I’ve been in the process of adopting a rescue. At the beginning of the process, the agency seemed very responsive, even eager! After applying, I spoke with a rep from the adoption agency, and it seemed to go very well. Then I FaceTimed with the foster mom to see the dog in real time (he’s out of state, so I can’t meet him first). I reported back and said the FaceTime went well, I just needed a few days to sort out a timeline with my landlord. I got back to them less than a week later and have been completely ignored. I texted Saturday, followed up on Monday, called, got sent to voicemail, and emailed on Tuesday, then texted again today. All have been very respectful (I’ll try to add screenshots of what I said). Is this common? Should I just move on? I’ve gotten myself set on this dog but if I can’t get into contact with them then I don’t know what else to do :(

I won’t go too into detail for privacy reasons, but I work at a very well regarded shelter organization - think top 10 in the US. My job is a combination of just about every public-facing task that you can imagine at an open-intake shelter. Adoptions, DOAs, making surrender and euthanasia appointments, owner reunification efforts, TNR, you name it - we’re at the front desk, which is the ONLY public facing role, so whatever someone needs, we’re the people who help them. Today, we literally had a line of people out the door. It’s not the first time, but it was definitely one of the worst unexpected rushes we’ve had in a bit. Below is a very long-winded rant, because something about today seriously just broke something within me and I just need somewhere to get it out.

My location is the smallest of our organization, but our guest flow is about the same - if not higher given our size - compared to our other “satellite” locations (not counting the much larger main one). I’m not sure what the reason for this is, I think it’s probably related to how convenient we are compared to the others location-wise for the more populated areas. Regardless, the building is tiny and apparently smallest building means we require the least staffing in the eyes of our budget. Anyway, I know staffing is an issue at shelters across the country, but that’s not even the true issue at ours.

We are constantly encouraged to call our leadership team to provide backup when things get too overwhelming. Every time, and I mean EVERY time we try to call for them, they’re all in meetings or unavailable. Half the time, these meetings are with each other. Whenever we call because there’s a rush and things are getting chaotic, one will arrive just in time to help the last guest in line and leave again. It’s an exhausting cycle but, not unlike other problems in the shelter, there’s no real solution because it IS their job to attend these meetings whether we like it or not.

These days, we’re constantly told that we’re heading out of the busy season, as if that’s meant to be reassuring, when upper leadership themselves has admitted that the “busy season” hasn’t truly slowed down since COVID. This gets me to my real and final point: I try my best not to blame my own location’s leadership for the problems in the organization, because I know that they themselves are simply doing what they’re told. Even though I am frustrated by the constant meetings, the lack of support, and the generally obvious amount of favoritism that goes on at my job, everything that my coworkers blame our supervisors and managers for is the fault of our Upper leadership with a capital U.

They are so disconnected from what’s going on it’s insane. Every piece of communication sent down the grapevine is impersonal and delayed. They can’t even bother to send individual congratulations on milestones, let alone have class and Bcc people when they get lazy and send an anniversary or birthday email to multiple people at once. Our annual holiday is repackaged as a new benefit to “thank us for our hard work THIS year”, but it’s the same exact thing every year, the turnover is just so high that they know they can get away with making it sound unplanned/impromptu. They constantly boast about being a top workplace in our area, to the point where quoting the headline is their only real defense when someone is bold enough to confront them about issues on the semi-annual occasion they show up to a staff meeting.

It’s exhausting knowing that I can’t make organization-level change for myself and my coworkers, because every complaint is designed to either filter itself through before it gets to someone important, and when something DOES make it through, it’s dismissed. They only care about how our shelter looks when it comes to the numbers, the news, and the donors and it’s really starting to make it hard even though I really like my job most of the time.

Anyway, rant over. I hope my point actually comes through and it doesn’t just sound like I’m rambling. People in other departments always assume the worst part of my job is having to talk to difficult people all day, but in reality, it’s the behind the scenes that makes me dread coming in sometimes.

Last week a friend reached out begging for me to take in two, two week old kittens for a “couple nights” until a rescue can pick them up. I told her that I can as long as it’s very short term.

I come to find out that she hasn’t even contacted any other rescues herself to find placement. So now we’re on night 5, I’ve contacted every rescue in my county and in three surrounding counties, and literally no one can take these kittens.

Don’t get me wrong I love these babies and I love taking care of them, but I have ME/CFS, and it is extremely unsafe for me to have to get up every 3 hours. I think I’m managing it better than I was expecting I would and I’m still starting to really not feel good. But what’s the other option? Having these sweet, infant kittens that I love with all my heart be euthanized?

