America’s animal shelters are overwhelmed. Pets – and staff – are at breaking point
America’s animal shelters are overwhelmed. Pets – and staff – are at breaking point
The shelter where I work took in 694 animals last year. Every day, we face animal cruelty – and communicating the crisis can feel impossible
Just a warning, this article has some unpleasant parts to read
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A friendly reminder to "adopt don't shop!" My wife and I just adopted a dog a few weeks ago (sadly, we had to put down one of our dogs a few months back)
I agree with you 100% but even adoption has been corrupted. Go to petfinder.com and search for a doodle. You will instantly see a bunch of puppies that are clearly from the same litter with an "adoption fee" of $800. I recently learned it's called "retail rescue".
We need to start heavily regulating breeders and educating the public.
Most people really need to stop getting their hearts set on a specific breed when adopting. I constantly see posts of people rehoming dogs because they can't keep up with them or meet their needs. Like, yeah, maybe instead of adopting a 1 year old Aussie, you should've gotten a 5 year old chihuahua if you're not the kind of person who runs and does agility and shit.
Also, I had a labradoodle who was rescued (as a 7 year old) from a puppy mill, which is where pretty much all doodles come from now. He shed like a motherfucker, was absolutely not hypoallergenic, and cost a ton of time and money in grooming bills. He was also the single most anxious dog I've ever had. We adored him but they're not some magical perfect breed. (We didn't seek one out, my parents just fell in love when I was fostering him.)
You kind of made your own point against your argument in the first paragraph. There are different traits to different breeds, and that is a fact. I would never get an Australian Shepherd (or any shepherd) because they simply have higher energy and exercise needs than most other dogs do. So I insist on getting a breed with lower exercise requirements.
The point is: breed matters. Environment and training matter, but so does the breed. Get one that suits your lifestyle.
The thing about most shelters is they are filled with mutts. Yes, breeds have traits. But with mutts, visual breed identification is notoriously difficult. Best to go to a shelter and meet with a dog to feel it out.
And don’t believe whatever label they slap on it. They are guessing (no fault on them, they gotta write something down). My recent adoption was labeled as a high-energy breed and he’s pretty chill. I almost skipped over him because I was afraid I couldn’t handle the breed that they thought he was/what he looked like.
Oh I know. I also know that it's popular to call everything a lab mix if it looks like it might have any pitbull in it. Improves the chance of adoption.
I'm not anti-pit, by the way. I just know that you can't trust what the shelters say.
It’s funny, the shelter near me just says “staffordshire mix” on most dogs, which is kind of the opposite of what I’ve heard shelters do, like you said.
Lucky you have an unusually honest one.
I have a dog who is definitely part pit. She is absolutely sweet and loving. To us. She hates most other people, especially men. She's never attacked anyone, but we've also made sure never to let her. She has killed pretty much every type of small animal she can get to in the yard though- squirrels, rabbits, moles, opossums... we were ready for that, but you have to be ready for it for sure.
I wouldn't give her up for anything, but we made sure she was the dog for us before we took her home.
Yes but a lot of people decide they want X breed because it's cute, and don't account for how that kind of dog will actually fit into their lives. Waaaay too many end up going to backyard breeders because the dog they want isn't common in shelters and they absolutely must have one. And then 6 months later, they're on Nextdoor rehoming it.
If more people said, "this is what I can provide a dog, these are breeds that might be a good fit but I'm open," and then went to the shelter looking for the best match, everyone would be better off.
Or not even the lifestyle but the dog’s life. Frenchies are the most popular dog in the USA despite the fact that they have terrible health issues and often need surgery just to breathe right.
I completely understand that and agree. I just think you didn't make the point well in your previous post.
You’re making circular arguments to your own first point there. You said don’t pick a specific breed in the first sentence but then go on to lecture how people should pick a specific breed that suit needs. this is the very definition of posting nonsense.
No, I said pick a dog that meets your needs, don't decide you need a particular breed and refuse to change your mind. Of course there are breeds that generally have certain traits so there's nothing wrong with saying, "I'm open to any of these," but people need to recognize that there are plenty of mutts that might be the right fit, or other breeds that might also be a good match. Instead, there's a whole subset of people who pick a breed because they like how it looks, or they like the idea of it, refuse to consider any other options, and then end up rehoming the dog when it doesn't fit perfectly into their lives.
