More than a dozen cats and dogs killed in eastern Ontario house fire
Linda Howie trains Sheltie dogs in agility and obedience competitions and runs a cat rescue out of her Barrhaven home
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A Barrhaven woman is reeling from a house fire that killed more than a dozen cats and dogs on March 10.
Linda Howie trains her Sheltie dogs in agility and obedience competitions and runs a cat rescue out of her Tedwyn Drive home.
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In an interview Tuesday, she said she was heading to Kemptville to pick up another cat in need of a home when she received a phone call that firetrucks were surrounding her Barrhaven home just after 9 a.m. on Monday.
“It was quite the harried road on the way home,” she said, as she was “just frantic.”
Arriving home, she found her two beloved dogs and more than a dozen cats didn’t survive the fire, which originated in the kitchen. Many of the animals died of smoke inhalation.
Ottawa Fire Services said Monday that a 911 call came in shortly after 9 a.m., with the caller seeing smoke from an upstairs bedroom window. Firefighters said the duplex was full of smoke upon entry, and “completed two full searches of the structure and no occupants were found inside.”
The fire was declared under control shortly after 10 a.m. Howie said the cause of the fire hadn’t been determined, but the fire marshal confirmed 13 cats and two dogs were dead.
Among the dead were Sheltie matriarch Gemma and her daughter Dazzle, who had recently given birth to a litter of three puppies. Two puppies, Dancer and Jingles, survived the fire, while the third, Prancer, was taken to a veterinarian for treatment.
“I didn’t have expectations of complete recovery. At midnight they called me and said he wasn’t doing well,” Howie said. “I felt, if he wasn’t doing well, it wasn’t a good idea to prolong his suffering.”
Two cats survived and are now staying with Howie at her son’s home, as well as the two surviving puppies. Howie is going to return home to see if any other cats escaped and have come back.
“It’s awful,” she said, “You really build a bond, working with a dog like that. I had them out practising and competing. They were doing quite well, so fun to work with. They were a lot faster and smarter than me.”
A fundraiser has been started to help Howie cover veterinary bills and to purchase food and other supplies for the rescue.
Howie said she started fostering cats 18 years ago, but, when local rescues were over-taxed during the COVID-19 pandemic, she began her own at-home rescue, using humane traps and a microchip scanner to identify which cats prowling the streets of Barrhaven had homes to return to.
If a cat has a microchip, Howie reunites them with their family. She once found a cat at a Barrhaven construction site that had been missing from Gatineau for four months and returned him home just before Christmas.
Those that are strays are brought into Howie’s home, where she gets them spayed, microchipped, vaccinated and ready for adoption with the help of a vet clinic in Quebec that offers these services at a low cost.
“I’m surprised people don’t get their cats microchipped, and a lot of people don’t get their cats fixed. And then you have them wandering and they shouldn’t be if they’re not fixed,” she said. The unfixed cats breed and litters of feral kittens are born on the streets, where they aren’t socialized to humans and are challenging to adopt, she said.
“Most litters of kittens die a brutal death,” Howie said. “It shouldn’t be happening, in my mind, in a place like Barrhaven.”
Over the years, her operation has grown, and she’s taken in cats from Kemptville, Brockville, and Spencerville.
“Rescues are full, and the people are desperate,” she said. “If I can help, I will.
“Even if you’re poor, you deserve to have a pet.”
The Ottawa Humane Society has a mobile vet clinic for low-income households, but for street cats those services are harder — and pricier.
“This cat has no income, no dollars, and nobody looks after those cats. Every dollar has to be fundraised,” she said.
Once Howie gets back on her feet from the fire, she plans to hold an event to raise money for stray cats to be spayed and neutered.
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