Pets looking for a loving home are filling local animal
shelters
Peanut the Chihuahua is very excited to see the people walking through South County Animal Shelter in San Martin. She launches her little body into the air, tail wagging, her disproportionately large ears perked up. She barks her welcome as Lily and Tank, two other dogs come running, barking, to see who has come to visit.
Across the way, an older golden retriever whose name was lost forever when he became a stray gets to his feet to wag his tail in welcome, too.
It’s a celebrity’s welcome courtesy of these adorable animals who have somehow found themselves in custody of the county, waiting and hoping for someone to love. All they need in return is a safe and loving home.
“I’ve been looking for a German shepherd for months, and I finally found her,” said Heaven Steed, 14, as she plays with a 4-month-old German shepherd named Pele. “If we went home without her, I wouldn’t forgive myself. And today’s my birthday, so it couldn’t be more perfect! I’m so glad I found her.”
Pele was brought in to the shelter by her owner, who had decided they weren’t ready for a dog, said Bob Ribardo, a staff member at the shelter.
The previous owner had begun training classes with Pele, who is still very much a puppy, playing and rolling in the grass with Heaven. And Pele is very smart, Ribardo said.
Walking through the row of cages containing dogs available for adoption, Ribardo comments on almost every animal. He knows a little bit about their personalities, about any medical conditions they’ve been treated for, or how the dogs ended up at the shelter.
One of his favorites at the moment is Red, a stout pit bull with a huge head who is clearly a softy at heart. Red, named for his reddish brown coloring, doesn’t bark, but he comes up to the door of his cage and leans in as he gives visitors his best “aren’t-I-cute-please-pet-me” look.
Red, Pele and Peanut are faces of an ever-growing problem: an explosion in the pet population that has flooded pet shelters in recent years with mind-boggling numbers of dogs, cats and other animals.
South County Animal Shelter in San Martin took in almost 3,000 animals last year alone, a typical number for the year.
“If more people would spay and neuter their pets, it would slow down the population,” said Julie Carreiro, a supervisor at San Benito County Animal Shelter. “We get in so many animals, and we try so hard to find homes for all of them, but that’s not always possible. It’s so important to spay and neuter animals, especially cats. If you think about it, one female cat can have three litters per season, and if she has seven cats each time, that’s 21 cats right there. Now, if any of those kittens are female, and they start having kittens – well, just do the math. It’s a huge problem.”
Carol Hernandez, a clerk at the South County Animal Shelter in San Martin, agreed that spaying and neutering is extremely important.
“It can be hard seeing how many animals come in needing homes,” she said. “But we do our very best to care for the animals and find them homes.”
Fletcher Dobbs, the Santa Clara County animal care and control program manager, said that although they haven’t done anything differently to increase adoptions, so far the shelter’s adoption numbers are up this year.
“I would say 65 to 70 percent of our animals have a positive outcome,” Dobbs said. “That means the animals were adopted, placed with a rescue group or placed with foster care givers. Those numbers are somewhere between four and seven percent better than our numbers in 2005.”
The other 30 to 35 percent of animals are euthanized for various reasons, including sickness and injury. Animals are also, however, euthanized when the population of the shelter gets above capacity, requiring the staff to make “difficult decisions,” Dobbs said, though he wouldn’t specify how those decisions were made.
County animal shelters aren’t the only resources for animals that need loving homes. Rescue organizations that work in conjunction with government shelters also work hard finding homes for pets.
Gilroy resident Michele Madrigal got one of her dogs, Penny, from the shelter in San Martin and her other dog, Poe, from a border collie rescue group in Southern California.
“We started looking for a dog online at www.petfinder.com, which is a great resource for finding adoptable pets – they’ve got everything from dogs and cats to rabbits and all kinds of other animals,” Madrigal said. “That’s how we found the shelter for border collies, and that’s where we found Poe.”
Another excellent resource is the American Kennel Club Web site, www.akc.org, Madrigal said. The site lists all different kinds of dog breeds and their personality characteristics. Using this information, people can decide what breed best fits into their household, Madrigal said. She also recommends making sure the rescue organization will take a pet back in case it doesn’t work out for any reason.
If a pet adopted at one of the county animal shelters doesn’t fit into a household, people can bring the animal back to the shelter, Dobbs said. The most important thing is never to dump an animal on the side of the road or out in a random field, he stressed. Bring the animal in to a shelter. It may end up being someone else’s best friend.
