Evacuation Plans

[Cinder and Me]

I only have one, and keep her carrier ready in the coat closet for emergencies. But from what I gather, most ranchers/breeders have multiple carriers and the proper vehicles to get their herd out.

 

[konayipark]

Southern California resident here - we have to watch out for earthquakes and fires. With only 2 chins, I'm hoping that in a blink of an eye, I can grab the two little ones and my wedding album and be out of there!

 

[Rebecca]

I only have two, but it occurs to me that I really need to set aside an emergency kit for them in case we get a seriously destructive earthquake.

 

[SunshineChins]

In a fire? That's a whole nother story. I love my pets as much as anyone, and it would kill me to lose them in a fire. But I honestly have to say, my priority would have to be my children first. And then if there were any way possible to save the pets, absolutely. But my kids would have to come first, and I would not re-enter a burning building. A fire is one of my worst nightmares.

I have to agree with Sugermama here. I love our animals but if our house is on fire my family is my priority. I love our pets and would try my best but my children come first. Any other emergency I am prepared for as we have carriers ready to go in case we have to leave.

 

[TillyChinchilla]

Sprinkler system at a ranchers? *imagines 1000+ soaking wet chinchillas* now that would be a whole new emergency

A wet chin isn't a death sentence. I'd rather my chins be soaked for a little bit than burned alive. Yes, it would take a LOT of work getting them dry and safe from any resulting fungus, but cleaning up the remains of that much damage would be worse.

 

[RainOverVegas]

I agree, I just couldn't help thinking of it!

 

[KingLouis]

This is a subject that gives me nightmares...not only bc i love ALL of my animals but also because I'm a very paranoid individual. The dogs sleep with us so we'd grab them and get them out first. Again in the case of fire it would depend on where the fire was and how fast it was spreading. The pet room is kind of on the other side of the house. I have pet carriers and if I was able to get to the pet room safely with atleast a couple minutes without being burned alive i would break the window shove chinnies in one carrier and multiple critters in the other. I'd make a pouch outta my shirt and put anything that would fit in it. I'd end up with a prego chinnie but it's better than her burning alive. I couldn't possibly get them all out....water turtles, dogs, chinchillas, gliders, rabbits, gp's...it breaks my heart. In a fire...we'd honestly probably only be able to save our dogs bc we could grab thim and bust out our br window and go....this is depressing. :-(

 

[KingLouis]

not that it'd really help in a bad fire bc it'd probably be too late but i have those fire fighter pet alert stickers on the front window and on the pet room window.

 

[galtinel]

Been there, done that re: massive wild fire in 2007. Wasn't home. Couldn't get home. Husband grabbed 2 cats and the 5 most important chins: 2 mommas and their babes and a dad. That's all his car could hold of my 70 chins.

Animal control came in and pulled the 20 or so who were in portable carriers and filled the one I could tell them quickly how to find and filled it with a specific run-hole trio. The rest sat it out. Luckily, my house didn't burn even though we did find evidence of burn marks up to the foundation a week later.

I then had to relay then to AZ with the incredible help from Heather, as I wanted them out of the smoke. That's something else you need to consider with that many animals...and so many people evacuating in an area like mine (San Diego) -- you can't go west (water), can't really go south (Mexico) and in our case the fires were pretty much wrapped around the other sides by the time we realized we needed to move them again.

Today, I have just enough carrier space as long as I keep pairs and combos together, which means I need to sort as I load the carriers. AND I have to have my SUV at home AND I have to be home for this to work. Jim will take the important ones (now there are 3 cats to worry about first), and if time/space run out -- he's leaving.

I just pray it never happens when both of us are gone from the house as I can't even go there.

For earthquakes, I have bottled water already staged for the animals until we can hook the generator up to our well/house. Feed, I try to keep 3 weeks worth on hand (oops, need to order!). And shavings, I keep about 4 big bales at a minimum on hand.

 

[amsue0222]

How scary!! I pray that this never happens here!!

 

[Stakie]

Well, I think if a true emergency happened I would be ready. I live in a one story house. and if there were a fire I would be jumping out the window and my chins and their FULL cage would be coming with me. But if it were something I had to get a smaller cage and run, I have a rather large travel cage with it's own stuff to go with it.

 

[Terbear24]

Sprinklers would be a great idea for people with big barns and such... but as for me they are in my basement and I really havent thought about it..... but I really should make sure I have a carrier spot for each chin.

