Did you know about these animal shelter stats?

November 04, 2019

Animal shelters tend to get the short end of the stick when it comes to support from the community. Politicians focus their efforts to satisfy their core base and spend most of their career campaigning for re-election. With budgets getting tighter, animal shelters never get the love they deserve.

Most of us would like to adopt every dog that we meet until we snap back to reality and realize that it’s simply impossible. While the number of euthanized shelter animals has gone down due to higher adoption rates and increased number of pets that are reunited with their owner, we can still do better with simple education.

Did You Know These Facts?

Purebred Animals: You will often hear people brag about their expensive fully bred dog but you will never hear that 25% of all shelter dogs are indeed purebred!
Euthanized For What?: According to the Animal Humane Society, 80% of the cats and dogs euthanized are usually perfectly healthy, treatable, and adoptable. Each year, approximately 1.5 million shelter animals get the death penalty.
Spay/Neuter: Did you know that just one female and her offspring can create 67,000 dogs in just 6 years? Only 10% of the animals received by shelters have been spayed or neutered.
Sheltering Is Costing You: It costs taxpayers roughly 2 BILLION dollars a year to round up, shelter and euthanize homeless animals.
Puppy Shopping: The average age of animals entering shelters is 18 months. This is perfect for anyone looking to adopt a puppy.
Homeless Dogs: Like humans, animals suffer from homelessness. There are more homeless animals than people!
Silent Crisis: Approximately 6.5 million animals enter animal shelters across the United States annually.
Evil Dogs: People tend to believe that shelter animals are evil and misbehaved nightmares. This myth is killing millions of potential pets and gives puppy mills an incentive to keep their abusive tactics alive. Nearly all shelter animals are your ordinary dog that you’d see on the street.
More Than Cats and Dogs: Animal shelters aren't just for dogs and cats. Often, people will run to the pet store when adopting a smaller critter. You can usually adopt rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, mice, hamsters, birds, and reptiles, too. Personally, we have seen horses in the Texas shelters we donate to.
Puppy Mills: Do not confuse all animal shelters with puppy mills. Puppy mills are commercial dog breeding facilities that only care about profit and have poor veterinary care, small cages, and awful, unsanitary conditions.
No Thank You: While some shelters will pride themselves on taking the no-kill route. They will often turn away animals that may be difficult to adopt.
Never Loved: Only 1 out of every 10 dogs born will find a permanent home
Saving Two Lives: When you adopting from a shelter, you are indeed saving two lives. You took an animal to a loving home and opened up a spot for another to get that second chance.

If more people knew about the struggles of operating animal shelters, more animals could find a loving home or live a better life while behind bars. It's imperative that people explore all options before wasting thousands of dollars on a dog that can be found in a shelter for pennies. These dogs will be fully vaccinated, examined, micro chipped, and often trained. It’s imperative that we the people take action and demand our elected officials to step up and help the members of our society that do not have a voice.

As we move further into the future, more bills are being proposed to punish animal abuse. While this is a great step forward, we must take actions into our own hands and inspire others to adopt and save two lives!