Are restrictions on pet adoptions a net benefit for animals?

[griffin1977]

@Chum

I don’t think restrictions like no-declaw, indoor-only, and especially required spay/neuter are excessive.

I’d agree on declawing. Saying you can’t mutilate your pet is not unduly restricting your choices as a pet owner.

I’d also mainly agree on spaying and neutering. In that for the vast majority of people (myself included) it is more suitable to insist on their adopted pet to be neutered. But if a responsible breeder wants to breed their adopted dog, and understands what is involved (and whats involved in stopping your on-heat bitch mating whichever random dog happens to get access to her), I think the should be allowed. If you don’t allow this then the only people who are breeding dogs is professional breeders (who are only going to breed pedigree dogs) and irresponsible owners who let their dogs breed with whichever dog comes along. I think breeding non-pedigree dogs you think make good pets is a responsible thing to do (IF you know what’s involved).

IMO the indoor/outdoor thing is entirely up to the owner. You decided that the risk of being an outdoor cat was not worth the quality of life increase, you cat would get. That’s a perfectly reasonable decision, but it should be up to the owner.

[griffin1977]

@Smokinjbc

. At the hospital I worked for, in an urban area, we commonly adopted out pets for a very low (like $25) fee and as long as you were a client or referred by a client, we wouldn’t give you the third degree.

Both our adopted pets cost 0ver $150 (and many places we looked for our dog had fees of $200 or $300). Hence why I was little churlish about the all the preconditions. If I was paying $25 I wouldn’t have any problem them.

[LVBoPeep]

@griffin1977

Both our adopted pets cost 0ver $150 (and many places we looked for our dog had fees of $200 or $300). Hence why I was little churlish about the all the preconditions. If I was paying $25 I wouldn’t have any problem them.

We were definitely motivated by limited space (and a cat rescue client who seemed to have an endless supply of candidates), so that is why your vet might be more motivated to move them out of there. We definitely had some oversight- we did turn people down, including one lady who went home to get a carrier for her newly adopted adult cat and then called us when she got home to make sure that if we got a cat closer to the breed she wanted, that she could bring the one she adopted back :eek:. We quickly made up a story how we didn’t know our vet had promised that cat to someone else LOL!!!

[Two_Many_Cats]

@Chum

While I recognize that restrictions can drive potential adopters to buy kittens from pet stores (which is seriously the worst possible choice - please try a different shelter first or at a bare minimum find an add in the paper for free kittens), I still believe they are better than free-for-all adoptions.

You gonna tell that to my two pet shop cats? Seriously, don’t pet shop pets deserve homes too? You’ve already admitted that the over-zealous loons that one finds working at shelters don’t really have the best interests of the animals at heart, because if they did, they’d let Mr Bubbles go to a home where the owner works all day, or they’d let Smokey go to a house with (horrors!) young children.
Because at bottom Mr Bubbles and Smokey and all the other animals need HOMES.

[zweisamkeit]

I guess I should also respond to the OP:

Like I said, I’m in general agreement. I truly believe many rescue organizations have the pets’ best interests at heart. They’ve seen the awful conditions that many animals end up in and want to prevent that. Heck, when they get in animals that were rescued from former “owners”, who often protested that they’re not bad owners, I can see them being very cautious.

However, the need for the best possible home has to be compromised with the desire for people to not buy puppies from backyard breeders/puppy mills. The shelters and rescues I’ve seen all want to succeed with the latter, but often drive people away because of their focus on the former.

I can understand a fee that’s higher than $100, especially if the animal had to have medical issues taken care of while at the rescue. I definitely understand the spay/neuter policy, because they’re trying to prevent more dogs coming into the rescue as a result of careless or accidental breeding.

I even understand a first cursory home visit, if the visit is just to ensure that there are no mistreated animals there currently, that they and the house look prepared for a pet, etc.

But, speaking as someone who tortures herself by looking at Petfinder when she can’t get a dog for at least another couple of months :), I’ve seen so many rescues go overboard. They include things like you MUST have a fenced in yard, period. Well, I live in a flat (the lower half of a home) that has a partially fenced yard but not completely (and I can’t change that). But there are dog parks and we’d walk the dog twice a day. We’re not looking to get a border collie or something that is very high energy, anyway.

I come from a family where we believed that if you agreed to take in an animal that is dependent on you for care, you do so. That means we’ve paid for knee ligament surgeries, for treatment of gastroenteritis, and more. I know many people who would not spend that much on “just a dog”. But golly, they have a fenced in back yard. Does that automatically make them a better owner?

