Local Animal Rescue Pleads For People To Stop Abandoning Pets Outside Shelters

Dumping a pup at a shelter might seem like a convenient way to not have to deal with the guilt of needing to give up your pup for whatever reason.

But the truth is that it makes life harder for the shelter involved and can even endanger the life of your pet.

Animal Friends Connection, a shelter and rescue in Lodi, is no stranger to these situations. They’ve had countless dumped pets, and due to their spot next to a busy road, it can be incredibly dangerous. Pets left overnight could chew through their ties or boxes and escape onto the road. And if the pet survives till morning, the shelter will have to spend hours attempting to safely chase the escaped pets down while trying to keep them off the road.

The unexpected addition of new animals can also lead to other hardships for the shelter. Without time to prepare, they sometimes do not have enough space for more, and the overcrowding can really stress the animals out. It’s also difficult financially, as shelters have no way of knowing if the pets in question are up to date on vaccinations or preventative care and have to do them anyway. On top of that, many dumped animals have health conditions that require expensive treatments – or being left out in the cold overnight makes them sick, which also needs medical care.

All over the country, animals are dumped at shelters all the time. Sometimes, they’re even dumped at shelters that have been closed for months. All of this leads to a lot of unnecessary problems that could be solved if the pet owner decided against dumping their pets.

Shelters like Animal Friends Connection understand the difficulty and guilt that a pet parent can face when they need to give up their pup, but they want those parents to know that honest communication is always the better option. They have access to resources that can help parents rehome their pets in different ways, and also a list of other nearby shelters that may be less full at the time. And of course, it’s just much safer. Shelters just want to help – they will not force you to keep your pup, they just want those pets to be given up safely.

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