CERES – Twenty-five dogs at Stanislaus County Animal Services Agency are at risk of euthanization. The shelter can safely house 160-180 dogs. This week, the shelter hit 300 dogs but currently sits at about 280 dogs.
“Capacity for care is much more than just the number of kennels that we might have here to house animals,” interim director Craig Gundlach said. “For instance, if we had 1,000 kennels, but the same amount of staff that we do right now, our staff would not be able to provide adequate and proper care for those 1,000 animals.”
Gundlach said the shelter had avoided euthanization over the last several months by outsourcing to other rescues and by fostering and adoptions.
“[Euthanization] is traumatizing for the staff here too,” Gundlach said. “Nobody wants to do it, so I’m thankful as the boss that the staff is not having to do that, I’m also super thankful just for the animals to be able to find positive ways out of here, and we are constantly looking for better ways to operate the shelter in a way that makes it more compatible with rescue.”
However, the crisis capacity left the shelter with little other options. Now, they’re counting on the community to either adopt or foster.
“Folks don’t have to adopt an animal, if they just have a home that an animal can stay in temporarily, and they,” Gundlach said. “And care for it and love it, play with it. It’s a much better environment for the animal to be somewhere like that than here in the shelter. So we have foster opportunities, and we can help support foster families like that.”
The agency is holding two adoption events on Friday and Sunday. Sunday’s event will feature all at-risk dogs that could lose their lives by the end of the day.
Gundlach reminds the community that the best way to avoid overpopulation is to spay and neuter animals. The shelter has its Love Clinic open Thursday and Friday of each week. The clinic provides reduced spay and neuters: cats cost just $25 and dogs cost $50.
The Stanislaus County Animal Services Agency can be contacted at (209) 558-7387.
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