In 1996, The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) launched National Animal Shelter Appreciation Week (based on an idea from the Capital Humane Society in Lincoln, Nebraska).
This campaign was designed to acknowledge and promote the invaluable role that animal shelters play in our communities, and to increase public awareness of animal welfare issues and shelter services.
During National Animal Shelter Appreciation Week, the first full week of every November, The HSUS promotes and celebrates animal shelters across the country through media and public outreach.
And right now, our animal shelters can use all the help and appreciation that they can get – they are now sadly overflowing with unwanted, dumped, and foreclosed pets.
If you can’t adopt a new pet right now to ease their burden, please consider either donating some food or supplies to your local animal shelter (they all have ‘Wish Lists’), or volunteering some of your time, to help them out. They are all woefully underfunded, and understaffed, and yet, most of them do a pretty good job of caring for animals that we as a society, continue to discard.
Your local animal shelter not only cares for displaced animals and adopts them into loving new homes; many of them also investigate animal cruelty and neglect, reunite lost pets with their families, teach our children to care about animals, and often provide low cost spay/neuter services to those in need.
The ‘Shelters Rock’ Logo shown above was created by Patrick McDonnell, beloved not only for his comic strip MUTTS and his many beautifully illustrated books, but also for his fervent support of critters, pet adoption, and animal shelters.
What would your own community do without your local animal shelter?
Please show some support to your local shelter, in some way, this National Animal Shelter Appreciation Week.
EDvard