CHAFFEE WOMAN GIVES HOME TO STRAY DOGS

CHAFFEE -- Clara Cable's life has gone to the dogs.

"Right now I only have 11 dogs, but there have been times when I've had 18," said the 62-year-old retired librarian.

For years Cable has been taking in stray and abandoned dogs and keeping them until she finds homes for them. "I think I'm a one-person Chaffee humane society," she said.

It all began 28 years ago when a friend of Cable's moved into a nursing home and asked her to care for her dog. She said she did because the only other alternative was to have the dog put to sleep.

"I took it to visit her every so often," Cable said, "That kind of started it all."

Since then, word has spread of Cable's compassion for homeless pets. Sometimes people bring stray pets to her home; other times dogs are simply deposited into her fenced backyard while she's away.

"I come home and find them here," she said. "They know I'll be home in a while and take care of them."

Cable also picks up strays. She visits area pounds to find dogs that don't have much of a chance of being adopted by someone else.

"I'm partial to poodles because they have a hard time finding a home," she said. "People want beagles and other kinds of dogs. They think poodles are too expensive to keep."

One poodle that lived with her for more than two years was first found abandoned in a Sikeston hotel room.

"A cleaning lady called and said he had been left in the room. She contacted the owner and they didn't want him, so by asking around she found me. I kept it for two and one-half years before it died."

Cable keeps all the dogs, and occasionally cats, in her home. She said they each are combed daily and bathed and blow-dried when they need it.

"It takes about a week working every day to give them all a bath," she said. The dogs are also groomed about once a month.

Cable retired in May. She was once a first-grade teacher at Washington School in Cape Girardeau. She has worked for the past 16 years as a librarian for the Cape Girardeau School District.

It takes three 25-pound bags of dog food per week to feed the dogs, she said, but she also buys canned food to mix with the dry.

"Then we have our treats besides," she said.

Cable estimated that last year alone she found homes for 22 pets. Not all of them were permanent.

"It's difficult for stray pets to adjust to new surroundings," she said. It's common for someone to adopt one of her dogs and then want her to take it back, something she's always willing to do.

"They get accustomed to certain things and they don't adjust well to changes," she said. "I've even gone back in the middle of the night to get them."

Cable said seeing dogs "leave the nest" is difficult, even when they go to good homes.

"I always miss them," she said. "It's just like your family: when you lose one, even though you've got lots more, you still miss it."