Monday, August 16, 1999
Couple needs shelter for dogs
House fire leaves 65 Danes displaced
BY TOM O'NEILL
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Dale Bath of Hamersville and her husband sheltered about 75 dog, most Great Danes, until their home was destroyed by fire last week.
(Jeff Swinger photos)
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HAMERSVILLE, Ohio — The rescuers of Great Danes need a great rescue themselves.
Tom and Dale Bath, who turned their rural Brown County home into a non-profit, no-kill “rescue center” — Harlequin Haven for Great Danes — now face two daunting tasks:
• Find a home for themselves after fire destroyed their three-bedroom ranch house last week.
• Find temporary homes for their 65 or so Danes, which are notoriously hard to place.
The process continues today, when friends are expected to established a fund for them at the Fifth-Third bank branch in Amelia. Neither the Baths nor the dogs were injured in the blaze.
“We're counting our blessings, you don't know how much,” Dale Bath said Sunday.
Hamersville Fire Captain Carl Schneider said the fire started in an attached garage. The cause is under investigation.
The house, where dozens of dogs lived, was “a total loss,” he said. Mrs. Bath said it was worth about $120,000.
The couple, both sheet metal workers, kept about 75 dogs in an elaborate indoor arrangement of kennel runs and cages in their house. All but 10 are Great Danes, which weigh up to 175 pounds and can measure 30 to 35 inches at the shoulder.
Great Danes were bred in Germany in the 1500s for hunting boar and as guard dogs. Mrs. Bath said her love of the breed began in Cincinnati with an aunt who had a Great Dane when Mrs. Bath was a little girl.
“We started breeding them in 1992,” she explained, “but we realized there were so many homeless ones. Most owners don't realize how big they get, the size and the expense. Amount of damage to furniture is more, medicine costs more (because they're larger.)”
Their size and protective, gentle demeanor suit them best to indoor living and owners often find themselves unable to properly care for them.
So they bring them to shelters. Many shelters, however, lack facilities for such a large breed. That's what leads them to the Baths' house on flat farmland near Ohio 125 and the Clermont County line.
That relationship with local animal facilities paid off after the fire.
All Creatures Animal Hospital in Amelia took in 15 dogs and the Mount Healthy Animal Hospital offered shelter for 14.
Most of the others were “fostered” out to people who previously received one from the Baths, including Nancy Doak of Anderson Township. “We got one (from the Baths), now we're fostering one.”
The Baths expect to take every dog back — in time. Their out-of-pocket expenses are supplemented by donations.
Petmart, a local retailer, donated food and supplies. The Animal Rescue Fund in Amelia and the League for Animal Welfare in Willowvale made donations, Mrs. Bath said.
The couple and about 20 Danes are staying in the Baths' former garage, which is rigged to accommodate the dogs. It is about 150 feet from the house.
The Baths hope to get temporary housing such as a recreational vehicle soon.
The Baths had started to renovate the garage as a family room, but when their dog rescue operation took off, they converted the garage into a dog shelter.
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