[Minnie_Luna]

I’ve attended conferences where these issues are brought up. There are shelter/rescue advocates that are eschewing the conventional “rules” and guidelines about who can adopt. They will adopt to just about anyone, with the feeling that the animal is going to be better off in a home than in the shelter.

My mother in law lives part-time in Aspen. The local shelter there is awesome, but light-years away philosophically from the shelter I worked at here in Philly. The Aspen Animal Shelter will let anyone walk in and take a dog for however long they want. My in-laws regularly go to the shelter and grab a dog for a hike or to hang out in town with for the day. When we visit, we always get a dog for a day or two. Write down your name, phone number and address, they don’t even ask for a driver’s license. They have a beautiful facility with a groomer on site and doggie day care which help fund the shelter. It is everything I wish a shelter could be. Well-staffed, well-funded, never full and a pleasant atmosphere to be in whenever I visit. So different than any other shelter I’ve been to.

I can’t speak to their adoption criteria, I’ve never adopted from them.

[Terraplane]

@griffin1977

I’d also mainly agree on spaying and neutering. In that for the vast majority of people (myself included) it is more suitable to insist on their adopted pet to be neutered. But if a responsible breeder wants to breed their adopted dog, and understands what is involved (and whats involved in stopping your on-heat bitch mating whichever random dog happens to get access to her), I think the should be allowed. If you don’t allow this then the only people who are breeding dogs is professional breeders (who are only going to breed pedigree dogs) and irresponsible owners who let their dogs breed with whichever dog comes along. I think breeding non-pedigree dogs you think make good pets is a responsible thing to do (IF you know what’s involved).

I disagree with this. If you work for an organization whose goal is to find homes for homeless animals and there are already so many of those animals that some have to be euthanized every day, the last thing you want is to let people adopt them intact. They will just make more animals and make your job harder one way or another. Every puppy bought from a breeder, however responsible they are, is potentially one less puppy people will adopt from the shelter.

I get your point on the level of a pet owner. If you have an awesome dog it’s tempting to want more awesome dogs like him, but from the shelter’s perspective it’s at cross purposes to their goal of finding homes for homeless animals.

@Two_Many_Cats

You gonna tell that to my two pet shop cats? Seriously, don’t pet shop pets deserve homes too? You’ve already admitted that the over-zealous loons that one finds working at shelters don’t really have the best interests of the animals at heart, because if they did, they’d let Mr Bubbles go to a home where the owner works all day, or they’d let Smokey go to a house with (horrors!) young children.
Because at bottom Mr Bubbles and Smokey and all the other animals need HOMES.

Individual cats in a pet shop are just as deserving of love and shelter as any other pet. But the problem is that if people are buying them then pet shops will keep breeding them. For every cat at the pet store that gets a home, they will make another cat to take it’s place. For me, personally, I think it’s terrible that there are people out there actively breeding more cats while literally millions of cats are killed each year due to overcrowding.

I’m sorry you had such a bad experience with an adoption agency. Despite a lot of the horror stories in this thread, they aren’t all like that. When I adopted my last cat from the local humane society I just filled out a sheet of paper with my information and an agreement to keep his vaccinations up to date, forked over the cash, and took the cat home. It couldn’t have been much easier. Maybe consider trying a different shelter next time you’re in the market for a pet. There are reasonable ones out there staffed by normal people who aren’t going to give you a hard time.

[Chum]

@griffin1977

IMO the indoor/outdoor thing is entirely up to the owner. You decided that the risk of being an outdoor cat was not worth the quality of life increase, you cat would get. That’s a perfectly reasonable decision, but it should be up to the owner.

You’re right, I did say that I decided not to let my own cats outside. But on a non-personal level, rescue organizations save a lot of cats from the harsh outdoors. Almost all the stray kittens that come in have parasites or worms of some kind. We see a lot of cats who were hit by cars or attacked by other animals. It makes sense to me that rescues would not want to see the cats into whose rehabilitation they’ve invested time, money (sometimes a lot of money), and energy end up back in the alley.

@Two Many Cats

You gonna tell that to my two pet shop cats? Seriously, don’t pet shop pets deserve homes too? You’ve already admitted that the over-zealous loons that one finds working at shelters don’t really have the best interests of the animals at heart, because if they did, they’d let Mr Bubbles go to a home where the owner works all day, or they’d let Smokey go to a house with (horrors!) young children.
Because at bottom Mr Bubbles and Smokey and all the other animals need HOMES.

I’m sure your cats are wonderful. But when people buy animals from a pet store, they’re also purchasing continued poor conditions for future pet store animals and the animals they breed behind the scenes. It’s a really sad situation. [On preview, I see that omgzebras has already said this better than I have.]

