# a disturbing tale at the vet's



## Stripey (Aug 25, 2012)

I was looking to air this somewhere, but didn't want to burden my wife with this particular bit of info. Your comments or advice would be appreciated. 

I should give you a heads up that some folks may find this kind of disturbing. If you are having a rough day, or your pet has recently passed away, maybe give this a pass.

A few days back, I was doing a service call at a vet's office in another city. Really professional looking place, friendly staff, clean office, and beautiful grounds. I was working in the back of the building, and had my tools sitting on this large tupperware like bin. (about 4' X 1 1/2' X 2'). 

Halfway through my job, this guy pulls up next to the bin in his sedan. He comes over and asks me if I can move my tools. Sure, no problem. He then opens the bin, and hauls out what appears to be three thick black plastic garbage bags filled to various capacities. He casually tosses them in the trunk of his car and tells me that they are dead animals. He then drives off.

I was a little bit shocked at his attitude, to say the least. I realize that once an animal passes away, his or her body is no longer a vessel for their spirit. I also realize that having the job of hauling away deceased pets cannot be easy. Still, show a little respect, dude. I never asked him what he was doing, by the way. He just blurted it out. 

If I happened to see this as joe citizen, I would have told the vet's office right then and there. Because I work for a large company, drive a very well marked company vehicle, and this happened in a very small city, I hesitate to tell them what happened. It could create ripples in the community, and possibly get me in trouble.

How would you handle this? Let it slide? Tell the vet's office? Tell someone else? 

Thank you.


----------



## MowMow (Nov 6, 2010)

They may be on their way to cremation. The guy picking them up may work at the crematorium.


----------



## cat owner again (Dec 14, 2012)

I can't imagine if you had a job like that, that you would want to get too emotionally involved with exactly what you are doing. I for one figured that was how it was handled. I am going to be cremated and I just want to make sure I am dead. Then, well....


----------



## Mochas Mommy (Dec 9, 2013)

Even so, being on their way to a crematorium, their bodies should still be treated with respect. Even just reading this makes me upset thinking about Mocha (she was cremated and I had a hard time leaving her body at the vets). I personally tend to avoid confrontation if I can...but even I might go into the vet's office and casually mention to the vet that you seen this. Maybe the vet doesn't know they are treating these bodies like this...it is bad publicity. If I lived there and seen that, you can guarantee there is no way in (fill in the blank) that I would take my cat there....to me that would be reflective of the lack of compassion on the vet's part. I trust you to put my beloved baby to sleep and to treat the body respectfully until I get my ashes back. Whether this is a stray or whatever....it is still reflective of the vet's business.


----------



## cat owner again (Dec 14, 2012)

I understand. I asked my vet when my dog died, will the body be treated with respect but I felt that once it left his hands, that is what would happen. There would have to be separate coffin like containers for it to be different. Nothing wrong with telling the vet.


----------



## Blakeney Green (Jan 15, 2013)

I would tell the vet.

Although the guy probably has a legitimate reason to be transporting the pets' bodies (maybe to the crematorium, as Krissy suggests) he needs to treat their remains with more respect.

What if someone whose pet had just been put to sleep saw that? The owner would probably be very upset, and the vet could lose business. For that reason alone, I would think the vet would want to know.


----------



## Sabrina767 (Sep 5, 2014)

Talk to the vet, not someone in the office. That's not how animals heading to cremation should be handled. Were each of them even individually identified? When the person gets the remains back, how the heck do they even know if it belongs to their pet?? That's a disgusting way to treat them.


----------



## MowMow (Nov 6, 2010)

We don't know if the animal had some sort of identification on it's body. Kat because it wasn't on the bag doesn't mean they isn't any at all.


----------



## doodlebug (May 13, 2006)

I'm more concerned with the vet's office leaving them outside in a container where anything could happen to them than with the guy who was a little rough with bags. Heck, the OP was using the container was a tool bench. Those animals should have been in a freezer until they were picked up.


----------



## zuma (Nov 5, 2009)

I think I may be a bit jaded, but while it is disturbing and not really something we want to see our think about, I think it's kind of expected. It's not right by any means though. There was a story on the news a while back about animal crematorium scams. And I dont think it's only animals either. I still remember going to the funeral home with my mom after my grandpa passed away and the guy was trying to sell a nicer, read more expensive, coffin and softer pillows and things like that. He was clearly trying to take advantage of the grieving family. It was absolutely disgusting. 