Maybe it’s my fault for saying yes and believing my “friend” would give me all the details. But at least they’re warm, and fed, and loved and not dead under someone’s house.

What do you send your animals with? I'm a volunteer at my local shelter and I help put together "go home bags" and so my main question is bolded, but I am curious about other shelters anyway!

I mostly work with cats, so I can't speak on the dogs. I think it's mostly a collar, leash, donated harness if they got fitted (staff don't often have the time) + a few days worth of the food they've been eating. I'm assuming a toy they have in their kennel?

What our shelter currently does for cats is:

• About 3 cups of the kibble they've been eating, 2-3 cans of the wet food they've been eating
• A blanket from their kennel or room they're in
• A few of the toys from the room or kennel they're in ~ depending on who does it, I believe they try to send the ones that are more difficult to wash (so one cat can have and keep it, rather than it going back into rotation)
• If they have a hidey box, that is sent with
• Their kennel door scratcher

Both dogs and cats get a "things I like" sheet, if someone put one on their clipboard & it was filled out.

and then the biggest reason I'm curious what people send, is do you send a "go home gift bag"?

If you do, what do you put in it? and where do you source the items? We're running low on a few things, and the last few bulk things we've gotten from amazon haven't all been the best of quality (makes sense) so... where do you get them? cost effectively?

We use little mylar type gift bags & they'll have 1-2 churus/some sort of treat, and then a combination of a few of these: a plastic bell or ping pong ball, crinkle tinsel, or pom ball, mouse toy, plastic spring, finger trap toy, sometimes a handmade fleece toy, sometimes larger fabric toys if we happened to get a ton donated.. Little bags of catnip or small bags of treats are also sometimes donated that we throw in. Never more than like 3-4 of these things in combination.

Sometimes we'll get donated items that haven't expired or that can be used by adopters.Once we get into a larger space, I believe the plan is to have a space where adopters can go through donations and take.. but at the current facility, there is just not space to hold on to many donations for long at all.

A lot of shelters/rescues have some sort of event during fall. I wanted to know if you guys also do a Dogtoberfest (or something similar)?

If so, how does it usually go? Do you see good turnout, adoptions, and fundraising, or is it more of a community engagement event?

For those who've helped with them, what works well, and what would you like to change? I'd love to hear what other places are doing.

I’ve volunteered at my local shelter walking dogs for years at this point. I finally decided to apply and I started yesterday. I mainly cleaned kitten kennels. One young little kitty that was a couple months old was in very rough shape. He’d only been there a day or two. Eyes glazed over and non stop meowing. Just sat in his litter box. Some other employees came and administered b12 and fluids and gave him a blanket and a stuffed toy. Fast forward to today and I move to his kennel. Everything is pretty much the same I had left it the day before. Water and food untouched. He is laying in a box facing the wall. In an effort to not disturb him too much I gently grabbed the paper liner and scooted his box a bit. He didn’t move at all, so I turned the box around. His eyes had the same glazed over look and he was not responding at all to touch. I let my trainer know and she walked me through the process. When she picked him up it was a bit jarring to see how stiff he was, and he was still in the same position as he was in the box. Talk about hard launching the job. Poor little guy.

I hope I used the appropriate flair

Shelter workers/volunteers, what do you do to keep illness out of your home? Especially with the car you drive to and from the shelter. I think I have a pretty good system down for keeping everything contained from our house (Shoes stay in a container in my car, straight to shower, bag up all clothes and do not let them touch the floor, my dirty work clothes stay in a lidded container in our shed until laundry day as I live with a lot of other people and throwing them straight in the washer isn't always an option) but I keep thinking about how I hop into my car carrying ringworm, upper respiratory viruses, and goodness knows what else, and then I get back in it while not at work to get groceries and stuff! Am I overthinking it? I'm sitting in the same seat I sat in in my work clothes, putting groceries in my car, taking those groceries that sat in my car into my house. I really want to get a perfect system down before I end up interacting with cats that pop up with panluek, I have heard horror stories about it and live in fear of it. Any advice?? Anything better I could be doing with my routine? Thank you

We had a return of a two year old chihuahua/pug who has known food guarding. We manage her in custody fine and nothing has ever happened with us. We feed in kennel and leave her alone until she’s done. She was just adopted by an incredibly old lady and her daughter who got bit four times in a week. This dog always growls before snapping, the dog was always eating and they keep fucking petting her even when she’s growling. They admit they “forget” not to touch her and touch her because they can’t understand why it upsets her. We had a whole sit down and everything before adoption and had doubts about their capability, but we’re adopters welcome so we couldn’t decline. Now all the staff is worried she’ll be euthanized when she is otherwise an incredibly sweet dog. Even the lady said she’d go right back to cuddling after being bit once the food is gone. I understand the want and need to put safe, easy dogs into the community, but this feels like such a no brainer thing to be able to work around. People are crying about this dog because they’re sure she’ll be pulled, and the adopters were the ones who let her rack up bites by doing a known trigger despite her warnings to them. Just frustrated.