You’re right - I don’t think that shelter workers always make decisions based on the best interests of animals as a whole. But the animals they take in don’t just need HOMES, they need good, forever homes. I agree that a blanket policy of not allowing a cat to be adopted to someone who works all day is ridiculous. But there are some cats who are so needy that they would not do well in a home where they were alone much of the day. This is more about proper matching of an animal and an adopter than about agency-wide policies. It would be frustrating to want to adopt a particular cat and be told you can’t because you work all day, but there are other cats. If shelter workers had better customer service skills (and people skills in general), frustration would be diminished and potential adopters would be more inclined to look for a different cat within the organization rather than going to a pet store.

[amarinth]

@Tastes_of_Chocolate

As for the re-homing fees you see on Craig’s list. Listen idiot. I’m willing to take in the animal that you are no longer able or willing to care for. And you want to charge me for that? I should be charging you for the service.

This drives me nuts. I don’t make the connection that I’ll pay Sally Jane $500 for a dog and I’ll care for the dog. For a shelter, I can kind of see it. I can think of it as a donation to the shelter to keep it running and help other animals, but from a person trying to give it up? I just feel extorted.
Make me prove that I have a vet? Ok. Make me show up with vouchers for $500 worth of food and toys for the dog? fine. I’d even be ok with having me spend $500 in grooming coupons and doggy day care certificates. But giving you that money doesn’t do the dog (that you claim to care about so so much) any good at all.

[Palo_Verde]

A few days ago we adopted two cats from the local pound. It was easy peasy. No requirements or questions. Just $25 and promise to take good care of them.

The Human Society is much closer to our house, but we didn’t go there because several years ago when we were looking to adopt a dog, they wanted us to jump through so many hoops! There was this form to fill out about how often you will walk your dog and the only choices were
a. Twice a day everyday
b. The dog will be my running partner and we’ll run daily
c. We will go on long hikes in the wilderness frequently.

Well our answer was that our son would take the dog on a walk before school most days. Plus we have a big backyard to run in and 4 kids who will play with the dog. This answer wasn’t good enough and we didn’t get a dog there. So we went to the local pound and got a wonderful dog there who is very happy and well cared for.

Now, I’m off to IMHO to ask a question about the new cat I got, because it is driving me crazy meowing all the time.

[Dangerosa]

No. There are awful evil owners, but the proportion of awful evil owners is small - and a lot of the hoops they are jumping through aren’t to catch awful evil owners but owners that don’t meet the volunteers standards for pet ownership. With as many pets needing homes out there, the last thing these volunteers should want to do is drive someone to rewarding the puppy mill - but in fact, that’s what they frequently do.

[griffin1977]

@Chum

If I had personally authorized an October adoption of a black cat to someone who ended up sacrificing the cat in some cult ceremony, I would likely be upset enough on a personal level to want to ban October adoptions forever.

Actually I’d put money on the fact that such a thing has NEVER happened to anyone who works in that shelter. In fact I’m fairly sure such a thing has never been documented happening anywhere outside of certain chain emails (don’t you know child molesters are poisoning halloween candy!).

“free to good home” pets can be taken by people who will either sell them to animal research or use them in dog fighting, etc.

Additionally I’d like to see some evidence for that. I can see the dog fighting thing might happen occasionally (dog fighting rings do clearly exist, and they have to get their “sparing partners” from somewhere). But animal experiments ? What kind of research lab would take random animals from Joe Bloggs on the street, and risk all the negative publicity that comes when they realise that animal was actually little Timmy’s pride and joy? (not to mention that they have no idea of the medical history of such animals)

.

[LVBoPeep]

@griffin1977

But animal experiments ? What kind of research lab would take random animals from Joe Bloggs on the street, and risk all the negative publicity that comes when they realise that animal was actually little Timmy’s pride and joy? (not to mention that they have no idea of the medical history of such animals)

.

If you watch the HBO Documentary Dealing Dogs, a dealer admitted going to fancy neighborhoods and stealing pets. There were many dogs at that facility that definitely had unknown orgins, although it was against the law for them to sell such animals, they manufactured paperwork and did it anyways. I don’t see it as such a stretch to see these people pick up free to good home, especially if a purebred they have a demand for (which was often the case in the documentary). Horses still have a widespread problem with this, people think they are “retiring” their old horse to a kind home, when in fact it’s going to slaughter.

I would definitely not ever give away any animal to a stranger.

[Chum]

@griffin1977

Actually I’d put money on the fact that such a thing has NEVER happened to anyone who works in that shelter. In fact I’m fairly sure such a thing has never been documented happening anywhere outside of certain chain emails (don’t you know child molesters are poisoning halloween candy!).

