Don’t surrender a pet until you see what help is available

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Surrendering a pet has less to do with the pandemic than you might think.

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Anyone struggling should know that animal agencies in Toronto are working overtime with programs and resources to keep pets and people together.

Call it a welcome sea change in the shelter mandate.

Toronto Humane Society (THS) CEO Phil Nichols said people have the same issues they had before COVID-19, so while there will always be animals which must be surrendered, the numbers are actually lower than they were pre-pandemic.

“Certainly, people are struggling with inflation and the cost of pet care, but that’s not drastically different from what we saw before,” Nichols said Tuesday.

And now, policies have shifted, “toward proactively working to keep people with their pets,” he said.

“In Canada, we started looking toward keeping you with your animal.”

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Keeping the human-animal bond intact involves programs, resources and guidance; for example, in 2021, the THS started a public clinic program offering accessible and affordable vet care.

“It runs five or six days a week, 48 weeks a year, with a focus on basic services such as spay/neuter, annual vaccines, micro-chips, heart worm/flea/tick medications. It’s basic care that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg.”

Some 10,000 pets came through the THS public clinics last year.

Then there are programs such as Urgent Care, which offers short-term boarding for pets whose humans face a crisis, such as hospitalization or temporary homelessness.

“The goal is to reunite the animal and their person.”

At Toronto Animal Services (TAS), Sue Shearstone, manager of shelter operations, emphasized the same proactive approach to keeping pets and people together.

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Of course, both the THS and TAS still take in animals, and are there 100% for those who must surrender a pet.

“But keeping animals out of shelters has been the trend for the last few years,” added Shearstone.

During the pandemic, TAS assisted pet-owners struggling financially with the help of PetSmart charities and the Scheinberg Relief Fund.

TAS Pop-up pet food banks are back this summer, thanks to an initiative with Petzlove Pet Food, and the mobile Chip Truck, providing low-cost microchips, rabies vaccines and pet licensing, will be out every month.

The one area where TAS has seen pandemic fall-out is with larger dogs that need training.

“We are getting dogs, two to four years old, medium and large, and not well-trained, and showing signs of anxiety.”

The owners often can’t handle the dog, but learn to do so with help from TAS.

For those who do surrender, TAS has an important new foster program involving the community.

“It can be short-term, to take a dog for a weekend, or just for a walk in the park,” said Shearstone, who explained this helps socialize the dogs.

It’s a program that also allows prospective pet owners to foster an animal to see if it might be a good fit for their family.