Video of animals being euthed at shelter-Warning. Heartbreaking. We are Monsters

There is actually a big no-kill movement going on right now in the shelter community. I went to a seminar about it last year, it was very interesting.

First of all, in the shelter community, "No Kill" means that less than 10% of animals are put to sleep. They acknowledge that about 10% of animals will need to be humanely euthanized due to health or behaviorial problems.

Also, "euthanize" means to put to sleep an animal who is suffering, due to health or behaviorial problems. In the no kill community, "euthanize" does not mean to put to sleep a healthy and happy animal simply because of lack of resources; they call this "killing." Hence, "no kill" means that they only euthanize animals who are suffering and cannot reasonably be cured; about 10% of the population that comes into a shelter.

The leaders of this movement are proving that the 90% adoption rate can be achieved in basically every type of shelter environment and community. Through increased adoption efforts, rescue group outreach, spay/neuter programs, etc., shelters are learning that it can be done. Two very large, open-admission shelters in my area have recently achieved a monthly 90% success rate, after having been at about 60% at this time last year. I honestly didn't think it could be done at these two particular shelters, but I'm proud to say that they've done it.

Nathan Winograd is probably the biggest leader of the no kill movement, his website would be a good place to start if you're interested in this topic.

I've always thought no kill shelters, IF the animals are going to spend too long a time caged up or in little stalls, are not all they're cracked up to be. It is a kindness to pts those animals that just don't get adopted in a reasonable amount of time.

Lizzy. The no kill shelter is exactly that. Unless the animal is sick and suffering they don't kill. It can be aggressive to the point of never being adoptable. Doesn't matter, it isn't in pain...

Winograd talks a good game, but I am sorry, it is totally unrealistic at this time. Pounds in certain areas are overflowing even with adopting out at $25 a dog, working with rescues, transporting dogs, etc. In some areas I do think "no-kill" is feasible, but not nationwide.

Winograd's ideas are great for shelters in the NE, but imo they will not work in the SE. Where do you put 18000 animals/yr from just ONE county in SC?! It sucks, but the SE is not the NE and people need to realize that.

I wish it was as easy as lots of programming for the community, but the shelter I worked at in SC had low cost s/n, humane ed, dog training classes, behavior services, low cost vet care, a volunteer program, was developing fostering and transport programs, and still got 18000 animals per year and had to euthanize for space/time. They had room for 350 to 400 animals at a time.

When the shelter in the neighboring county started requiring owners to pay to relinquish animals the shelter I was at saw an increase of about 1000 animals/yr. 1000 MORE despite all of their work! It was so discouraging.

The shelter near me that just reached their 90% adoption rate, brings in 23,000 animals a year. My computer's not opening the fiscal year report on the other shelter, but I believe it's comparably sized. These are two adjacent counties, too, which makes for a LOT of animals in a relatively small area.

And yes, this is in Texas, which is not in the northeast.

Lizzy, that kind of "no kill" I'm okay with, even thouh I truly don't believe that every shelter ever will be able to implement it. Not to be rude, though, but it's not truly "no-kill." Not the fanatical, zealous kind that I am familiar with.

Also, I think it does a huge injustice to villify the people putting animals down. Or the shelters who 'aren't doing enough'. They have been created to clean up other people's mess. Yes they should do the best job they can... but its not their fault those animals are there.

Why not have some hate for the people who churn out dogs? Or the people who buy em and dump em?

My biggest beef with no-kill shelters/rescues is actually when they are not open admission but then act extremely adversarial to those who ARE open admission.

It's easy to be no-kill if you pick and choose to only take in highly adoptable animals and turn everyone else away. If that's how you want to run your rescue, fine, but then to turn around and vilify the ones who will take those hard cases and make hard decisions about them is... disappointing at best.

Lizzy thanks for sharing the link - I think that is super awesome! I wonder what really helped them do it? From their site it doesn't look like their programming is very different from the shelter in SC I'm so familiar with.

That isn't really accurate. Have you read any of Winograd's information? It isn't simply about continuing business as usual expect not putting any animals to sleep. That would without a doubt fail in most places.

Like was mentioned, no-kill does allow for dogs to be euthanized who are too aggressive to place. It simply means that no healthy, adoptable animal is killed. In that area, I think a lot of shelters all over the country can do better - especially many county run pounds. There are a lot of politics within the shelter community that prevent adoptable dogs from being placed. Turning away homes because of shelter policy, shelter workers with an us against them attitude when dealing with the public, shelters refusing to work with rescues or making it extremely difficult for rescues to pull dogs, etc. Those things are all issues which can be changed within the shelter to help more animals be adopted. The sad fact is that it is easier and cheaper to kill than it is to increase efforts made to promote adoptions. I have met more than one shelter directors who use their position of deciding which dogs live and die to make a point or to get back at someone who disagreed with them. It has happened in my area within more than one shelter or rescue. Those are the sort of issues that the no-kill movement is attempting to tackle.

He isn't just talking a good game though, he has experience with turning shelters from high kill to no-kill in several areas of the country including the south. A lot of shelter/rescue people are so opposed to his ideas but I always wonder, what would be the harm in trying his plan? They could always go back to killing if it truly didn't do anything to increase adoptions.

Around here, the hard-core no-kill rescues only consider 0% euthanasia "no-kill". They would consider what you've described a "kill shelter".

