I live in the city in a tiny house with no yard. My sister lives in a larger house with a fenced yard. My neighbor lives in an intermediate-sized house with a larger fenced yard.

All of our dogs live inside with their human pack members. They are loved, cared for,and well-exercised—not living outside and left to exercise and entertain themselves, as you apparently envision happening to the “happy” dogs living in the country.

Even those of my neighbors who, in my judgmental opinion, don’t walk their dogs often enough, or who let them get their air in the yard or on a tether, take them inside, and keep them inside, with the family, when they’re not out to potty. Even one dog whom I’m not sure is walked regularly, their dog is normally inside the house with the family. The only occasions when I see that dog outside, is when he’s going out for a ride with his human family (happens regularly), or when the first-mentioned neighbor’s dog is out in her yard (always with one or the other of the couple that owns her, or with me, because I’m there visiting with my dog.) Then that dog is nearly always let out, and the two (or three) dogs play together (yes, play, not fence-fight) along the fence between the two properties.

A dog loose on the street is unusual enough to prompt an immediate call to Animal Control (who believe their job is to help animals as well as people), with whatever information is available about whose pet it is that’s gotten loose accidentally. (Sometimes that information can be very exact; other times there’s some guesswork involved.)

Do we have some annoying barkers? Sure! But that family is fostering rescues, and always manages to improve their health and behavior significantly before they move on to their forever homes.

The city is a wonderful place for a dog to live, because a city dog generally has a lot more time with family and a lot more opportunities for socialization.

I know perfectly happy, healthy, well-loved and well-cared-for dogs who live in Manhattan studio apartments … and suburban homes … and on ranches. Dogs are the most adaptable of species: They are happy where we are, to be where we are.

Yes, of course they need care. And of course some people don’t give their pets enough time and training, and some allow their pets to be a nuisance.

But no dogs? Not a chance. You prove, once again, that humans are the most common nuisance species of all, not dogs.

Most dogs in are kept in Suburban housing estates. Dogs need huge amounts of exercise and almost constant companionship which is why dogs confined to back gardens tend to bark and howl excessively; they are literally going slowly mad from loneliness and lack of stimulation. Anyone who locks a dog in a small back garden all day, only taking it out for walks once or twice a day, is abusing an animal. Please stop kidding yourselves that you are “dog lovers” A dog deserves better than that, and so do your neighbours.

A dog is a wonderful companion if you live in the country and have plenty of space so that the dog can get plenty of exercise without bothering the neighbours. A dog is great company if you work in forestry or farming or any job which allows you to take your animal with you for the day. I don’t have a dog because a dog is most definitely not suitable for a standard urban or sub-urban back garden. The people of this country who are not stupid or selfish enough to own dogs have a right to walk the streets of their neighbourhoods unmolested by your annoying animals. They have the right to sleep peacefully at night, or sit quietly in their gardens on a sunny afternoon without being driven to despair by the cacophony of barking that has become endemic in this country, courtesy of the local “dog lovers”.

A dog is not a piece of garden furniture. If you are considering getting a dog you need to ask yourself some basic questions.
1. Do I have at least 3 to 4 hours a day to spend exercising the dog?
2. Do I have any idea how to properly train and look after a dog?
3. Can I be sure that my having a dog will not unduly infringe on my neighbours right to peace and quiet?

Few dog owners can answer these questions in the affirmative. Most are simply too selfish to even consider them. Most believe that their right to keep a dog supersedes everything else and that they are somehow absolved of any responsibility either to their neighbours or even to their own dog. I would appeal to anybody not to support dog shelters or dog charities. Unwanted dogs should be humanely put-down, not farmed out to irresponsible idiots; “dog lovers”, who just add to the already massive dog menace in this country.

If pet overpopulation and/or the suffering of unwanted pets is to be blamed on “irresponsible pet owners”, and if the animal welfare community is the ONLY group out there funded to educate those people to be more responsible, then we must take responsibility ourselves; each and every pet that suffers or dies as a result of an irresponsible person, is a pet that we failed.