I know when my friends dog passed away she kept him overnight and drove him to the crematorium herself the next morning for a private cremation. I think if you really want to be sure that's the only way. I'm not sure I could do that though.


----------



## Sabrina767 (Sep 5, 2014)

"Three black garbage bags filled to various capacities" would indicate they were not put there with care or marked, or at least that's how I view it.


----------



## MowMow (Nov 6, 2010)

I took that to read some bags were full (larger dogs) and some bags were not so full (smaller dogs or cats).

They put human remains in plastic bags without identification on the bag too..... hence the term 'toe tag'....


----------



## 10cats2dogs (Jun 16, 2013)

These could also have been some deceased pets, that people didn't either want to take home and bury, or have cremated...
Very sad...
I would mention it to the vet in charge, quietly, and see what the response is...


----------



## gizmothecat (Jun 26, 2013)

Sighs, hate to say it...the vet already knows this. I don't want to upset anyone...but just hope that's where they are really going...and not on the side of thge road....which HAS happened


----------



## Sabrina767 (Sep 5, 2014)

Very true, Mowmow. I just interpret it differently.


----------



## cat owner again (Dec 14, 2012)

They lost my dad's ashes and were honest enough to tell us. That was painful.


----------



## Speechie (Dec 2, 2013)

The optimist in me has to hope that inside those larger bags they were packed carefully inside individual bags. 
after Teddy died we received a box with his ashes, beautiful little clipping of his fur, and his footprint set in stone.
The fur and the footprint were both obviously his. So I'm glad at least some places are doing it right. 
I would tell the vet, gently what you saw.


----------



## Arianwen (Jun 3, 2012)

There is no excuse. What if by coincidence, you had been the owner of one of those pets? I'm sure undertakers are "hardened" but they are professional enough not to show it to the outside.


----------



## marie73 (Jul 12, 2006)

Well, I'm sure I'm in the minority here, but I don't see anything horrible about what this guy did - if these were, in fact, "throwaway pets." If these were bodies of animals that nobody wanted cremated, why should this guy care any more than their owners, who obviously didn't care what happened to them? Plus, if he's not a "pet" guy, they're just trash to him. 

If his truck was unmarked, chances are pretty good that he was just collecting the vet's "trash" and not an employee of any cremation company. He was just doing his job, probably repeating something he does 8 hours a day.


----------



## Mochas Mommy (Dec 9, 2013)

I disagree Marie. Even if these are "throwaway" pets that no one cared about, if I lived in that town, would I know that? I would see an animal's remains treated disrespectfully and that would remain with me when it came time to choose a vet to care for my pet or to help my pet pass to the Bridge. To me, this is just good business sense. How these "throwaway" pets' or beloved pets' remains are treated is still a reflection of the vet office. I would NEVER take my pet to a vet if I seen them treat any remains in that manner; I would not feel confident that they CARE about the animals they treat. And, I would always wonder if they treated MY pet that way when I wasn't around to directly supervise.


----------



## MowMow (Nov 6, 2010)

I'm not entirely sure what everyone expected of this person. It's not like he was twirling the bags over his head, and cracking jokes. He moved them from what I assumed was a pick up receptacle into his car. It's not like he was cursing and snapping limbs to make them fit.....

It's unlikely they would mark the bag with an identifier, they would tag the animal. If someone inadvertently opened the container would you want them to see a plain trash bag or a bag marked "Mrs. Thompson's -Fluffy"? The plain bags are less likely to be messed with and less likely to draw attention.

Perhaps it wasn't a crematorium worker. Perhaps they were deceased animals donated to a vet school.

Whoever he was, he was doing his job, an unpleasant task that I sure as **** wouldn't want to dod. He didn't know these animals, do you expect him to be sobbing or stroking the bags and saying he was sorry?


----------



## Mochas Mommy (Dec 9, 2013)

I would never do that job as well.
But "casually tosses" is how the OP described it and then he told the OP the bags were "dead animals". 
Given this is a place of business and the business is to care for animals...optics are everything....even if that bag had a dead skunk scraped off the road. As a potential customer, one would not know if the bag contained "Fluffy" or the scraped up skunk. All they would see is someone "casually tossing" the body bag into the back of a vehicle from a container outside the building. I love my cats; if I knew or seen my vet's office treating any animal's remains that way, I would be taking my business elsewhere. I wouldn't expect them to stroke the bag, sob, or say they were sorry; they didn't lose the pet. But I would expect them to show respect just in case that is someone's beloved fur-baby....because someday, that could be my fur-baby. That is just me....and we are all entitled to our opinions and feelings.