That’s why you go to a local shelter or through a legit nonprofit. My poor guy was a stray abandoned in a park and cops took him to the SPCA :(
But yeah, that just sounds like backyard breeding with extra step
The only dog we got from a rescue instead of a shelter (back when petfinder wasn't shit) was a dog which we believed was a basenji-chihuahua mix that was found abandoned in a junkyard in Mexico when he was still a puppy. He had terrible anxiety, but he was a wonderful dog and I'm glad we gave him a good life considering how it started.
Definitely adopt and do it from your shelter. And get a mutt because they tend to be smarter and healthier. Don't go to a shelter looking for a breed, go to a shelter looking for a dog that you make a personal connection with. That is how I have always done it (with one exception that we got from a rescue instead) and I have not regretted it with the four dogs I have had in my life.
I am sorry you had to lose one of your dogs. It's always so hard because to a loving pet owner, they are family.
Thanks, they really are family members! It was hard because we only had him about 4 years. It’s hard no matter how old they are but we had to put him down when he was only 10. In those last few days his quality of life totally changed though. Luckily we had like 6 months warning and he lived towards the long end of the vet’s expectations given the size of the mass they had found.
We had a similar situation with the last dog we lost. It was very clear it was coming long before the end. We knew it had to happen when we woke up to find that he had pooped all over his dog bed and the floor. He was so ready that he was gone within seconds of the injection. I'm just glad we gave him a good life and I'm glad you did with yours.
Well put, but I'd say include your lifestyle to help in selecting that mutt's breeds.
As in, don't get a working dog breed if you can't be there to give them something to do all day.
But it's really best to meet mutts to see if you gel together.
Definitely type is important, but I would say that much more so than breed. And you can tell pretty easily if it's the type of dog that needs constant stimulation if you just spend a few minutes with the dog. The first dog I got right after I moved out of my parents' house was not only the first dog I saw, but the only dog the shelter told me about on the phone. And it was love at first sight. But I forced myself to look at every other dog in the shelter just to make sure she was the one for me. And she was.
True dat - and lovely doggy tale <3
The type of dog I prefer generally doesn't end up in shelters, because the vast majority of breeders are ethical.
You really believe that, don't you?
Given that I have over 30 years in various aspects of animal science, yes. I actually do know what I'm talking about, because my perspective comes from actual lived experience and not memes.
But I've seen you post in Lemmy multiple times, and every time you fail to grasp that you don't know everything.
I don't know most things and I grasp that very well.
I do know that saying that people who perpetuate dog inbreeding for money are ethical is a bit silly though.
"Dog inbreeding" just shows how little you know. Ethical breeders make careful selection of their breeding pairs. It's far better than letting health issues perpetuate wildly. And ethical breeders don't tend to make much, if any money off of it, either. They tend to do it for love of the history and purpose of the breed.
The idea that any pure dog breed is not inbred is laughable. If you have the animal expertise you claim, you would know that. Incidentally, the fact that you refuse to say which breed you're talking about is quite suspicious.
But go ahead, tell me the inbreeding coefficient of the breed you're talking about. Let's see some evidence to back it up.
Same goes for children, too!
I don't expect this to be a popular opinion, but by all means, adopt the pets created by unethical breeders instead of buying ones from breeders who are ethical, cautious, involved, and caring.
All these people who are vehemently "adopt, don't shop" never like to have it pointed out that they are adopting puppy mill dogs who need to be rescued. Those dogs do need to be rescued, but we should support good breeding practices at the same time. Responsible breeders should not be lumped in with the puppy mill trash. They should be what we aspire the future of dog breeding (and buying/adopting) to be.
This argument pretends that you can’t support shutting down the mills while adopting. It also ignores the stray population and revoking of adult dogs, which is the biggest burden on shelters.
No. My argument is exactly that you should support adopting dogs while better enforcing laws against puppy mills.
Those edge cases that you mentioned are the ones that shelters should be there for (those revoked adult dogs usually didn't come from proper breeders).
All the downvoters proving that it's about being holier than thou and not about the health of the dogs. Good breeding leads to healthy dogs.