Kansas City Animal Shelters

According to the ASPCA (the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals), there are about 13.600 community animal shelters all over the United States. Since June is Adopt a Shelter Cat Month I want to share a few statistics about animal shelters and highlight some Kansas City area shelters.

• Approximately 7.6 million companion animals enter animal shelters nationwide every year, 3.9 million are dogs and 3.4 million are cats
• Each year, approximately 2.7 million animals are euthanized (1.2 million dogs and 1.4 million cats)
• Of the dogs entering shelters, approximately 35% are adopted, 31% are euthanized and 26% of dogs who came in as strays are returned to their owner
• Of the cats entering shelters, approximately 37% are adopted, 41% are euthanized and less than 5% of cats who came in as strays are returned to their owner

With 37-47% of all households in the United States owning a dog, and 30-37% owning a cat there is no reason why we cannot rescue some of these animals! As a proud parent of a shelter dog I strongly believe that shelter animals deserve to get adopted just as much as an animal from a pet store. 

A few local Kansas City Animal Shelters include:

Wayside Waifs - Kansas City's largest no-kill animal shelter established in 1944

The Humane Society of Greater Kansas City - Kansas City's oldest humane society and has been a no-kill shelter since 1994

KC Pet Project - Has 3 different locations around the Kansas City area, creating a no-kill community in Kansas City

Unleashed Pet Rescue -  Works to pull animals from high kill shelters and rescue "unwanted" pets.