OP was obviously shocked and upset enough by this event to post it here, asking what we thought.


----------



## Mandy and Ellie (Oct 22, 2013)

That does seem slightly disturbing. But like Marie said, they could have been pets no one wanted. Sadly, some people just drop their pet off to be put to sleep... they don't care and don't want to witness the outcome or deal with their body.  I have an aunt who makes relatives take her animals when they're near the end, and wants nothing to do with it because she "can't handle it"... it's honestly kind of cowardly in my opinion. I've been with both of my pets when they were put to sleep. They were my companion for life, and I'll be there til they take their last breath.

We really have no idea what they looked like within that trash bag. When my family cat, Sheba, was put to sleep, they had her body sealed in a thick plastic bag (then covered it in a blanket) so we could bury her and her body wouldn't be disturbed. This may have been how those animals were in the bag... and they may have just had no better option of transporting them than a black trash bag.

I know when my bunny passed away as a child, it was below zero and the ground was frozen so we couldn't bury her. My mom wasn't going to pay for cremation, so we had to take her to the Humane Society to dispose of her body. We found out they pretty much store the animals in freezers until they have a decent amount, and then dispose of them in a "mass burial". Not sure how or where... but I'm guessing that's what was happening with this guy you saw at the vet. 

I just hope that it was something like this, and not some sort of cremation scam... because I've heard horror stories of those. Luckily I knew a girl who worked at the place that handled cremations for my vet, and she verified that when my dog was cremated, it was JUST him and that they always treat the animals with respect. But not every place feels the same...

It's hard to answer your question. If I were you, I would contact the vet... if anything, just for clarification of what they were doing. If the vet acts sketchy about it, that could speak volumes.


----------



## Blakeney Green (Jan 15, 2013)

MowMow said:


> He didn't know these animals, do you expect him to be sobbing or stroking the bags and saying he was sorry?


Just moving them with some minor degree of care rather than tossing them would be plenty, really. 

A vet is a service provider for animals, and respect issues aside, it's not really good business practice for any employee or contractor to convey indifference about animals while in view of the public on the premises.


----------



## littlecatblue (Sep 3, 2013)

I was thinking along the lines of Mandy and Ellie. Some vet clinics offer mass cremations to dispose of the body after an animal dies. In these cases, the owners do not expect to get their pet's remains back.


----------



## marie73 (Jul 12, 2006)

It's this guy's JOB, he doesn't need to be emotional or "respectful" - and he's probably never even seen by the public 99.9% of the time. If these animals are just left in a bin outside for pick-up, he's the *last* person in this chain of custody I would accuse of being disrespectful.


----------



## 10cats2dogs (Jun 16, 2013)

Hec, the poor guy could have even been rattled by you using the container to put your tools on! And all he could think about, was trying to get out of there!! (I mean, it is kind of awkward!).


----------



## marie73 (Jul 12, 2006)

Exactly! And the comment could have been him being embarrassed that someone could think he was simply going through someone's garbage.


----------



## Kaylesh (Aug 22, 2010)

littlecatblue said:


> I was thinking along the lines of Mandy and Ellie. Some vet clinics offer mass cremations to dispose of the body after an animal dies. In these cases, the owners do not expect to get their pet's remains back.


I know my Vet offer varying degrees(costs) of disposal of pets remains. One is mass burial which is the least expensive. To cremation and individual urns to coffins with loved pet to be buried by the owner etc.. 
Not everyone can afford the highest level no matter how much they loved their pet. My guess is like littlecatblue these were mass cremation animals.


----------



## doodlebug (May 13, 2006)

What does "treat with respect" mean when it comes to a bag full of dead animals? When the OP mentions that the guy "casually tossed" the bags in his car...what does that mean? I don't think it means that he stood 4 feet away from his trunk and tossed it in. The picture that came to my mind was that he just put it in his trunk as he would any other item...that he didn't set the bags down gently and with reverence. And that's OK with me. Heck, in the last 18 months I've picked up Maggie & my father's ashes...I didn't really treat either one with any "reverence". I just put them in the car like any other package. The funeral director handled the box with my father's ashes with lots of care and reverence and while I knew that's what he had to do, I thought the whole thing was rather silly. 