My bet would be on the same side, for what it’s worth. The idea of cults mutilating and sacrificing animals - actually, only black or mostly black cats - during the month of October is way out there. Next time I get into the issue with one of the lead volunteers at the rescue I’ll ask them to tell me about a time when it actually happened. I imagine their response will be fear-filled yet vague, possibly evasive.

[Chronos]

Not adopting out black cats in October is probably a wise policy, just not for the reasons stated. There are few to no cults who would be trying to sacrifice black cats for Halloween, but there’s all too many folks who think a black cat would make a cute Halloween decoration and then get bored with it come November. It’s just like how you don’t want to adopt out bunnies just before Easter.

[griffin1977]

@Chronos

Not adopting out black cats in October is probably a wise policy, just not for the reasons stated. There are few to no cults who would be trying to sacrifice black cats for Halloween, but there’s all too many folks who think a black cat would make a cute Halloween decoration and then get bored with it come November. It’s just like how you don’t want to adopt out bunnies just before Easter.

Not really seeing as it will probably result in an animal that could have gone to a perfectly good home being euthanized . Yes, you should ask some questions to gauge whether the potential adopter really understands this is a 15+ year commitment to looking after an animal, not a halloween decoration. But blanket bans on things like that are just stupid.

Thats general approach to this stuff. Yes its perfectly reasonable for a shelter to ask some questions to make sure this is a suitable pet for you. And its better an animal is destroyed that go to a complete unsuitable home. But things like this just result needless killing of animals that could have got a good home.

[zweisamkeit]

@Smokinjbc

If you watch the HBO Documentary Dealing Dogs, a dealer admitted going to fancy neighborhoods and stealing pets. There were many dogs at that facility that definitely had unknown orgins, although it was against the law for them to sell such animals, they manufactured paperwork and did it anyways. I don’t see it as such a stretch to see these people pick up free to good home, especially if a purebred they have a demand for (which was often the case in the documentary). Horses still have a widespread problem with this, people think they are “retiring” their old horse to a kind home, when in fact it’s going to slaughter.

I would definitely not ever give away any animal to a stranger.

Yep. Even if it’s a 1 in 1000 chance, that’s not something I’d want to risk for a beloved pet. The rehoming fees I see are usually $100, maybe $150. It’s supposed to be enough where you are serious about getting a pet (instead of getting it on a whim since it’s free) and will discourage any of the possible (even if rare or next to nonexistent) people I mentioned previously, but not so much as to be totally outrageous. I’d still cap it at maybe $75, though.

[Walton_Firm]

@zweisamkeit

Yep. Even if it’s a 1 in 1000 chance, that’s not something I’d want to risk for a beloved pet.

What if the alternative is a 100% chance of the pet being killed tomorrow in the shelter’s gas chamber? Which choice do you think the pet would prefer, if it could understand statistics? Would you really kill a thousand animals, 999 of which could have gone on to lead perfectly happy lives, in order to prevent the thousandth one from being abused?

It is quite likely that in the long term, restrictions on pet adoptions (especially the neutering requirement) benefit the animals by reducing, over time, the number of animals that need to be adopted out in the first place. However, there can be little doubt that from the point of view of an individual animal which will be killed if not adopted, the answer to the question in the thread title is a clear “no”. And if overly restrictive policies simply cause people to visit puppy mills, then the long-term advantage is also rather dubious.

[Nava]

@whiterabbit

Goldens unsuitable for families with children??? WTF??? There are hardly more kid-friendly dogs on this planet than goldens. Apparently these people are from another planet entirely.

I’ve seen posts in the SDMB declaring german sheperds scary; I’m still trying to recover from the stun.

[Tamerlane]

@Nava

I’ve seen posts in the SDMB declaring german sheperds scary; I’m still trying to recover from the stun.

German shepherds are very popular in the U.S., a legacy of Rin Tin Tin ( we can probably discount Won Ton Ton as a major influence ), which has led to puppy-milling, which has led to a lot of behaviorally “shy-sharp” and undertrained dogs ( another legacy of numbers and popularity ), which has led to a lot of bites.

Irresponsible breeding the world over has left the German shepherd breed with a myriad of problems that a prospective owner must be concerned about. Unreliable temperaments in a dog this size are a major worry and a frequent subject of headlines. A study of 178 dog-bite cases reported to Denver animal control officials in 1991 revealed that German shepherds and chow chows were the dogs most likely to bite.

From here.

Goldens have suffered at times from similar problems - I’ve known some pretty nervous goldens.

I like both breeds, but popularity is often a behavioral warning flag. These days I’d probably get a mutt from the shelter, but if buying a pure-bred, always spend the extra money for a puppy from a established breeder with a good reputation.