Two leashes per hand, RaeAnn Stewart makes a loop around her Norwood neighborhood each day, in rain, snow or below-freezing temperatures, with her four furry friends who all came from shelters.
“I’m officially banned from animal shelters by my fiance because I’ll end up bringing another one home,” said Stewart, 21. “I just always want to save them and take care of them. I have a very soft heart when it comes to animals.”
Local shelters will need plenty more giving spirits like Stewart in the coming months, as the weather warms up and dogs and cats start multiplying.
“We’re already full right now,” said Cheryl Byers, manager of the Humane Society of the Ohio Valley, on Mount Tom Road outside Marietta. “We probably have 120 animals right now.”
Likely to be complicating the overcrowding issue this spring will be a growing number of pet owners impacted by the economy. They may be moving out of a home after a foreclosure or simply not able to keep another mouth to feed.
“We haven’t had people come right out and say that they’re bringing a pet in because of a foreclosure, but we are getting many, many people who say they are moving into apartments and can’t take their pets,” Byers said. “We hear that all the time — every week.”
It’s the same story all across the state.
At the Animal Resource Center in Dayton, Director Mark Kumpf reports getting a few pets each week due to foreclosures or evictions, compared to about one a month last year.
Elsewhere in southwest Ohio, the Darke County Animal Shelter in Greenville is getting three to four animals a month exclusively due to housing issues, according to The Associated Press.
Locally, there have also been a larger-than-normal amount of puppy litters this winter, said Byers.
“Usually it starts to get busy early in the spring, but for some reason this winter the puppy season never ended,” she said. “We’ve had puppies all winter.”
As the number of puppies and kittens begins to grow even more this spring, the shelter will be in need of more volunteers, said Byers.
“When we have large amounts of litters, we really need families to foster them until they’re weaned from the mother,” she said. “It makes a far better, more soothing environment for the mother, and it’s healthier for the puppies.”
It usually takes about six weeks before the young animals can be on their own.
Other than lining up foster families and volunteers, there’s not much the humane society workers can do to get ready for their busy season, said Byers.
“There’s really no way to prepare,” she said. “You just have to try to take it in stride.”
