Why would a shelter/rescue discourage adoptions?

Shelters and rescues exist primarily for two reasons -- to be a safe haven for homeless pets until they find their forever home and to help these pets find their homes. And yet, every year around this time, I find it amazing at how many shelters and rescues are actively out DISCOURAGING adoptions -- which is exactly the opposite of what their goal should be.


Earlier this week, a fairly new blog called "PetMoz" wrote an article entitled "Please think twice before putting that puppy or kitten under the tree" that included seven "Reasons not to give puppies or kittens as holiday gifts."


Meanwhile, Marji had a blog posting this week that featured another bad advertisement with the headline "What are YOU returning this holiday season? Sweaters don't die when returned. Dogs are not gifts" -- featuring, of course, a dog in a jail cell.


Dogtime ran a story: "Holiday puppies: A nightmare after Christmas?"


The Humane Society in Grand Junction, CO is also telling people to resist the urge to adopt a pet as a Christmas present.
AllVoices.com calls puppies "one of the gifst you should never give a person, especially at Christmas."


Twitter and Facebook continue to be littered with similar messages - -that actively discouraging adoptions. It's painful to witness -- as these shelters are discouraging adoption while animals remain in shelters waiting to be adopted.


Anyone else see a disconnect?
Yes, it's true that sometimes people make bad decisions about giving pets as gifts for the holidays to people who don't necessarily want, or need, a pet.
And yet, the holidays can be an awesome time for families to adopt. Most people have a lot of time off during the holidays to spend working the new puppy into the family home. And puppies can make great gifts for the entire family -- as long as everyone is at the table to help in the decision-making and selection process.


Last weekend at our shelter, a family came in looking for a pet for the holidays. All five members of the family were there: mother, father, and three kids. The youngest daughter kept saying to her mother "Puppy, Christmas? Puppy Christmas?" It was sweet, and the familly was there picking out the dog together -- with the parents fully understanding the long-term commitment of adoption as some volunteers helped pair them up with a dog that would fit their family lifestyle. Why would we discourage this?



There are plenty of ways to responsibly adopt around the holidays -- and this is something we should ENCOURAGE, not discourage. So encourage people to adopt responsibly during the holidays. Encourage them to bring the entire family to your shelter to meet a new family member. Help them find a pet that fits their lifestyle. Help them to understand the lifetime commitment. And help them have a great holiday with their new pet.



This should be a joyous time, and people LOVE the idea of doing good around the holidays, and giving back to the community. What could make someone feel better than adopting a dog or cat from their local shelter for the holidays.


Embrace it. It's an awesome opportunity to adopt out pets. Don't discourage adoptions with doom and gloom messaging. It's counter-productive, and illogical for a group responsible for adopting out pets to do.


Merry Christmas -- and Happy Adoptions.



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I agree with them. I think we should each pick our own best friends. There's a large percentage of dogs in shelters that were gifted and not picked so the person feels its ok to pass on something that was passed onto them.
I volunteer with a group what we do is hike bully and rescue dogs and also help train the dogs and the owners. I haven't run into a case yet that someone got them their rescue pitbull as a gift. These people chose their own dog.
Also by discouraging the purchase of pups you encourage adoption and also make a shelter dog more attractive than a backyard bred dog. I think everyone should have a dog to their liking so if you want a performance dog than go get yourself a real working water dog or bird dog or guard dog of game dog or whatever. And if you only want a pet dog just something to pet than go to shelter and pick out a best friend that will never get bred and pet away.

 

You shouldn't give any animal as a gift (unless as a parent to your child, but then the parent is still responsible) because it brings a lot of responsibility along the owner might not want. Thereby, you can't return the animal because you don't match, or maybe you can but its not fair to the animal and the other option is to drop them in a shelter. As you said before the goal of shelters are "to be a safe haven for homeless pets until they find their forever home " Not a temporary home because of an impulse. It is much more likely to find a forever home if the owner chooses the animal himself and takes the time for it. Instead of someone else going to a puppy mill last moment because 'we need a puppy for christmas' and it's cheap for example. Enough reasons not to do it.

 

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people will do whatever they wanna do regaurdless of what anyone thinks abt it, the humane society is a joke. they kill animals by the truck loads but yet everyone is ok with this? why, cause its a neccesary evil? i dont understand they raid a yard and steal someones dogs that are all happy and very well take care of and then the public call the dog man a murdering savage? then to top it off they put all the dogs to sleep because they claim them to be vicous and cant be adopted cause their fighting dogs? thats such a load of BS some of the dogs those lying bastards kill are just puppies, its obsurd that people still soppurt the humane society. i would like to make a video of what goes on behind the closed doors or the butcher shop kill shelters and fire it at the HSUS just to show people who the real offenders are. what abt that law animal cruelty they wield so much, you think i could just start collecting strays and injecting them with deadly fluids and still be free? another apect no one looks at is what kinda mentality its giving people who work their, these people have no reason to care for these animals, their job is to clean cages and murder them. after killing that many animals everyday you think their gonna treat them with any kinda care? they prolly beat the hell outta them all day and a humane imagination can get pretty wild after you lose that feeling call morality. but yet they call dogmen killers? i call dogmen victems