8 Reasons to Adopt a Dog
Choose Dog Adoption
The decision to add a dog to your family should not come lightly. Getting a dog is a big responsibility after all. But once you are sure you can handle it, adopting a dog is the way to go for multiple reasons.
1. You’ll Save a Life
If more people chose to adopt a dog, the number of euthanized animals would decrease dramatically. Currently, between three and four million dogs and cats are euthanized annually in the United States.
2. Wide Variety of Choices
You can go to a breeder and choose amongst a select few puppies of the same breed — or you can visit your local animal shelter and choose from possibly hundreds of puppies and adult dogs. One reason so many dogs end up in shelters is because people make uninformed decisions on what breed to get and end up needing to give the dog away. Visit your local animal shelter to adopt a dog that captures your heart rather than choosing a breed because it’s cute.
3. Basic Healthcare Provided
It’s true that not all dogs that come into shelters are healthy. However once a dog is brought in, the shelter will do all it can to nurse a sick dog back to health, or provide preventive care to dogs coming in. This includes vaccinations, as well as spay and neuter operations if applicable.
4. Adopting Saves Money
It is significantly cheaper to adopt a dog rather than one from a breeder or a pet store. And the cost often includes vaccinations and spaying or neutering!
5. It's a Gift that Keeps on Giving
When you do pay an adoption fee through your animal shelter, that money isn’t adding to a pet stores personal profits — it is going towards the care of the remaining animals at the shelter.
6. You Won’t Be Supporting Puppy Mills
When you choose to adopt a dog rather than buy one from a pet store you say no to puppy mills. Unsuspecting consumers often don’t realize that the adorable doggy in the window at a pet store more likely than not came from appalling conditions and has not received proper medical care or socialization. The more people who adopt over buying from puppy mills means we are one step closer to making puppy mills obsolete.
7. You Can Pick a Housebroken Dog
If the act of training a puppy is too much for you, adopting a dog leaves you with the option to choose an older or already housetrained dog.
8. Rescue Dog Bond
Many dogs left in shelters come from poor home environments or have suffered after being uprooted from what they thought was a happy home environment. Just think of the bond you and your adopted dog will have once you provide it with the loving home it has been missing.
