According to Emily Kerylow, director of operations at Monadnock Humane Society in Swanzey, “The year of 2020 was unprecedented.”

She said “adoptions were through the roof,” and in addition to adopting pets, more people were fostering. 

“The bright side for us is we were able to find homes for animals pretty quick in 2020,” Kerylow said, “We are now seeing the pendulum swing the other way.”

Although they have not seen a large increase in people who got puppies in 2020 surrendering their dogs, which is happening in other parts of the country, Monadnock Humane Society is basically at capacity for dogs right now. 

Kerylow has observed that in the last year, it is taking longer for animals to be adopted, and when they are full, they are not able to take in as many transfer dogs from overwhelmed shelters in other states.

“In 2022, we had 637 animals surrendered; 126, or 19 percent, were due to housing-related issues.” said Kerylow.

The society also runs an Animal Safety Net (ASN) program, providing free medical care and boarding for the pets of people who temporarily cannot care for them due to domestic violence, homelessness, a natural disaster, hospitalization or entering a treatment program.”

Once people are in a safe, stable situation, they can reclaim their pets. Kerylow said 77 percent of people using the program in 2022 were unable to care for their pets due to housing emergencies or homelessness.

“The whole goal is to reunite animals with owners,” she said.

The program is in high demand, and the society has fewer fosters than it did in 2020. People are struggling to find housing where they can live with their pets, so their timelines are more uncertain.

“We try to make it work as best as we can,” Kerylow said, and when they have had to send a plea out to the community looking for fosters, they have had a strong response. 

Sanctuary in Sharon

Sarah Smith has been involved in animal rescues since she was 18 and has worked as an animal cruelty investigator for PETA. She said the situation in shelters now, particularly in the South, is worse than ever.

Smith and her husband Colby moved from Dallas to Sharon in May of 2022. They brought four dogs and a couple of rescue fish, and in September they founded a nonprofit shelter and animal sanctuary, Tig’s Journey Animal Rescue and Sanctuary. 

“[Nationally] animal shelters are definitely overwhelmed,” Smith said.

Smith works with shelters in New York and Texas, and they’re always at full capacity. She currently has 14 dogs in the house, and most of them are elderly or have medical issues that can be expensive to deal with. They are dogs that most likely would have been euthanized if the Smiths hadn’t rescued them. 

Smith will adopt out some of her dogs, while others will continue to live at the sanctuary for the rest of their lives. She said it’s on a case-by-case basis, but for some dogs, it’s too traumatizing to be sent to another new home. She has a senior dog, Maisy, who Smith said outlived one of her owners and then her other owner became unable to care for her.

Smith said Maisy didn’t eat for a week when she first moved in, and she wouldn’t want to put the dog through another traumatic transition, so she will live the rest of her life at the animal sanctuary.

“There are shelters euthanizing 30 to 50 dogs a day,” said Smith, adding that some dogs are only getting three to five days to get adopted before being put down, even dogs that are young and healthy. She emphasized that these “open admission shelters” are important. They will take in every dog, but post-pandemic, many more dogs are being surrendered and the shelters just don’t have enough space.

Smith explained that many dogs who were purchased from breeders or adopted during the pandemic are now being surrendered. People returning to work realize they don’t have the time for a dog and the housing crisis is leaving people desperate, often with no pet-friendly affordable housing options. Also, breeders who were in high demand during the pandemic are now having difficulty selling all their dogs. Some of these puppies end up in shelters, and Smith said she has seen many purebred dogs up for adoption.

On top of it all, people aren’t adopting or fostering dogs nearly as much as they were during the pandemic.

“It’s the worst we’ve ever seen,” Smith said, “There’s no end in sight. I’m so grateful for folks in the Northeast. Folks here are not seeing the desperation.”

She explained that there’s more education about owning a dog, from neutering and spaying to vaccinating to strong state laws, and Northern states aren’t experiencing the same crisis as Southern shelters. 

More information about the Monadnock Humane Society’s Animal Safety Net can be found at monadnockhumanesociety.org/animal-safety-net.

 The website for Tig’s Journey Animal Rescue and Sanctuary is tigjars.org.

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