The issue of animal homelessness is a much larger issue than most people think, because of the fact that even though around 1.5 million animals are euthanized nationally, which has been declining from about 2.6 million in 2011 thanks in part to the larger number of animals that are successfully returned to their owners, or adopted by new owners. There are still 6.5 million animals that get accepted into shelters per year, of these 3.3 million are dogs and 3.2 million are cats (ASPCA 2017). Another thing that you might not know is that there are about 70 million stray animals in the US alone (Kristina Pepelko 2-20-2014). If all of the strays were sprayed or neutered, and if the rate at which animals get accepted into shelters stayed the same, then it would take roughly 11 years to get that problem taken care of. Then the problem becomes, “What are we going to do with all of these animals that we just brought into the shelters?” If you would be asking that same question, then I would say, “Why don’t you ask people to come and adopt, but if they have someone in their family who is allergic to pet fur, then ask them to come and help take care of animals that are not just cats and dogs, but unusual animals such as owls, alligators, deer, equines, and others if their local shelter has any unusual animals.” The reasons why I am interested is because of the fact that there are about 70 million animals who are alone and out on the streets of major cities and in the municipalities of states and their various counties (ASPCA 2017). Some of the other reasons why you should be interested in this issue is because of the fact that shelters can be overcrowded, and that prevents the shelters from taking in any more animals than they already have. Also that is a problem, because in 60 years one unspayed female dog and her offspring can produce 670,000 puppies, and one unspayed female cat and her offspring can produce 4,200,000 kittens in just 70 years. The issue of animal homelessness has been around for hundreds of years, because at first we didn’t have any real means of identification other than word of mouth for identification, but now we have identification tags and GPS chips, which unlike the identification tags that could be loosened, GPS chips can’t get loosened, and they also allow people to find their pets if they get lost and pretty much track the movements of their pets if those animals decide to wander off and don’t return. The problem of animal homelessness has become slightly easier than it was a couple of thousands of years ago, because back then they didn’t have the GPS technology that we have now so they had to either hope that their pet returned after a time or just move on with life, but now if a pet has a GPS chip, then we could theoretically find them in a matter of seconds or minutes. The Watatuga Humane Society reports that in just six years, one unspayed female dog and her offspring can create 67,000 dogs and one unspayed female cat and her offspring can produce 420,000 kittens in seven years (One Green Planet 2014), and then there comes the issue of having the fact that with that many animals around, then it would be hard to contain them all, and I say hard not impossible for the reason of that it is theoretically possible to house 420,000 cats or 67,000 dogs, it wouldn’t be realistic, because you would need to have a whole bunch of food for all of those animals, and getting that much food alone would probably be way more than most people can afford, and there is also the factor which is that so many animals would need veterinary care in case they get any diseases, which means a whole bunch of additional costs through veterinary costs. There are so many various organizations which help homeless pets, such as the ASPCA, CARE for animals, No voice unheard, Alley cat allies, Animal Rescue Foundation, D.E.L.T.A. Rescue, Patriot Paws, Leave no paws behind, The Humane society, Save-a-pet, and others, the whole list can be found here (note: the list is for 2014, I couldn’t find the list for 2016). There are a whole bunch of organizations, but that list only has 50 of the possibly hundreds of thousands of organizations. There are multiple ways to volunteer at various organizations, the ASPCA has a whole bunch of ways such as: helping with the advocacy center, reporting animal cruelty, sharing you story (if you have one), volunteering, helping farm animals, and other opportunities. The other organizations that I looked at on the list that is linked in the previous paragraph has good organizations, but most of the organizations that are on there are either not in NC or they are in NC but they are not in Raleigh. The SPCA Raleigh is about 5-ish miles from Martin, and they have a volunteer program, and 8th graders under 14 don’t need to come to the New Volunteer Orientation (the site at which I found that information is here). One of the things that I was thinking of doing was to volunteer at the SPCA Raleigh, which would mean that if some of the 8th grade wants to help, then some of us would or wouldn’t have to go to the New Volunteer Orientation, because of the fact that some of the volunteers might be 14 while some (including myself) would be 13. The only problem is that the amount of time spent getting to the place would depend on traffic, and the timing of when we hit the lights. I would also suggest that we leave at or around 10:49 because if we traveled at 55 mph, then it would take 10.9 minutes to travel the 5 miles. One of the only problems with the timing issue is the fact that the SPCA Raleigh animal shelter opens at 11:00 am Monday-Saturday and at 1:00 pm on Sundays, which is a problem, because if you want to leave as early as possible and still get back in time for any after-school activities, then you would need to be there for 9 hours and 12 minutes (that is assuming the same travel time of 10.9 minutes and that the carpool line starts packing at 2:00, so arriving around 1:59). The goal that I would have is to attempt to help take care of at least like 30-40 animals by the end of the 9 hours and 12 minutes, thus freeing the staff to help newer animals get acclimated to the shelter. Works Cited: SPCA of Wake County. SPCA of Wake County, 2017. Web. 26 Mar. 2017. <https://www.aspca.org/animal-homelessness/shelter-intake-and-surrender/pet-statistics> Top 50 Pet Charities of 2014. Takeshi Young, 29 Dec. 2014. Web. 25 Mar. 2017. <http://www.entirelypets.com/top-pet-charities.html> . "12 alarming facts about pet homelessness." 12 alarming facts about pet homelessness. One green planet, 20 Feb. 2014. Web. 17 Mar. 2017.<http://www.onegreenplanet.org/animalsandnature/12-alarming-facts-about-pet-homelessness/> The pictures above can be found here.
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