I hope my post wasn't taken wrong...what I said about the sad state of affairs the human race has put upon dogs and cats. (I see many posts defending the shelter workers and that we shouldn't "demonize" them. I didn't see where that was done so thought maybe my post was misinterrpreted) I didn't mean the shelter workers. I meant the public when I used the term, "human race"...those who are irresponible and uncaring about their pets, who cause this huge mess in the first place of homeless animals and multiplying of animals due to stupidity or thoughtlessness. The shelter people are just absorbing all the mess caused by the rest of the public and trying to right things. (not to say that the entire public is to blame.) (better get that disclaimer in too, while I'm at it)

Why do I need to read his information? Its irrelevant as the no kill shelters here (and if you read other people's posts my area is not the only one) where they don't euth for anything but sever medical conditions.

His ideas might be great, but they are not my experience with 'no kill' shelters. And has he does not own the right to the term 'no kill' people are free to call their shelter no kill and do as they please.

Just because some no-kill shelters do a poor job doesn't mean that "no-kill can't work". We adopted our corgi from a not so great no-kill shelter and IMO they could have done better in several ways. However, at least they were giving the dogs a chance at find homes. In many other shelters, Ziggy would have been killed because he had been there over 2 months. So in his case, a less than ideal no-kill shelter was still far better than the alternative.

Even if people disagree with the No-Kill Movement, it is hard to disagree that there is certainly room for improvement at many shelters. And that such improvements would help save more animals.

Anyone interesting in learning more about the no-kill movement: My Website

I'm not discounting that no-kill as you've defined it can work. The largest shelter in my area ascribes to that philosophy. I just think the waters of the terminology are very muddied and leads to a lot of miscommunication.

I agree, which is why in my first post I defined no kill as adopting out 90% of dogs, and humanely euthanizing the 10% or so who are too sick or behaviorially challenged to be adopted out.

I didn't mention that this 90% number would be applicable in open admission shelters. Closed admission shelters should theoretically have a near 100% adoption rate.

It really isn't all that different from most other shelters. They do have an award-winning volunteer program which really does set them apart and helps adoptions tremendously. They're very helpful to rescue groups, dozens of rescues pull from this shelter. They're also very much IN the community.... The shelter is a few blocks from downtown, they do media at least once a week ("Pet of the Week" segments on TV, ads in the paper, etc.). Just about everybody in town who's adopted a dog knows of this shelter, even if they didn't get a dog from here.

I really think it's all about little things that add up and make a huge difference.

"It can't work in my area. My area is different."

"The public is irresponsible, it is their fault we have to kill animals in shelters!"

These have been said many times by many people, and even in this thread. But many shelters across the US are and have changed to no-kill, meaning they don't kill healthy adoptable animals, but will still euthanize for severe aggression or illness that can't be treated.

Read KC Dog Blog, he has examples of where Nathan Winograd's philosophy has worked.
Chippewa County, MI sees no kill success - KC DOG BLOG

Knowing that it's possible - KC DOG BLOG

And you know, we all want to believe those who work in shelters are the good guys. I can tell you that a lot of the time, that's not true. I worked in a kill shelter for about a month and a half. They killed some cats (black ones included) who were perfectly adoptable, sweet cats without even putting them out on the adoption floor. I know it can be hard to adopt out a black cat, but THEY DIDN'T EVEN FRICKING TRY. And we had room on the adoption floor. Oh but they put the aggressive orange tabby up for adoption, the one I couldn't move from one cage to another for cleaning without feral cat gloves. There was also a beautiful cat that got sick, so they put him in the back and let him get really sick, and then they killed him (I didn't really know what to do about this cruelty back then, who do you report animal control to?). They used to not adopt out pit bulls, but they changed that policy.

Loudoun County Animal Control does not adopt out pit bulls. They give a few to Misunderstood Pit Bull Rescue. They also refuse to work with most mixed-breed rescues around here, and mostly only work with a few pure-breed rescues. They choose to kill pit bulls based on no good reason at all.

A lot of shelters seem like they CHOOSE to kill. I mean, check out YesBiscuit! once in a while. She's following a kill-shelter right now that kills most of the cats and dogs without even putting them on the adoption floor, without reaching out to rescue, without giving owners a time to claim lost pets. They DON'T CARE.

I never once said it couldn't work. I just said that the current shelter does not do no kill the way you state it. Our local humane society is now no kill, closer to your definition than our private shelter.

Sweet, that may be some kill shelters, but I can tell you that, at the kill shelter I volunteer at, we try our hardest to get these animals adopted. The manager is amazing and loves animals. Sometimes, it IS the public that is to be blamed. We hold adoption events every single week, we have a low cost spay neuter clinic, we have networking and do transports every month, we have a segment on the noon show, we foster, and we're STILL killing tons of EXTREMELY adoptable animals every month, including and especially litters upon litters of 8-week-old puppies because people refuse to get their dogs fixed around here!

What do all the "anyone can be a no kill shelter" people propose we do? And yes, we do take black puppies straight to the euthanasia room during the summer without putting them on the adoption floor first, because there are absolutely NO cages open, and we're not about to kill a couple colorful puppies that kind of have a chance of getting adopted, to make room for black puppies that have NO chance of getting adopted.