Who Will Let the Dogs Out?
All over the southern US, dogs are waiting.
Some lucky dogs are in progressive shelters who have staff, resources, and community support that allows them to place all of their adoptable dogs through local adoptions and outside rescues.
Some not-so-lucky dogs are in open intake, high-kill shelters that routinely euthanize for space. Many of the people who work in these shelters try desperately to save every dog they can but our understaffed, under-funded, under-supported, and overwhelmed.
And then there are the dogs left behind at tiny municipal pounds in rural communities on back roads people rarely travel.
These dogs live in sparse conditions with few resources and no extras. They are held in chain-link kennels until their owners come for them or when they don’t (as is more often the case), they are killed at the local veterinary office or shot by a dog-catcher’s gun. Their pictures are not on a shelter website or petfinder. Rarely is there anyone working to address their physical, emotional or behavioral needs, let alone search for an adopter. Their only chance beyond being claimed by their owners is for a rescue worker to drive down one of those long, lonely roads and ‘pull’ them, transporting them to rescues sometimes states away.
We started the nonprofit initiative, Who Will Let the Dogs Out, to document the faces and stories of the forgotten dogs waiting to be let out. It’s grown into more than that, but from the start, it has always been about these deserving dogs whose only fault lies in being born in a desperate area that does not value dogs.
Our first Who Will Let the Dogs Out trip south happened because of my then-high school age son, Ian. He insisted. He was a budding photographer, and he wanted to document the faces of the dogs to raise awareness. I’d told him about what I’d seen in the south while touring to support my book, Another Good Dog: One Family and Fifty Foster Dogs. He wanted to see it for himself and figure out how we could help.
We had no real qualifications beyond being people with wide open hearts who believe that the problem has never been that people don’t care — but that people don’t know.
By traveling to the shelters, we hoped to shine a light on the forgotten dogs and inspire change.
Since that first trip, I’ve gone back two more times and am in the midst of planning another trip in January, despite COVID restrictions. The situation has not improved, despite a brief flurry of rescue adoptions at the onset of the pandemic. Now the shelters and dog pounds are filling again, and the desperation level only rises.
I am posting the stories and pictures from our trips in the hope that they will motivate more people to help, to spread the word, and to consider donating what they can in terms of time or resources to help the dogs that have been forgotten. You can find more information on all of the shelters, pounds, and rescues that we’ve visited and how to help them directly on our website, Who Will Let the Dogs Out.
Together, we can let the dogs out.
For more information on Who Will Let the Dogs Out, an initiative of Operation Paws for Homes, visit our website or find us on Facebook or Instagram.
For more information on my writing, blogs, and books, visit CaraWrites.com
#togetherwerescue
