Animal shelter adoptions rise
Saugerties Animal Shelter has adopted out 19 dogs and 65 cats from May to June 15.
Among the few positive side effects of shutdowns due to COVID-19 has been a bit of puppy love resulting in a high rate of adoptions from the Saugerties Animal Shelter over the past two months.
The facility on state Route 212 has found homes for 21 dogs and puppies in less than six months, surpassing the number for all of last year, said shelter manager Elly Monfett during a telephone interview Monday.
“Because everybody’s home because of COVID, that’s the best time to train a new puppy or a new kitten,” she said.
“They want a buddy at home,” Monfett said. “Most people were thinking about it anyway, so this was the perfect time to do it.”
The shelter adopted out six dogs and 30 cats between January and April, then saw the figures jump to 19 dogs and 65 cats adopted from the beginning of May to June 15.
The adoptions were important because there were also more animals coming into the shelter, as supporters sought to take the burden off of areas where COVID-19 patients were forced to give up their pets.
“There were 29 kittens from a shelter in Louisiana,” said Adele Zinderman,
president of Saugerties Animal Welfare Fund. “It was a shelter we knew and totally trusted and they came up with a clean bill of health.”
Shelter officials noted that because spay and neutering programs have been successful in the region, there hasn’t been an abundance of young animals to choose from until the pandemic.
“There were 25 puppies (from Louisiana) so far and 11 are on their way,” Zinderman said.
Zinderman noted that all the animals were put into a two-week quarantine before they were made available for adoption.
“They are taken from a shelter by a rescue group, then they go to a foster home for two weeks,” she said. “They have a total clean bill of health and vaccines. So by the time they come up here they are good to go and be adopted the next day.”
Supporters note that the fees for adoptions are $300 for puppies, $195 for adult dogs, $140 for kittens, and $85 for adult cats.
However, they noted that the fees do not keep up with expenses and the downside of the pandemic has been a reduction in weekly donations to the shelter from about $2,000 to $500.
“We’ve had to cancel all our (in-person) fundraisers,” Zinderman said. “Our (fundraisers) are virtual and we’ve had some success with that. Virtual raffles, virtual voting is how we are raising money.”