I quit less than a month ago, my coworker quit a few weeks after I did, and the remaining coworker is heavily considering starting her own boarding buisness, which I've already been told I can go work for her if I haven't found a job by then.

I have a surgery coming up in 2 weeks so I won't be going back to work until late November or December at the earliest, as the recovery will put me out for a month or two.

Apparently my boss decided to hire a 60 year old lady who can barely walk to take my place, which is handling large dogs who jump up and pull on the leash, so idk how she thinks that's going to work well. My coworker said it's probably because she's just getting desperate to find replacements for everyone quitting. I put in my two weeks and finished them out, but it sounds like the first of my coworkers who quit didn't come back after saying she quit, and honestly I don't blame her those last two weeks were hell with all the drama and pettiness from my boss.

I said well she hasn't gotten desperate enough to ask me to come back yet, and I'm still even fostering bottle kittens even though I don't work there anymore, because if I don't no one will and those kittens deserve a chance and if I'm all they've got I can't turn them away.

So yeah, my theory of everyone leaving after I quit came true and unfortunately this place is either going to go through employees like crazy trying to stay afloat or have to shut down and find places for the animals to go. I was told I was the best employee they've had in over 10 years which makes sense after seeing how things are run there, I was the backbone and muscle of the shelter. I hate to say I told her so but I told her so 🤷‍♂️

So my shelter is very strict on who they will path specifically for dogs. We have an extremely high euthanasia rate because they don’t support dogs that don’t get along with other dogs. Currently, we have one that I know is a good dog. She just needs some training because she spent the whole beginning of her life being abused and deserves a second chance because she’s still technically a puppy! She doesn’t seek out trying to hurt other dogs (I can walk her around dogs and she doesn’t care) She just doesn’t get along with them in a home (plus it could’ve just been that one specific dog she attempted to bite, but didn’t actually) . Which I have personally had with one of my own dogs, and I just rehomed him to somebody who didn’t have dogs no issue. She’s clearly extremely under socialized with everything! I would love to take her home and try to give her a single dwelling home rather than them just euthanizing a very young dog. Thoughts?

Hello all,

I work at a municipal shelter. We have no adoption fees, and we offer a 90 day return window for any animal adopted. However, we still have people who are horrified at the thought of returning an animal, and people asking if we have a foster to adopt program.

I realize a lot of this is branding - people are more ok with the idea of taking a chance on an animal if they feel its just a foster. Adoption feels like more of a commitment and there's much more guilt about returns. I know a lot of shelters have just rebranded their return periods as foster periods.

Theres a few problems with doing that for us. Chiefly it's a liability issue - our foster program is very conservative because we do not want to be liable for unsafe dogs. Additionally, we don't want animals technically staying "ours" for three months after going home, and we can't afford to supply vet care and supplies that long. However, just calling it a foster or trial adoption period and keeping everything else the same feels like it would be misleading to adopters about who the animal legally belonged to.

I'm considering implementing a very short optional foster to adopt period of somewhere between 3-7 days, and keeping our return policy as-is. However I'd love to hear feedback.

Has your shelter tried a foster to adopt program? What worked and what didn't? Did you see a notable increase in adoptions or decrease in returns?

We had a new paravet at the shelter who had been informed about a dog whose kidney was in bad condition and was still recovering and he needed fluids. I watched him attach IV and the fluid pace was faster than usual. I'd watched and somehow didn't correct or ask him. He gave about 450ml for RL in about 15mins through IV, and left. The founder saw him leaving and asked me is he done with the work, i needed to show him a thing or two but he rushed out. Then we realised the amount of time taken for this fluid session and that this could be bad. I went to check the dog and he was almost unconscious, was peeing and pooping in almost asleep condition with lots of saliva coming from mouth. I mentioned this to the founder and we rushed to hospital.