The other thing we don't know is how the guy who has to do this gruesome job feels about it. Treating the bags casually may be his way of coping with what he's doing.


----------



## MowMow (Nov 6, 2010)

I think a lot of people are making a big deal over a LOT of speculation. Fact is we don't know what he was really doing or why.

The original question was should the OP say something to the vet..... if YOU have concerns what this person was doing and from what YOU observed it was done improperly then go see the vet to clear it all up.


----------



## marie73 (Jul 12, 2006)

I would have an issue with the vet. Why are deceased animals being put in a bin outside? Isn't that against some health code? Every time I take my girls to the vet I get charged some random "waste disposal" charge for a cotton swab, but they can put a *cat* outside?


----------



## Mandy and Ellie (Oct 22, 2013)

marie73 said:


> I would have an issue with the vet. Why are deceased animals being put in a bin outside? Isn't that against some health code? Every time I take my girls to the vet I get charged some random "waste disposal" charge for a cotton swab, but they can put a *cat* outside?


That is _so_ true! They also charge to dispose of the body, or atleast our emergency vet did when my cat had to be put down years ago (they gave us the option of taking her home to bury vs. price of disposing of the body, cremation, etc). The least they can do is keep the bodies in proper conditions so they don't decompose, like my humane society does with their freezers, until the bodies are to be disposed of. 

The fact that this post has this many responses shows that this is somewhat of a sketchy issue with this vet. I would definitely contact the vet wanting some answers.


----------



## zuma (Nov 5, 2009)

They may have just been put outside for the pick up. I think at the end of the day we can all speculate and we all have different views of what is acceptable and what isn't, but without knowing the facts it is somewhat pointless. 

If the OP thought it wasn't right, I would politely enquire with the vet and see what they say.


----------



## orangekitty (Aug 30, 2014)

*Reply*

This reminds me of something I experienced. 

I have an elderly neighbor who was feeding a couple of stray cats. One became very ill and was truly suffering. I offered to take the cat and have him put to sleep. It was the weekend so I had to go to an emergency vet clinic where I paid a fee to have it done. 

While I was having it done, a thought came to my head about how the clinic knew he was a stray. I began to wonder if they would really put him to sleep or just let him die, while I paid a fee they didn't have to use products for in the clinic. He was clearly very ill from what seemed to be 
distemper. 

Although I felt this was so slim and an overactive imagination, I asked to see him after they said he was dead. I had waited during the procedure. Believe it or not, they protested and said that I didn't need to/couldn't see him since he was a stray and not mine. I told them I paid for the service and I was the one who brought him in and they better show me the cat.

They brought him out and he was dead, but they were very weird about it. I never forgot that. Because of all of it, I will never leave my animal behind. I will take them to be cremated or bury them at home. 

I had another experience in a vet's office with my own cat. I had a cat right out of college. She was going into a vet who was not her regular vet. It was for a procedure hers didn't do. When I took her back for the follow-up, she went to the bathroom in her carrier within seconds of entering the office and growled and hissed at the vet. It bothered me then and I always wondered what they did to her. Now, they would have gotten a massive piece of mind. Based on their reaction, maybe even a state board complaint.

You never know what's happening behind closed doors and I think your pets will tell you by their comfort levels and reactions while there.


----------



## Mandy and Ellie (Oct 22, 2013)

I was actually reading a bit on the topic and found someone on a forum's experience of working at a vet's office. Slightly random, but I felt it applied to this thread well.

"I worked at a vets office for a while and to be honest its a little grim. Once the pet is dead they are wrapped in a plastic bag and left in an industrial freezer, then about once a week a truck comes by to pick them up and then transport them to a cremation facility. I always dreaded having to help load up the truck, the drivers just threw the corpses in the back of the truck. It was difficult seeing the family cry at the loss of their pet and only a few days later see it thrown nonchalantly into a truck."

Sounds really similar to the way the OP's vet handled it.



orangekitty said:


> This reminds me of something I experienced.


That is definitely weird, but it's good you asked to see the cat's corpse after she passed away. Years ago, there was a rumor in my town that a local vet was selling diseased/sick animals left to be put to sleep (owners weren't present) to labs and other sketchy resources. Coincidentally he stopped practicing soon after. Ever since then it's made me very skeptical, even if it's overreacting, I want to be there and know what's happening to my pet.


