More and more dogs are bought and then dumped, especially following lockdowns. Now, all the people who’ve decided that they can’t keep a dog or don’t want a dog are sending their pets to shelters, or worse, abandoning them in the middle of nowhere. The problem here is not only the fact that shelters are now overrun with dogs needing homes, but a lot of these animals spent months in homes that were not equipped to care for them. These dogs weren’t given the proper training and socializing, making them much more difficult to rehome.
My family’s dog, Pixie, is a rescue. With us, she’s an incredibly smart goofball, but as soon as she’s outside, her fear takes over and she turns into what we call ‘a beast’. Although we’ve spent countless hours training and attempting to socialize and desensitize her properly, the fear and behaviours she learnt as a puppy will most likely always be with her. Out on walks, people see an aggressive, untrained, large German shepherd, but the reality is, she is terrified of other dogs. I wish others got to see the loving, playful and smart side of her that my family gets to see.
Not all rescues or shelter dogs come with behavioural or medical problems; it’s the luck of the draw. My previous family dog was also from a shelter, and she had no behavioural problems. Unfortunately, a lot of dogs are surrendered without any history from the previous owner, which makes it incredibly hard to assess the dog’s behaviours. These dogs are stuck in fight-fight-freeze mode trying to keep themselves safe and it takes time for them to learn that they are safe and cared for. We had my current dog for over a year before she learned how to play and it took many, many months for her to learn that we weren’t going to steal her food.
One of the biggest problems is illegal backyard breeders. Not only are the dogs often bred in inhumane conditions, but the breeder usually doesn’t care what breeds, tempers or behaviours they are mixing. These breeders don’t have the required knowledge on breeding, training or care. When the breeder can’t sell certain dogs, they either kill, abandon or surrender them, leading to overrun animal shelters and rescues.
Next time you see a dog behaving poorly, you should watch the handler. If the handler is attempting to work with their dog, you should cut them some slack as they’re doing the best they can with the resources and knowledge they have. If you want to adopt a dog, I suggest you check out your local animal shelters and rescues instead of going to a licenced or unlicensed breeder. The shelter’s descriptions of the dogs will tell you if the dog has any behavioural problems and what they are. There are so many dogs looking for their forever homes and unfortunately, once the shelters get full, they either have to turn away dogs and/or euthanize dogs if they’ve gone unadopted for too long.