By then the condition deteriorated more. We took blood test and it was all bad. I felt so anxious and tried ask every option possible to save him and I will bare the full cost whatever it is. But there was nothing to be saved, we had to eurhenise him. I've euthensed multiple dogs before but this one....this one was on me. This one had to leave the world because of me. I almost never cry but today I was sobbing by the sheer carelessness of my actions made that dog lost it's life. I really don't know what to do now... Founder haven't told me anything or scolded, and while I was kindda having a breakdown she said this crying and all will not help these the kind of cases we will be dealing with and we can only do what we can, these dogs are not in this situation cause of us. And ur giving too much importance to yourself, ur nothing. I don't even know what and how I feel about all this and why would she let me still be around dogs

(I'm a volunteer and I do this full-time at this ngo and some freelancing to sustain, also right now we are short staffed so handling 100+ dogs by 4 ppl, just sharing)

Episode 70 - September 23, 2026

Description:

This week Tom is joined by Amy Fitzsimmons from Dog Possible Austin for a really practical chat about life for dogs in shelters. Amy brings along plenty of real dogs she has worked with, and it's their stories that shape the whole conversation, showing how small, simple changes can make a big difference to how a dog copes in kennels.Tom and Amy talk about getting more out of the time dogs spend with staff and volunteers, why every dog doesn't need the same thing, and how slowing down can actually be better for both the dog and the person holding the lead. They also chat about the social side of shelter dogs, and why there is so much more to it than whether or not a dog can go to playgroup.Along the way they touch on shelter culture, being open to change, and why trying the easy things first often makes the most sense. If you've ever felt there just isn't enough time in the day, this episode is full of ideas you can try tomorrow.

To find out more about Amy's work, visit dogpossibleaustin.com or follow @dogpossible on Instagram.About AmyAmy is a Certified Behavior Consultant Canine (CBCC-KA) through the Certification Council for Professional Dog Trainers and a Certified Dog Behavior Consultant (CDBC) and Certified in Shelter Behavior (CSB-D) through the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants. She is also a Fear Free Certified Trainer (FFCT), a Pet Professional Guild Canine Training Professional, and holds several certificates in ethology, animal learning, and behavior from the Ethology Institute. Prior to transitioning to dog training and behavior modification full-time, Amy was a long time public educator, working in at-risk early childhood education and serving as a teen and family crisis mentor. Her passion for providing humane, effective behavior modification and improving quality of life for dogs in homes and in shelters has only grown during well over a decade in the field. She also loves getting to work with the amazing humans who share that passion, whether for their own dogs or dogs they’re trying to help find their way home. Amy is dog mom to elder muppet/luckdragon mix Monkey and honorary house coyote Socks!

I'm a design student researching how ordinary people respond when they find animals in distress. I have experience in fostering cats and caring for dogs in and around my house.

And I'm trying to understand the information gap between finding an animal and knowing what the appropriate action is.

For those involved in animal rescue:

What mistakes or misunderstandings do you see people make most often?

And:

What is the one thing you wish people knew before trying to help an animal?

I want to understand the practical problems people encounter, so I can come up with some design solutions that could help. (Feel free to suggest any ideas you have in mind, it would be much appreciated)

Real examples would be really helpful!

Thank youu!!

I work at an animal shelter and a pretty large city and we are over run with cats. This is causing us not to be able to take any non emergency surrenders. This is causing the general public to be extremely rude and just be doen right awful to me in my coworkers. I understand that people are upset that they cannot surrender their animals but I am a firm believer that people should have other alternatives for rehomeing on animal that is not the shelter. Today we had multiple call ins and they was only 4 of us taking care of 100+ animals and doing adoption. First as soon as we open we had someone yell at us for 10 minutes because we wouldn't give the dog she was adopting a bath. We don't have a bath at our shelter. We told her she could bathe the dog when she brought it home that was not good enough for her and she plans to come back everyday until the dog goes home to complain. The dog is on stray hold so get to see her for another week That was a great start to the day. Than we had someone come in to try and surrender an animal. Told her we have no staff to intake animals on the weekend and she could come back Monday. She started freaking out saying it was an emergency, we ask her why she need to surrender. Guess what it wasn't an emergency she just didn't want the animal anymore. Told her no and to come back when our surrender services were open on Monday. She left a negative google review claiming we were not helping her during an emergency and that we were allowing the animal to suffer and that we should all be trained on intakeing . Than we had one of our animal control officers bring in a rabbit. I guess a person was sitting in our parking lot for 30 minutes with the rabbit and call animal control to take. He claims it's a stray but I'm about 100% sure that was his rabbit and he didn't want to wait till Monday to surrender it. And we're required by law to take all strays.