----------



## dt8thd (Jan 7, 2013)

Am I a callous person for giggling at some of the comments that have been made on this thread? Krissy and Doodlebug, I blame you two for making me seem like a total creep (it was the twirling over the head and cracking jokes, cursing and limb snapping, attempting to get a "basket" from 4 feet away, sobbing and stroking the bag comments specifically). I would, of course, find such actions absolutely horrifying if I actually observed someone behaving that way (except for the weeping and bag stroking--which would be a different kind of disturbing), but a little bit of irreverence is warranted when talking about a topic that a lot of people find very difficult to discuss in a personally meaningful way. The fact is, no one who wasn't incredibly emotionally and socially stunted, and likely at least a little psychopathic would cross the line between casually hefting a bag full of dead pets into the back of their pickup truck like a sack of potatoes and trying for a 3 point shot into the truck bed. 

The question then becomes, what degree of reverence _should_ someone whose job entails disposing of dead animals show when performing their duties? If this thread is any indication, there's no real objectively correct answer beyond the consensus that basketball and centrifugal force probably shouldn't enter into it. The idea of a kitty's body in a garbage bag being thunked down none-too-gently in the back of a truck isn't at all pleasant--I certainly wouldn't want to see it, but, realistically, the cat can't feel it, or anything else, anymore; any objections that I might have regarding the treatment of the remains (provided that the process of collecting the bodies isn't needlessly reckless, damaging, violent or gruesome) is based, at least in part, on empathy for the living being those remains used to be. Empathy is a wonderful thing, but maybe not so much when your job is to pick up the dead bodies of people's pets. I don't know, but I sure as heck couldn't do that day in and day out without a degree of detachment.

I'm also sure that, in most cases, the disposal area behind a veterinary clinic is not regularly accessed by the public, or even easily accessible to the public. The area at the back of my vet's office is surrounded by a high fence with barbed wire, which makes sense when you consider that medical waste and expired veterinary drugs are disposed of back there. I can't imagine the area behind a vet clinic being a happening hang out spot for kids; mad scientists' assistants looking for animal body parts to complete a franken-dog are hardly going to take issue with someone being a bit too blasé about how he loads dead animals into his truck; and it's unlikely that bored, especially creepy olfactophilliacs are lurking in the shadows behind the dumpsters, hoping for a whiff of dead animal--and if they are, well, the casual treatment of someone's deceased pet is likely the least disturbing aspect of this whole, increasingly silly, disgusting scenario my brain has concocted to help illustrate my point: namely, those whose job it is to pick up the bodies of dead pets for cremation, or disposal, or whatever, probably just arrive and get on with their job, without worry, or maybe even awareness, of how seemingly callus their detached efficiency might appear to other people.

I'm not suggesting that no consideration should be made for the fact that the bags being picked up contain the remains of much loved pets (or the remains of species that we regard as "pet animals"), not at all. However, I don't think that we can, realistically, expect the same reverence and delicacy with which we ourselves treat the death of our loved ones, furry or otherwise, from people with no personal connection to the situation, particularly those who deal with death at work on a daily basis.

I do agree that the OP should mention something to the vet if they really did feel that the individual picking up the bodies was especially careless or callus in the way he did so--there's always a chance that a customer of the clinic could witness a pick up and decide to take their business elsewhere. If I were a vet, the last thing I would want my clients to think would be that I didn't empathize with them or genuinely care about their pets; I'm reasonably certain that having a client see a bag containing the bodies of animals from my practice "tossed" into the back of a truck would give the wrong impression.


----------



## BotanyBlack (Apr 6, 2011)

considering I have just lost 2 of my feline furbabies. I find it a bit disturbing. Luckily my vet uses a good service to cremate her patients who pass. They have a really nice Van. That actually is marked as a Pet Cremation/Burial service that has their phone number clearly on the doors and back. The people driving it are well dressed and polite. Any time I have seen them they have acted in a gentle manner to the pets they are there to pick up.. including the strays. My vet does a lot of work with ferals.. where other vets will turn them away. 

My Vet usually wraps the animal in a towel or small blanket and stores them in a plastic, frozen until pickup. The service has always brought back the blankets freshly laundered with the ashes. (or I assume mass buries the feral/strays that pass)

I can honestly say.. I LOVE my Vet and none of my pets are afraid of her.

OH.. and when I lost my 2 girls a day apart they even allowed me to cremate them together as part of my private service. paw prints taken and a lovely carved wooden box


----------

