of which there are many at the shelter.

Some have been left by people who move, want a younger pet, or are overwhelmed by age-related maladies. A good number of the older rabbits were bought as Easter bunnies for small children. Months pass. The novelty wears off, and the cuddly little critters turn into rabbits, weighing up to 25 pounds if they are Flemish, that can bite if they don't want to be held. Animal Friends is a no-kill shelter, so once an animal arrives, it stays there or in foster care until it is adopted.

Ms. Cadman had an idea: Form an exclusive society for people who adopt older pets, by which she means dogs more than five years old and cats over six. Rabbits are considered old at three.

Members would get discounts on pet jewelry and apparel at the shelter boutique. They would be honored with a proclamation suitable for framing, and they are invited to coffee klatches.


Ms. Cadman decided to call the group the Red Collar Society, after the well-known Red Hat Society, in which women over 50 glory in being middle-aged. "Both societies see age as something to celebrate," says Ms. Cadman.

Ms. Cadman's Red Collar Society appears to be effective. Since it was formed last April, more than 300 older cats, dogs and rabbits have been adopted from the shelter.

Members say older pets have distinct advantages. They are loving, calm, don't nip or insist on playing fetch. They don't gnaw as much on furniture and are good at visiting hospitals, nursing homes and elementary schools. Children with reading problems, for instance, will read aloud to Jazz, a seven-year-old black poodle, because he listens quietly and uncritically.

Maureen Pfeifer joined the Red Collar Society after adopting Erma, a Dalmatian somewhere between eight and 10 years old. Erma had a cloudy eye, bad teeth, a heart murmur and a tumor. A family had taken her but brought her back because she had too many things wrong with her.

"I always started with puppies and wanted another dog," says Ms. Pfeifer, who also has a seven-year-old dog that is in better health but getting creaky. "I love the idea of not having to house train. Erma knows basic commands already. It's really a lot easier."

Older animals available for adoption are advertised in the shelter newsletter, as well as in other local publications. Featured recently was T-Bone, a white seven-year-old cat originally from Egypt who responds to whistles just like a dog would, and Chester, a five-year-old coonhound who has a pleasing temperament and likes treats.

Wayne Croushore saw a picture of Bongo the rabbit and thought he might be good company for his other rabbit, Perkins, Perky for short. Mr. Croushore, 77 years old, adopted Bongo last year and became a Red Collar Society member. The retired insurance consultant has had pets all his life, including beagle puppies, which are cute but need housebreaking and obedience school. A few years ago, Mr. Croushore discovered rabbits and liked them as pets. "They're kind of like scotch, an acquired taste," he says.


Far more interesting than he imagined, they growl when they are unhappy. Some cry and grind their teeth. Their personalities vary. Perky is just that. Bongo is rakish -- tough, aggressive and independent, like a one-legged pirate, Mr. Croushore says. Buddy, his first rabbit, who has since died, came up the steps at 11 every night to have his ears scratched. Buddy's ashes are in a white ceramic dish on a shelf in Mr. Croushore's basement.

The key to making these relationships work is education. There's a class at Animal Friends on geriatric cats taught by a feline-massage therapist. http://louis0j0sheehan.livejournal.com/15433.html
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 Red Collar members can attend monthly programs on bonding and estate planning. Mr. Croushore has arranged for Bongo and Perkins to be taken care of by Animal Friends if they outlive him.

There are downsides. Elderly pets can have expensive medical problems, such as strokes and failing vision. Glaucoma drops can cost $90. Older pets need to be taken out more at night. Aging rabbits need dental work. Geriatric pets need low-impact exercise. Fat and calories need to be watched in their diets. Older animals can become disoriented. An Australian study published in the Journal of Small Animal Practice reported that 28% of cats aged 11 to 14 develop at least one geriatric-onset behavioral problem, such as forgetfulness. This rises to over half of cats 15 years of age and older.


Mary Soukup, a retired teacher, provides foster care to the sickest older animals at Animal Friends, nursing them until they can be adopted. She often cares for dogs showing signs of dementia. She watches for telltale symptoms, such as going into a corner and being unable to get out. She is an unofficial Red Collar Society member because she hasn't officially adopted a pet, but she takes care of many. She currently has two: Bagel the beagle, a 12-year-old with arthritis, and 16-year-old Hercules, a Yorkshire terrier, who is blind.

She and the two dogs attended a recent coffee klatch. Over refreshments, Ms. Soukup and other owners traded tips. A fish-oil tablet, good for the heart and coat, is eagerly gobbled up by dogs if it is wrapped in salami. Pets at the social gathering traded stares and sniffs.

Old pets can learn new tricks, some society members say. Katie Tontala points to her 11-year-old cat, Karma, whom she adopted last year.

Karma is deaf and thus can't hear a can being opened; most cats know that the sound means dinner is served. Ms. Tontala taught Karma sign language. She puts her fingers to her mouth and taps her lips. Karma comes.

Natural-gas producers are swarming into Pennsylvania to chase what many are betting could be the next big thing: a thick wedge of gas-bearing rock called the Marcellus Shale.

The recent surge in interest was triggered by disclosures in the fall from producer Range Resources Corp. of Fort Worth, Texas, that it had drilled a well there producing more than three million cubic feet of natural gas a day, proving that Marcellus Shale wells can be profitable. http://louisajasheehan.blogspot.com/

Since then, Range has reported wells that produce even more gas.