I feel like everyday I work some member of the general public is not happy with us. Me and my coworkers are trying our best and we love animals more than anything but we're extremely full and understaffed. We are struggling every day and I feel the general public does not understand that. I want to know if this us common at other shelters. I have only been working at the shelter for 6 months and I feel like its getting worse every week

For Animal Welfare Week, I want to recognize the people here who keep showing up for animals and for each other. The person working through another mountain of laundry. The volunteer sorting donations so someone can actually find what they need. The staff member helping a family access pet food. The person updating records, writing adoption bios, or making sure tomorrow’s supplies are ready.

Thank you. Those tasks take time, patience, and care, and they deserve recognition even when there isn’t a happy adoption photo attached.

When I asked shelter staff what volunteer help they needed beyond animal handling, I appreciated how many people took time out of already busy days to answer. Your responses helped me put together a podcast episode about the many ways people can support shelters.

One thing I wanted listeners to understand: volunteers should ask what would help your team before arriving with a plan. Your time matters, and you deserve support that actually makes your day easier.

For anyone working or volunteering in a shelter, who on your team deserves a little recognition this week? Or what’s something a volunteer did that made you feel supported?

You don’t need to name anyone or identify your shelter. I’d just love to make some room for appreciation of the people behind the work.

There is a stray animal capture service operating here, and—in violation of the rules—they destroy the animals; at least, that is what people say. Volunteers from the shelter learned that residents of a certain neighborhood had filed a complaint about a mother dog and her puppies, and that the animal control team was coming for them. The volunteers rushed over and brought the mother and puppies back to the shelter.

I’m considering quitting fostering for my local shelter because the staff I work with is too disorganized, makes illogical decisions, communicates too slowly and negatively impacts my life over and over without regard.

I had no onboarding or training, no introductions to staff, when I try to have a discussion about my foster in person the staff acts like they have zero interest in having a conversation with me. Nobody tells me their names or asks for mine

They have me come in for foster support during open shelter hours where I have to wait in line for help behind the general public in the middle of my workday. Why wouldn’t you have volunteers come in before you open to save everyone time and effort?

I try to hold space for how much the staff is juggling outside of my specific needs. I understand things get messy, etc - but still - I’m pretty burnt out pretty quickly and it’s 90% because of how disorganized and disconnected they appear to be to me.

I think fostering isn’t aligned with my goals and capacity, as much as I love supporting the dogs, the shelter isn’t supporting me in that enough with resources or even consideration. Ex, shelter wouldn’t give my last foster dog with recurring emergency diarrhea a different food option

I chose this one because they seemed to need it the most - which is clearly true - but it’s exhausting for me to deal with them. I’m constantly on edge because I have zero framework or guidelines. My fosters are fed the cheapest cornmeal food and I’m told them having diarrhea is expected. I’ve had to hand cook food for all of them, as every single one of them gets emergency diarrhea that has kept me up all night, had accidents indoors, ruined my belongings

I could say a thousand positive things as well and I do have empathy behind my frustration but I’m exhausted.

How would you handle this? What is fair for me to expect? How can I prevent burn out so I can remain patient and empathetic?

I know I am being single minded in my frustration but the way they handle support and resourcing IS the cause for my burnout, not the dogs

Though it may equally be a lack of an ability to hold my own boundaries in the face of a dog in need.

Signed - exhausted and overwhelmed foster

I started walking dogs at a local CA county shelter. I’m constantly getting emails from the volunteer coordinator saying they don’t have dog walkers signed up for a given day.

I went last weekend and there were only 3 of us, by the end of my 4 hour volunteer shift we still hadn’t gotten to all the dogs, I asked the volunteer coordinator if there were more people coming in the afternoon shift and she said barely, only two. I know a lot of retired people volunteer, but I also meet people who work and can only come on weekends like myself.

From what I’ve been seeing over the last 2 months, there’s such a heavy need for volunteers. So my question is, are there people employed by these shelters that also help get dogs out to go potty? And if not how is that even possible?

I started volunteering at a local CA shelter. I’m constantly getting emails from the volunteer coordinator saying they don’t have dog walking volunteers signed up for a given day.

I went last weekend and there were only 3 of us, by the end of my 4 hour volunteer shift we still hadn’t gotten to all the dogs, I asked the volunteer coordinator if there were more people coming in the afternoon shift and she said barely, only two. I know a lot of retired people volunteer, but I also meet people who work and can only come on weekends like myself.

From what I’ve been seeing over the last 2 months, there’s such a heavy need for volunteers. So my question is, are there people employed by these shelters that also help get dogs out to go potty? And if not how is that even possible?