Comments on: Three Out Of Four Animals Euthanized At Shelter http://puppyintraining.com/three-out-of-four-animals-euthanized-at-shelter/ A Guide Dog Puppy Raiser's Blog To Raising Dogs And Puppies Thu, 09 Feb 2012 05:26:22 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Colby http://puppyintraining.com/three-out-of-four-animals-euthanized-at-shelter/#comment-3090 Colby Thu, 10 Dec 2009 20:03:17 +0000 http://puppyintraining.com/?p=910#comment-3090 @hrj, We agree. It's shocking to hear statistics like this one. We do our best to help out by volunteering as fosters for our local animal rescues. @hrj, We agree. It’s shocking to hear statistics like this one. We do our best to help out by volunteering as fosters for our local animal rescues.

]]> By: hrj http://puppyintraining.com/three-out-of-four-animals-euthanized-at-shelter/#comment-3086 hrj Thu, 10 Dec 2009 17:42:42 +0000 http://puppyintraining.com/?p=910#comment-3086 This shocks me! i love animals and would hate to see any animal being killed. they have lives to. they need to be spoken out for. they need help just like anyone else does! This shocks me! i love animals and would hate to see any animal being killed. they have lives to. they need to be spoken out for. they need help just like anyone else does!

]]> By: Colby http://puppyintraining.com/three-out-of-four-animals-euthanized-at-shelter/#comment-1604 Colby Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:16:31 +0000 http://puppyintraining.com/?p=910#comment-1604 @Jai J, I'm really glad there are people out there like you to volunteer and help out the local shelters. It's really tough to hear how awful it can be at the shelter even one that "claims they do not euthanize unless an animal is very sick or 'unsuitable' for adoption." I've volunteered as a foster doggie parent and rescued dogs from our local shelters. Unfortunately, there's only so much time in the day and I'm currently raising a guide dog which doesn't allow me the time to foster. However, after reading your comment I'm inspired to try and help out the shelter by working with and walking the dogs. Thanks for your great comment and hopefully I can get some posts up about my future experiences working with and walking shelter dogs. @Jai J, I’m really glad there are people out there like you to volunteer and help out the local shelters. It’s really tough to hear how awful it can be at the shelter even one that “claims they do not euthanize unless an animal is very sick or ‘unsuitable’ for adoption.”

I’ve volunteered as a foster doggie parent and rescued dogs from our local shelters. Unfortunately, there’s only so much time in the day and I’m currently raising a guide dog which doesn’t allow me the time to foster. However, after reading your comment I’m inspired to try and help out the shelter by working with and walking the dogs.

Thanks for your great comment and hopefully I can get some posts up about my future experiences working with and walking shelter dogs.