•  Rising Interest: Natural-gas producers are swarming to the state to drill in a potentially hot production area.
•  Difficult Area: Lack of equipment and manpower has impeded some efforts.
•  The Risk: The area hasn't yet shown that producers will find major gas deposits.

The result is a land rush unmatched anywhere else in North America as companies try to snap up drilling acreage on a giant swath of rock stretching from West Virginia across Pennsylvania to the northeast corner of the state, 90 miles from New York City.

Range Resources plans to spend $426 million in Appalachia this year. Other out-of-state companies, such as EOG Resources Inc., Chesapeake Energy Corp. and Anadarko Petroleum Corp., have either begun drilling or are planning to drill wells targeting the Marcellus Shale.

Wall Street has recently awakened to the potential earnings power of these Pennsylvania wells, but analysts contend they still could be undervalued. "Even though these stocks have done well, to say the market has fully captured the potential is laughable," says Subash Chandra, an energy analyst with Jefferies & Co. Range Resources' shares were at $64.31 apiece as of 4 p.m. New York Stock Exchange composite trading, up from $34.01 a year earlier.

A relatively clean-burning fuel, natural gas is in growing demand. About half of U.S. homes use natural gas, and it generates about a fifth of the nation's electricity. Meanwhile, natural-gas prices have gone above $6 per million British thermal units for the past three years, triple their historical average. Prices recently topped $10 per million BTUs before falling back and ended Tuesday at $9.72 on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Estimates of the Marcellus Shale's supplies vary widely. In 2002, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated there may be 1.9 trillion cubic feet. Earlier this year, Terry Engelder, a Pennsylvania State University geosciences professor, made what he called a conservative estimate of 168 trillion cubic feet. http://louisbjbsheehan.blogspot.com/
http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire.blogspot.com/His estimate has yet to be confirmed. By comparison, the U.S. consumed 23.05 trillion cubic feet last year, according to the Energy Information Administration, or about 63.2 billion cubic feet a day.

Still, there have been relatively few completed Marcellus Shale wells, and it isn't clear whether the rock will produce prolific wells across the state or only in certain pockets. Companies could be spending a lot of money leasing acres and drilling wells in counties where there won't be enough gas for the wells to offer a reasonable return.

Information about the potential of the Marcellus gas field has emerged slowly because of Pennsylvania rules that allow companies to keep well-production data and drilling logs confidential for five years, compared with about 60 days in Texas. While Range has told Wall Street analysts about its wells, it hasn't disclosed where the wells are.

"Why would we educate anybody else?" says Ray Walker, Range's head of Appalachian shale production. The best way to protect shareholders, he says, "is to keep information close at hand." In the fall, after Range personnel caught someone snooping around their wellhead reading the production meter, Mr. Walker padlocked covers on well-production meters.

The technique for drilling into shale rock to harvest natural gas was pioneered outside Fort Worth about six years ago. Since then, the Texas Barnett Shale has gone from obscurity to the most prolific domestic gas field in the continental U.S. That one field produces about 3.5 billion cubic feet a day, or about eight times more than all of Pennsylvania in 2006, which is the latest data available.

Gas producers hope they can do the same for the Marcellus, but development in Pennsylvania has been slowed by a lack of equipment. Drilling rigs capable of penetrating deep into the complex rock formations needed to be imported from Texas, Wyoming and other active energy regions. Experienced crews capable of fracturing the dense shale in order to coax out the gas also had to be brought in.

Now, oil-field services firms are slowly expanding operations in the region, raising another obstacle. Jefferies analyst Mr. Chandra says development of the shale could be slowed by a culture clash generated by hard-charging Texas and Oklahoma energy companies "doing business in a way that hasn't been done before" in Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania has had an oil and gas industry for more than a century, but it's been dominated by small companies that tend to drill low-cost, low-risk wells that produce a fraction of the gas that companies believe they can coax from a Marcellus Shale well. But these small, local companies long ago locked up most of the drillable acreage.

To gain access, out-of-state companies are opening up their checkbooks to sign deals with local companies sitting on large swathes of acreage. http://louisdjdsheehan.blogspot.com/
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"We've never seen this kind of money around here," says Terry Jacobs, president of family-owned Penneco Oil Co. He cut a deal last year to allow Range to drill wells on leases he holds.

It isn't uncommon to find drilling crews filled with Texans and Oklahomans. On a recent morning, Jared Griffith, a third-generation Texas oil hand, sat with his crew inside an oil-field office trailer. Almost all were Texans. "I never thought I'd be north of the Mason-Dixon line," says Mr. Griffith, an operations manager for Frac Tech Services Ltd., a drilling-services firm based in Cisco, Texas.

Leasing prices for land still available for drilling has skyrocketed along with the out-of-state influx. Near Williamsport, Pa., a drilling lease that fetched $5 an acre in 2003 now can fetch $2,000 an acre, local residents say. Louis J Sheehan Those kind of prices are "unheard of in our part of the world," says Rich Weber, president of Atlas Energy Resources LLC, based in Moon Township, Pa.

Range's Mr. Walker has worked to smooth over relations with local landowners. The company contributed $35,000 so Hickory, Pa., could buy a bronze statue of a farmer to commemorate the region's agricultural history. At last year's local Washington County Youth Livestock Show, Range bought the champion steer for $12,285. "I thought it was cheap," Mr. Walker says.