You ever see those commercials from ASPCA or the Humane Society reminding you to spay and neuter your cat and dog? The message was driven home for me a few weeks ago when I paid a visit to our animal shelter. I was doing some research on our animal control division and decided I would schedule a meeting with the division supervisor over at the shelter as appose to my office or the police department where she occasionally pops in and out of. Our animal shelter is less than a year old and I had yet to tour the facility.
In my meeting a learned a great deal about how animal control services and shelters operate. There is no down time as an animal control officer. Our animal control division receives a large volume of calls every month. Despite being a new facility and larger than the previous one we still operate at full capacity, sometime over capacity, nearly every week. I wish I could say that many of our animals are adopted out but truth is many of them are put down. Some animals simply cannot be kept as pets while others go unclaimed.
After I met with the division supervisor she gave me a quick tour of the facility. I can understand how animal control officers can become mentally burned out. So many animals are forgotten, owners never claimed them, and many are put down. How many of us have the strength to put down a dog or cat? Now imagine doing 5, 10, 15 at a time. Moral of the story, spay and neuter your pets and never get an animal unless your certain you want it and can take care of it. Its not just a matter of food and water but time and attention.
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That's a good message for everyone. I read that once the economy was deep in the downturn, a lot of people were forced to get rid of their animals because they did not have sufficient funds for them. I'm surprised that animals are forgotten so quickly and it saddens me that they are put down.
ReplyDeleteThis is a great post to put out there. Like George said, too many people get rid of their pets as if they were disposable razors simply because they can't "take it" anymore. There was a story a month or so ago about a lady who kept trying to get rid of her daughter's cat but the cat kept coming back!
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