]]> By: Jai J. http://puppyintraining.com/three-out-of-four-animals-euthanized-at-shelter/#comment-1601 Jai J. Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:47:05 +0000 http://puppyintraining.com/?p=910#comment-1601 I do volunteer work a local Humane Society, working with the dogs, mostly walking them, giving them time and attention. I love working with them BUT am having difficulty with dealing with the reality of how being in the shelter affects them. I can't stand seeing so these dogs going through what they do. What I see is really good and beautiful, loving dogs come into the shelter where they spend their first days in various states of panic and/or what I call "abandoned shock" and after that they begin to become more and more detached, focusing more and more on the workers with begging eyes, hoping just to be the next dog going out for a walk. Once out, their focus switches from looking to the person who took them out to walking and sniffing, going and going, not wanting to stop for petting or being talked to or cuddled (the detachment). I'm guessing still hoping to get away to "somewhere else", their former home or environment, somewhere they will feel home and safe and happy. My heart breaks for them. I search my mind, heart and soul hoping to come up with something I can do, someone I can talk to who can help do something for these dogs, somewhere I can go to change their sad, sorry situation but I can’t find anyone or any solutions. In the meantime dog after dog after dog sits in their small, concrete kennel "cage", often smelly because they don't get out often enough or are just too tense to hold it so end up urinating or defecating inside, and waits for their former owners to come back or for someone who will get them out of there. There must be a better way to house and care for them while they wait, whether they end up adopted or euthanized. The shelter I work for claims they do not euthanize unless an animal is very sick or "unsuitable" for adoption. Some are definitely aggressive and not good candidates for adoption. But I am shocked at how easily a dog is deemed unsuitable and pulled to be euthanized. Euthanization is a fact of life at the shelter and way too many perfectly good dogs end up that way. Yesterday they put a big, beautiful Lab and 2 St. Bernard's down because they "became dog aggressive". The 3 adult dogs had been there for months, not properly exercised or given enough attention, bored and lonely, and they began "lunging" at other dogs as they went bye their kennels. If they had been taken out for longer periods of time and properly exercised and gotten some stroking, scratching and talking to instead of sitting in their small kennel inside in the constant loud, barking noise of the kennel and only being taken out 5 to 15 minutes twice a day, very seldom receiving affection or real loving talking to, they'd be perfectly fine. They were all gentle, sweet dogs when they arrived. And today a beautiful Great Dane puppy was put on death row (to be euthanized tomorrow) because it "bit" someone. Come on, it’s a 3 month old puppy and all it needs is training! The “bite” was just a playful puppy wanting to play some more and trying to wiggle out of being put back in it’s kennel, nothing more than an innocent pup that now won’t have a chance at the life it deserves. Just makes me sad and angry and SO frustrated. But what can I do . . . quit my volunteering there? That won't change a thing. At least by going there I give a little love and comfort, time and exercise, for a little while and that adds SOMETHING to their day. But . . . how can I/we somehow change the plight of shelter dogs? How can I/we make this particular shelter improve and be a better place? What can I/we do to educate and impress upon people, all people, that they MUST neuter their pets, should buy pets already here needing homes rather than buy from breeders which only encourages the breeder to breed more? How can I/we make Humane Societies/Shelters better places for dogs to wait (more calming, caring, quality time places)? I do volunteer work a local Humane Society, working with the dogs, mostly walking them, giving them time and attention. I love working with them BUT am having difficulty with dealing with the reality of how being in the shelter affects them. I can’t stand seeing so these dogs going through what they do. What I see is really good and beautiful, loving dogs come into the shelter where they spend their first days in various states of panic and/or what I call “abandoned shock” and after that they begin to become more and more detached, focusing more and more on the workers with begging eyes, hoping just to be the next dog going out for a walk. Once out, their focus switches from looking to the person who took them out to walking and sniffing, going and going, not wanting to stop for petting or being talked to or cuddled (the detachment). I’m guessing still hoping to get away to “somewhere else”, their former home or environment, somewhere they will feel home and safe and happy. My heart breaks for them. I search my mind, heart and soul hoping to come up with something I can do, someone I can talk to who can help do something for these dogs, somewhere I can go to change their sad, sorry situation but I can’t find anyone or any solutions. In the meantime dog after dog after dog sits in their small, concrete kennel “cage”, often smelly because they don’t get out often enough or are just too tense to hold it so end up urinating or defecating inside, and waits for their former owners to come back or for someone who will get them out of there. There must be a better way to house and care for them while they wait, whether they end up adopted or euthanized.

The shelter I work for claims they do not euthanize unless an animal is very sick or “unsuitable” for adoption. Some are definitely aggressive and not good candidates for adoption. But I am shocked at how easily a dog is deemed unsuitable and pulled to be euthanized. Euthanization is a fact of life at the shelter and way too many perfectly good dogs end up that way. Yesterday they put a big, beautiful Lab and 2 St. Bernard’s down because they “became dog aggressive”. The 3 adult dogs had been there for months, not properly exercised or given enough attention, bored and lonely, and they began “lunging” at other dogs as they went bye their kennels. If they had been taken out for longer periods of time and properly exercised and gotten some stroking, scratching and talking to instead of sitting in their small kennel inside in the constant loud, barking noise of the kennel and only being taken out 5 to 15 minutes twice a day, very seldom receiving affection or real loving talking to, they’d be perfectly fine. They were all gentle, sweet dogs when they arrived. And today a beautiful Great Dane puppy was put on death row (to be euthanized tomorrow) because it “bit” someone. Come on, it’s a 3 month old puppy and all it needs is training! The “bite” was just a playful puppy wanting to play some more and trying to wiggle out of being put back in it’s kennel, nothing more than an innocent pup that now won’t have a chance at the life it deserves. Just makes me sad and angry and SO frustrated. But what can I do . . . quit my volunteering there? That won’t change a thing. At least by going there I give a little love and comfort, time and exercise, for a little while and that adds SOMETHING to their day. But . . . how can I/we somehow change the plight of shelter dogs? How can I/we make this particular shelter improve and be a better place? What can I/we do to educate and impress upon people, all people, that they MUST neuter their pets, should buy pets already here needing homes rather than buy from breeders which only encourages the breeder to breed more? How can I/we make Humane Societies/Shelters better places for dogs to wait (more calming, caring, quality time places)?

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