 

[3CsMommy]

Just sitting here thinking about this, I've realized I'm not really set for a 10 minute or less evac, but I'm good for a planned one of 15 min. +. In a fire I'd probably have more trouble getting my Taller Half out of the upstairs bedroom than I would getting Cleo, Cervantes, Crash, Grendel and Vilya out of the house, since I usually sleep on the living room couch. Cleo will go where I do and I could wheel the chin cage straight out the sliding door and up the hill into the neighboring parking lot. But there's no way down from the bedrooms that doesn't involve breaking a window, and we'd have no time to go back for the food containers, or even the fish and mouse tanks.

Darn. Guess I should plan an evac kit.

 

[Tonyschins]

I have enough carriers and would be able to get everyone out in about 15 to 20 minuets. My supplies are all in easy close totes also. We lost power for 9 days two winters ago and after that, I make sure I am prepared for emergencies if need be. I also have extra cages ready in my dads barn just in case I need them. It was not fun when that happened 2 years ago at all.

 

[starleomach]

I have enough carriers to get everyone out but in a short amount of time it is unlikely I would be able to do it. But worst case I would shove everyone I had time to grab into my ferret barn and worry about separating later.
If I had time I have plenty of carriers and some spare cages in the barn

 

[Lolie]

This is a really scary thing to think about! I only have two chins so it should be easy for me. I have a carrier ready for my girls, but their room is on the first floor and on the opposite side of the house from my bedroom. If it's no problem to get to them, the thing I worry about is actually getting them out of their cage. I think they would try to resist being grabbed, especially in a high stress situation. If it were possible I could wheel the whole cage outside, but if not, I wonder how I would get them out of the cage without them trying to get away. They interact with me and jump into my hands when they're outside of their cage, but they are never happy about being picked up. Has anyone else worried about this same thing? It would be awful if the only thing keeping me from saving them was them not wanting to let me grab them.

 

[mistywaterwoman]

I've got carriers in case of fire, and collapsible cages from QC for our hurricane evacuations. They aren't huge, but they are sufficient. We successfully evacuated my four chins, 2 guinea pigs, 2 hamsters and four dogs last summer, for Hurricane Gustav. Six days away from home! Everyone did fine, but BOY were they happy to get back into the giant Ferret Nations when we finally got home.

 

[blacksettingsun]

I think I'm pretty prepared...I have a ten hole carrier for my seven chins, then another carrier for Georgie (bunny) and a leash for Stewart. The chins' carrier is right next to their cages, Georgie's is on top of his cage. I timed myself once and as long as everyone is at least somewhat behaving, I can get everyone out between 1.5 and two minutes.

 

[ABBY W.]

I feel horribly irresponsible as I never really thought about this one too much. I have a concrete house, so we are fairly hurricane and tornado proof, and fire is unlikely because the walls and floors wouldn't burn. Plus, we don't live in an area where we get much in the way of dangerous weather. I'm not in a flood plain, and we do get small tornadoes occasionally, but not often at all.

My husband and I are trying to develop a device we are calling the "chin speedloader" which would allow us to successfully load up all twenty-two chins very quickly. It would involve something like a large PVC tube with slots cut out at intervals. I could grab a chin, slide them into the tube, slide in a wall in the slot, then slide in the next chin, slide in a wall, etc. Then carry out the whole bunch in one or two tubes. I don't know if this will work or not, we just came up with it yesterday, but we're going to try to see if we can make one and test it out.

I am also going to build some "away from home" cages and keep them covered up outside the house, so if we did have to leave quickly and be away from home for a while, we would have a set of cages for them. Maybe an emergency care package with hay cubes, water bottles, etc. I could keep that outside or at someone else's house, I guess.

My cats are actually going to be more difficult, as they fight tooth and nail not to be put into carriers...

 

[Cinder and Me]

I had to learn how well equpied I needed to be. This past summer there was a fire in Santa Barbara and we almost got evacuated. Several of my friends had to leave, we were only a few streets over.

Yup, you and me both have to be prepared for the fire season So.Cal. gets at least once a year. I'm in Yorba Linda, and I was about 1/4 mile from mandatory evacuation. I wasn't *too* worried since 1/4 mile was still quite a distance for the fire to eat it's way through a thick residential area, but I still got Cinder's carrier out. It was hot, smokey and uncomfortable especially upstairs. I had my air purifier running, fan and AC going full blast for 3 days since the air outside was basically toxic. I even had to put rolled up towels by the windowsills since apparently, the windows can't close tightly enough to block out smoke!


For pet owners, I think its a lot easier to have a plan and evac. everyone out. But for ranchers/breeders its going to be tough, and most likely heartbreaking when a big disaster hits. You can be as prepared as possible in your head and have a plan, but when a disaster stricks, there are always variables and surprises you hadn't thought about. I'm glad that most people have a plan, carriers, etc. though. I don't even want to imagine what would happen to the animals if the owners didn't even think about what would happen in the event of a disaster!