Whether we failed to prevent that pet’s birth, educate his owner, provide his family with support, or rescue him from the hands of a true abuser - it was our responsibility (our business!) to have used our donations, our resources, and our energy to prevent that tragedy.

How can we take money from the public to educate the public only to turn around and blame the public for being uneducated?

Before I started working exclusively with NESR, I got my start in fostering by taking in “stale” dogs from a local shelter for two-week “cage breaks.”

Did them a world of good, got them evaluated in a home environment, and was an easy way to foster without making an open-ended time commitment. It was much easier for me to do a short-term foster once a month than it was to drive the 45 minutes to the shelter to work with an animal a few times a week.

This shelter has legions of cage-break foster homes.

And if you have 40-50 animals out on cage breaks at a given time — guess how many runs they are NOT occupying?

I agree, too, that thoughtful design can mitigate kennel stress. Dunno if the butt-ugly Ozzie facility that Janeen had on her blog is it, but stress control is something that should get top priority, with safety and sanitation, when designing new facilities and upgrading old ones.

And facilities that minimize stress for the inmates also contribute to employee well-being.

Whenever possible, sensitive or fearful dogs should be fostered. Or given time in some ones office to escape the noise and commotion of the main kennel area.

Walks, play time, kong toys, some basic positive training exercises every day, a cozy bed, a dog-loo to go into to get out of the noise and bustle, all these things go miles to keep dogs mentally healthy and most can be accomplished with volunteers and charitable contributions from an engaged community.

A well engaged community is the key, it provides volunteers, donations and support. And new homes! And it is becoming increasingly obvious that the community, the public, is far more willing to support earnest No-Kill efforts than doom and gloom, status quo facilities.

Is there a way to make this a trend — to design shelters so that “kennel stress” doesn’t happen?

With the housing market downtown, there are lots of underemployed architects — perhaps it’s time for HSUS (I’m picking on them since we all know they have bucks! ;-P) to sponsor a design competition for low-materials cost, community-based shelters that are people welcoming and prevent kennel stress in dogs and cats. . .

Comment by Chris — December 30, 2008 @ 5:08 pm

Gina and Susan have already addressed the fallacies you’ve been fed about No Kill. I want to ask you one question.

Shelters routinely kill dogs who have become “kennel stressed.” My little dog would be “kennel stressed” within at most a few hours of entering the shelter kennel environment. She’d be dead, most likely, by the end of the first day, but certainly by the end of the first week.

But because she had a responsible breeder to take her back, she didn’t wind up in a shelter. She got rehomed to me, and she’s a loving, well-behaved, happy pet who loves every child and most adults that she meets. Tonight, we spent an hour in our local Borders, and I didn’t get to do the book shopping I came for because she was so busy charming other customers and giving me the chance to promote the benefits of rescue dogs to a family that wants a dog but needs to have one that will not exceed the maximum size in their development.

Is her current condition really “worse than being dead”—which would be her fate in any High Kill shelter in this country?

ALL shelters have limited space, even Best Friends. So?

Chris, I volunteer at an open admission, (but no owner turn in), county shelter run by our sheriff’s dept. It is No Kill, as in we do not kill for space. We have a volunteer rescue coordinator, a volunteer transport coordinator, a long list, including myself, of people who transport dogs and whole group of volunteers from the local high school and lots of community support.

Why? Because our director wants every animal possible to leave on four paws, so we all pitch in to make that happen.

We’ve had 58 dogs when our capacity is officially 55 because we double ‘em up temporarily if necessary. Dogs waiting for rides sometimes spend a night or two at a boarding kennel if we’re jammed.

No Kill is quite doable, even in a rural county like ours. But first you have to decide to save animals instead of kill them. The rest flows from that. Because…it’s a SHELTER.